Panhel president pens book on women's nutrition

Panhellenic Council President Janelle Brodsky helps Penn women come to terms with food and body image. Women of Penn: Put down your NutraSlim shake and pick up the double fudge ice cream. College and Engineering senior Janelle Brodsky has written a 100-page guide to loving your body and leaving behind the food neuroses that plague a high percentage of American women. Brodsky wrote Things We Wish We Knew: Empowering College Women About Our Bodies and Food this summer, and with funding from the Office of the Vice Provost for University Life and Charlotte, N.C.-based First Union Bank, she has distributed over 400 copies around campus. "This is just research I did for myself that I wanted to share with people," Brodsky said. Things We Wish We Knew emerged from Brodsky's personal search for information about nutrition, exercise and dieting. Initially intending to create a pamphlet, her project ballooned into 10 chapters. The book emphasizes that in order to eat responsibly, women must understand how their bodies use food. "The reality is we enjoy food but we hate eating because it's such an upsetting experience," Brodsky explained. The key, she writes, is to eat the food we need and the food we want in moderation. So go ahead and have double fudge ice cream, but only eat one bowlful, and balance dessert with nutritionally sound meals. Things We Wish We Knew has received rave reviews from its target audience -- the women of Penn. Brodsky is bombarded daily with e-mails from students thanking her for writing "bluntly and honestly." University President Judith Rodin, who penned the foreword to the book, praised Brodsky for addressing "a sensitive topic with perhaps its most important and vulnerable audience." Brodsky saw college women as important targets for this information because society, she said, has put enormous pressure on young women to conform to an unattainable standard of beauty. "We are surrounded by images that make the average woman feel horrible about herself," she said. This extreme body-consciousness leads directly to eating disorders, weight obsessions and adherence to "fad diets" that are not always medically safe. "We read all this stuff in Cosmo and take it as fact," Brodsky pointed out. Brodsky's writing is straight forward like a sister-to-sister talk. And she avoids preaching. Personalizing her subject matter with anecdotes, she also makes references to life at Penn. College junior and Alpha Phi sister Jill Kleczko found the book easy to read and said it reinforced her ideas about nutrition. "I think it would be great if they could distribute it to more students," Kleczko said. Kleczko received a copy of Things We Wish We Knew when Brodsky, who is president of the Panhellenic Council, began distributing the book to sorority houses. Brodsky has also placed copies in lounges and hangout spots around campus. She has also applied for a grant from the Trustees Council of Penn Women in order to secure the additional $7,500 needed to print a copy for every incoming freshman female next year. In the meantime, Brodsky has sent the book to 10 publishing firms. The book is currently bound in plastic rings by Campus Copy Center. Writing Things We Wish We Knew was as therapeutic for Brodsky as it is for her readers. "I learned to be happy with who I was because I finally found out what works for me and came to terms with the fact that I am going to weigh 140 to 150 pounds no matter what I do," she said. Brodsky usually works out four times a week and tries to eat a balanced diet. Interested students can receive a free copy of Things We Wish We Knew by e-mailing Brodsky at janelle@sas.upenn.edu.

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