WEEKLY ADVICE: STOP RESTRICTING

Effects of Restricting on the Body

• Loss of bone density — this can start just six months after anorexic behaviors start, and is often irreversible.  This is especially true since anorexia usually begins during adolescence, when you are supposed to be growing your bones.
• Weakens heart (your heart is a muscle and, just as your other muscles often feel weaker as a result of restricting, it also weakens without adequate nutrition)
• Higher risk of a miscarriage, pregnancy complication, and postpartum depression
• Changes your brain chemistry
• Dry skin
• Poor circulation
• Headaches
• Brittle fingernails
• Bruising easily
• Endocrine disorders
• Amerorrhoea (loss of period)
• Decreased libido (impotence in males)
• Reduced metabolism
• Slow heart rate
• Low blood pressure
• Low white blood cell count
• Hypotension
• Hypothermia
• Anaemia (iron deficiency)
• Abdominal pain
• Retention of fluid
• Stunting growth
• Abnormality of mineral and electrolyte levels
• Lanugo (fine hair all over the body)
• Thinning hair
• Zinc deficiency
• Reduced immune system function
• Constipation or diarrhea
• Tooth decay

Tips to Help You Eat

• STOP WEIGHING YOURSELF!!!  Also, stop counting calories.  This one is obvious, but I know it’s something a lot of people struggle with.  Your weight is just another number for you to obsess over, and recovery is about letting go of the numbers.  Keep reminding yourself that those numbers don’t matter.  They do not dictate who you are as a person or what you are worth.  You are not doing yourself a single favor by stepping on the scale, so take responsibility for your recovery and stop.  Smash your scale like I did!
• Separate your voice from your eating disorder’s voice.  Think – what does my ED want me to do today?  What do I need to do today to further my recovery?
• Recognize what you are already doing right.  Make a list of healthy eating habits you are already practicing.  Then make a list of unhealthy habits.  Finally, make a list of how you can correct those unhealthy habits, or your vision of healthy habits that could replace those – challenge yourself to eat that way for one day.
• Communicate your struggles with your support system.  Your support system will only know to help you if you ask.  If you need someone to make sure you stick to your meal plan, find someone you trust to hold you accountable.  Show them your food diary so they can make sure that you are getting the right amount of food – and if you’re not, they can support you while you do.
• Disagree and disobey…or, agree and disobey.  When you identify a thought as disordered, practice disagreeing.  If your ED says, “Skip this meal, it is going to make you fat,” say (aloud if you need to), “No, I will not skip this meal, and it will not make me fat.”  Can’t do that yet?  That’s fine.  Say, “Fine, maybe it will make me fat, but I’m going to eat it anyways.”  You don’t have to disagree to disobey.
• Consider choosing higher calorie foods.  This was a big thing for me in recovery.  I had a really hard time with meals because the longer it took to eat, the longer I had to think about why I didn’t want to eat it.  I started choosing higher calorie foods just to speed the process up, and it really worked!  There was less time to think about it, so I could just finish it quickly and move on with the rest of my day.
• Listen.  Sometimes, we get so preoccupied trying not to listen to the ED, we forget that we still need to listen to recovery.  Your recovery voice is there – it may be quiet, but it’s there.
• Find something that reminds you of recovery, or why you are recovering.  For me, dragonflies are really symbolic of my recovery.  Find something that you can bring with you at mealtimes to look at if you need a reminder of why you’re recovering, like a necklace or key chain.
• Practice grounding.  If you’re feeling overwhelmed at a mealtime, take a timeout and bring yourself back to the present.  Close your eyes and focus on what you can smell, touch, hear.  Identify all of the noises/smells individually.  Open your eyes and look all around you – think about everything you can see.  It sound stupid, but it works – sit there and make a mental list of everything you can see, including shape, color, etc.  There are other grounding exercises discussed in my post about triggers here.
• Use affirmations.  You may feel stupid saying something like, “I am worthy of this meal,” over and over again, but it will help to drowned out the sounds of your ED.  Some of my favorite affirmations are here.
• Write down all of your thoughts – ALL of them.  If your mind is racing, get it all out.  Write down everything – disordered thoughts, rational thoughts, whatever is going through your mind.  Then, go back and read it – underline the disordered thoughts and rationalize them.
• Make goals.  Yes, you can do it.  I don’t care what it is, you can.  So challenge yourself. Set goals every single day.
• Understand what recovery is.  Define recovery for yourself — what is your end game?  What does “full recovery” mean to you?  Also, understand that the process is going to be very painful.  You will be uncomfortable and anxious a lot, so expect this.  Recovering sucks.  It really does.  But recovery is worth it.
• Don’t self-sabotage.  That means that you need to take responsibility for everything you can control in your recovery.  Don’t look at pro-ana/thinspo websites.  Don’t go to the gym if you get competitive or over-exercise.  Don’t hang out with people who trigger you.  Don’t hoard binge food.  These are things you can control, so make sure you aren’t purposely (or passively) sabotaging your recovery.

