Spouses, partners, parents of loved ones with eating disorders--I need you to keep reading. Really.

You may have no idea how they're suffering. Your wife, or mother, or partner or son. It's about shame. And fear. That's why they can't tell you. That's why it's so hard for her to ask for help. I'm not placing blame, but I'm asking you to start to listen like you never have before. Because it's hard for those living with anorexia, bulimia and binge eating disorder to say what needs to be said.

Don't be fooled by his size or his weight. People with eating disorders come in all sizes. And don't be fooled by how well she had been doing. Slips happen. That's normal. But recovery requires acknowledgement that things are amiss, and that support is available. Right there. In person. Not just virtually through this blog, or a virtual support group or a friend across the world.

Yes, they need to know that you are there for them, unconditionally. Even if you really don't understand. Even though you wish they'd just 'get over it'. Struggling with an eating disorder is something they simply did not choose.

She may not discuss it with you, seeming as if all is well. And he may deny that he's restricting or over exercising. Besides. It's so much easier to see what we'd like to see.

So if you suspect that there's something not quite right, please start a discussion. And use open ended questions, ones that can't be dead-ended with a simple yes or no response.

You just might have your blinders on to
what's really going on--right before your eyes.

Do you know how trapped she's feeling?
Like there's no way out of her misery?

Sometimes we're a bit too close to the situation to
see the whole picture.

Don't wait for an earthquake to shake you into action.

I was talking to a guy from San Francisco this week, and the subject turned to earthquakes. This long-time SF resident and survivor of the big quake of 1989 offered some very practical advice for me to share with my son, a San Francisco newbie, fortunately naïve about the seriousness of going through an earthquake. His focus was not on what to do during the crisis—although that advice is critical as well—but rather what to do before hand. How to be prepared for this challenging situation, because being prepared, as he put it, is the surest way to increase survival.

Imagine that while sitting and discussing such matters my mind moved to you, my dear readers. No, there’s no need to worry about earthquakes for most of you. Rather, the subject of preparedness as a means to ensure survival and minimize damage struck me as most fitting—whether you struggle with an eating disorder or living free of diet rules.

Have a plan, he said. In San Francisco that might mean knowing which are the secure places to hover—the solid doorways and tables to stay under. But before it strikes, he emphasized that it’s critical to have an action plan: to keep cash on hand—because you never know when you’ll need it and ATM machines simply don’t work in these situations. Have a plan for communicating with those you’re close with—because electric doorbells to apartment buildings will fail and telephone lines other than landlines will fail. A transistor radio helps you connect with the world—to reality check what’s going on outside of your own limited space. You’ll need light of course—so batteries and flashlights need to be stashed to access easily.  And of course a supply of non-perishable food as well as water. Decision-making when undernourished will surely be compromised.

Time to come out of hiding and ask for what you need.

You can guess where I’m going with this. Yes, the analogy applies to you who are metaphorically on no greater solid ground. Communication is key to survival, and planning for opening these channels is critical. Can you tell your partner you’re struggling? Can you ask for help shopping and cooking to ensure your health and nourishment? Can you simply say “I need a place to eat dinner tonight?” Can you ask them to keep the pastries off the counter when you are trying to avoid impulse eating? Can you ask for a referral to a therapist or a behaviorally oriented dietician?

Where’s your transistor radio, so to speak, your exposure to the world outside of your own thoughts? Admittedly the cultural media may not be the most fitting reality check for sane thoughts, for diet-free messages, unfortunately. What I mean is that you need exposure outside of your own disorder thoughts—someone that can ground you when you are limited inside your own space. Were you really happier when you were so much thinner? Did staying on that crazy diet truly improve your quality of life? Your mental health? Or are you using magical thinking like the way we recall old boyfriends/relationships, fantasizing about how awesome it all was--when really it was nothing of the sort? Do you think you’ll restrict just for now and then be able to simply normalize your eating? Think again!

Do you have a grounding place to run to—your doctor, therapist, dietician, perhaps even a higher level of care—if your foundation is shaking? Do you have ready to eat food for when resources are tough to come by? A reserve for when, due to all the stress, your ability to organize and think through what’s best to eat may be impaired?

Where will your light come from when the power goes out? Do you recharge with talk therapy, or maybe yoga or meditation? Do you get spiritual support or guidance from wise friends or loved ones?

You may get no warning before the quake, before the shake up to your healthy behaviors and thoughts. So have a plan. Be prepared.

What steps will you take? Please share—we can all use to hear some ideas!

