Advice About Binging/Weight Gain & Healing
Hello -

I came about your site one night... I thought it was interesting how we have something in common... we both have anorexia/bulimia....I hate those words. I don't know if you're still going through it; I hope not since it is an awful thing to have. I however am... this time last year I was in the hospital for 3 months for low weight and heart problems and then a little time after I was released I was put in again for a lower weight. Now that I have been released I have gotten into the binge phases, which is what I think is the worse part. I have gained quite a bit of weight and I haven't felt so bad in my life. All I want is to lose some weight but I find it's too hard right now with the binging. I'm scared to gain any more weight. Everyone says I look normal but I always want to look smaller. If you have any advice I would be glad to hear it. Thanks!

***

Hi - thanks for writing. To answer your question about my own experience with an eating disorder - I struggled with anorexia/bulimia from age 11 to age 27 - a 15-year battle from start to finish. I no longer have any difficulty in my relationship with food, and I consider myself to have healed completely from both disorders.

Please take heart! It doesn't matter how long it takes you to heal from it or how much time or money you have to spend - IT IS WORTH IT. This is your life we are saving here - a life that was created for a precious and unique purpose to uplift humanity, to offer something only you can give to others, and to bring the joy and love you deserve to have into your own life.

If anyone had told me five years ago that I would have the wonderful life I have today, doing work I love, with deep and beautiful friendships and family relationships, I would never have believed it was possible. But I am living proof that it is possible and I know you have the power to tell the same story in time as you heal.

Consider this - victims of eating disorders have an interesting personality profile. I did some research and found out that statistically-speaking, across the board, eating disordered individuals are motivated, type AAA personalities, above average to brilliant intellectually, socially conscious, really want to make a difference in the world, really want to know why they are here and what they are meant to do with their lives.

Did you know that over 95% of all people who diet can't keep a diet for more than 72 hours? And did you know that of the people who do successfully diet, about 95% of those people gain all their weight back and then some the following year? Compare and contrast that with you as an anorexic and bulimic - you've managed to keep a strict discipline of dieting for quite awhile if I am reading your email right. Do you know what that is? Misplaced discipline. Misdirected potential. Can you imagine what a shining star you would be if you channeled all the energy and perseverance you are now using to maintain your eating disorder into doing something fulfilling with your life?!?

Do you know who has the perfect combination of traits to be best able to heal from an eating disorder? Believe it or not, it is YOU - it is a person who has an eating disorder. Now you have entered a phase that is finally becoming unmanageable to you - bulimia. Now you are waking up to what the disease intends to do to your life - destroy it. And look what you are doing - you are reaching out for help. You are not giving up - for starters, you have found me, and you are seeking inspiration to keep fighting because deep inside you know that you were created for a wonderful purpose and that purpose is not to struggle with anorexia and bulimia!

I would respectfully submit to you that you really don't want to die - you really don't want your life to be lost in the grip of your eating disorder. An eating disorder is nothing but slow suicide - the coward's way out. You don't want to take that road - with your potential and your intelligence, you would have found a way to die by now if you really wanted to die. You just aren't sure why you really want to live yet. I don't want to assume anything, but I can guess that maybe you don't really know what you want to do with your life yet, or maybe you do and you are afraid you won't be able to achieve your dreams, so the eating disorder is a way to stay far away from having to try that hard and risk failing.

I would guess that you will find yourself somewhere between those two extremes - either lost and excelling in school to satisfy someone else's expectations of you, or desperately wanting to do and be something very specific and have somehow convinced yourself that it isn't possible for you to live the life you dream of.

Does that sound like it fits? It is critical for you to recognize that if you are here, you have a purpose in life, and it is guaranteed that you are supposed to do what your heart dreams of doing with your life. Knowing what you want to do and are born to do will give you the power to fight the disease and take your life back.

If you haven't seen this movie, go out and rent it - it's called 'Enough' with Jennifer Lopez. It is a perfect example of what an eating disorder does to us. The disorder lies to us - it is like an abusive significant other who says to us 'if you try to leave me you will die, and if you manage to escape you will NEVER find anyone who will love you and take care of you and ease your stress like I will.' In the movie, Jennifer Lopez wakes up and realizes that she doesn't have to take the abuse anymore - she can and will and does fight back and take her life back.

That is where you are. You have all the power you will ever need within you right now to take your life back and fight your way back from the disease. You just haven't fully connected with your will to live and your right to live a disease-free, happy, fulfilling, loving life doing what you love to do and being the person you were born to be. And if you are afraid of your light, afraid of the success you are experiencing now with academics and afraid you might not be able to keep it up (which of course you can - it is your birthright to succeed at what you are good at!), you may be diving into the eating disorder when your own light gets too overwhelming and you are seeking a place to hide for awhile - but this is not a safe hiding place for you. There are healthy ways to balance your life and rest while still working to be all that you can be.

I created Key To Life: Unlocking the Door to Hope to give hope and inspiration to others who are struggling with eating disorders. It is based on my own recovery from my eating disorder, and focuses on saying no to the worldly paradigm that outer 'beauty' equals inner beauty and a well-lived life.