Things That Helped Me

• I got a jar and a bunch of marbles at the dollar store.  For every day that I went without a behavior, I put a marble in the jar.  I didn’t take them out when I used behaviors, because I don’t believe that relapse erases progress, but I always tried to put a marble in the jar at the end of the day.  When the jar was full, I rewarded myself!
• In PHP, we always tried to get pumped up before meals.  We’d do cheers (there was a cheerleader there, so they were pretty good!), turn on music, and dance around.  We called ourselves “Team Rock Star!”  Anyone who finished their meal was in the 100% Club for the next few hours, and even though that didn’t actually mean anything, it was the coolest club to be in, as far as any of us were concerned.  I think it was a kind of “fake it ‘till you make it,” but it worked!
  
• I built a really strong support system.  My parents, brother, boyfriend, and friends all had each others’ phone numbers and email addresses.  They all had my therapist’s number.  I was in constant contact with them, and they all had a copy of my safety plan and meal plan.  I really don’t think I would have recovered without their support.  It’s up to you to open up and accept that support, though.  Seek help wherever you can get it, whether that be at home, school, treatment center, church, etc.  Most importantly, be honest with your treatment team and support system.
• I am not a particularly creative person, but during the recovery process I was constantly painting, coloring, drawing, sewing, knitting, whatever I could do to keep myself busy.  It didn’t matter that my art sucked — actually, it might have been better that it did, because I learned to let go of perfectionism.  I learned to just express myself, however I wanted, however messy or ugly it might be.
• Some people preach mindfulness while eating (including the clinicians at my treatment center).  This didn’t work for me.  For me, the faster I ate, the better I did.  The more time I had to think about it, the less likely I was to actually do it, so I’d shovel it in before my brain caught up.  Distracting myself while eating, by talking or watching TV, was also helpful.
• Write in a journal or a blog.  Studies have shown that people tend to feel better after writing down their thoughts and experiences.
• Understand that the “listen to your body” mantra does NOT apply to you until after you refeed.  Before/during refeeding, your body’s signals don’t mean anything.  I watched some many people in treatment (and I pulled it myself plenty of times, don’t get me wrong) say things like, “But I don’t feel hungry!” and, “But my body is telling me I’m full!”  First, starvation can make your hunger cues disappear.  Also, it shrinks your stomach, so you will feel very full, very fast.  You still have to eat.  It is physically painful, but you have to do it.

If You DO Restrict…

FORGIVE YOURSELF!!!  Nobody’s recovery is perfect.  You will probably slip-up during the process.  That does not erase any progress you have made, it just means you need to make a couple adjustments.  If you restrict or skip a meal, that doesn’t mean the rest of the day is ruined.  You can get back on track, if you think rationally about the situation.  Look back at what happened — why did you restrict?  What triggers were there?  How were you feeling?  What could you have done differently to cope?  Learn from the event and use that knowledge going forward.

Dealing with Weight Gain

• Check out my post about body image and use some of the exercises and affirmations.
• STOP WEIGHING YOURSELF!!!  I know I’ve already discussed this, but it deserves repeating.  You need to let go of the number, and it’s impossible to do that when that bright red number is staring you in the face every morning.  Don’t measure or body-check, either.
• Throw away your “sick clothes.”  They will just taunt you if you keep them.  Donate them so at least some good can come of them, and get clothes that you are comfortable in.
• Don’t spend too much time in front of the mirror.  You’re only going to drive yourself crazy.
• Practice self-care.  If you treat your body like you love it, eventually, you’ll start to.
• Remember that you are gaining health, not weight.
• Use affirmations.  I put affirmations all around my mirror, so I had to look at them every time I stood in front of it.  Check out the video here.
• Trust.  Trust that your body will distribute your new weight evenly (maybe not immediately, but eventually).  Trust that you will gain what you need to and stop when you get to your healthy set point.  Trust that your body knows what that set point is, and where you need to be to function at your highest possible potential.

Sources

• Eating Disorders Victoria
• National Eating Disorders Association
• srslyrecover-ed (my old advice blog)
• WebMD
• Women’s Health