In recognition of National Eating Disorders Awareness Week (NEDAW – February 26 – March 4th, 2006), I’d like to share the 9 steps that helped me in my recovery. I would also like to invite you to join me on the recovery journey! During NEDAW, if you choose to take this journey with me, I will be providing a roadmap and actions to make the trip easier. As we travel together this week, I will be expanding on each of these 9 steps, with examples and actions you can take in your own life.
We can also bring a sense of fun and celebration into our journey by supporting and encouraging each other. While recovery is a serious business, we don’t have to take our lives so seriously! For me, the more I focused on hope, happiness and the positive aspects of life, the easier it was to deal with the stumbles along the way.
3 Steps At A Time
I will be covering 3 steps at a time, over the next 3 days and will be adding detail to some of the steps over the course of NEDAW. I would love to hear your thoughts, comments and questions!
The 9 Steps to TRANSCEND Bulimia:
- Tell someone – get help
- Responsibility
- Acceptance
- Nutrition
- Spirit/Soul
- Commitment
- Exercise
- Nurture yourself
- Discover who you really are
- T – Tell someone and get help. Have you told the most important person or people in your life that you have an eating disorder? Are you trying to recover on your own? I know that telling others about having an eating disorder can be scary. In some cases, you may feel like they won’t understand or that they will reject you. The key to telling someone is to be clear about your motives for telling them and what you need from them (support, help, etc.). The benefits of telling someone are that you will no longer feel alone and you’ll have support in your recovery.
- R – Responsibility – Take full responsibility for your recovery. Responsibility is a perspective. If your perspective is that you blame others (or your body or food) for where you are in your life, it takes away your power to change your life for the better. You become a victim. If your perspective is that you are responsible for your life and your health, you have power to change.
While we all know that there are circumstances and influences that can lead to eating disorders (family issues, societal pressures, the media, genetics, etc.), I accepted that I chose an eating disorder as a coping mechanism. My energy was then free to go into recovery. It was much easier to work from a place of empowerment as I started to take steps toward my recovery.
- A – Acceptance – Accept where you are. Accept that you have an eating disorder and that you want to recover. If you spend time berating yourself for not being able to change or wishing it away, your energy gets drained. Wishing something is different from what it currently is contributes to the cycle of an eating disorder. It creates negative thoughts and keeps your mind and body in a state of war. Accepting your current situation allows you to start taking action toward your goals of recovery.
For example, if it is raining outside and you had planned a picnic with friends, what happens to your mood? Are you sad? Disappointed? Angry? How does it help to wish it weren’t raining? Does it change the weather? Now what if you decided to accept that it’s raining – so you call your friends and have an indoor picnic? Everyone still has a wonderful time – in some cases, it may even be more special.
