Exactly like in the title - learning how to cope with and recover from BED/disordered eating, the process has lead me to a new lease on life. A new fresh take on life, if you will.
You might be reading this like - say what? Jocelyn...nothing good can come from living many of the best years of your life with any sort of eating disorders. You have every right to be bitter, angry, moody, mad at yourself, mad at the world, flinging blame everywhere. Uh...no. I beg to differ. Coming out of that mess and realizing my worth, realizing how amazing life can be, realizing that I have another chance at living my best life - is worth every ounce of pain and confusion. Realizing that FOOD is not the enemy, my body is not attacking itself, I don't need to be in weight loss mode 100 percent of the time no matter how big or small I am, it's ok to take a break. It's OK to have pizza for lunch and a big salad for dinner. It's OK to have a cheese burger one night and homemade soup the next. It's ok to practise gentle exercise like walking outside or yoga and still be able to reach healthy weight loss goals.
What over coming disordered eating has given/taught me
- The ability to slow down - patience
- The brains to question, research and study everything
- Appreciating real, home cooked food
- Appreciating the "experience" of meals
- Ability to trust my guts - intuitively eating and healing
- Expressing myself creatively
- Spirituality
- Realizing what I do and don't want to do ever again -patterns repeating themselves
Let me go through these one by one.
The ability to slow down - patience
For many years of my life I was on the yo-yo dieting train. I think my first diet was when I was 8 years old. Shocking and sad all at once but not really out of the norm these days. I bounced around (even until recently) trying all sorts of fad diets. I never learned how to be patient with myself. The weight didn't pile on over night and it definitely won't come off over night. I had to learn that the best thing for me and my system would just be eating and cooking clean, real, simple foods and partaking in gentle exercise like walking or yoga. I aim to mostly cook at home - we try our best for that unfortunately it doesn't always happen the way we would like it. But we are trying. I also try not to beat myself up for eating out or getting take out on occasion. I was a very busy "on the go child" Very heavily involved in the world of dance and competitive dance. Meals would be eaten on the go in the car to the next lesson and again I was always putting undue stress on my body from a young age to fit the typical dancer mold - to be thin and athletic. I was always the chunky child. I never really fit the mold and sadly didn't have the best support to realize it was OK that I didn't fit that typical ballerina profile. Taking time to sit at the table and enjoy my food or go for a stroll and enjoy the sights and sounds of nature and to learn how to really stop and meditate...these are all things that have really helped me intuitively heal myself.
Question everything, Research everything, study everything
I haven't gone into great lengths about this but I have lived for many years of my life unknowingly with a bad candida overgrowth. I also was diagnosed borderline hypothyroid when I was 9/10 years old. I don't suppose much was known back then about thyroid health and diet but typically if you have thyroid issues you should avoid gluten, dairy, and greasy carbs. I grew up eating ALL of those things in mass quantities. I also didn't realize why I had all these freaky symptoms until i visited with a natural doctor and nutritionist. From the age of 17+ I would live with weird dry skin, cracks and rash all over my hands that even a dermatologist could not figure out what it was and would prescribe steroid creams that would make it worse, terrible UTI and yeast infections, thrush in the mouth, intense sugar cravings, brain fog, and just in general a feeling of pain all over the body. As a child growing up I was pumped full of antibiotics instead of being allowed to let my body fend off sickness and infections for myself. I had tons of antibiotics for constant ear infections and asthma. I was also put on birth control quite young to control PMS, hormonal acne and more as well as accutane for really bad cystic acne I had. All of these heavy medications clog up and damage a perfectly healthy functioning liver which then creates havoc in the body. Add on top of it a binge eater who can't get enough sugar...it was the perfect storm for bad candida infection. Since then I have really looked into the affects of these mainstream medications and I only ever take antibiotics now when ABSOLUTELY necessary (aka last year when I had strep throat for a month) I urge you, if possible, really take a look at the medications you and your children take. Go the most natural route whenever possible. I have tons of natural herbal remedy books and subscribe to podcasts whenever possible to learn more.
Learning to appreciate and to cook food at home
This is pretty self explanatory. I fell into the trap of eating out, boxed, greasy, sugar laden foods a great deal of the time. Somewhere along the way I forgot what my grandmothers taught me - the importance of decent home cooked food. Food that you create at home with real, honest ingredients and that you know everything that is put in that dish. We still eat out from time to time - but nothing like I did before. Especially in my college and university years - I wasted so much money and time eating fast food just because I thought it was easier. AKA I was lazy and uninformed. I think so many health issues could be solved by people cooking and eating their meals at home. I do strive for this although we still do eat out from time to time ( hello McDonalds breakfast or Superbowl pizza) like I said..I am human, not perfect...
