09
Aug

Control is Feeding Your Food Addiction – a mental path to recovery

Topic / addiction and recovery, disordered eating, mental health

I am a control freak.  I am also a recovering addict.  (These two things are not mutually exclusive.)

They say the first step of the 12 Steps is the hardest one. They aren’t kidding.

“I admit that I am powerless over my addiction, that my life has become unmanageable.”

So far, I have leaned back into Step 1 no less than 138 times. I have to continually revisit it, remind myself of it every day.  After that much practice, you’d think it would get easier.

It does, but not a whole lot.

Not one time have I recited step one that it doesn’t pinch a little bit.

I hate being powerless.  I hate being not in control.

As I’ve learned (and still learn every day), control is a paradox. It contradicts itself. The more you try to have it, the less of it you have. What you attempt to control soon controls you, dominating your thoughts and feelings and life.Read More

17
Aug

How to Recover from Addiction – 4 Truths that will Change Your Life

Topic / addiction and recovery, disordered eating, mental health

Not too long ago, a Facebook post by James Fell ran through my newsfeed.  (If you don’t follow him, you should.  He’s pretty great.)

Here’s what he had to say.

james fell sugar addiction

The comments were, as you could probably guess, reactive.Read More

26
Feb

How to Love Your Body – photos and fear

Topic / The Body Image Project

For those of you that follow, you’ll know all about this.

The Body Image Project

goal

Through this Project, you will construct a deeper level of comfort with and acceptance of your body.  When executed as intended, the Project will help you to develop a relationship with your body that is positive, welcoming, peaceful, and harmonious.

procedure

To participate in The Body Image Project, take photos of your body every day, according to the schedule below.  Once you have taken your daily picture, look at it.  REALLY LOOK.  Think about the part of your body you’ve photographed, then sit in meditation or write out answers to the questions that follow.Read More

09
Oct

How to Hate Your Body – Scale Worship

Topic / mental health, The Body Image Project

I am a Body Dysmorphic.

In scientific terms, that means I am “characterized by persistent and intrusive preoccupations with an imagined or slight defect in my appearance.”  It means I struggle with anxiety and obsessive-compulsive thoughts about the way I look.

According to the American Psychiatric Association, it means I have a chronic mental illness.

(That should probably bother me, but it doesn’t really… I always knew I was a little bit crazy.)

In layman’s terms, Body Dysmorphia means “I don’t like my body.”  There are parts I would even say I hate.  I don’t hate all of the parts, just some.  And, those parts I hate, I spend a heck of a lot of time thinking about them.  They’re always there.  Whereas most (normal) people exist in their skin without giving their body much thought, I think about my body all. the. time.Read More

16
Sep

The Skill of “Good Enough” – Being Great, Just As You Are

Topic / mental health, The Body Image Project

So…  I’m kind of a perfectionist.

[I can hear the people who know me best, snorting and laughing.  My brother’s guffaws are loudest.  JUST SHUSH, BROTHER.  I KNOW.]

Really though, JUST KIND OF.  I’m kind of a perfectionist.

My brother’s laughter is not without warrant.  I used to be an over-the-top, anal retentive, angry, bossy, OCD, anxiety ridden, control freak perfectionist.  I’m not anymore.  [Seriously guys, really.]  

After years and years of driving myself into the dirt, setting personal goals to deliver the world and then feeling like a failure if I didn’t OVERdeliver the whole effing universe, hating myself for never living up to what I could be instead of what I AM, I got tired of it.

Sure, there are still things that I get clenchy about.

Like making my bed.  I can go from zero to bitchface in the same amount of time it takes a small child to jump into my halfway-made bed, which (I have found) is less than one second.  I like straight, tight sheets and covers, pillows plumped just right, cases clean and all facing the same direction.  Once the bed is made I don’t expect it to stay that way, but while I’m making it, BACK OFF.

I like my closet arranged “just so.”  I arrange all the shirts on matching hangers, facing the same direction, in order of sleeve length and sub-categorized by color, partially because it makes me happy, but also because I can tell simply by looking which shirts are in the laundry, and what color laundry needs to be done next.

Read More

27
Aug

The Fear of Fat and Ugly

Topic / mental health, The Body Image Project

This last weekend, I attended a personal development workshop.

There were 25 of us in attendance.  We filled one small meeting room.  For the duration of the event, I was seated next to and paired with a delightful woman.  Her name is Kate.  She offers personal coaching, owns her own business(es), and is raising a BE.YOOTIFUL. little girl, all by herself.  Kate is a powerhouse of a human being, independent, strong, outspoken, and she lives her life louder than any other woman I’ve ever met.  I was in awe of her at first sight (and a little intimidated, to be honest), and my awe deepened as I got to know her over our few days together.

Kate’s sense of style cannot be overstated.  For the event, she was wearing a little black dress and super cute, wedge heels.  We worked together as partners throughout the day, and every time I was asked to turn and look at her face I was impressed.  I would turn toward her, take in her genuine smile, the frenzy of intelligence behind her eyes, and the don’t-let-the-serious-topic-fool-you-I-am-a-bad-ass gold, hoop piercing in her nose, and I had the same thought every time.

