the exercises and activities that are right for you. You and I are collaborators in this process. Each chapter lays the groundwork for exploring your emotions and experiences at tolerable levels of intensity. As you develop the emotional capacity to be present, you will grow beyond your suffering. You can be known and understood.
The following list of experiences may not seem, on the surface, to relate to eating disorders. Most of them are not specifically about food or eating. But they can reveal how you use your eating disorder to live behind a façade. In responding to the list below, please use the words never, rarely, sometimes, often, or always.
1 I hide from people.
2 I've thought about suicide.
3 I find it difficult or impossible to make long range commitments.
4 I have emotional meltdowns where I am terrified and feel lost.
5 I have a disappointing—and somewhat shameful and secret—sex life.
6 I feel a low, continuous anger and resentment towards people in my life.
7 My short-term memory doesn't function well.
8 I say to myself “This is the last time I will ______” about certain behaviors but invariably repeat them.
9 I describe my suffering to someone and ask for help, yet reject suggestions offered.
10 I perform relentless exercise routines to ward off caloric consequences.
11 I eat mindlessly when I'm not hungry.
12 I tell lies at the grocery store checkout stand when buying my binge foods.
13 I weigh myself every day or several times a day.
Please breathe and know that you have just completed a powerful task. You might feel anxious or relieved. You may think you are overwhelmed, but you are not. You may be surprised or dismayed to discover how many of these descriptions apply to you and how much time they take up in your life. You may begin to criticize yourself or feel terribly deficient. But please put aside self-punishing thoughts. You are simply beginning to take a first look at the reality of your life, especially those aspects dominated by your eating disorder.
If you have had any of the experiences in this list, you have to live this way. Let's acknowledge that strength right now. Fortitude, creativity, determination, and strategic thinking are required to maintain an eating disorder and all of its demands. If you have the strength and ability to sustain an eating disorder, then you have the strength and ability to move beyond it. Together, we have a chance to find a way out of your torment and into a much healthier and happier way of living.
Your honest response to the questions in the list will alert you to areas in your life that need support, love, care, healing, and encouragement. When you finish going over the list, create a recovery journal with a separate page for each item that applies to you. These pages will provide topics of your choosing for journal entries, free writing, and explorations. Instead of eating or starving, or relying on food or excessive exercise to give you safety and emotional numbing, your journaling on these topics will help you heal your way through your troubling experiences, ultimately making your eating disorder unnecessary.
Sometimes your feelings will come up so fast you seem to have no choice except to act out your eating disorder. Often, you don't know you are feeling anything. You follow an irresistible urge to eat, or you discover yourself eating without being aware of when you started. You might, for example, find yourself eating your child's unfinished lunch in the kitchen before you wash the plate. You might notice that the one cookie you ate from the dish on the coffee table led to your eating all the cookies. You may or may not have noticed the surprise on the faces of people who saw you.
If you have the strength and ability to sustain an eating disorder, then you have the strength and ability to move beyond it.
When you are in the grip of your urges, you have emotional tunnel vision. It's difficult or impossible for you to imagine options. You are not aware of the consequences of your behavior to your health, your use of time, and your relationships.
At the close of each chapter, you'll find exercises based on the healing benefits of mindful breathing, affirmations, and writing that will help you expand your mind and develop your ability to move beyond the dictates of your eating disorder. They will become more involved as you progress on your recovery path. To start, here's a description of what to expect and what to try first.
Breathing
Breathing and noticing the details of your breath flow will help you to unite your sense of yourself and stay present in the moment. Stopping your activity and attending to your breath throughout the day, regardless of urges, cravings, or powerful emotions will gently and subtly build a pathway for you to be present without needing your eating disorder.
Give yourself a minimum of five minutes to quietly watch your breath. Breathe normally. Watch where your breath starts. Notice when you feel your breath in your lungs or nose or throat. Notice when you lose track of it. You cannot make a mistake here, you simply attend to your breath as it is. Do this at least three times in a twenty-four-hour period.
Because you are bright and because you want results quickly, you might try to make more of this exercise than what I describe here. For example, you might think you are supposed to be thinking some particular thing or you are supposed to get some kind of revelation or inspiration by attending to your breath. Not so. Attending to your breath is a building block for your recovery. You may extend the time if you wish. But, please, keep it simple.
Affirmations
It takes a month or two of practicing a new behavior to change a habit or mindset. Repeating self-affirming statements along the way helps you accept your developing strengths and self-knowledge.
Choose three affirmations you believe would make your life better. For example: “I enjoy excellent help,” “I am lovable,” and “I succeed where I put my efforts.” Read each aloud twenty times each morning, noon, and night. Change your position as you read: stand in one place with correct posture; walk around a room or outdoors; stand before a mirror.
At the end of one month, add new affirmations to your list. You may substitute them for the affirmations you did the preceding month, or you may tack them on to your first month's list. See Appendix A for more affirmations and advice for creating your own.
Journaling
Almost every self-help book suggests some form of writing. You've probably had some experience in journaling or keeping a diary. You may even keep a journal now.
When you pour your thoughts and feelings onto the page, you are able to see them more clearly. The page holds your written thoughts and feelings, not you. You become free to read, observe, think, and feel something other than what you wrote.
This is particularly helpful when you are in the thick of an emotional storm or when you have a difficult decision to make. You can write your dilemma onto the page and then ask for what you want and need. You might be surprised to discover that after you write out your problem and ask for help, your own psyche, or the voice of your heart and soul, comes through with relevant answers. In your recovery work, you'll harness the power of journaling to
