I Challenged My Eating Disorder For 60 Days

It feels very strange to be recording this, but it's good because it makes me accountable. I'm not defined by what I eat, I don't know, it's like a cycle where I feel like I could never win. May and I'm going to challenge my

eating

disorder

for two months. I have been struggling with an

eating

disorder

for as long as I can remember, my eating disorder actually started presenting as a binge eating disorder and that led to purging behaviors and then I went to therapy for this. I was diagnosed with binge eating disorder to compensate for the amount of binge eating.

I started restricting during the day and as I got my binge eating under control, my restriction skyrocketed and that's when I developed. Severe anorexia from the end of September to the end of December. I was losing weight rapidly. Luckily, I went home for the holi

days

in December 2019 and my parents said they made me get checked out. He had an extremely low pulse rate, so low that the nurse had to redo it. I did it three times because she told me that she should be dead if she had the pulse that she had and after that I started treatment for my eating disorder and did an intensive outpatient program for three months and that ended in March.

He had things under control. control I knew I still had a long way to go, but I felt like I could handle it and then the pandemic hit and it definitely took me a couple steps back in October 2020. I actually started treatment again. I'm very lucky and now, instead of being disappointed, I honestly feel more grateful to be able to do it again, so I wanted to do this challenge for myself. The next two months will be all about food. We have Thanksgiving, we have Christmas, we have New Year's. It's a really pivotal moment for me to make the decision to do the exact opposite of what my eating disorder tells me to do.

I know it won't be like a 180 degree turn where I feel super comfortable and have a great time eating everything. this meal, but I'm determined to take steps in the right direction. I'm terrified, but I don't think I'll ever stop being afraid, so let's start this challenge. I've actually been up all night crying because I'm so terrified of all the food I'm going to eat and it's so easy because I still love Thanksgiving. We're using like vegan butter and I'm eating all these oils and fats and things that I'm just not comfortable with, but I want to be and I'm trying to allow myself to spend time with my family and have a good time, but it's really hard when, like, everything.

What I can think, my body doesn't deserve anything I'm going to put into it. I don't know, it's like a cycle where I feel like I could never win. Okay, so I put on my big girl pants, took a shower and let's do this. It's going to be difficult, but I'll do it. and I'm in my kitchen and I'm going to help cook and maybe it's hard, but you know, that's part of the process. The vegetables are all chopped, I honestly feel good about that, but now we're making the cake. the one where the crust includes two and a half sticks of vegan butter in my little pea brain doesn't sit well with me, I don't know, maybe if I spend enough time with her we'll start to get along, this just doesn't sit well with me.

I've barely eaten today and I'm literally preparing to binge. My girlfriend is here and I'm trying to take her out to dinner and then she's like, look, you need dinner too. My first instinct was, “Okay, me.” I'm going to eat like this cauliflower rice stir fry, which is literally just vegetables, which is not enough for anyone. I'm trying hard. We'll add a little more sausage so we can get some protein. I must admit that it is definitely better. have something other than just vegetables in my food, so one point for me, zero points for eating disorder as of now, I'm having a battle in my head right now, like my eating disorder is telling me I need to throw up immediate because under no circumstances world, should I feel full, the recovery side of my brain is like you need that food, there will be many more negative consequences if you throw up.

It feels very strange to be recording this, but it's good because it makes me accountable. I'm fine going up the stairs in my head, I literally have two options right now and it's one: throw up everything I just ate or two, go down and binge as much as I can, but I know both options are my eating disorder so I kind of need to find the third option, which is just being present with myself in this moment, staying with the discomfort. I'm going to do a meditation and try to center myself. I hope that helps, literally.

The first thing I thought when I woke up was that I was going to skip breakfast. because my family eats thanksgiving at 2:30. so if I skip breakfast, then okay, then I can eat. No, what we are not going to do today is start off on the wrong foot. I feel like last night's meditation really helped me. I'm really just trying to use those affirmations and just to reassure myself. I guess I deserve the food. My body is not that different from anyone else's. I deserve it so much. Another thing I'm doing in treatment is like trying to do.

The opposite of what my eating disorder tells me, the whole time when I was about to get dressed this morning I thought, "Okay, I want to wear a really big shirt because I don't want to see my stomach, but I want to look cute." we're going to fit in the hut, so once again a little bit of my stomach is showing and that's okay and when I'm full that's okay too happy thanksgiving from my family to yours, it's a good tradition, I only got seconds, literally the first person to get the second. It's thanksgiving you can have two plates you're supposed to have two plates honestly it's okay it's okay and the real fear starts my mm-hmm outside I literally had to withdraw everything inside me tells me to throw up right? now i ended up eating a big cookie and then two pieces of cake, oh my god now i'm so disgusted with myself even though i saw everyone else literally getting the same amount of cake as me.