Have you seen any of the 'Matrix' movies? If not, go rent the first one in particular, and watch it. Watch what happens when a small group of people wake up to the fact that other people they don't even know have taught them how to think and feel and act and react in life. It is a hard struggle for them to take their lives back and maintain their independence, but I think it's interesting, for instance, that American corporations have identified young people between the ages of 12 and 25 as having the largest amount of disposable income available to spend on products and services.

I don't think it's any coincidence that, given that most advertising that we see in most magazines is designed to encourage 12 to 25 year olds to spend money on products and services, 12 to 25 year olds are also the age category that suffers the most from eating disorders. We are fed a marketing Matrix - a web of lies that tells us that if we look a certain way, weigh a certain weight, and buy these products and services to help us achieve that look and weight, we will be happy, find love, be successful in life, be accepted and beautiful. But that is someone else's Matrix serving their own selfish ends and it doesn't hold water in what we see every day and the people we know who are all around us.

How many people do you know who are happy, who are leading fulfilling, productive, wonderful lives, who are loved and in love, who don't look like the super-thin super-models on the cover of Elle and People Magazine? I know many, many people who would never be on the cover of any magazine who I truly admire, who are truly beautiful to me, and who I know are truly happy. THAT is an accurate Matrix - a way of thinking and relating to food and life that recognizes that food has one purpose and one purpose only - it is fuel for the body.

I will share this one last thought with you for now, and please feel free to keep in touch with me, ask me any questions you have, and keep me posted on your progress.

But consider this - what if I told you that your body is nothing more or less than your car, and that food is nothing more or less than fuel for your car to keep running? Contrary to the corporate marketing Matrix we discussed above, your body and its appearance is not capable of giving you the dreams of your heart and the life of your dreams! It can't give anything to you at all and was never designed to - it can only get you to where you want to and are born to go, IF it is properly maintained and cared for.

Food is not emotional medication, and it cannot do anything more than fuel your car, your body, to get from one place to another. You give your body food and fluids, take it for a checkup once or twice a year, and it pretty much will do whatever you ask it to. It will get up, go to sleep, go to school, take you to a friend's house, to work, back home...whatever you ask it to do it will do for you without complaining, UNTIL you stop maintaining it and it starts to break down. Then you are stranded. Then you can't go anywhere, do anything, because your car no longer runs.

A big part of my healing process began when I realized this, and made a conscious effort to use food ONLY for the purpose for which it was intended - as fuel for my car, my body. Your body right now is like a car with all 4 wheels pointing in 4 opposite directions - it gets too much fuel one moment, not enough the next - it is breaking down. You need treatment on multiple levels to heal - a doctor/nutritionist for your body, a psychologist and maybe a psychiatrist for your mind/emotions, and if you are someone who believes in God, then I would recommend a pastor or spiritual counselor to help you strengthen your faith to continue to heal (I can also share with you that this was an essential element in my own healing process). And you didn't develop the disease overnight it took time so don't expect to heal overnight. Healing too takes time - it took a long time for me because I was sick a long time. But I did heal and you can too!

Try this for starters - buy a journal, and every morning when you get up write down just one thing BESIDES losing weight that you really want. Then ask yourself if weight loss has any power to help you achieve that day's goal. I also want you to spend some time each day contemplating what you want to see when you are 80 years old and you are looking back at your life. Go rent 'Titanic' and watch what happens at the end - when she is looking back at the full and amazingly rich, exciting, wonderful life she has lived and she is so grateful she didn t give up when life got hard when she was young so long ago.

Go get a copy of the book 'When I am an Old Woman I will Wear Purple' (I think that's the title of it!) Ask yourself how you want to be remembered - and if the eating disorder can play any part in giving you the life of your dreams.

Write down your goals - to succeed in school, to have a successful, fulfilling career, to have a family, close friends - whatever your goals are, and then answer for yourself the question 'Can my anorexia and bulimia add anything of value to my life or help me achieve these goals?' I want you to do this every single day first thing in the morning when you wake up. And I want you to seek out a good counselor who is qualified in treating eating disorders - I don't know where you are living but if you don't know someone in your area I can try to help you find someone.

If your family and your mom in particular are open to it, I would suggest that family counseling would also be highly beneficial as an addition to individual counseling, but individual counseling is where you should start. I hear what you are saying about your relationship with your mom being a possible trigger to your own food-related struggles, and if that is something you believe is a contributing factor, then I believe you when you say it is.

Unfortunately it sounds like you may not be able to move out at this time, but just recognize that ultimately this time right now is your opportunity to recognize what is triggering your eating disorder and take steps to heal from it, so please do not think that your living situation will prevent you from healing. There is nothing that can prevent you from healing if you decide you want to heal!

Take heart. Healing is possible. You are worth it. Please stay in touch. I am glad you contacted me and I will support and encourage you in any way I can.

many blessings and peace,

Shannon