I dont know

[shortstack016]

So I've been eating and I haven't thrown up any of my food on purpose, so I should feel accomplished, but I dont. I currently weigh 103lb and I'm 17 years and I'm exactly 5 feet tall so I'm happy to be over 100lb cause that's what I've always wanted, but now that I've eaten and gotten this far I just feel gross and I just dont want to eat anymore so this gross feeling goes away. Has anyone experienced this before???

[crazycrossstitcher]

Yes - its the ED playing mind tricks - I've put on weight - feels like all round my middle - but my therapist says it will redistribute in time - but the feelings can be overwhelming at times. I find looking at my target weight helps - and realising I've a way to go - this seems to help keep things in perspective and separate the feelings which come from the ED and the truth that I need to gain this weight to be healthy and well.

[shortstack016 in reply to crazycrossstitcher]

I know I am a healthy weight but I still feel gross about all the food I've eaten. I'm glad to be the weight I am, but it's been over a year since I started eating again so I dont understand why I still feel like this.

[crazycrossstitcher in reply to shortstack016]

The "mind fix" of anorexia is extremely powerful - it takes a long time to get that voice out of your head - have you had any counselling - I found CBT really helpful to give me an alternative and healthier voice which really helped.

[shortstack016 in reply to crazycrossstitcher]

No I haven't had any counselling. I've been trying to talk to my best friend or my bf about it but I feel like it would be too much for them.

[crazycrossstitcher in reply to shortstack016]

As we're in lock down guess counselling is out currently - you could try the Anorexia and Bulimia Care helpline - or their befriending - they are great and really helped me see things more clearly.

[shortstack016 in reply to crazycrossstitcher]

I just really havent been a huge fan about counselling cause I grew up with it and it hasn't helped me much so idk what else to do

[crazycrossstitcher in reply to shortstack016]

I too was doubtful about counselling - but the help I received from ABC was really good - and my most recent counselling through the local ED service has also been helpful - I think its about being in the right place to "hear" what is being said - and wanting to hear and accept things that challenge us - but it has to be right for you.

[shortstack016 in reply to crazycrossstitcher]

Ya I understand that. But I just feel like it wont reach Ana. Like it wont get her to go away completely

[Hidden]

I totally understand how you feel. Like others have said, the ED is trying to trick you. The ED is like a parasite that is desperate to survive and will try to convince you that engaging in behaviors is the only solution to any life problem. Unfortunately when you do start to recover your body does not trust that it will not be starved again, so it tries to protect your vital organs from future starvation by prioritizing weight gain to the trunk of the body. This, of course, is a scary thing for a person suffering with an ED. However, once you body starts to trust that it will be fed, things do start to redistribute.

The body changes are hard--I am not pretending they are not. But a lot of recovery is having faith that your body is doing its best to heal and repair all the damage caused by your ED. It takes a lot of time, but it does start to sort itself out as long as you are providing it enough fuel and are not backsliding. There are a few people in the recovery community that who talk about how to deal with these things--Tabitha Farrar and Kayla Rose Kotecki are two people who helped me understand what was going on.

Recovery is one of the hardest things I've ever had to do in my life, but really wish I had jumped into recovery much earlier. I was sick with EDs for the majority of my life (I started behaviors as a kid), and I feel like I would have found the right path much earlier if I had the correct information about how to do true recovery and what to expect. I am coming up on my 2 year anniversary of full recovery, and I can tell you despite all the suffering and hard work of recovery it is worth it.

[shortstack016 in reply to Hidden]

I just have a very very small body and I only suffered through mine for a little over a year but it did a lot of damage. Im coming into my 2 year of starting to eat and trying to recover but im still having problems. My body doesnt trust me at all and there are days where I wont eat at all. And I dont want to go back to the ED and feeling all the effects of it, but I dont wanna feel "gross" when I eat food either if that makes sense. Through these entire 2 years of eating again, Ive surpassed my weight goal that ive always wanted to pass of 100 lb and now im 105 lb. But on the days that I don't eat I lose 2 pounds and I just keep going up and down and I cant ever get passed 106 lb. At this rate I dont think my body will fully recover.

