Hunger Pains: The Modern Woman's Tragic Quest for Thinness

by Mary Pipher

We live in an appearance-obsessed culture. Fashion ads, magazine covers, TV shows, and movies idealize a body type that is impossible for most real women to achieve. In this comforting, liberating book, Dr. Mary Pipher, bestselling author of Reviving Ophelia, offers advice, counsel, and practical solutions for understanding our needs, our fears, and our many hungers. She shows us how we can at last learn to live at peace with the natural differences in our bodies and appetites. 

The rates of anorexia, bulimia, and depression for women are the highest they have ever been, and begin at ever younger ages. Dr. Pipher reveals how society encourages our misery and prevents us from accepting our looks. Indeed, for many women the humiliation of overweight or obesity is a wound that never heals. Dr. Pipher reminds us that accepting our bodies the way they are is the greatest gift we can give ourselves.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Feminism, Health, Mental Health, Food

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Mary Elizabeth Pipher, also known as Mary Bray Pipher, is an American clinical psychologist and author, most recently of Women Rowing North, a book on aging gracefully. Prior to that, she wrote The Green Boat, which was published by Riverhead Books in June 2013.

Reviews

[Em · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mary Pipher has such clarity and insight to her research and her writing. There were parts of this book were quite disturbing and difficult to get through because of the subject matter. That and a very hectic month is why it took so long to finish this, because let's face it I can and have read a book this slender in about 2 hours of uninterrupted reading. The part I found most enlightening was the last chapter having to do with changing our culture, the reasons why our culture has bought into lookism. Something she traces back to our fragmented and disconnected society. She says in past generations of small town life, you knew your neighbors, your cashier at the grocery store, your bank teller, knew their family, knew about them. But now we don't so the only way to recognize anything about the people we meet is entirely on appearances. And we also make judgments about people by appearance and thinks because of that, and especially knowing the type of judgments made based on appearance is why so many women have eating issues. Fascinating, and very likely true.

[Magali · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know what I was expecting but I clearly wasn't prepared for a 80's book to basically say everything we still have to fight to be able to talk about. Other than a few words that we don't use anymore in fat activism, the whole book could have been written today. 40 years later we still have the same issues and people still belive in diet, still hate fat people, still don't understand what healthy means. It's heartbreaking.

[Melinda Bush · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eye opening. Fresh perspective on how culture has affected the way we view our bodies, being "over weight" and obesity in America. I will never see weight the same way again (mine or others) and I will raise my children differently. Being more aware of our culture's prejudice against the over weight and better understanding eating disorders gives me more compassion and personal body awareness and where I use food in an unhealthy way as well.

[Jessi · Rating 3 out of 5]

So many timeless sentiments on how culture affects our self image as women, but also very dated entries on women's experiences. Since this was published in 1988, I'm not sure how to rate it, because 30 plus years ago this would be so spot on to me. I am sad to find that our society has only recently started talking about body acceptance in the main stream.

[Lesley Cheung · Rating 4 out of 5]

td;lr: ask if you're really hungry, or just tired, lonely, restless or tired? Also, who cares how you look? It's how you feel about yourself.

[Stephanie Chambers · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been reading a lot of body image books and this seems to be where they got some of their research. I really loved the stuff about how your body has a weight point where it always goes back to.

[Janille · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was recommended to me by a friend when I mentioned a niece of mine struggling with anorexia. The author is a practicing psychologist who mostly treats women and girls with some type of eating disorders. I thought it was a well done book, easy to read, especially useful for helping us have better attitudes about our bodies and about food. Pipher discredits the old school methods of calling people with eating disorders "weak" or "lazy," or placing blame on their families, and puts the responsibility for the upsurge in eating disorders over the last 20 years on our American culture (media, diets, fads, swimsuit editions, junk foods, etc.)

I think this is also a good read for parents, so we can learn how to speak about bodies and food in a way that help our children have healthy attitudes as they grow up.

[Ariadna73 · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is another book on the nonsenseness of dieting all the time. It is better to live life to the fullest, no matter what the scale says.

Uno de los muchí­simos libros que he leí­do sobre el sinsentido de hacer dietas y regí­menes para amoldarse a un ideal de belleza que solo aparece en las revistas, y que solo unas pocas pueden alcanzar porque nacieron genéticamente diseñadas para ello. La autora de este libro consigue su objetivo de describir la angustia de aquellas niñas que se sacrifican detrás de "nada", porque al final, aunque están flacas, se ven feas e infelices. La respuesta no es engordar hasta estallar, sino ser uno mismo, feliz en el mundo.

[Jeneah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this during and after my struggle with an eating disorder. Hunger Pains helped me to put into perspective what I was dealing with psychologically and emotionally. I recommend it to anyone because I am sure most of us can relate to either having/had or knowing someone with an eating disorder. I recommend this to parents, it will give you great insight into your children's phyche and it also provides a comprehensive list of symptoms you may not otherwise think about. Overall it is a great read.

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

In one of the high schools I used to teach in, a woman came in to do a workshop on eating disorders and she brought this book with her and I've referred back to it time and again when I have a student in need of it. Very powerful stuff.

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Also a bit dated, but interesting. The book seems to lack focus. I kept really wondering why she wrote the book, as it's not about treating eating disorders, body dysmorphia, obesity, raising children, changing society - although all of these are brought up.

[Colleenish · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love Piper. In this book she matter of factly talks about eating disorders and how to deal with them. Some of her information seemed very out of date, which isn't a surprise because this book is not new. It was an easy, thoughtful read.

[Lesley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent tutorial for those of us who work on a daily basis in the trenches with young adults. It elicits very helpful suggestions in dealings with middle and high school students facing conflicts with weight and body issues.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

All teens girls should have to read this book.

[brie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary Pipher is an excellent author for those seeking understanding regarding emotional issues that effect women and girls. This book was no exception, and I highly recommend it.

[Meg · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pipher is great at exposing serious, depressing problems but providing little practical advice about solving or dealing with them.

[Laura Blabac · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read for anyone dealing with eating disorders, or raising girls today.

[Gayle (OutsmartYourShelf) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book but obviously dated now as written almost 20 years ago. Good introduction but there has been a lot of development in this academic field since this was written. Rating: 3 stars.

[Valentina González · Rating 5 out of 5]

Esta muy bien desarrollado, ameno y tiene pautas a seguir

[Renee Boundy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Mary Pipher usually. This book lacked depth, though.