Eating disorder recovery

are you stickles?

>>18367492
only in my dreams :'-(

>>18367488
I don't really get it. Do you not like being fat? Lift weights, add on a lot of lean muscle mass.

Literally every bodybuilder has an eating / image disorder but they're pretty healthy from having lots of lean mass I guess

>>18367716
I have a BMI of 17. What part of my post made you think I was overweight?

>>18367488
What kind of therapy? Were they experienced in eating disorders? You didn't mention if you were a guy or a girl - if you're a guy, you probably want a therapist who is experienced with male EDs.

What happened with the nutritionist? Have you worked on meal plans?

What's your ED? How does it present? What do you care about?

I'm working on self recovery personally, but I don't know if my ED relates with yours. I've been doing binge/restrict EDNOS/anorexia for around 6 years, been recovering since February.

>>18367731
Bad reading comprehension on your part. I understood you were underweight, which is why I asked if you don't like being fat?

I don't understand eating disorders

>>18367765
>I don't understand eating disorders
I'm not OP, but yes. This is clear.

Have you gotten a blood test?

Maybe your hormones are out of whack?

>>18367763
They were female; I'm also female. I wasn't their first patient with an ED, but they weren't a specialist or anything, I don't think.

The meal plans just reminded me of what I was already doing. I started overcounting calories so it would look like I was eating more than I was, and if I actually followed the meal plan, I'd usually end up purging at least once every couple days which kind of sabotaged my progress.

I typically just restrict now, though sometimes there's a month or two where I purge a lot more than usual. I care less about the way I look than how the food feels in my stomach. I used to binge and purge really frequently, especially for the first couple years, but I've gradually moved away from that and more towards restriction.

It sucks to see someone else dealing with something similar, but I'm glad you're also trying to change. Gives me some hope

>>18367780
This is the first I've heard about that sort of a solution. Do hormones affect the development of EDs? Might sound stupid, but I had no clue there was a relationship.

What should I look into doing if I needed to get that sort of test done?

>>18367913
I can't tell you any specific for a girl but with guys you can have hormone imbalances that do weird stuff like can't loose weight or have cappy metabolism

It's not like deathly but you can correct them. The biggest ones are test replacement therapy

Get blood work done, should be maybe 150 out of pocket in the USA and talk to a good endrocologist, I think it's what they are called.

You might have some imbalance in your body that isn't too hard to correct

If you go to the gym a lot you will get hungry and just make sure you eat good normal home cooked food

Also look into juicing green vegetables

>>18367913
Therapists honestly need to be shopped around. You've gotta find someone who you feel comfortable with. It's good to have a relationship where you can work towards being honest about when you purge or restrict, who won't make you feel guilty or ashamed.

Though have you had any work done for other things? Are you taking any meds? I've been with therapists on and off for depression and inattentive ADD. I was in denial about my ED so I didn't talk to them about it. I'm on duloxetine and IR ritalin.

Congrats on the slow down of your b/p! Purging is really hard on you.


I'm the kind of person who likes to experiment, so I don't really prescribe to only doing the typical "no limits" type of recovery. Though I'm also not as committed to recovery as some people may be. Eh. I've only had the chance to experiment for a bit, so I'm still working on it. My main goal is to not keel over and to regain control.

I tried keto for a couple months, which was fun. If you don't like fullness, you might get a kick out of it. Calorie dense foods mean that you have to eat less mass to get the same energy. There's less floating around in your stomach. I got a little obsessive over the macros, but I think a general LCHF diet could be helpful. Be sure to drink a lot of water if you do.
It also completely kills cravings, which I was crazy about.
Oh, and I haven't heard anything about hormones and EDs. I feel like that's something I would have run into. I would maybe suspect that if there was a sudden recent change, but you've been dealing with this for a while. It's worth it to research, though. If you learn anything while this thread is up, let me know.

>>18367954
Again, I'm not OP, but eating disorders are generally mental disorders. It's not that OP can't lose weight or that she isn't hungry. I think I can safely assume that she is feeling hungry and making the decision not to eat.

You really don't know anything about eating disorders. Typically when I give advice here, I like to gather information about what is going on before I start giving advice. Ask questions. Because you obviously do not know what the problem is here. You can't give a solution if you don't know the problem.

>>18367971
Hormone imbalance's can make your head go out of whack too

Getting you blood work done to make sure isn't a bad idea though it may not fix the ops problem

No expertise in eating disorders specifically but lots in body issues

Op, is there anything else bothering you that might be causing this?

Some sort of trauma or bad event in the past?

>>18367983
The issue is that you look pompous and ignorant when you talk with such confidence about things like, "Just make sure you eat good normal home cooked food"

That is not a solution to this problem.

Yeah, sure, getting your blood work done wouldn't be a bad idea for anybody. But I know that I sure as hell am not going to drop one hundred and fifty dollars for an irrelevant test. If there was a strong connection between hormones and EDs, then I would be willing. But I have never heard of this.

