How To Trust Your Body During Recovery

  1. Know that you will feel some discomfort during recovery - trust that this is part of the process.

  2. Let go of your need to control the outcome - what happens is what happens, we can’t change it. We can do things to make it better, like adjust how we eat or what we eat (e.g., organic foods, cooked vegetables instead of raw, avoidance of gas-producing foods until our intestines heal, etc.).

  3. Surrender – accept that this is the normal process. If you wish it away, get anxious about your body or get angry, you will increase your suffering. Once you focus your mind on what you wish “wasn’t true,” all of your energy starts to go into negative thoughts. If you focus your mind on accepting that you are recovering & your body may feel discomfort, your mind can be free to focus on the positives of recovery.

  4. Disengage your thoughts after eating - after you eat, do something active — go for a walk, call a friend, do the dishes, read a book or leave the house and go somewhere. Take your mind off of what you just ate & how it feels in your body. This really helped me — once I accepted that my body was feeling discomfort, I stopped thinking about it & used my mind for something else. If I focused on the way I felt & got anxious about it, I’d want to b/p. Once I realized this, I could disengage my thoughts from my body & do something to get me away from the kitchen & out of my head. Take your mind out of your body. Put your mind on something fun, uplifting and engaging.

  5. Eat when you are hungry - If you let yourself get too hungry, it could trigger a b/p. Studies show this to be true — if your body thinks it’s starving, it wants more — and more — and more. You lose the ability to become satisfied after a normal amount of food.

  6. Find your own normal - no one can tell you what’s normal for the quantity you eat. There are some guidelines from Ayurveda, a 5,000-year old Indian wellness practice. Ayurveda says that a guideline is to eat a meal the size of your two fists. The rest is for warm liquid, like tea & empty space to digest. While this is a guideline, you must trust yourself to find your own normal — experiment. If you make a mistake, experiment with something else the next time. Bodies don’t get fat overnight — trust yours to guide you. Sometimes you may eat more, sometimes less — that may be normal for you. The only way to know is to experiment — and to stay aware — stay in the moment, so that you can “listen” to your body. Close your eyes and visualize your inner body. Feel the aliveness, the tingling or any energy that it has. This is your true self, inside your body. It is the real you, rather than your outer body. Your inner body is where YOU are — your spirit. The more you tap into this, the more you will trust your own normal, rather than listening to someone else’s. All books are written for the masses – diets, etc., are all written for a conglomeration of people, not individuals. Each individual has different needs. For example, oranges & tomatoes are really bad for ME — while they might be very good for you or someone else. I never would have known this because everyone always says how good for you they are. The more you tap into your inner body, the more it will guide you. You’ll be listening to your heart, to your soul.

  7. End the mind-body war - As bulimics, we lose this mind-body connection because we are at war with our bodies. Imagine if the U.S. and Canada were at war? Canada sits on top of the U.S., like the head sits on top of the body. Both are innately important and intelligent. If you only live in Canada and never listen to the U.S., you wouldn’t know about the intelligence and wonder that is there — and vice versa. Now imagine them at war — no ability to cross the border. Everyone suspicious of each other, shooting each other, bombing each other. If you lived in one of these countries, wouldn’t you want to move? Would you feel safe? Now go back to your mind & body. How safe does either one feel when they are at war? Something magical happens when you start to trust. Since your body cannot talk in voices, you have to tune into your inner body to feel, to sense what it is asking you to do. If it is in pain, what does it need? If it is hungry, what does it want to eat? What will nourish it? What exercise will make it feel most well? Start to work in harmony and see what kind of trust starts to happen. In a war between the mind & the body, the body will always win. The head cannot walk around without the body. It can fail you & win the war. It can cripple you and win the war. Or your mind can let your body be its guide. Your mind can be the intelligence out in the world — it can speak to others and solve complex problems. And your body can guide the mind for matters of the heart — the spirit.

  8. Look in the mirror with love - your mind is what judges your body. How can your mind know what’s best for your body — especially when they’ve been at war? Is it what others say that is right for your body? Remember that what others say is “right” or what it “should” be is all made up for media and image. Consider that most models either have eating disorders or drug problems (e.g., Kate Moss). Is this the “right” we want to live? Whose right are we buying into? Does that person’s right allow you to live a wonderful life? Do you feel stifled, imprisoned? When it’s right for YOU, you feel peace, you feel a release. It might be scary — because you aren’t sure others will approve — but it will feel freeing. Once I started to do what was right for me, I noticed some people really started to admire me more — even like me more — because my true self was shining. The perfect person that they felt intimidated by was no longer there. No one is perfect — people like humans, not Stepford wives. Of course there may be some friends who won’t accept changes in you — my question would be — are they really friends? There are all kinds of people out there waiting to love you for you. Trust this, just like you will trust your body.

  9. Dress for comfort - wear comfortable clothes. Throw away or give away the clothes you wear to prove you are at your skinniest. These only serve to judge your progress based on weight, rather than how you feel — and how your body feels. Go into your inner body to find out how you feel. If you keep using mind tricks like numbers and sizes and clothing, you’ll end up continuing the cycle that imprisons you. Your body will continue to be imprisoned by your mind.

  10. Stop using numbers - scales, counting calories, counting everything — assigning things with numbers is only a mind-created attempt at controlling your body. Remember, your body will win the war and you will end up with both body & mind in prison as long as you continue to try to suppress your body. Give your body a chance to show you how healthy it can be — with love, nurturing and trust. The body doesn’t know numbers, only the mind does. It’s like asking you to speak Chinese — or to take orders in Chinese, when you only know English or Dutch or Spanish. It just doesn’t work. It will never work — Chinese is a difficult language to learn. Your body’s language is also difficult to learn — unless you give it a chance.

What are your thoughts about this list? Have anything to add? I’d love to hear from you — we can all learn from each other!

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