“Damn.”

EVERY TIME.  Same thought.

“Damn.”

(I also thought “great rack, amazing eyelashes, I love the bangs,” and every time I hugged her I immensely enjoyed her curvy goodness, but yes.  Mostly just “…DAMN.”)

At one point in my not-so-distant past, sitting next to Lovely Kate would have made me want to hide.  (Seriously.  She’s so amazing.)  She is confident.  She is absolutely GIRL.  She is intelligent, feminine, sexy, strong.  She is, in my mind, what I should probably want to be.  The put-together, intentional, presidential persona she so successfully displays is what every professional, confident woman should strive for.

…yeaaaaahhh………

I’m so, so, so, SO SO SO not like Kate.Read More

15
Jul

The Body Image Project – “grab that ass”

Topic / The Body Image Project

July 14.

About two weeks ago, I bought new underpants.

Some of you may think “what’s the big deal, it’s just a pair of underpants, everyone has them.”

True.  Everyone (hopefully) has and wears underpants.  (And if they don’t, I hope it’s by choice.)  Probably not a big deal.

For me, though, the new underpants were a super huge big deal, because in order to BUY underpants, you have to THINK about underpants, which means you have to think about what goes IN the underpants.

“My ass.”

I had to think about my ass.

As an anorexic, there are a few parts of my body that I try hard to NOT think about.  My stomach.  My hips.  The thick-skin-fat roll that smooshes out just under my bra strap along my back, south off my armpits along my shoulder blades.  My inner thigh, my inner knees,

and my rear end.

In order to buy underpants, just like buying a new pair of jeans or a swimming suit (both of which I detest shopping for equally as much), you have to think about the size, shape, and necessary confinement of your backside.  You have to consider what it looks like now, and what it will look like in your new clothing.

You also tend to consider what it should look like.

What you wished it looked like.

And aaaaah…   there’s the problem.Read More

13
Jul

The Body Image Project – “chunky monkey”

Topic / The Body Image Project

July 13.

Even though I haven’t starved myself in a very long time, I am an anorexic at heart.  I loved being thin.  I loved being skinny.  I loved, loved, loved the ridges of my abs, the distinction of my ribs, and the way my hip bones jutted out past my womb.  I loved the way my body felt at the tail end of a five day fast.  I loved the way reality got blurry and fuzzy, the empty, hollow feeling inside my body, the fist of hunger that pushed into my guts all the way through to my lower back, the soporific effect of calorie deficit and the lucid, crazy, more-real-than-real-life dreams it produced.

I know I’m probably not supposed to say any of that here.  I’m POSITIVE there are people that will think less of me, call me a freak, say “you need mental help,” and stop reading my words.

Doesn’t matter.  I have to own my truth, and this is it.

Right or wrong, good or bad, beautiful or horribly ugly, this is it.

This is ME.

Turns out, so this this.

20150713_133245

Hi.  My name is Erin.  I am a recoverING anorexic bulimic body dysmorphic.  I have three kids, stretch marks, a herniated belly button from three, full term pregnancies,

and fat.

My name is Erin, and I have fat.Read More

13
Jul

The Body Image Project – “thigh gap”

Topic / The Body Image Project

July 12

If there were ever any popular female aesthetic trend to take the prize for “stupid,” thigh gap has to be it.

It took me a while to decide whether I wanted to write this article at all.  Part of me feels that thigh gap deserves no acknowledgement, it is seriously that stupid, but after some consideration I decided to include it.

I might not give even one rat’s ass about thigh gap, but others do.

To those of you that disregard thigh gap comments or concerns in the same way you would the weather in China, HIGH FIVE.  Well done.  Keep doing what you’re doing, because you’re doing it right.

To those of you that hear thigh gap comments or concerns and sigh, roll your eyes, feel steam roll out  your ears, or are overcome by a sense of irritation that rivals lemon juice in a canker sore, FIST BUMP.  I do the same.

To the rest of you…  Just read.

Thigh gap is, without any doubt, the worst measure of anything healthy.

It is the worst measure of anything PERIOD.Read More

10
Jul

The Body Image Project – “bees knees”

Topic / The Body Image Project

July 9.

When I was a kid, people called me “Chicken Legs.”

I get it, now, why they did that.  I have grown a child in my own image, and her knees are just as knobby and bumpy and walnutty as mine were at the same age.

This is Norah, age 9.

20150709_154608

Cute roundy little walnuts.  :)

In my head, my knees still look like that.  Or at least, I feel like they’re supposed to.  In my head, no matter how warped and messed up it makes me, my knees are supposed to look the same as my nine year old daughter’s.  They are supposed to look just like they did when I was 21 and 112 pounds.

They are supposed to look pre-pubescent, completely fat free, bony, and thin.

Skinny.

As an anorexic, there are a few places on your body where you can most easily judge your starvation progress.

Collar bones.  Elbows.  Wrists.  Hips, on the side, and pelvis in the front.  Pubic bone.  Ribs.  Cheekbones, jaw, chin.

And knees.Read More

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