As many of you, just as I, may be unaware that this past week (today is the last day) of National Eating Disorder Awareness Week. The theme of this years week is "It's time to TALK ABOUT IT."
I wanted to add a little bit more of my story to this week. In the past I have opened up about my eating disorder, but now that was years ago and it isn't a thing that just goes away, rather it is something to choose not to do any more. You choose to fight it every single day. And sometimes it wins and sometimes you win.
So lets talk more about it. What it is like in the mind of recovery...
Every morning I wake up and thank God for another day. I pray that it will be a good day. Good choices will be made and I honor myself and my body. Then I drink coffee and go about my day.
But what about breakfast- yea that is something I struggle with now and it has been for about 3 years. I very rarely eat breakfast. I was getting better for a bit there just last year and would have some nuts and an apple but it didn't last long. Why? I twisted this idea of intermiten fasting I heard on a podcast a few years ago and it stuck with me. Maybe not the "right" way to do it, but I developed it into my way of doing it. That means- drink coffee and go about your day until lunch time.
Lunch is my first meal and usually is what ever my heart desires, my budget allowed, and what I cooked for that week. Roasted veggies and a salad, avocado toast, squash toast, tacos, you name it. And it depends on when I eat this meal because for the past 8 months I have been in an internship to be a real dietitian and thank goodness because dietitians love to eat on a time schedule so it was usually around 12:30/1pm.
Then I go about the rest of my day. Sometimes fighting off hunger because I need to go home and workout. So I would and then I get meal #2. Shock again yes, I eat twice a day usually. (I'll go into it further in a minute.) This meal is usually more of a breakfast type meal of banana bread with almond butter and fruit, oh and chocolate chips, with a side of cashew milk. Then I call it a day. Maybe sometimes I grab some more almond butter, nuts, and chocolate or fruit and milk depending on my hunger level (or what my mind wants) and then on most nights I go to bed feeling as though I failed another day because I didn't do what I really should have.
So is this really the mind of a person who recovered from an eating disorder? Maybe not so much anymore, but 3 years ago- yes. I just don't know her any more or how to get back to there. But maybe that is the point. I don't necessarily want to go back tot here but rather reach a new level of me with a balance of food.
Food is my tigger. Food will forever be my trigger. Food is what I want to make my life about. Help others with food, with their disorders, help them recover. So why can't I fix myself? I dream about eating like everyone else, not overthinking each bite, not beating my self up when I push too far, and then start the same cycle the next day with that last thought of tomorrow I will do better. Its horrible. It is no way to live. I'm too old for this. But you know what...it is my pattern. When I get too stressed it is what my mind and body knows is "safe" for me to control again. So I do, without even realizing it until it is too late and I find myself right back here- in a relapse. And it sucks.
So I am choosing to talk about it. To be open and real about it. Because I know someone else out there is going through the same thing and needs to know they are not alone. None of us are. And we need that to be known. I am taking steps to make myself better, to help me go back down the path of recovery and not fear.
Make sure you talk about it too- what ever that thing is that eats away at you. If you don't it will start to control you and take a part of you away with it. It is time to TALK ABOUT IT.
<3
