Advice About Slipping Back Into Old Habits
Hi -

A friend sent me to your website and I was just listening to your music - it's beautiful. I think it's really amazing what you are doing. I am currently in recovery from anorexia and bulimia. I was very sick for five years and I'm coming out of it now, but I have a long way to go. Do you ever slip? Sometimes recovery scares me a lot and I wish I was sick again...anyway, I hope I haven't bothered you - take care.

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Hi - I'm so glad you wrote! Thanks for the sweet words about the music...how wonderful that you have a caring friend who helped you connect with someone who has been in your shoes in recovered.

First of all - I'm proud of you for taking the initiative to reach out for help! It sounds like you have some good friends and that you support each other, and that is a very good sign of your progress. You have contacted me to ask for some perspective on what's coming down the road for you as you continue to make the day-by-day choice to recover. And I want you to know that the last thing in the world your email would ever be to me is a bother...I do what I do now because I used to be standing in your shoes and there was no one around who knew how to help me.

So it is my honor and joy to talk with you, offer encouragement, and affirm that YES, recovery is worth it. It is. You will have days (maybe even the day you wrote to me) when you will wonder if it is. You will have days when you don't feel 'recovered', and days when you don't act 'recovered' (ie. you slip). But that doesn't mean you are not making progress. I have a perspective you do not yet have, but you will have it in time too...and then, like me, you will see that it is worth every bit of energy and every ounce of your strength and every dollar in your bank account and every tear you will ever cry to get there. My life today is 180 degrees different than when I was still sick. It is so much better - so much greater - than I ever thought it could be. To be happy more than unhappy, laughing more than crying, eating without stress and feeling better when I eat than when I don't, doing what I love (making music and public speaking) with my life, talking to young women like you and taking courage from your courage....I am living proof that dreams CAN come true if you decide that you WANT them to!

And by the way, the fear you mention is a very normal part of the recovery process. You've probably read some of my replies to others who ask similar questions on the Key To Life website - our disease is a product of our mind's wrong understanding of where happiness is found. Every magazine cover and newspaper ad and TV show tells us that thin = happy. But all around you and me there are people who do not fit that mold who are incredibly happy, productive, generous and truly beautiful people who are living totally fulfilling, joyful lives rich in love and purpose. How's that for showing the world's 'truth' for the lie that it is! So you and I, and your friends online, are ready to wake up from that lie, from that bad dream. We are ready to find out what REAL life, healthy life, is all about. But the world isn't going to suddenly stop running ads of anorexic supermodels whose photos have been electronically altered just because you and I aren't buying into their marketing schemes anymore. The world will go on as it is - trying to make money by selling fear and false hope.

So it is important in light of that to understand that the fear comes in letting go of this old paradigm and all the false evidence ('marketing') that supports it that you and I as eating disordered individuals bought into in the past - that thin = happy. The fear come when we decide to choose life and to recover but then we start to wonder - what if we decide that thin doesn't = happy and we're wrong? What if the eating disorder WAS telling the truth when it told us it was our best friend and could meet all our needs and make all our dreams come true? What if healing means getting fat - what if there's nothing in between too thin and too fat - no balance where we can be healthy and still be thin and beautiful? You and I both can think of a hundred other 'what if's' that could contribute to that fear that are equally as invalid and un-provable as these....and it might even be helpful to make a list of each 'what if' you can think of when the fear comes. Then you can go back to the list (I've done this, by the way - it does help) when the fearful feelings arise and say 'oh, that's #23', or 'oh, that's #35'. You will start to see recurrences of the same fearful thoughts over and over again - in fact, it is the thoughts themselves that are causing your fear, and the sooner you start to see that the easier it will be to disregard any thought that triggers fear.

Fear can be very powerful in stalling us in our recovery efforts if we don't understand what causes fear. Fear is caused by three things:

1. Doubting our own Truth (i.e. doubting what we know to be true, for instance - eating to fuel our bodies is the right action to take to live a responsible, mature, healthy and happy life; thin does not = happy.)

2. Letting our minds run away with us and think whatever they are accustomed to thinking (i.e. you wake up each day and look in the mirror and think 'wow I'm fat!' but you never actually check that out with reality and you choose to restrict instead of giving your body the fuel it needs.) Thoughts breed emotions - emotions such as fear.

3. Being afraid of yourself. Fear cannot withstand the power of knowledge - have you ever heard that 'Knowledge is Power'? It is very true. Right now you are afraid of your own mind, which is controlling you and perpetuating your disease. It is in the mind where you are sick; your body is just bearing the brunt of the disease. But you are not your mind. Your mind is a part of you. And right now a little part of your mind has something akin to cancer - it is sick. But it will respond to radiation and chemotherapy (right thinking, right information, right action) and in time it will think healthy thoughts again and you will not be divided within your own skin.

Finally, I'll tell you that recovery isn't what most people think it is. 'Recovery' isn't where all of sudden all the thoughts and desires to engage in the eating disorder go away and never come back. I still struggle every day with what I call 'the old tapes' - those old mental messages that whisper to me that anorexia or bulimia would be a good way to manage my stress, make me feel better, get what I want, etc etc etc. Every single day I have moments when, if I wanted to, I could relapse or slip.

I just choose every day not to. It's a daily walk - recovery doesn't happen in week or month or year-long increments. It happens each day. Each day you wake up and you have the same choice - live or die. Stay sick or heal. But for awhile you will not make the best choices every single day when you are confronted with those questions. Recovery is like a pendulum swinging - you've spent so long swung way out to the left, really really sick, and then you'll spend awhile swinging out to the right and really really trying to heal, but there's so much momentum built up in the pendulum's swing that you can't just stop it in the center all at once. You'll have days when you do really well. And you'll have days you don't do so well. But after awhile you'll see that the swinging motion gets smaller and shallower - the pendulum is starting to slow down. And finally, like it has for me, the pendulum's motion will cease and rest in the center - balanced, healthy, and totally committed to choosing life no matter what.

Be patient with yourself. That is my #1 bit of advice for you. Do NOT let your mind discourage you when you slip and tell yourself you can't do it. You CAN. I slipped off and on for a few years before my pendulum of sickness-to-health stopped swinging - but I don't slip anymore. If I can ride it out and heal, you can too. Do NOT beat yourself up when you have a not-so-good day. And whatever you do - do not get mad at yourself when you want to go back to the disorder again. That is a natural desire - the disorder feels like 'home' to you because you've lived there for so long. No matter that you were abused in that home, that your needs weren't met, that your life was threatened...it still feels like home to you because in this disease what is bad looks good and what is good looks scary and bad. You simply must be patient with yourself in order to recover. You didn't break overnight - you won't heal overnight. But you broke over time and you can and will heal - completely - over time.

Please know you are more than welcome to keep in touch, let me know how you're doing, and if you need encouragement and support I am here. You are a very brave young woman and you should feel VERY proud and encouraged that you are turning your back on a disease that will kill over 50,000 young people this year. You made it out before that happened to you. You have chosen life just like I did. Now you just have to go through the process of recovering your potential and regaining your health so you can live the wonderful life that is waiting for you right around the corner.

Please stay in touch and let me know if there is anything else I can do to help or support you.

blessings & love,

Shannon