Read more about slips and relapses:

http://dropitandeat.blogspot.com/2011/08/so-you-really-think-i-can-keep-this-up.html

http://dropitandeat.blogspot.com/2011/08/hope-or-despair-only-you-can-decide-but.html

http://dropitandeat.blogspot.com/2011/11/quick-fix-for-your-struggle-with-eating.html

http://dropitandeat.blogspot.com/2010/12/new-years-resolutions.html

Avoidance isn't the answer. It's time to bear hunt.

Recovery is a tricky thing. You may be making progress with your eating—whether you are working to overcome binge eating, anorexia or bulimia—but may be fooled into believing that you’ve truly normalized  your relationship with food. It may feel like you’ve largely recovered; you’ve started to include ice cream (but only when you’re out, never keeping it in the house). And your binge frequency is close to zero. And surely you who’ve been restricting deserve credit for eating more than you used to—at least of the foods you deem good for you.

But consider this:

No, avoidance isn't the answer.

• Is it really recovery when the only way you feel in control is to fill your days with so much activity (no, not even physical activity) that you don't get to sit with your feelings? You work long hours waitressing, take on extra shifts or extend your work hours only to avoid being with yourself. You struggle to allow yourself to feel hungry—fearing you're not trustworthy to respond correctly. You equally fear fullness, that satisfying feeling of truly getting enough. Would you allow your best friend to carry on this way?

• Is it really recovery when you stop binging, only to restrict your food intake? You stick around family or friends because you know you'd never binge in their presence, but you also struggle to eat enough when they're around—and even when they’re not. If your child see-sawed between binge eating and restricting her food intake, would you say “that's just fine”?

It doesn't have to be so scary.

• Is it truly changing your relationship with food when your solution for managing chocolate cake—or your favorite flavor ice cream or bread or peanut butter—is to simply never have it around? You forbid yourself access—just for now, until you meet your weight goal, or maybe believing you’ll resist these for the rest of your life. Would you suggest this to your parent, or would you hope that life could be much better for them?

• Are you really recovering when the only way to nourish yourself (yes, I know some of you struggle with this loaded expression which implies self care in its fullest sense) is by keeping everything the same, limiting your food choices to just a few "safe" foods? Or, by weighing and measuring all of your food? No, not just for now, but forever? What would you say to your partner if he or she kept to the same restricted allowance, an even number of items to be comfortably ritually consumed, day after day after day?

Time to start living again.

• How normal is your eating if you rely on counting your calories, or your points a la weight watchers? Or if you can't release yourself from exercising when your intake exceeds your ideal or your self-prescribed amount?

Can you truly recover? Absolutely!

Full recovery requires feeling—not avoidance of hunger and fullness. Detaching yourself from these physical sensations, like avoidance of all feelings—sadness, disappointment, fear, hopelessness—only prolongs your suffering (while admittedly for a moment it seems like the only way to get through). Avoiding feeling by numbing out with your eating or your not eating, serves a purpose. But let’s not forget that you lose out on life’s positive emotions and experiences, too.

It requires “Going on a bear hunt” so to speak—a reference to Rosen and Oxenbury’s children’s book I loved to read when my kids were very young.

"We're going to catch a big one. / What a beautiful day! / We're not scared. / Oh-oh! Grass! / Long, wavy grass. / We can't go over it. / We can't go under it. / Oh, no! / We've got to go through it!" The family skids down a grassy slope, swishes across a river, sludges through mud and, of course, finally sees the bear…”

It takes trudging through all the uncomfortable challenges—with support, of course—in order to get past your fears. Like the very young kids, you might (at first) run away when you face the bear. But with some work (perhaps there needs to be a part 2 to this classic), you’ll be embracing it and feeling all the better for it.

There’s more to life than yearning for foods you enjoy yet avoid, or regretting the little you did eat. Or struggling after a binge—an inevitable consequence of days, weeks or a lifetime of rigid diet rules, of avoiding eating enough.

You deserve better. Really you do.  I don’t mean to minimize any progress you’ve made. I simply want to urge caution to be on guard for those sneaky eating disordered thoughts and actions. So please consider reaching out to take the next step to push through—to change your thoughts, your feelings and your eating. Push through the tall grasses and the mud. And conquer the bear.

Oh, and please share your thoughts with us!

Thanks.

You? An eating disorder? Breaking the silence on binge eating disorder and OSFED.

I'm not posting this to brag nor, I'll add, to solicit more emails. 

