Take control: heal your relationship with food: holistic beauty expert and health advocate Kat James offers new strategies for vibrant living. .

Chances are, you or someone close to you struggles with food cravings, weight issues or even a full-fledged eating disorder. While well over half the country is overweight or obese, an estimated 7 million females and 1 million males suffer from some kind of eating disorder, according to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders. The good news is that there are practical ways to overcome these challenges.

Success Stories?

Whether it's you or a loved one who deals with such food and body-image issues, pervasive billboards and Hollywood ideals often contribute to feelings of physical inadequacy. Mothers and teachers can unwittingly project their own body-image values on girls from a tender age without saying a word. A father's view of what makes an ideal woman can also have a devastating impact on a daughter's self-worth. Even our inner circle of friends can influence us if they pay attention only to superficial physical attributes.

But body images fostered by the entertainment industry aren't exactly grounded in reality. After working behind the scenes on ad campaigns for some of the top-selling weight-loss products and magazines, I learned that many of the success stories and celebrities you see promoting diets and diet products continue to face constant struggles with food, even as they pose in their new size 6 jeans. Some women, who never had addictions to food in the first place, can drop tons of weight gained during pregnancy or periods of inactivity. Others rely on constant will-power and strict workouts, battling cravings one day at a time. In reality, few women have truly conquered food obsession. Why? Because they don't receive guidance from conventional medicine regarding biochemical issues.

Chemistry Counts

Food and body-image struggles often arise from changes in the body, and it is normal, if not instinctive, to react aggressively when you see such changes reflected in the mirror. For example, you might start out with a healthy body image, then--as a result of a hormonal change or neurochemical imbalance--begin to pile on weight and become obsessed with dieting. Or, you could start out with an emotional need for food, but then develop blood sugar swings from eating foods that are so addictive that even psychological breakthroughs no longer have a chance to interrupt the cycle of binging, as was the case with me. I discovered, after reading books I found in a health food store, that there were matters of chemistry that not only kept me addicted to food, but also kept me fat and, therefore, obsessed with my weight. If I'd only known how factors such as thyroid imbalances, serotonin or DHEA deficiencies, too much estrogen, sleep disturbances, elevated cortisol and compromised human growth hormone release can contribute to weight gain, I might not have been so obsessed with my weight all those years. A naturopathic or complementary physician can help you look into these issues, but here are a few general ideas about the types of biochemical problems that can lead to eating disorders.

Low serotonin. Low levels of the ...