Early recovery from an eating disorder. Thoughts on food:
Them: “ Food is good. Food is your friend. It will nourish you and make you healthy!”
Me: “ Screw THAT noise!! Healthy means FAT! Food is NOT my friend! Youre trying to make me FAT!!”
Them : “No we’re not! We’re trying to make you healthy and save your life!”
Me: : “If gaining weight means “saving my life”; I would rather die!”
Them : “You are very stubborn!”
Me: “ Yes. I know. You may now kiss my ass and go away, now. Try to make me drink an Ensure ONCE more and Ill throw the can at your head!”
IN recovery:
Me: “ Is it time to eat yet? I’m hungry. I don’t like feeling hungry. I don’t function well without food! If it’s not time to eat, I will eat a snack. I know my pattern. If I starve myself, I’ll obsess over food. I will probably binge eat once I eat something.”
Them: “ That’s a very healthy mindset.”
Me: “I learned it from you. Thank you for staying with me and having enough faith in me to believe that one day; Id think these thoughts on my own.”
Making yourself eat in recovery from disordered eating is seemingly simple, but you best BELIEVE that it one of the most difficult things ever. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with hunger or food. It is about control, loss of control, and perfection. Managing and controlling food is a complete obsession. Food is not “food”. That dinner roll isn’t simply a crusty brown delicacy in a basket on the table. It represents your family or job, etc. If you let it enter your body; you are not perfect enough for anything. If you indulge in eating meals like everyone else; you are an utter failure. You have failed YOURSELF, first and foremost. You are disgusting; a greasy, gross mistake. A blight in the world. You would rather look like hell, starving yourself into an emaciated horror than be like the rest of them. “THEY” might need to eat to survive, but I am above the rest of humanity. I will attain perfection, even if it kills me. Say I won’t. These are eating disordered thoughts.
In recovery, you come to absolutely love food. It is not the enemy any longer. Once you have decided to LIVE; food means life and nourishment. Not calories that make you fat. You learn to accept that youre imperfect and definitely don’t control the world. You eat; because you’re supposed to. You do NOT want to, but you know it’s the right thing for you. Youre so grateful for facing the hell of the early days of refeeding with dignity and grace. You feel blessed to have lost an obsession that consumed every ounce of your existence. You give the universe a little smile.
You then eat your breakfast, just like youre supposed to.
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