We can't tell just looking at you who's living with an eating disorder.

And I certainly don't want those of you who are not in such a great place to feel worse about your apparent lack of recovery; I'm aware that's how some of you may think. Perhaps you, too, have come a long way on your journey toward recovery, in ways you rarely stop to acknowledge. (SHOUT OUT: identify what you have done well with today!)

Rather, I write because of what could have happened to Leah. And about what usually happens, to those with Binge Eating Disorder and other eating disorders. So please read on!

"I hope you are doing well and a Happy Belated Birthday!  I just read your latest blog post and it made me quite happy and blessed for our time together.I am happy and proud to say that I am doing great and haven't used food to deal with my emotions.  I am still in therapy and it is a big help but I have really come to the other side with my eating disorder.  I have my moments here and there but ultimately I consider my self in recovery.  I completely think a different way about food and to me that is huge.  I have an amazing relationship with food again and for that I thank you and all of your help.  It was just a year ago - March 18, 2013 that we had our first Skype session and I was in a pretty dark place and didn't know how I was going to get through it all....and then you came into my life.

To build on what Dana wrote....thank you thank you thank you for having the confidence in me when I didn't and for being there as a guide to help me get to this amazing place in my life that I can now say I am truly thankful and happy to live. Thank you!!"

I'm driven to post after an ICED (International Conference on Eating Disorders) session about the lack of treatment for eating disorders, particularly binge eating disorder and EDNOS—Eating Disorders Not Otherwise Specified (now renamed OSFED for Other Specific Feeding or Eating Disorder)—that catch all disorders not meeting the criteria for bulimia, anorexia, and binge eating disorder.

Anorexia and to a lesser extent, bulimia, are more likely to be treated—although admittedly so many more aren't in treatment and need to be. And truly, treatment is typically not long enough or intense enough or multi-faceted enough—my thoughts, not the presenter’s.

But I write about these other conditions, these seemingly lessor eating disorders because their impact is so great; of those with eating disorders, approximately 60% of women and 83% of men have BED/EDNOS combined. And while the need for hospitalization or risk of sudden death might be lower, the impact on quality of life, mood, self-esteem, body image, control over eating is tremendous. And let's not forget GI distress, heartburn, constipation, fatigue, high cholesterol, blood sugar management issues—I could go on.

You? Living with an eating disorder?

No, it's not about size!

Sufferers are rarely identified nor have their eating behaviors addressed, contributing to minimizing their own struggle. I mean, if your doctor doesn't ask the questions why would you volunteer about your struggle? More likely, attention is paid to your BMI or 'weight issue' instead. If your loved ones don't sense your struggle with food, but rather just see your weight as a concern, maybe you're the one with the distortion. If you look good and your weight is more or less fine, what's the big deal? They have no idea how you struggle. And if everyone around you is focused in how fat their thighs are or how much weight they're gaining, then you’re certainly not the one needing treatment, right?

Wrong.

Back to Leah. I received her note coincidently while at the ICED conference, and invited her to stop by, as we had never met in person. She would have surely agreed to meet for lunch—as she had come a long way from relying on froyo as lunch/dinner—but time was tight for me, so chai lattes would have to do. And our meeting got me thinking about her history. She long struggled with dieting and food rules, consuming way too much of her mental energy.  That was the norm in both her family and in her peer group.

But Leah knew that this was no way to live.

As she recalls it, it took a tweet of mine that she came across, which lead her to my blog, and then my website and then my book, food to eat, to move her from knowing to doing, to taking action on making her life around food better. We skyped, and I encouraged therapy as well. And as you can see by her note, she did it.

But what if she didn't stumble upon that tweet? Would she, or you, or your friends take the step and initiate change, to move from being ruled by food? Apparently not. The stigma and shame around binge eating and EDNOS is great,as described by Stephanie Bauer, PhD, a researcher in Heidelberg, Germany, making the barrier to change hard to get over. And I learned in a session by Federico Girosi, PhD, from the University of Western Sydney, Australia, that it's hard for those with eating disorders to consider the long term consequences of their disorder, when the short term risk of seeking treatment seems great.

I'm doing my small part. You can do yours too!

Let me tell you, you are not alone. More of you struggle with binge eating disorder and other eating disorders that don't meet the criteria for anorexia or bulimia but which need to be treated!!! You are no less deserving of being freed from the burden of your disease as the person living with cancer.