I'm not trying to do the same. The same meditation as before until the urge literally passes. As soon as I stopped recording, I went into the bathroom and I was about to throw up, but I'm not going to. I'm going to document myself walking down because I don't need to throw up my mind is telling me that I do it doesn't mean anything because my mind is lying to me hello so we're fighting the urge so I had to change my shirt and my name is big sweatshirt now and I honestly feel so much better, it's a bit disappointing to have to use it again.

I think it's a better alternative than vomiting. I'm still pretty proud of myself, so we're two

days

after Thanksgiving and this was a lot. more successful than I thought I was going to be knowing that I could have thrown up, I could have continued with that pattern and I almost did what I actually almost did and as soon as I got out and sat down, my leg was literally like shaking from the next hour. because I couldn't stop thinking about it, but I told my family and my girlfriend and I said, Hey, listen, please don't let me go and if I do, come with me and it's like a marker of growth. being able to ask for help that I know I need instead of just ignoring it.

Yes, I feel proud of myself for how Thanksgiving went, but it's also like I'm still struggling, like I haven't really been able to get out of these extra problems. big sweatshirts, so in my family the day after thanksgiving means Christmas, I'm already thinking literally a month in advance because every year on Christmas Eve we make fried dumplings and I'm so afraid to eat something fried because I won't like fried. food I just want to be able to eat and not think about it so much. This whole part of my recovery is about thinking about it because I need to be aware of what I'm doing, so now thinking about my meals was important, but hopefully one day it won't be today, even though I've really been eating.

The reason I'm so hungry is because I didn't eat enough yesterday and I've found myself overeating. I'm literally like I'm watching. to every single thing in my kitchen because I want to binge so badly and I'm trying to get away from it and I'm trying to get away from the feelings, I'm trying to just sit with it, yell at my girlfriend for being my tooth brushing partner to Don't do stupid things in the bathroom. I'm not growing today, it's currently December 7th and I just had arguably the worst binge I've had since I started my recovery, I honestly don't remember 90 of In the last hour there is a big difference between nourishing your body by eating the foods that you need to eat versus completely losing control and feeling like I can't stop no matter how much I want to.

In fact, I reached out to one of my friends who also struggles with this type of thing. She sent me a link to this yoga exercise that is supposed to help with swelling. She recommended using it because I guess it helped her physically feel a little better after a binge. I have been trying to do this yoga. and then I already contacted my therapist and we're going to talk about this tomorrow good morning, so it's almost Christmas, it's December 23rd and I've caught myself skipping breakfast like almost every day, I'm going to wake up and be like "Oh my God , I need to get back to sleep so I don't have to eat yet, so this morning I caught myself doing that again and I finally take responsibility for making this decision to get out of bed, make my breakfast." It's progress, I recently made a big bowl of oatmeal.

I've been seeing a lot of these types of things to eat with me on Tik Tok and honestly, I find them really comforting. Eating alone can be very difficult and watching those videos makes me feel. Like I have a little bite to eat, if you need it, I'll do it for you today, let's give our bodies what we deserve, so I'll go first with really good oatmeal, okay, your turn, I hope it tastes good, I hope you choose something good. I'm going to finish this, finish that and I'll check back later. Well hello, I just finished lunch and I have the craziest urge to binge right now because sometimes I almost use binge eating as a layer of escape.

If I binge, then I have a reason. to be upset and I have a reason to feel these feelings of shame that I'm already feeling and it's easier to accept those feelings when I can blame it on something, but that's very self-destructive and I don't deserve it. to feel bad right now I ate a very good breakfast I ate a very good lunch I'm going to go for a drive I'm going to go somewhere nice and I'm just going to get distracted sometimes that's what you have to do, one thing to note that I eat oatmeal for breakfast almost every day and that's something I'm trying to stay away from because it's a safe food for me right now, it's more important that I eat anything and I'm going to continue Try to integrate unsafe foods as I go.

Time passes, but since I've been in a difficult situation, I'm just giving myself a break. My sweet mom, who literally knew nothing about this, came up to me and said, Wow, that's a really big bowl of oatmeal earlier, if I'd heard that, I wish I'd thrown it away or done something so I wouldn't have to eat it. or saying I was full, whatever it is, this is the same amount of oatmeal I literally eat. every day and I know this is the amount of oatmeal that makes me feel full and makes me feel satisfied and gives me energy for my day and today is particularly hard because it's Christmas Eve and today we're making cookies oh I'm so I'm sick of thinking in food all the time.

I deserve this food. My body deserves this food. People like me for many things besides my looks. This may not seem like a big deal, but I'm just putting cream in my coffee for the first time. first time, literally, maybe ever, I know I could have drunk this coffee black, I know I could have added water, whatever it was, no one was here to tell me I should make the other decision, it was like I was having a hard time accept it. This whole greed situation. I'm stressed about my parents' health. I'm stressed about the fact that I'll have to self-isolate for at least two weeks.

