Why You are Not Your Eating Disorder

** POTENTIAL TRIGGER WARNING **

When a new client comes to me with an eating disorder, I always request that they change their language and stop referring to ‘their’ eating disorder as ‘mine’. It becomes ‘the‘ eating disorder, and ‘that‘ mean voice.

I love working with Eating Disorders. I know not many in the health and medical professions feel the same. In fact, I’ve had several look me in the eye and state how much they “hate working with eating disorders”. They quickly move them on.

Perhaps because they don’t refer to their patients as people, but the “eating disorder”, may be a part of the problem.

For me, it’s different though. I’ve been there, I’ve lived through it. Eighteen years of bulimia nervosa and co-existing panic and depression made me who I am; A holistic therapist who calls BS to the idea that eating disorders belong in the too-hard basket.

Each recognised mainstream eating disorder has a unique ‘voice’ attached to it that whispers at the back of the sufferer’s mind. Although similar messages are given, the intent can be quite different.

While I’ve written about bulimia nervosa many times, I’m recently seeing more clients with anorexia nervosa.

Therefore, the following is focused more on the ED voice of anorexia in helping you to see it for what it is – not a part of you.

If you’re a carer, it will give you greater insight into what your loved one with anorexia is dealing with.

You Are Not Your Anorexia….

The aggressive voice in your head taking over is not the original, kind and loving voice coming from your authentic, healthy self… you didn’t hear it when you were a baby, or even a toddler. Your natural thoughts were very different then.

You may not have even heard that eating disorder voice until you reached your teenage years, when it obsessively took over.

You’ve quite simply been listening to it for so long that you’ve lost a part of yourself to its’ persistence and started thinking it IS you. But it’s not.

In reality, the ED voice is a mean bully (sometimes in the guise of a friend) who jumps in and takes over when life feels too overwhelming for you.

It pushes you into submission by anxiously making you think you’re weak and can’t cope, promising to be the hero and save you from dealing with your feelings.

It replaces your emotions, with the pain of hunger. When you want to eat, it tells you outright that you don’t deserve to eat.

Yes, it suppresses your feelings but causes you pain anyway.

The ED voice of anorexia makes you small and sick. It makes you want someone to take care of you, but it won’t let you be taken care of. Because if you become stronger, you won’t need the ED anymore. And the ED doesn’t like losing control.

It’s conniving, convincing, manipulating.

So the ED voice treats you like a child and keeps tricking you into thinking you’re not worthy, not deserving, not significant..

It tells you you’re a pig for eating a ‘whole’ apple, makes you believe there’s a beast or monster inside of you that needs starving, should be kept hidden and out of sight..

The ED voice is controlling, demanding, relenting…

But it’s NOT your voice. It’s NOT your desires. It’s NOT what you want.

The ED voice is NOT you. It’s a burden, a weight, a prison that locks your true voice in a darkened cage and won’t let you free to fly.

It feeds off your fear and piggy backs off your insecurities.

It pretends to be the hero to save you from feeling your emotions, but it only suppresses them until they erupt soon enough.

The ED voice is a LIAR. It doesn’t want what’s best for you.

It uses you, controls you, denies your human needs.
It avoids anything that might let you think you’ve got any control.

In a nutshell, the ED voice doesn’t give a shit about your health, happiness or wellbeing. In fact it doesn’t care about you at all. It’s not a part of you so why should it? It’s simply serving a purpose.

THE KEY here is to understand that the eating disorder is driven by an intention for you. And in order to recover, it’s essential that you learn what that intention – and purpose – is.

THERE’S ANOTHER VOICE BACK THERE. CAN YOU HEAR IT?…

Take a breath and get silent for a moment. Listen to your breath… go beyond the breath into the whispers of your heart…

There’s another voice inside, softer, wise.

This other voice is gentle, a little weary, but full of heart.

It’s a voice of love and genuine concern.

It’s a voice of reason and desire.

It’s a voice of resilience and inner strength, persisting in the darkness, offering a flicker of light.

The other voice is your healthy self.

Your real, true, healthy and authentic voice, who absolutely cares about your health, happiness and wellbeing.

It’s the voice that says, “I don’t want to keep living like this. I’m so sick of living like this. I’m not living, I’m just existing. I want to get over it, be done with it, move on from it. I want to be a person, feel normal, and not be controlled.”

Start listening to THAT voice.

That inner voice is kind, soft, supportive.

That voice is your REAL voice. It cares, it’s concerned, and it absolutely wants the best for you.

Remember who you are. Because you’re not the eating disorder. And the eating disorder is not you.

You’re not broken and you don’t need fixing.

The eating disorder lives off your fear so it can control you and make you think you need it. But you don’t need it to cope with your feelings of overwhelm. Your feelings are overwhelming because you don’t how to cope with them.

But you can learn how to feel them and release them, maybe even embrace them.

You can learn to find your own voice – your inner power – and reconnect with your body.

You can learn how to take back ownership of your mind and your life.

The first step is separating your true self from the false one.

As soon you begin to challenge the ED voice and what it’s trying to do for you, it begins to lose it’s influence over you. As you strengthen your healthy self, the eating disorder’s purpose slowly starts to fade away, until it’s no longer needed.

The more you challenge it, the more you can distinguish between the ED voice and your own instinctively healthy self. The more willing then you are, to trust your own inner wisdom and shake the bully off your back.

Don’t be afraid of freedom, or the fact you’ll then have nothing else to blame in times of challenge or roadblocks.

You’ll have choices. So many new and wonderful choices!

Transformational Coach, Psychotherapeutic Counsellor & Integrative Clinical Therapist
Freedom and Recovery from your Emotional, Weight & Eating Issues