Recovery is a practice
What to do when the voice still talks and how to support someone you love (including yourself) through eating disorder recovery
I kicked off eating disorders awareness week with my personal story, facts and tough truths about this complex mental health disorder which you can read more about here.
Today, I want to provide tips and resources. I first want to acknowledge how normal it is to still experience disordered thoughts and behaviors especially when you’re “fresh” out of a recovery setting or when you’re experiencing a particularly painful period of life.
When the disordered voice shows up, because sometimes it still does, I have tools and a support system. Here are a few I learned from my eating disorder program and qualified eating disorder specialists in my network.
Stopping yourself from future tripping. If my brain starts forecasting catastrophe around food, body or performance, I shut that down.
That means I fuel my workouts. Taking gels during a long run is great but nourishing my body throughout the day and on rest days is what keeps me in the game. Performing and functioning well.
I take rest days. Two completely off from running. I look forward to them.
I do not push through pain. There is a difference between discomfort and harming myself.
I challenge normalized but disordered fitness behavior. I remove any influencers or people on social media who either push disordered thinking, share harmful fueling and training tips or simply glorify the grind.
I speak about aesthetics honestly. I can have aesthetic goals without being driven by shrinking myself. Putting on more muscle, strength, function, performance. These lead the way.
And most importantly, I do not isolate. Isolation is where the disorder grows teeth.
If You’re Supporting Someone Who You Know (or Think) is Struggling
This cannot be overstated. Recovery is not linear. That will frustrate you. Accept it anyway.
You cannot force someone to want help. Being ready is a part of their work.
Here’s what you can:
Refuse to collude with the disorder.
Avoid commenting on weight or appearance.
Encourage professional support — whether that’s free 12-step groups, outpatient care or higher levels of treatment.
Help them find movement that is medically appropriate and responsibly guided.
Be discerning about the coaches and trainers in their orbit.
Understand this: eating disorders convince people they are safe and in control.
They are not.
Where I Am Today
Grateful and proud to report I’ve not engaged in eating disorder behaviors in several years. To be clear, I am not cured. I am not immune. I am not a unicorn in “recovery land.” Be very cautious of those who claim they are.
I am practiced. I am aware. I am supported.
I am no longer willing to shrink myself to feel acceptable or in control.
If you are in this, you are not dramatic. You are not broken. You are not weak.
You are navigating a serious mental health disorder in a culture that often rewards its symptoms. That’s hard. You do not have to do it alone.
Cheers, friend.
Resources to save and share:
This sentence hits hard: Isolation is where the disorder grows teeth.
And it is because it is not just about eating disorders but life. I have realized, recently, that a lot of my past behaviors were isolating but because I put it on social media it felt like I wasn't hiding.
Truth is that I was hiding. I was hiding the pain, stress, anxiety and burying it without thinking that life wasn't going in the direction I wanted or needed it to.
To steal your words: I am working on not playing small anymore. I'm becoming more vocal, more creative, more alive.
Thank you.