5 Things I Learned From My Own Eating Disorder Recovery
1 - The little wins are actually the big wins.
It can be hard to celebrate the little wins because they often don’t feel momentous. I hear clients say all time, “Why would I celebrate eating a cookie when ‘normal’ people can do it so easily?” But eating a complete meal, honoring a craving, allowing yourself to skip a workout, connecting with a friend rather than isolating yourself, trying a new food, showing up to a therapy session, signing up for a support group, listening to a recovery podcast… these may all seem like small acts, but they are not! Recovery is really just a collection of small wins strung together. These tiny moments are your building blocks, and even the tiniest wins push you closer to the life you want to live.
2 - Perfectionism feels safe, but it’s not.
Most individuals who struggle with eating disorders also struggle with perfectionism and all-or-nothing thinking—and it makes sense why we fall into these patterns. We are more comfortable when we feel a sense of certainty and control over our circumstances, and perfectionism seems to give us that. This is why perfectionism can feel so safe and comforting.
However, it’s important to remember that perfectionism always hurts us in the end. It is an unrealistic goal driven by shame. It leads to a lot of self-doubt, negative self talk, anxiety, loneliness, and lack of fulfillment. It keeps us from being truly seen.
3 - The false summit.
There’s a phenomenon in eating disorder recovery called “the false summit” which is exactly what it sounds like. Most of us hit a point in our recovery where we think we are all the way there, but we are not. It happens when we’ve been climbing the mountain of recovery for a while and we start to enjoy glimmers of food freedom and body acceptance. We think our work is finished, so we stop climbing. After all, the view is pretty nice from here! …and then reality smacks us in the face, and we realize that we still have work to do on our relationship with food and body.
The false summit is disappointing and disheartening. It may even feel like you are back at square one when you realize you have not yet achieved full recovery. It can feel very scary when we realize that we have to keep pushing, keep eating regularly, and maybe even keep gaining weight. But it’s also a treat to realize that you haven’t even hit the true summit yet, because you’re about to see how good it can really get!
4 - Relationships get so much better when you recover.
Eating disorders are one of the most isolating mental illnesses. They thrive in isolation and secrecy, pushing us to deceive our loves ones and ourselves. We slowly start to ditch our friends to get workouts in, or we start skipping events because we don’t want to be around food. And even when we are with loved ones, we aren’t truly present. It starts to get really lonely.
I didn’t even realize how alone and disconnected I felt in my eating disorder until I was on the other side. I was never truly “there” when I spent time with loved ones. My mind was always racing a mile a minute and I felt numb to what was going on around me.
All of my relationships have become so much stronger and deeper since I have chosen recovery, and it’s one of the best trade-offs I could imagine. Life is much more fulfilling when we allow people in and let them see our true, imperfect selves. Connection and community have the power to heal mental illness, which I can now see very clearly.
“Rarely, if ever, are any of us healed in isolation.” -bell hooks
5 - Life on the other side is not perfect.
It’s easy to fall into this trap of believing that life will be full of rainbows and butterflies once we are recovered. We imagine this perfect version of ourselves that is always confident, has perfect body image, never uses unhealthy coping mechanisms, and suddenly has tons of newfound joy and happiness… But this isn’t realistic.
Life is still really hard! We still have to do hard things, face hard truths, and take responsibility for ourselves. Things don’t magically feel easy now that I am living without my eating disorder.
I like to say that life in recovery is life in color. Less numb, less lonely, less of the extreme highs and extreme lows. Things feel simultaneously more simple and more complicated… but I’m actually glad that life isn’t perfect. That’s what makes it so rich and full. I am grateful that I stopped numbing my emotions with my eating disorder and can now feel the full spectrum of pain and joy and disappointment and excitement and sadness and love. I feel connected to others and the world around me in a way that I wasn’t before. I have so many new passions and things that bring me joy. I have much more space in my brain to think about what truly matters to me. I’m more creative, more motivated, more alive. I am able to connect to a sense of deep peace that I never knew was possible.
Life in recovery may not be perfect, but it’s so much better than I ever could have imagined.
If you feel ready to take steps towards your own eating disorder recovery, please reach out to me at eada@morningbirdtherapy.com!