Think Pieces

Is Overeating the Female Problem Nobody Talks About?

Compulsive overeating, not the Thanksgiving kind.
Compulsive overeating, not the Thanksgiving kind. Photo: Zachary Zavislak

In The Wall Street Journal, Caitlin Moran files an eye-opening essay about unhappy overeating, mostly on the part of women, which she calls the “most pointlessly secret of miseries.” Behavior like “breathlessly eating slice after slice of bread and butter” is an addiction like any other, only “you can still make the packed lunches, do the school run, look after the baby, stop in on your parents and then stay up all night with an ill 5-year-old — something that is not an option if you’re regularly climbing into the cupboard under the stairs and knocking back quarts of scotch … And that is why it’s so often a woman’s addiction of choice.” [WSJ]

Is Overeating the Female Problem Nobody Talks About?