However, just because you have unwittingly bought into a culturally proscribed stereotype of what type or size body you would be comfortable inhabiting does not mean you have to live your whole life from that perspective. The difficult and lovely thing about personal perspective is that it can be changed at any time. By this I mean, you can at any moment decide to make feeling comfortable in the body you have a priority goal of yours. And then, once it becomes a priority goal, you will begin day by day to challenge your own vision, thoughts and feelings for validity when you catch yourself making disparaging remarks about your body, or wishing your body was different. You will begin to ask yourself, ‘do I see beauty in her, but not in me, because I have been told that only certain bodies are beautiful, or because I have independently decided that beauty exists there?’ And you must go over that dialogue in your mind as often as it takes until you begin to be able to include your own unique look, shape and size in the category of ‘beautiful’.

Now, since I do not know for certain what you mean when you say ‘comfortable’, that may not have even begun to answer your question. For instance, if you are searching for acceptance of the way your body looks, feels and moves post-treatment, then I will say that you should expect it to take awhile for your emotional and mental acceptance to catch up with your physical transformation. One issue that seems to crop up frequently upon discharge from inpatient treatment, for instance, is that the person is restored to physical health, but has inadequate mental and emotional readiness to maintain that physical health. One reason for this can be a lack of alternatives in the ‘coping skills tool bag’ for times when life gets tough and the habit has been to turn to an eating disorder for refuge.

Another issue I have personally experienced, and I know other women have also experienced, is the tremendous discomfort brought on by a condition called ‘body dysmorphia’, which is when you are unable to accurately perceive your body shape and size. In this case, you simply have to find another way to ‘see’ yourself – sometimes I use my friends’ eyes and ask for feedback from people I truly trust to let me know how I should perceive my physical appearance. But I also have learned to mentally accept that I will never have the ability to truly see my size and shape for what it is – that is just part of the package for me in the aftermath of a lengthy eating disorder. So I can put it aside in my mind to some degree so that it no longer controls, or destroys, my days.

If you would like to write again with more clarification about what you meant by ‘comfortable’, I would be glad to explore this again with you in future editions of Good News. Hang in there – much love,

Shannon

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