Intimate Enemies
by Jennifer Berger

I was born with asthma and food allergies so severe I would vomit certain foods as soon as I swallowed them. I couldn't eat anything with eggs in it—mayonnaise, most pastas, many breads, cakes, cookies, and so on—so I continued to be thinner than other teenage girls I knew. Ironically, I became the object of envy. Women tell me, "I sure with I had your problem." But what price would women pay for thinness? We're taught that fat is bad, thin is best, regardless of the sacrifice—that thin equals healthy.

Most people say they don't even think about breathing, which is a totally strange concept to me. I am constantly aware what my lungs are doing and what my breathing sounds like. My body talks to me. American culture teaches us to cover our ears when we hear our bodies talking to us. By silencing our bodies, we end up with health problems.

Jennifer Berger is now twenty-seven years old and an editor in San Francisco. She is also the executive director of About-Face, an organization that provides girls and women with tools for thinking critically about images of women in the media. She has not yet found a cure for her food allergies but is hot on the trail.