I'm going to emphasize that I could have it. I'm stressed because something could happen to them and now I'm sitting on my bathroom floor trying to convince myself not to throw up. I binged and that's okay and I don't need to throw up and I don't need to make up for it later. This is very difficult. I'm going to take a nap or something, the anxiety is already coming out of me, my parents and I have had to isolate ourselves from each other, we haven't been able to literally be in the same room because my parents We have corona, we finally are, this is literally our first day that we can all be together and I am very happy about that and we are going to redo our Christmas.

I think a big part of me has been really grateful that it didn't happen. And I hate, I hate, I hate to admit that because no part of me is happy that my parents got sick, like it was a really constant anxiety and everything was so overwhelming, but there was a small part of me that was relieved and I didn't. . I don't have to eat this food that I knew was going to happen. I'm vegan now, but at the time I was just a vegetarian and I was very happy to be a vegetarian, soI never had to eat any of these wontons again.

I said this here, I'm a shame, I can't eat it, I'm vegan, there's no way I could have recognized that and I'm getting over it now I find that substitutions, things like that, are huge, huge, huge markers of me in terms of my recovery. , another thing is that I'm wearing a very tight t-shirt that shows part of my stomach, if I then get a little food, baby, that's okay and normal. Welcome to our family tradition. In fact, I'm excited to see how they are with this. impossible burger when we started this tradition we actually made it inside and it was a disaster so now we fry outside.

Wow yeah, I'm usually not a filler, I'm a friar, so this is what suits me so well that I didn't do it. I realize how much I missed this. It didn't feel like Christmas when we were all sitting in our own rooms on Zoom. A pretty sad Christmas. Well, now throw it in the pile of facts. Look at her honestly. Usually seeing this oil there would make me feel so happy. terrified but it's a little easier to have people with me right, look at those brown edges wow they look good eh yay appetizer time oh the vegan ones might be better the last two wontons my parents actually decided they weren't hungry because they had a breakfast a little bigger with me, I know I'm still hungry, so I'll still eat.

My therapist told me the other day that she told me that if you had a Toyota Camry and your friend drove a Prius, you wouldn't do it. Don't just don't fill your gas tank just because you didn't need that much gas to get to your destination. Some cars or bodies need more fuel than others, so all of our bodies have different size gas tanks. I'm going to eat this maple. I'm going to eat tofu with rice because I know I like it better and yes, it will be harder to make it alone, but they will still be there to support me.

I deserve to eat it when my body feels hungry no matter what. other people are eating, my mom actually decided she was going to eat, but he didn't, I'm not hungry, there's no clean bowl club, not really she, but I did and it's okay that I finished it and she didn't, what? Can you tell how much I made it? I don't believe that phrase, but it is, I'm really so full and my brain is screaming at me that I'm too stupid, but I'm not going to do it. I'm having dessert, which may seem strange, but it's a graham cracker with frosting.

Don't write it off until you try it, but it's my third one and it was really good, so I'd say it was a really successful day and as much as I'd love these thoughts to go away, they would make my life a lot easier. I sure know right now that that's not realistic for me, so dealing with them, dealing with them, it's better not to listen to them, as much as a success for me right now. I had a snack, but it wasn't that big or anything. My stomach was raw. It looks like a turtle shell right now like it's sticking out so much from my body, literally everything in my body and brain is like screaming at me.

I just got off the phone with my therapist we talked for half an hour we just talked about things like ways to cope I did some breathing stuff and I'm just trying to distract myself now I'm going to watch some Netflix I've been getting too comfortable with my oatmeal this morning I'm eating some vegan greek yogurt with granola and blueberries and I was going to put something less caloric instead of granola but I knew I really wanted vanilla so I'm eating granola and I also had my coffee creamer a month ago I wouldn't be enjoying this and I'd be too busy freaking out about what I was eating or whatever, this is really good, so two months off, honestly these last two months were some of the hardest of my life.

I was really surprised at how much recording this whole experience helped me and how connected I felt. For people who haven't even seen this yet, I'm filming this before it comes out, obviously, but something about knowing that other people would maybe be watching it and following it, it almost feels like we're doing it together. My advice to people struggling with similar things is to just keep trying, don't be afraid to be afraid. I also think you need to give yourself time to make mistakes and give yourself time to take steps back, as long as you try, that's all you can do.

This feeling of success and pride is something I don't want to let go, so I'm definitely going to try to keep pushing myself, taking it one day at a time. Will you ever want to come back to this? Watch me say this. Again you have this, we have this in every moment that you are free from your thoughts about the eating disorder, even if it lasts like two minutes, that is progress and hopefully one day it will be our entire life.