Are You Ready For Recovery?
Our intake coordinator and meal support specialist, Amy, wrote this article about her experience deciding to get help for her eating disorder.
There’s this idea of only entering treatment if you’re dead set on recovery or if you’re ready to give up your eating disorder once and for all. People think if you aren’t ready to recover, why waste your time in treatment? I did not enter treatment ready to recover. I did not enter treatment wanting to give up my eating disorder. I entered because I was exhausted, I wanted to stabilize my behaviors “a bit”, but most of all, I was desperate to take some time off from work. Four years recovered and here’s what I’ve learned about being “ready” for recovery.
1. You can enter treatment being skeptical
The majority of people I’ve met have not been excited to start treatment, and most of them wanted to quit fairly soon after they began. Go in with an open mind, you never know who you’re going to meet or something you’ll hear that will start you on the path towards recovery.
2. Eating disorders are hard to let go of for a reason
I’ve heard it said that eating disorders serve a purpose in everyone’s life. Maybe it helped you cope with trauma or it gave you a sense of control when everything else in your life seemed out of control. You can’t just “let go” of something that has been such a significant part of your life, it’ll take time, and that’s okay.
3. Recovery isn’t linear
No one’s recovery is perfect. It’s not like you enter treatment, or even leave treatment, and never struggle with an eating disorder thought or behavior again. One step forward, two steps back. Two steps forward, one step back. There will be good days and bad days and everything in between, but eventually, the goodwill start to outnumber the bad.
4. You will never think you’re “sick enough” to deserve help
I kept waiting until I felt sick enough to deserve help. I was waiting to go to treatment until I had some sort of concrete medical reason to prove that my eating disorder was causing me harm. Do you know what? That never happened. Not everyone has big, scary medical complications from their eating disorder. Looking back, however, I realized I was sick, and that throughout every stage of my six-year struggle, I deserved help.
5. No one is ever truly ready for recovery
I was waiting until I reached rock bottom to recover. Do you know what happened? I never reached rock bottom, or so I thought. Years later I can look back and see that I reached rock bottom many times, but I never thought I was that bad. If you wait until you’re ready you’ll probably be waiting for the rest of your life, so why not start your recovery journey today?
If you’re looking for a sign to seek treatment, this is it. Your eating disorder will always tell you that it’s not a good time to recover. You’ll probably never feel “sick enough” to seek help or feel ready to start recovery, but in the words of Morgan Harper Nichols, “Perhaps this is where you breathe deep and take the leap.”
Ready to get help for your eating disorder?
Are you thinking about starting therapy for your eating disorder? Learn more about our approach to eating disorder therapy here.
