Eating disorder recovery is not a perfect art, but I am a long way into the process now. I have four years of what feels like solid progress to me. I still wobble from time to time, but I do not spiral. So let me tell you what that means.
Depending on which of the nine different eating disorders is the primary issue, we may have to eat more or less food, more or less frequently, or different food altogether. But as food is an essential survival tool, at the end of the day, we have to eat.
A story for those who are long-recovered or want to understand more about the origins of eating disorders. For family members of those suffering. For women who have ever been worried about their appearance and how they fit into society. The unpleasant sexual experiences almost universally experienced by women. And the ongoing impact of childhood emotional neglect by parents who hoped to do their best but severely lacked the skills to raise happy children.
Living with mental illness is a shit. Whether that illness comes from nature or nurture is neither here nor there. Through the course of the illness, you learn ways to manage distress and those ways are frequently unproductive. Often numbing.
Diet culture espouses thinness as a ticket to beauty and happiness. As someone who has lived in almost every sized body, I can assure you that my happiness was not impacted by a number on a scale. Something I need to remind myself of when I’m fighting the urge to skip breakfast.
I wrote a book. You’ve probably heard me banging on about it over the past few months. Years even. But now we’re at the pointy end of the process.
Today I bought new clothes. It might sound like a frivolous way to spend a Thursday afternoon, but for me, it was a big deal. It marks a line in the sand.
I follow a lot of eating disorder recovery accounts on Instagram and there’s much talk about diet culture. We live in a diet-cultured society. Before I express my highly uneducated opinion I want to clarify the confusing difference between diet, diet and diet.
I’ve gained weight. I would hazard a guess that most people don’t want to gain weight, but when you’re recovering from an eating disorder it’s especially hard. The eating disorder wasn’t entirely about weight, but it was a big part of it. For me at least. I have an intense fear of gaining weight and being overweight and now both have happened.
I invite you to look at my campaign, subscribe to it, share it, and if you would consider it – preordering a copy so I can get this message out into the world.
I’ve been recovering for six months now. Just over. And I guess the difference between actively seeking recovery and actually recovering is the associated behaviours. It may seem blindingly obvious, but changing eating disorder behaviours is really fucking hard. It’s taken me years of psychological therapies to put into practice the very things that make perfect, logical sense. But here I am – putting stuff into practice for six months now. More if you count my time in the clinic where I was forced to be healthy.
According to the authors, the first seven keys are about recovering ‘from’ and this key is about recovering ‘to’. The focus is on searching for the spiritual, soulful side of ourselves – which can sound like mumbo jumbo if you’re not willing to be open-minded. I’m applying my willingness to this key.
There is a very good book called 8 Keys to Recovery From an Eating Disorder by Carolyn Costin and Gwen Schubert Grabb. I have started the keys on numerous occasions in the past, but now I feel completely ready to tackle them all. There are multiple writing exercises within each key, so without giving away the entire contents of the book, over the course of eight weeks I want to share my recovery journey with you. The following is a composite of all my answers for this key.
There are a lot of behaviours associated with eating disorders – some cross between different types of disorders and some are stand-alone. If you don’t change behaviour you can’t recover.
Eating disorder behaviour isn’t about ignorance – we all know how to eat properly. Rather, it’s a coping mechanism that is extremely hard to let go of and the thought of not using ED behaviours is, quite frankly, terrifying. If I’m not numb, what will happen? But this girl had transformed from full-on eating disorder patient to completely recovered.
