Leaving Large

The Stories of a Food Addict

Non-Fiction - Inspirational
190 Pages
Reviewed on 08/11/2022
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Author Biography

Michelle Petties is an author, speaker, Food Story Coach, and recovering food addict. Her first book, Leaving Large: The Stories of a Food Addict, features powerful stories that chronicle a lifetime of eating for all the wrong reasons. After gaining and losing 700 plus pounds over four decades, Michelle finally discovered the secret to ending the battle between her mind, body, and hunger -- her Food Stories. By unlocking her own unique Food Stories, Michelle debunked long-held misconceptions and misconnections about the purpose of eating. Leaving Large won the Memoir Magazine 2022 Book Award for Inspiration. Armed with these insights, Michelle now shows others how to find their own food truths. A veteran, public media professional, Michelle lives in Annapolis, Maryland.

    Book Review

Reviewed by Astrid Iustulin for Readers' Favorite

When Michelle Petties started writing about her experience with food, she had thought of a cookbook, but when she finished writing Leaving Large: The Stories of a Food Addict, she revealed a different story. More specifically, she tells many stories - 22 in all - that she appropriately calls Food Stories. In each of them, Petties discloses events in her life, accompanied by reflections and lessons learned along the way. They marked her path to overcoming the morbid obesity that haunted her for 42 years. As Petties herself says, she wrote these stories for herself, but she published them for each of us to make us all more aware of why we eat.

Leaving Large: The Stories of a Food Addict is a book that deals with a hot topic - obesity. Petties shows us how she changed the way she manages food and does so in a delicious way. However, she does more than reveal the negative consequences of eating for the wrong reasons. The value of this book is that it explains why the problem is related to the Food Stories we tell ourselves and the memories and emotions we associate with food. This is a great discovery and lesson, and I am grateful to Michelle Petties for sharing it with us. I recommend this book to all people dissatisfied with their physical appearance and who find it impossible to reach their ideal weight. This book will help them change their perspective and hopefully solve their problem as Petties did.