Filmmaker, charity promote Love Your Body cause

Media Release

Filmmaker and charity team up to promote the Love Your Body cause

Nibbles, networking and No Numbers

September 10 2009

“How am I supposed to get better when everything around me tells me I’m not thin enough?” That’s a quote from one woman at the centre of compelling eating-disorder recovery documentary No Numbers: Identity Beyond Measure by Canadian filmmakers Sonja Ruebsaat and Dena Ashbaugh.

Filmmaker Dena Ashbaugh is flying in especially for a one-off screening of No Numbers at The Academy Cinema on Thursday October 15. Join EDEN MC, radio host JayJay Feeney, Amanda Billing (Shortland Sreet’s much-loved Dr Sarah Potts) and other EDEN supporters for networking and nibbles from 5.30pm, before a 6.15pm film screening. The ticket price of $30 includes snacks, door prizes and guest speakers (a cash bar is available).

Remember you’ll nab a chocolate fish if you wear your Thundies to the screening – and yes, we’ll take your word for it. Dena Ashbaugh will host a Q&A session after the screening.

No Numbers tells the stories of people who are moving past the definitions and practices of disordered eating and eating disorders to find their own voices. It also explores how beauty is portrayed in popular culture and how this can misconstrue the meaning of health. This film will appeal to many as a one-off professional development opportunity for people who work in the sector, to those whose lives have been touched by disordered eating and to anybody interested in thinking about exploring identity with¬out measures.

On its third birthday, EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign is rapidly growing in support and recognition nationwide. “New Zealanders agree that it’s unacceptable that 80 per cent of New Zealand women are dissatisfied with their bodies, and that up to one in five struggle with disordered eating,” says EDEN Agency Manager Dr Maree Burns.

“In a society which idealises thinness, EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign is a rare opportunity to celebrate and appreciate our bodies as they are, and to acknowledge the beauty of all body shapes and sizes. Body satisfaction and appreciation are key ingredients for building positive body image and self esteem, which in turn help guard against the development of eating difficulties,” says Burns.

Every dollar raised from EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign , through the sale of underwear and donations, will go towards the charity’s early-intervention and prevention services for disordered eating. EDEN (the Eating Difficulties Education Network) is the only specialist NGO provider offering these serv¬ices in the North Island and (as the government allocates no funding to early intervention or prevention) it receives no public funding for this work. As well as providing information, services and resources to individuals and organisations, EDEN works at a wider social level to promote body trust and satisfaction and size diversity. The agency has been in operation since 1990.

For more information about EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign go to www.eden.org.nz.

*Please refer to this campaign always as “EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign”.

EDEN’s Love Your Body Campaign 2009

www.eden.org.nz

ENDS

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