Check out this Ted Talk video below on this topic. I wasn't raised this way. But I am learning now as an adult.
Appreciating the Experience of meals
As mentioned above - for a great deal of my life I was always on the go. Always eating the next meal as I got to school, after school on the way to dance or after dance on the way home because it would be too late to eat once I got home. I'm not placing blame on anyone - it's no ones fault. Looking back it is what it is. Many families with active children in various programs do the same thing today and it will continue to be that way. When I was in university and college it became the norm to eat in my bedroom (even worse on the bed), at wacky hours due to studying, or just picking up fast food to go. It is quite typical in North America. It's not so typical across Europe. Did you know that in areas of France they are given a few hours off at lunch to cook and eat meals at home with family or friends? True, they eat lots of things like bread, meat and cheese but it's all quality, home grown and cooked and served fresh and in small amounts. They also enjoy it at the table, savouring it over a few hours while conversation is enjoyed. The company and ambiance (nice dishes, nice table wear, location) is just as important as the meal served. The meal isn't rushed or long forgotten afterwards. I think that's something that we North Americans typically miss the mark on. We are too busy, too much in a rush to make meal time important. I really enjoy sitting down in the evenings to enjoy dinner and conversation with my husband
Intuitively Eating and Healing
I think one of the most important things to come out of this whole mess was the ability to see and feel the importance of intuitive eating. Not subscribing to one more fad, trend or diet. To really understand and feel what my body is needing or wanting and knowing the difference! To learn what hunger feels like. Sometimes my body wants dessert - that's OK - as long as I'm still filling it with what it needs. I might go through a period where I eat less carbs, less gluten , less sugar - it's OK - it's not a diet, just a choice for that specific time and day. Nothing needs to be so restrictive and strict. It makes food, cooking, meal time full of misery. I mentioned to a friend the other day that food had become so overwhelming to me and I really just lost my love of good food, cooking it, eating it and serving it as well. I've learned the importance of enjoying a good detox and what it can give to the body to get it functioning properly again (detoxing the liver especially) I've learned the importance of meditation, slowing down and really feeling into what my body is needing on any given time or day. This is so important and profound to me that I named my website after it ;) Our body loves us. Our body is amazing. Our body is not attacking itself (my doctor would tell me this at 9 years old) due to the hypo thyroid diagnosis. But this could not be further from the truth. I refuse to beat myself up over what my next meal is going to be. I am not perfect. I am human.
Expressing myself creatively - finding new hobbies
When you are working on intuitively healing your body and your life - it's a good idea to find hobbies and ways to express yourself as an outlet and fuel to keep yourself going through the process as it can be hard and uncomfortable. This can be anything from gym classes, gardening, joining local clubs etc. I personally found for me that writing everything down from stories and experiences of my past to even keeping the food journal online really helped me to continue on this path. Sharing with other people in hopes of finding some sort of common ground, sharing the pain and trauma but finding the rainbow together...finding others out there like me. That's what helps me. If sharing my stories can help one person then that is worth it to me. There is many things that I would like to learn and do and it's never too late.
Spirituality
I have shared a little bit about what I like to call my spiritual awakening. Although I have always had this "spiritual" side to me - I believe the start of my spiritual awakening really helped me figure out my purpose in life and ultimately helped me figure out how I would go about healing myself. I couldn't NOT heal myself. I could no longer remain stagnant. The people I have come into contact with along this journey and resources they have shared with me since "the awakening" have helped me to learn how important things like shadow work is and how important consciousness is to the healing process of body, mind and spirit. This process is about so much more than just losing weight. I will be touching more on this as time goes on. It's an integral part to my puzzle and I think could help many people out there along the way too.
Breaking The Patterns
I do talk a lot about my past this is true...but it helps when i put it down on paper or type it out. It helps me let it go. I realize how skewed my view of food had gotten and if I ever have kids I never want them to have that attitude towards food and life. Food is just food, there is no good food or bad food, kids shouldn't be dieting, we should enjoy meals at the table and learn to cook good simple food. If we follow simple concepts such as these...obesity wouldn't become such an issue as we try to become healthy, functioning adults. Learn to love your body TODAY. Learn to love getting outside for a walk and releasing yourself from what the end result might look like (# of pounds lost) Release yourself from counting points or calories. For many years I was stuck in a binge/starve/diet/over exercising cycle. And it didn't do my body good. It didn't do ANYTHING good for me. In fact, progress slowed down for me. The harder I worked the less things happened for me.
It's time to slow down, my friends. Take it moment by moment and start enjoying your life now.
It took me over 15 years to get here...this is just what I have learned from much reflection. Do you have anything to add? Drop a line below :)
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