Grande\u2019s decision to see out her tour and then take a breather from the limelight has kicked off a frenzy of speculation about Grande\u2019s body, about whether she has an eating disorder, and about whether we should even be talking about it if she does<\/a>. As Grande herself said when she addressed fans at a recent concert about her decision: A few things can be true at once. Like that she has been touring and promoting Wicked and performing her albums for years. She has also dealt with the dissolution of her marriage, the end of the relationship that followed, the death of her ex-boyfriend Mac Miller, the breakup of another engagement, and a terrorist attack that killed 22 of her fans in Manchester, all within the last decade. The girl has taken a beating, and deserves a break. And while no one truly knows what\u2019s going on with Grande\u2019s health except her, and her doctors, looking at her, it isn\u2019t that hard to guess.<\/p>\n Between the therapeutic mindset that insists we accept ourselves as we are, and the supersonic boom of weight loss drugs that allow us to whittle our proportions down to whatever we want, it\u2019s easy to assume that eating disorders are a thing of the past. But anorexia, and the whole constellation of eating disorders around it, is an ancient scourge that we\u2019ll be living with as long as there are young women. And it isn\u2019t actually about looking good in clothes, or even necessarily losing weight\u2014instead it\u2019s about imposing order, and having rigid, punishing standards for oneself. It can be a twisted-up form of perfectionism, or in some cases, a misguided attempt to avoid growing up. It also isn\u2019t about being heroin chic, or any one fashion trend or any one influencer. Hadley Freeman, who chronicled her own yearslong experience with severe anorexia in her book Good Girls<\/a>, wrote in The Free Press<\/a>: \u201cI hadn\u2019t even heard of Kate Moss.\u201d<\/p>\n Besides, fame, as we learned in Lena Dunham\u2019s new memoir<\/a>, can make you sick.<\/p>\n I think Grande is indeed suffering, but I don\u2019t think that she will suffer the same terrible fate as the women who wasted away in front of our eyes, like Whitney Houston, or Amy Winehouse, or, most famously, Karen Carpenter. I think that when she\u2019s good and ready, she will come back with a vengeance.<\/p>\n Watch Dan and I talk about Grande, and a few more stories that caught our eye recently:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n We are in an era of coaches for every aspect of life, whether for your fitness, diet, or career. Now, there\u2019s a new crop of coaches for your marriage, specifically for the \u201crecovering man-child,\u201d as one coach puts it<\/a>, who needs to be taught how to pick up after himself and pitch in around the house. Fellas: The laundry isn\u2019t going to fold itself.<\/p>\n There\u2019s an editor named Whitney Frick<\/a> and she\u2019s behind the most talked-about authors of the last few years: Belle Burden, Amy Griffin, Glennon Doyle. They\u2019re memoirists, all women, all who went through some life-altering drama that they let their readers in on, which in turn took over the zeitgeist. Everyone has something to say about what they\u2019ve written, even if it\u2019s not very nice.<\/p>\n Charles Manson always seems to be having a moment. His granddaughter came out with a documentary about growing up in the shadow of his crimes<\/a>, and another Manson documentary, featuring recordings of conversations with him in prison, is coming out this week. Nearly 60 years later, we\u2019re still obsessed with how one failed musician became the face of American evil\u2014and convinced otherwise normal all-American teenagers to do his bidding.<\/p>\n Speaking of, I can\u2019t wait for when Annie Karni (The New York Times\u2019 congressional correspondent) signs up to write her memoir with Frick. She wrote this week about her divorce,<\/a> and how she received support in the unlikeliest of moments: before or after interviews with the subjects of her political reporting, including Chuck Schumer, Steve Bannon, and Nancy Mace. \u201cMen are so stupid,\u201d Schumer told her. \u201cJust so stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n I don\u2019t envy parents who have to raise kids in 2026. It\u2019s a minefield. But Liz Wolfe seems to have a good handle on it; she wrote about why she is bullish on chores<\/a>, including tasking her 3.5-year-old with making a chopped cucumber salad. And when in doubt on how to be a good mom or dad, always trust Abigail Shrier to give it to you straight<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/e7f30d6d-d1e9-4489-a2be-fd40d6dea622_3006.jpeg\")
<\/a>Ariana Grande performs her song \u201cPetal\u201d in a new music video. (\u00a9 2026 Babydoll Music, under exclusive license to Republic Records, a division of UMG Recordings, Inc.)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/3a851c91-f69a-42f8-aaa5-81545e7b3e67_1320.png\" "\\"\\"")
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