You talk about physical problems. But eating disorders are honestly not largely physical problems. If you magically poofed someone with an eating disorder into peak physical health, that would not cure their eating disorder. They would likely revert right back to where they were (and there are people who do this after they get hospitalized!).

You really do not understand what you are talking about.

You saying "just eat better" to someone with an eating disorder is like telling someone with depression that they should "just feel better".

>yes I'm mad

>>18367963
I was on Zoloft but it wasn't helping anything so I quit seeing my psychiatrist & stopped. Things aren't perfect or anything, and I probably still have depression, but moving out of a dangerous living situation improved a lot of the mood stuff for me. Not currently prescribed any meds; I abuse opiates & occasionally Adderall because they decrease my appetite, but not with any degree of frequency (I try hard not to because I know it's a shitty, expensive habit)

I don't know, I think with this kind of shit it's hard to be 100% totally committed to recovery. Rationally, I can understand that I need to eat & I'm doing a good thing by choosing to eat, but I still have a visceral negative reaction to the food being in my body & it's hard to commit to recovery completely when dealing with that.

I really appreciate you talking to me about this stuff. It seems like we're dealing with similar things and hearing what helped you makes me feel a lot better about my options. I'll probably give keto a shot and see if it helps me. Thank you so much, fr

>>18368009
Yeah. I grew up w an abusive parent and giving/withholding food because I was getting chunky was one of the ways he exerted control. I'm not at my lowest point bc I don't have to live there anymore, but it's still wearing me down & I'm gonna try to get rid of it

>>18368026
Group hugz? Don't be mad
Were all here to help

>>18368033
Perhaps this is where the problem formed and needs to be addressed ?

Lots of difficult problems can grow out of such situations.

Are you in a good environment right now?
Do you have any stress in your current enviroment?

>>18368047
yeah I know

I'm in a great environment, my mood stabilized a bit after I came here. Just leaving a bad environment typically isn't enough to help you deal with all the fallout, though, even if it's helpful

>>18368054
OK step 1 is great
Be in a positive enviroment

How do you feel otherwise?
Do you think your eating problems resulted directly from this past abuse?

Are you happy with yourself?

>>18368033
I'm glad that I could help! Ever since I've come out of denial about this I just can't stop thinking and talking about it hah. I was a little desperate at first to find someone, anyone who could understand where I was coming from.

I'm glad that you're in a safer place. A good environment is so important.

Medication kinda sucks with how fiddly it is. It took me 5+ years to find a prescription combo that worked for me. It takes a while since you need to take each new prescription or dosage change for 1-2 months before deciding if you want to change to a new one.

It freaks me out a little bit on what this medication does for me. It feels a bit like magic. I had an experience recently where I ran out, and I got to remember what I was like off it. I was staring at myself in the mirror thinking about how much I hated myself and wanted to die, I couldn't enjoy the great news I had gotten during that time, I was tired and didn't care about taking care of myself. Before recently, I didn't really have those problems any more now that I'm on it.

Recently I've come across some stress (moving to new city in with bf, leaving home town, trying to find job, issues with college) so some old habits have come up- like not getting enough sleep, avoiding homework, not going through my daily to-dos, general hand wringing. But I've decided that that is not unexpected with my situation. In the past, in such a position I would be completely non functional. I'm still showering daily, more or less. I call that a success.


>>18368047
>Group hugz? Don't be mad
>Were all here to help
Thanks. I like hugs.

Go Vegan, Work Out

>>18368033
Oh, and since you said you liked hearing what helped me-

This stress has inspired me to fall off my ketosis wagon (initiated by a drunken party with fancy cupcakes) so I've been binging on carbs for 2-3 weeks. I'm trying something scary and letting myself binge without compensating with restriction. I stopped the restricting previously by not binging, so I'm testing to see if I can stop the binging by not restricting.

I'm playing the long con. If I can get myself under control, then I can get back to some high restriction.

I think that my subconscious is acting like a starved cat. I think there's a part of me that is worried that I won't let myself eat these treats again, so I've gotta eat them all right now. I'm letting myself calm down. I'm already getting to a point where it's just not as orgasmic as it was just a week ago. I also tried something crazy and ate dinner before I binged on desserts, instead of just eating only desserts. I realized that I associate eating a craving size of dessert with restricting my meals that day to compensate. I'm trying to introduce the concept of dessert WITH dinner to my head. And I actually stopped today. I was surprised. I didn't feel the itch to go back.

So I've been working on figuring out the preconceived notions I have in my head and how I can change them.

Hey OP, I have to go. If you want to talk more about ED stuff, send me an email at [email protected]
I hope things smooth out for you. Take care.

>>18367913
Stop counting calories. This will be hard. Calorie counting is an addiction in and of itself.

After you stop, make sure you eat a small meal ******three times****** a day. Try calorie dense foods like meat and fats (fat doesn't make you fat. It's a myth). Go for liquid calories if you find food makes you uncomfortable.

I agree with >>18367963 though. Good therapists are hard to find. The medical system is whack. Don't give up hope. Shop around. Figure out what caused you to have the views about body image and food that you have now. It's the only way to get to a point where you can be healthy and not even notice.