Please speak up. Halt the fat talk that you hear in your home and with your friends. Start living now, regardless of your size. Ask yourself if the cost of treatment--your fear of what you might hear and how you might feel--is really greater than the cost of not seeking treatment. Do you want to live your whole life concerned about food labels and the calories you consume? Do you want to spend time at meals preoccupied with food and it's nutritional value, rather than enjoying the company of your loved ones? And do you want to carry this sentiment to your children as well? For Leah, that might've been just the tipping point she need, as she was approaching age 30. It felt like enough was enough.

Yet there was no action until perhaps she felt like somebody got it, that she'd be understood, that the risk of shame and stigma might be lower seeking help from someone whose messages she was already comfortable with.

Or in a blog?

Please share this with your friends, whether they have an eating disorder or not. If they start a conversation about dieting or body image, turn it on it's head. share the messages you're reading here and challenge them to have a better life. Check out our new book drop the diet: guided recipes for overcoming your food rules, a modified version of food to eat, rewritten with chronic dieters and binge eaters in mind—coming VERY soon!

Work on giving yourself permission to eat, and enjoying food, all foods, regardless of their fat or carb content. And seek out the services of providers who specialize in eating disorders to help guide you along the way.

Really it's not too late.

Please share on FB, Twitter, Pinterest, email or in conversation with your community! Thanks for reading. More to come from the ICED conference soon!

Do you ASPIRE to recover from your eating disorder?

Is your eating disorder your own little secret? Do you hesitate to confide in others, fearing they just wouldn't get it? Do you wish you had support from someone knowledgable about the struggle to recover, yet safe to share with?

Introducing the desperately needed ASPIRE, created by Cate Sangster, who knows a lot about these struggles, as you'll read. We connected through this blog as she embarked on her journey to recover, created a book together and are now dear friends. So read on and then visit ASPIRE!

"Ask someone off the street about eating disorders and they’ll probably tell you about skinny young girls with too much vanity and not enough substance to their lives. But those of us in the know, understand that the true landscape of eating disorders looks very different to this. 

Firstly we understand that eating disorders are not a lifestyle choice. They are not about vanity or attention seeking, but rather they are a severe mental illness that cannot be cured by guilt and ridicule. 

Secondly eating disorders are not just about anorexia. Bulimia and BED are far more prevalent and equally as devastating to the sufferer, both in terms of mental and physical health. 

And thirdly, we also recognise that this is not an illness that strikes only young girls. Increasingly it is being seen in older women as well as men. However little exists in the way of exclusive treatment centres or support networks for older adults.

ASPIRE, or Adults Supporting Peers In Recovery from Eating Disorders is group I started recently to fill the gap I felt existed for adults with an eating disorder. During my own recovery from anorexia I found that one of the places I felt most at home was on the FEAST facebook page, and Laura’s Soap Box (the FEAST founder’s personal blog) as the people on these sites were not only adults, but also parents like me. However these sites were set up to support carers – the parents of young ED sufferers – so was not really my place. As much as I enjoy Laura’s perspective on things, as well as the information shared by the parents, it is not set up to support sufferers.

This is where ASPIRE fits. Adults need information and support – we are often in the treacherous position of being in charge of our own recovery, as well as, in some cases, needing to raise a family at the same time. We have unique problems, but also unique skills and insights that we can use to help each other through the minefield of recovery. Being in charge of our own recovery means we have to make the decision to attend appointments, make and eat appropriate meals, take medication, hold down jobs, pay bills etc, all while our eating disorder is in control of our minds. Not impossible, but very difficult, especially when you are not accountable to anyone but yourself (and your eating disorder).

So where can you find ASPIRE?

-        blog – adult recovery tips and answers to questions from readers

-        facebookgroup - *new* a space for members to ask questions, reach out for support and provide advice to other adults sufferers

-        twitter – random thoughts on recovery, RTs from other ED tweeters and respected researchers, as well as inspirational quotes to get you through the week

-        pinterest – boards for recovery motivation

How can ASPIRE help me?

•        providing you with information about recent ED research
•        providing you with motivational advice and information
•       providing you with support  - talk to other adults in recovery, ask questions about the things that are on your mind
•        and you can provide others with support when you are in a good place – helping others gives great purpose to our lives. We have a wealth of experience we can use to help others just starting out on the recovery journey.

-          

The value of ASPIRE will increase with every member that joins. The more members we have to support each other and provide advice on the myriad of complicated situations that arise during recovery, the better!! Start by visiting the blog to find out more.

Look forward to meeting you soon."

Cate

http://aspire-network.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/welcome-to-aspire.html