Have you found yourself struggling with an eating disorder, or do you know somebody who is struggling with food or weight? If so, you might find this article useful.
Recently I recorded a video explaining my eating disorder journey and how mindfulness has helped me with my eating disorders. You can view the video here.
Before My Recovery Journey
Eating disorders are a sensitive topic. It is something that I have struggled with for a long time. I began taking diet pills when I was just 20, something that I’ve never actually put out there and told people. I used to hide them in a secret compartment in my car. Eating disorders can make people very secretive and so can go undetected for a long time. In reality, I now realise that those diet pills probably messed up my metabolism as well as my mental health.
The Turning Point
Fast-forward about 10 years and finally my eating disorder got to a point where I had to work on recovery or I would quite literally die. I found myself in the emergency department after work one day because my heart didn’t feel like it was beating right. I was hooked up to an ECG machine for monitoring and had to answer all kinds of questions that made me feel uncomfortable, but were necessary to give the medical staff a full picture of why this heart issue could be happening to me. I knew at that point that I couldn’t continue the way I was. I was destroying my body.
I got referred to an Eating Disorder Clinic and was diagnosed with EDNOS (Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified). At that point I was swinging from restrictive eating to binge eating so I didn’t fall under either the anorexia or bulimia criteria.
My Road to Recovery
I saw several psychologists and dietitians, and they helped me a lot to recover to a point. Over the years since, I’ve become gradually more accepting of my body and more able to ‘let go’ of the destructive thoughts in terms of both food and body image.
Discovering Mindfulness
When I discovered mindfulness several years ago now, I worked on changing my attitude towards life in general. At the time, it wasn’t specifically to work on my problems with food. However, as I incorporated it into my life more and more, mindfulness did end up having a huge impact on how I have gone on to think about food, weight and body image.
How Mindfulness Helped Me
Training my brain to think mindfully has helped me keep my thoughts in the present moment. For example, I no longer give myself goal weights. I keep myself in the present and try to accept what I find in that moment.
It’s good to have targets in various areas of life and it can help you achieve things which is great, but when you have an eating disorder I don’t think having a weight target is helpful. Removing those goals was one of the best things I did.
I know I make some of this sound easy. It didn’t happen overnight for me, but over time I did manage to change my mindset. If you are in the situation I was back when I was really struggling, I want to tell you that you can change your mindset too.
How I Coped With Lockdown
A lot of people put on weight over lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic. Being immunosuppressed, I had to stay home as I was identified as being extremely vulnerable to severe illness from Covid-19. I’m not very energetic anyway as I’ve got various disabilities and can’t walk far so I did pile on quite a lot of weight. That was difficult, and I was conscious of the many people who would be finding that a challenge across the World too.
Although I did struggle a bit with being bigger, the main struggle for me over lockdown was the lack of control over what food we could get hold of. Whilst there were food shortages, I was unable to order some of my usual foods in the early days of lockdown.
I managed my emotions by using mindfulness. I noticed and acknowledged to myself how I was feeling about the situation. It helped me accept the situation as it was. I couldn’t change the circumstances so although it made me uncomfortable, by processing those emotions and allowing them to pass it made it easier to cope with. I would notice those feelings, acknowledge them and then bring my attention back to the present moment, focussing on what was around me at that time.
The Here and Now
I got into my size 14 UK size trousers this week, which at one point would have been traumatic for me because I used to be a lot smaller. I’m happy with that size at the moment though. I’ve accepted that it is the size I am right now and that’s okay. It’s not about a size specifically, it’s about how you feel in your body.
Gradually over a period of time I have become more comfortable with the size that I am, so today I celebrated being a size 14 because that made me happy today. Today is today, and today is all we have in this moment so I try to embrace that.
This Moment Won’t Last Forever
Try to be aware that the moment you are in won’t last forever. If you feel bad, try and reassure yourself that you will not always feel that way.
Self Acceptance
Try and get to a level of self acceptance that you are happy with. It may be easier said than done, but it is achievable. The best thing that I ever did was accept myself as I am. Not only in terms of size, but also in terms of my autistic traits. That’s a whole other topic though that I will write about some time on the blog.
Mindful Eating
Mindful eating is being aware of what you’re putting in your body and how your body feels. Think about the nutrition, and how it can help you feel healthy and well. That is the important thing, that you’re well. It doesn’t matter what size you are, it doesn’t matter if you are big, small, tall, short. It doesn’t matter. You are who you are on the inside and that’s what we want to strive for. Mindfulness can help you with that.
I do have a mindful eating challenge you can access for free on my website. The eating challenge is not about how much you’re eating, or the scales. Mindful eating is about really noticing tastes, textures and being comfortable with that. You can access that by clicking here. Please do speak with your health professional before taking on the challenge though if you are struggling with your eating mindset. It’s important you have the right support in place.
I am also planning on releasing a course on mindful eating. You can already enrol in some of my mindfulness courses by clicking here. There is a free course running at the moment which answers the top 10 questions that people ask about mindfulness.
Disclaimer
It’s really important that you seek professional medical advice if you are suffering with an eating disorder, or any mental health disorder. This blog is me sharing my own experience and I hope you find it useful, but it is not aimed to replace advice from a healthcare professional.