Recovery from Anorexia

The end of this summer will mark the 3rd year I have been in recovery from anorexia. I was hospitialized for 5 weeks during the summer of 2005. This made me miss freshman orientation and the first week of classes during freshman year at college. I was also on contract with my college which lasted through my freshman year.

I started restricting due to PTSD (previous entry explains more). I had/have flashbacks when I eat so not eating means less flashbacks. After a while, it morphed into anorexia and didn’t stop until I was hospitalized.

In all, I had lost 24 lbs from the weight I started at to the weight I was hospitalized at and was, according to their ideal weight for me, 21% underweight. I’m only 5’1, so I guess it was pretty noticeable. Looking back at the pictures from that time (which I took almost every week along with weight and measurements) I still can’t see how "bad" I was. Maybe some day.

I am now about the weight I was when this all started. I gained 14 lbs in 5 weeks while in patient. It was painful, both mentally and physically. I don’t know where I would be today if I hadn’t been hospitalized. I met some wonderful people there that I am still in contact with.

There were some "steps" I followed to help me get, and stay, at a healthy weight with healthy eating patterns for so long:

1) Stop the eating disorder behavior. For me, this was restricting. I didn’t binge, I didn’t purge, I just restriected. I was also really active in dance and baton, but I did not seek out exercise to burn calories.

2) Find someone to be accountable to. My contract with the college served to keep my healthy and every week I was weighed, had therapy, etc. If I went back to restricting, they would find out and could kick me out. That brings me to the third step.

3) Find something you love that is not compatible with your eating disorder. For me, freshman year at least, it was college. I knew if I lost too much weight, they could kick me out. I had worked too hard for that. After my freshman year, I found something else, lifting weights. I LOVE liftings weights and even if I don’t eat enough before lifting, I notived a difference so I try my best to keep myself healthy, even if it means having horridflashbacks.

Whenever the PTSD gets bad, the desire to not eat returns. I have been lucky so far and have not relapsed into the anorexia. My weight has been healthy ever since I got out of in patient. I hope that it continues to be so and that in time, eating will not longer cause flashbacks.