My Stages In Recovery
Stage 1: Sign Up
My first step was agreeing to recover. I sat across from a room of doctors who were finally able to penetrate my ED's perception of invincibility and prove to me I was not healthy. That day I “signed up” to recover, I consciously took a step toward the right path but I refused to get on it. I was still convinced I could do it my way…
Stage 2: Just eat more of my safe foods
When presented with a meal plan from my dietician, I blankly consented to all of her recommendations knowing full well I would not be following them when I got home. I could wrap my head around eating more, but it was going to be my way. I felt no need to add butter, cookies, and burgers back into my diet. I could gain weight just eating more of my safe foods, problem solved. Only it wasn’t a problem solved… I thought it would be easy to incorporate more food seeing as I loved food and I loved to eat but my eating disorder still made it very difficult. My ED had a strong hold on my anxiety around over eating. And while this tactic of incorporating more safe foods was better than nothing, it was not going to address one of the fundamental aspects of my eating disorder which was I Feared Food. I categorized everything as either good or bad and that left a significant amount of foods I had to go through life avoiding with intense anxiety. Even if you are weight restored and can eat enough to sustain your body, if you still fear food you still have an eating disorder.
Stage 3: Bending the exercise rules
I was told no more exercise. Well my ED said that was never happening. I came up with a compromise, no more running or lifting (the two biggest components of my routine). It sounded like progress, except you have a former athlete with an intense compulsion to exert herself… So running was replaced with intense hiking/walking on treadmills inclines- but that was okay to me because “it wasn’t running”. Lifting was replaced with yoga, pilates, and my own core routines- but that was okay because “it wasn’t lifting”. Now my reduction in exercise was still significant because I was literally running/lifting myself into the ground before this change. My extreme exercise was now lessened to moderate but it was nowhere close to what was asked of me. They wanted sedentary, they wanted me to remove the physical stress I was placing on my body to give it a chance to heal. This made total sense to me, until the time came for me to skip a work out and the panic set in…
Stage 4: Choosing my recovered weight
I got to my pre-ED weight. It took getting closer to their guidelines and farther from my own, but I got there. I was able to gain the minimum weight required of me to appease the doctors (for the time being) and it was a body that I wasn’t comfortable in but I could live with for now. I thought I was done. But the doctors said I needed a buffer, I needed at least another 5 or 10 pounds to help my body feel secure that it had enough of everything it needed. I wasn’t convinced. Then they said my pre-ED weight might be irrelevant since I am older now and bodies are supposed to change over time. Still wasn’t buying in. Finally they said your body will tell you what weight it needs to be when you regain your period; no period meant I wasn’t there yet. I acknowledged this, but I was determined to give me body plenty of time at this weight to really decide if it “wasn’t enough”.
Stage 5: Concede
One way or another you have to reach this stage. For some it is stage 1 (and if that is you, I cant commend you enough for the strength that took). For me it was 19 months and a long time in stage 5. Up until this point I was still not fully bought in to recovery. I was still trying to do it “my way”. But after a while you can’t help but recognize it isn’t working. My way wasn’t working. I have been at this weight for over a year and nothing has happened, my blood work still isn't completely normal, my estrogen hasn't improved, and I don't have a period. So I have to Commit. Commit to the weight gain, commit to not choosing my recovery weight, commit to the no exercise.
You have to ask yourself:
“What is being stuck in recovery worth to you?”
“Am I willing to not be able to run or lift again?”
"Am I willing to jeopardize my future health?"
“Am I okay with not being able to have kids?”
For what? To stay at this minimum weight and avoid the further discomfort of gaining more. It really puts things in perspective when you realize what you are giving up in order to avoid additional self-consciousness. So I conceded. I gave in to recovery. I gave in to eating even more food, to moving even less and to gaining even more weight. I got off my path and walked over to theirs because mine turned out to be a dead end.