[Hidden in reply to shortstack016]

I am sorry things are hard for you. I don't know if it helps you, but one thing helped me start to heal was realizing that my healthy weight is actually predetermined by my genes and biology--it's like your height or eye color. Sure I can change that stuff using artificial methods (wearing heels or using colored contacts), but at some point I have to return to the predetermined traits.

Similarly, I can temporarily move my weight around using extremely dangerous behaviors, but I will also be hurting my mental and physical health because I trying to make my body conform to something that is not natural for it. I cannot make my body be a size that it isn't natural for it permanently.I realized that even in the deepest points of my ED my body was always trying to get me to the place where it felt balanced and safe--it problem was in my thinking that I could and should make it what I wanted it to be. It was hard, but I had to have faith that my body would be able to regulate itself given the necessary resources--the more I tried to fight it the worse things became.

In order for my body to start trusting that I wasn't going to be in a famine soon, I had to fuel it regularly everyday. Over time my body has realized that I am in a safe environment and it return to doing all the things it didn't have resources for when I was starving--regulating body temperature, regulating menstrual cycles, growing hair and fingernails--all of the extraneous stuff it could not do because it was using the few resources (food) I gave it to just keep my heart beating everyday. I promise it will happen, but you have to surrender control--and learn to be okay with whatever happens.

I also had to really understand that in order to stop feeling scared of food and eating, I had to keep doing it--I had to act as if I didn't feel gross or afraid. You don't get better at things by avoiding them. So learning to be a "normal" eater took time, just like it took a long time to learn to be a disordered eater.

Sorry for this long response, but I hope some of this makes sense. I tell you this stuff because none of this ever occurred to me when I was sick, and I wish someone pointed this stuff out to me. I wish I knew that things could get better and things could heal, as long as I trusted my body to do what it needed to do. I spent so much of my life and energy fighting something that I could not successfully fight. I didn't realize that the only way to "win" that war was to die--I could fight my body until it gave up and that was it.

[shortstack016 in reply to Hidden]

No no Im glad you were able to tell and share this with me. It helps more than you know. As for a couple of weeks I was able to eat without feeling gross about it but after that I started to eat less again cause I started judging myself and comparing myself harder than ever and being more judgemental to myself and restricting myself again, but there will be days that I slip and just eat whatever. But now that started to happen I just cant get passed 102lb.

[Hidden in reply to shortstack016]

I am sorry things are getting bad again for you. Recovery is really tough, but you have to attack it with the same furor you have used to suppress your weight. A lot of it is trying to do your best to behave like a non-disordered person. Ask yourself: Would a non-disordered person keep tracking their weight? Would a non-disordered person let the scale determine how they feel? Would a non-disordered person compare themselves to other people (people who have a different genetic makeup than you)? Would a non-disordered person invest a lot of energy and feelings in food?

I do not have any adult models for normal eating, so I thought about how my young nieces and nephews approach food and their bodies. They give both things very little thought at all--it is sort of beside the point, they are pretty carefree and happy to focus on the things they enjoy in life. I think everyone should try to get as close to that as possible.

In the short term, I would advise strongly against having a scale in your house--as you have seen, it is the quickest path toward relapse city. Again, I am not pretending going through recovery is super easy, but I do believe everyone has the potential to get there. I hope you can get closer to recovery while you are still a young person. I wasted a lot of my life being disordered and it really kept me from having many positive experiences. Never mind, sparing yourself the long term physical consequences of an ED (for example, I am pretty sure my ED stunted my growth to a significant degree). I wish you all the best in your journey towards recovery, my friend. Please know it is possible <3

[Icanhelpyou5]

Yes I remember this feeling very well and though it made me feel gross, it was the most important stage of my recovery. The body needs the food but the mind is against it because of the fear of getting bigger and fat. However our main goal is to be healthy and to feel good about ourselves.

I think what can really help you at this point is exercise. When you exercise you stay fit and strong and it allows you to eat more without having to feel guilty or worried about it. But make sure you don’t exercise excessively. Walking is one of the most effective forms of exercises for the whole body and it’s very therapeutic for the mind as well. Give it a try and tell us how it felt 🙂