I’m very proud to be in recovery. I have come so far in the last year and a half and it feels great. But I am not perfect. And neither is recovery. This past week I experienced one of those things they tell you in treatment and you’re like “yeah yeah..” cause you think you know more than your therapists.
I remember being in therapy and them talking a lot about how undereating often leads to binging or overeating later on and actually does more harm than good. Now I was a strict anorexic who thought I had total control over my eating and never really experienced this in real life. It became something I heard, but never listened to.
Until this week.
This week I was off work and had multiple friends come visit/stay with me on top of it being the holiday season. Naturally, my eating disorder got louder. One day, I had eaten a late lunch and wasn’t very hungry when my husband and friends were, so decided not to eat dinner at the same time as them. Which was really great intuitive eating to start with! But then my eating disorder turned it into an excuse NOT to eat dinner. Since I was already eating late, why not just skip the meal all together???
Well, as we were hanging out, my body began to send hunger cues. My eating disorder kept pushing off eating and pushing off eating until I was ravenous and realized I couldn’t do this all night. So I made some food. When that didn’t feel me up, I made more. Even then I wasn’t completely full so 2 hours later before I went to bed I ate more.
By the time I was done eating and feeling really shitty about myself, I realized that I ate WAYYYY more than I would have it I had just eaten dinner the first time my body signaled hunger. LIGHTBULB. That’s what they told me in therapy, dummy. Sometimes we actually have to experience something to believe it.
When your eating disorder gets loud, I challenge you to eat anyway when your body asks for food. Putting it off could truly lead to overeating which will just make you feel worse. Stay strong and remember, you are not perfect and neither is treatment/recovery and that is OK.
