ED-Free Life

Your ED is great at making you feel like you’re under a microscope when you’re out and about. You think that others are watching what you’re doing / eating / not eating etc. But GUESS WHAT? 

No one is watching you - everyone has their own lives, errands they’re running, people they’re meeting etc.

No one (but you) cares about what you eat or don’t eat; how fast you eat it or where you eat it. Everyone is busy being concerned with themselves, their children, spouses, pets or whoever else.

When someone looks over at you, all they’re doing is just that - briefly looking over because that’s what people do - they glance around all day, every day - they’re not looking over to keep tabs on how you’re doing with your meal.

When someone walked by you and is laughing - they’re not laughing at you, trust me. As much as your ED would like you to think that your eating or lack-of is of utmost importance to everyone around you - that’s just absolutely NOT the case.

Questions to ask yourself this morning:

Did yesterday bring me closer to where I want to be in the future?

What worked for me yesterday and what didn’t? What did I learn?

What can I do differently today that will bring me closer to the life I want?

If things aren’t going the way you want them to, don’t give up and hide from the world. You’re not doomed to “be this way” forever! 

Today is a new day full of new chances, opportunities and choices. If yesterday wasn’t all that amazing, learn from those experiences and feelings, forgive, forget and move on! Staying stuck in the past is a surefire way to stay stuck period. Don’t stay stuck - get up, get ready and try again! 

Even one tiny change can make a huge difference to not only your day but your life.

Weekend Survival Guide

When you have an ED pecking away at your mind, weekends - something most people await with knee-trembling impatience, to you become a free roaming, untamed beast ready to swallow you alive. As if it’s not bad enough that having an eating disorder sucks in general but when something that is supposed to bring you joy and fill you with anticipation instead incites panic and fear, that’s just a cruel joke, right!?

Eating disorders take the idea of “the weekend” and completely distort your perspective causing you to instead see weekends as basically mine fields of unstructured time, 48 hours full of nothing but sitting with your urges, thoughts, loneliness and with your most depressing playlist shuffled on repeat while “everyone you know” is basking in the warm April sunshine without a care. Does this sound like something you might have gone through / are going through? I know I’ve been there and it completely blows! Since the weekend is just a few hours away, how about a survival guide? Without further babble, these 2 coping strategies worked wonders for me:

1. Take the “Un” out of “Unstructured”

How do we make unstructured time less scary? We structure it! Oh, that’s common sense you say? Yes it is but very few of us actually put in the effort in taking steps to avoid unstructured time during your days off. What you need to do is, on whatever day is your last working / school day, sit down and break each day of your weekend down into planned-out chunks that leave no room for sitting with your skewed ED thoughts. Try to be as specific as possible and account for every minute of your day if you must. Avoid ambiguous activities like “Do something until 1pm” because guess what that “something” will turn into? Nothing pleasant, that’s for sure!

Example)

8 am - Wake up, make coffee and read 10 pages of my new book.

8:45 am - Jump in the shower and get ready/dressed for the day.

9:30 am - Make and eat breakfast according to my MP.

10:15 am - Call grandma and chat for a while - I’ve been putting it off.

and so on…

Might seem micro-managey BUT trust me, if weekends always sneak up on you and toss you out of the recovery wagon out of nowhere, micromanaging your time will do wonders in preventing that from happening this weekend too!

2. Sabotage your ED!

Your eating disorder is not your friend. In fact, it’s the exact opposite of a friend - it’s the most evil and abusive asshole in your life at the moment (hopefully the only one!) So why grant ED the power to ruin a perfectly good weekend (again) by giving him what he needs to make you miserable? What the hell am I talking about!? Well…you might be giving your ED several weapons that he WILL use against you come Saturday:

You might be buying foods you KNOW you binge on during your grocery run.

You might be scouting a new workout outfit that shows off your emaciated body because you have a 5-hour date with the Gym planned.

You might be telling a friend that’s inviting you to hang out this weekend that you’re “sooo… busy” knowing full well you’re not.

Catch my drift?

The thing is, though, you actually have the power to say “You know what ED? No! You don’t get to destroy yet another weekend!” You have the power to let those urges and thoughts pass through your mind without tossing the keys to your future in their grimy, misery-toting invisible fingers by giving them your time of day. It won’t be easy because you’re used to stepping down and complying with the voices in your head and you WILL have to force yourself to go against them at first which WILL take effort and emotional energy on your part BUT guess what, as difficult as that will be - think of HOW difficult it will be to pick yourself up after you fall off that wagon again?

Think of how miserable you will inevitably feel after you do what the voices in your mind tell you and everything hurts and you’re crying yourself to sleep at night yet again. I guarantee you that the latter will be MUCH harder on you.

Luckily it’s completely up to you in this moment to make the decision to go one way or the other and I am confident that you CAN choose the still difficult but later rewarding path!

In summary:

Micromanage the hell out of your weekend by planning it out in as much detail as possible before Saturday morning rolls around.

Force yourself to go against the voices in your head that are telling you to “buy this gallon of ice cream because ‘this time will be different!’” and other things you KNOW for a fact are a recipe for nothing but disaster.