Kathryn Lean, who relies on tube-feeding for her nutrition, explores the appropriation of feeding tubes by the “medical spa” industry as a method for rapid weight loss.
Last week, a casual scroll through Instagram saw me alerted to a business called Royalty Holistic MedSpa, run by an American beauty queen, advertising a tube-fed diet as a “fast and healthy weight loss” solution.
“This little tube is part of a system called The Dream Body System,” says Rachael Lynee, Miss Texas International 2014, as she points to her nasogastric tube in a video posted to both TikTok and Instagram. “It is a tiny paediatric feeding tube that is going to feed me a perfect balance of nutrition for the next 10 days… I will be fed 24/7 for the next 10 days. It puts my body into a deep state of ketosis so I’m losing 1-2 pounds of fat per day.”
Watch: Body shapes are not trends. Post continues after video.
To hear these words while attached to my own feeding tube, in an attempt to keep weight on, was gutting. I clicked on the comments and witnessed the hurt felt by others in the feeding-tube community. Responses of disbelief, outrage and disgust.
The reasons people have feeding tubes vary widely. My own need for one is due to having gastroparesis and oesophageal dysmotility, conditions which make it extremely hard for me to nourish and hydrate my body through food and drinking alone. Never have I heard of a feeding tube being used for the total opposite reason: to starve a body.
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