"I got my life and myself back"
How I did it: It took years before I even understood I had an eating disorder and even longer to get to the point of getting serious about recovering. Perhaps what makes anorexia so complicated and difficult to overcome is the fact that often the patient doesn't want to recover and doesn't fully understand, if at all, that she or he has a problem. For the longest time I wished to feel better but didn't have the courage to let go of the familiar and jump into the unknown. As painful as it was to suffer from day to day, an eating disorder gave me an illusion of control when there was none in other areas of my life. But there comes a time the pain gets so bad, so unbearable, that you've two options: either stop living or do what you are most afraid of. I decided to face my fears.
While definitely one of the most difficult and painful things I've ever done, beating my eating disorder is also perhaps something I can be most proud of. To be able to make a firm decision to recover no matter how much anxiety it might bring when you're in the middle of something that feels like a never-ending nightmare without a possibility to get out of and yet succeed at sticking to your decision, I guess you've the right to believe you can succeed at anything.
I'm still work in process but probably healthier than I've been in ten years or longer. I nowadays think of anorexia being a lot like alcoholism - I doubt I'll ever be able to drink "just one glass" without being at a risk of relapsing. Even though I'd say I'm very near being completely healthy, I wouldn't dare to start counting calories again for example. It is simply not worth the risk.
I'm not sure how much of help this entry is for others. I can only know what anorexia was for me, so perhaps others have had different kind of experiences. I had so much more to say than what I wrote but I tried to choose what I feel would have been most important for myself to hear when I was ill. I found back then it was really difficult to find instructions that would have actually been helpful and not just something vague written by people who had never had eating disorders themselves. There are things that might be almost impossible to understand if you've never experienced them yourself, and I think anorexia is one of them.
I wish you luck.
--
"It became so unbearable that suddenly the thought occurred to me, ‘I cannot live with myself any longer.’ That thought was the trigger for a transformation. The thought kept repeating itself many times in my head and then suddenly there was a stepping back from the thought and a looking at the thought. I asked, ‘Who is the ‘I’ and who is the ‘self’ that ‘I’ cannot live with? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the ‘I’ and the ‘self’ that ‘I’ cannot live with.’ ‘Maybe,’ I thought, ‘only one of them is real.’”
-- Eckhart Tolle
Lessons & tips:
- Avoid everything eating disorder related: websites and forums discussing eating disorders; documentaries, books and movies about them; even other people with eating disorders. While an accountability partner might seem like a good idea and a great source of support, I personally found it to be of no help. Quite on the contrary actually, I didn't make any real progress until I finally made the hard decision to cut ties with people who had eating disorders themselves. One of the symtoms of anorexia is not wanting to recover and/or not feeling mentally ill at all, so even though people might say they're trying to get better, even a well-meaning support group can easily turn into a silent competition of who eats the least and thus "succeeds" in being "the best anorexic". If you've found someone to support you with the recovery and find it helpful, that's simply awesome! But my advice would still be to not particularly search support from people who are still sick themselves. It might work for some people of course but it certainly didn't work for me.
- Consequently, surround yourself with healthy people who have a relaxed relationship with food and weight. If you spend most of your time with people who, like you, have trouble eating, your habits and way of thinking might start to seem acceptable and "normal" - after all, everyone else around you is stressing about the same things as well. So instead of letting your eating disorder seem like the norm, spend most of your time in a company in which your habits are seen as unnormal. I personally found this to be perhaps the single most important step I took when I decided to recover. Before that I had spend so much time with people who had eating disorders themselves that I had lost the picture of what was healthy and normal. If I had continued spending time with them, I highly doubt I'd be recovered now. Perhaps I wouldn't even be alive.
- It is very likely that your eating disorder is just a symptom of other problems you've in your life. You perhaps came, in the past, to a point your old coping mechanisms simply weren't enough anymore to handle everything you had on your plate at the time, leaving you with no other option but to turn to not-too-healthy defense mechanisms to survive. Someone else might have turned to alcohol or drugs in your situation, you developed an eating disorder. Perhaps it was to (seemigly) regain some control over your life which seemed chaotic and out of control at the time, or to avoid thinking your real problems, or something else. If these problems are still present in your life, you have to face them and cope with them now. If you don't develop healthier coping mechanisms, you most likely beat your anorexia just to develop something similarly unhealthy afterwards. It's not really a step forwards to switch from being an anorexic to being a drug addict.
- If you've thoughts like "I don't deserve food" and don't seem to be able to get past them, try thinking your body as something that is separate from you. You're you, and that body you see is your house, not your identity. Why on earth would you want to break down the place you live in? Even if you didn't believe that you deserve better, perhaps you agree that it doesn't make any sense to ruin your home. You might be able to move into another house in your next life if you believe in reincarnation, but at least in this life you're stuck with this one house so you better keep it in good condition!
Another option could be to think of your body as your best friend with whom you're going through this journey called life. Why would you want your best friend, who has never done anything to intentionally hurt you and who has always tried its very best to help you out in every situation, to suffer? Even if you believed you deserve nothing but suffering, why drag down others who don't deserve it? Of course, you too, and first and foremost you, deserve food. You deserve all the happiness, joy, enjoyment, inner peace, love, care and everything good in the world. But at times, when you find that hard to see, remembering you aren't your body might be helpful. I know it helped me tremendously.
- To really kick your eating disorder's ass, try playing a little game and do the opposite of what your ED would want you to do. When I for example felt like I had to go jogging (or otherwise I'd become fat overnight), I went to my bed to read a novel instead. Felt like skipping dinner? Nope, didn't do that, but ate twice as much as I normally did AND enjoyed some dessert. Felt like weighing myself? Nope, didn't do that either, but took out the batteries of my scale and threw them away. Felt the need to go to the gym asap? Didn't go but went to a movie with a friend instead. Make fun of your eating disorder and ridicule it! Show it who is the boss! :D
Break your habits and do exactly what makes you most anxious. Eat foods you've avoided for the longest time. If you've had problems with overexercising, stop exercising completely for a while. After breaking the cycle of overexercising, you may try doing sports you genuinely enjoy. But don't fool yourself - if you know you'll turn any exercise into a calorie and fat burning affair, don't play with fire. If you genuinely enjoy playing tennis, for example, feel free to enjoy it in moderation, but be honest with yourself.
I know all of this is terrifying, but trust me, it will get a lot easier quickly. By avoiding your fears and doing exactly what your ED wants you to do, it'll only get worse. Even if you think you possibly can't get more anxious and depressed than you currently are, unfortunately anorexia has its ways to do just that. Only after you make a firm decision to face your fears will it get easier. It's hard at first but I can't come up with anything that'd be more worth it. You'll not only get back your life but yourself.
- If you've already tried to recover for a long time and haven't got any results... Stop "trying" and start doing. I "tried" to recover for the longest time but the thing is that I wasn't really doing anything. I wanted to get rid of the anxiety and depression that had got almost unbearable, but I also wanted to stay thin. I wanted to feel better again, but I wasn't ready to actually change what I was doing.
As unfortunate as it is, that combination doesn't work. Being malnourished and/or underweight dramatically changes your way of thinking. When previously mentally healthy people are exposed to a low calorie diet and a rapid weight loss for a long time, they start to get anorexia-like symptoms and become obsessed with food, unable to think much else. Even if you're truly trying to change your thinking, see a therapist and try your best to get better, as long as you aren't eating enough and/or your weight is too low for you, it can only help so much. I can't even describe how much gaining some healthy weight helped me. No amount of soul searching or therapy could have done that. It is impossible to feel mentally balanced & anxiety free AND continue being unnaturally thin for your frame. I'm sorry but that's just how it is.
Realise that you not treating yourself and your body well is not a sign of control or self-discipline. Quite on the contrary, a person with an eating disorder perhaps couldn't be more out of control, letting something else (in this case an ED) to influence their actions and decide for them. If being disciplined and in control is something you regard highly, make a decision to recover and act accordingly. Instead of being a prisoner of an illness polluting your mind, decide to set yourself free. That is being in control.
Resources:
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Apr 19, 2011, 09:28AM PDT
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