I Thank Your Eating Disorder for its Service… Wait What?
I’ve been off on maternity leave for a year and a half and am beginning to come back to the work I love with clients so very much.
While my time away from work transformed me in so many ways, one thing did not change. And that’s knowing that working with people living with eating disorders is exactly where I want to be. It brings me both peace and excitement to have such clarity about how I want to spend this next stage of my career.
That said, one thing really shifted in the past year and a half about the fundamental way that I perceive what an eating disorder is and why it shows up.
I used to regard people’s eating disorders a bit like bullies. While I had heard about the concept of eating disorders having a role in people’s lives, what I saw every day was the raw pain and heartache they always seemed to be causing in my clients’ lives. And so I tended to refer to their eating disorders as antagonists that we have to show who is boss in recovery.
Fast-forward to my maternity leave, when I went down a bit of a rabbit hole relating to Internal Family Systems by Dr. Richard Schwartz. To say this framework was an aha moment for me is an understatement. It has had a profound impact on how I think about myself and why I react to things the way I do, on my parenting, and on how I see my clients’ eating disorders.
Where I once saw a bully, I now see a part of someone trying its absolute darndest to care for the person and protect them FROM the raw pain and heartache they are experiencing.
I have tears in my eyes as I picture someone’s eating disorder putting everything it has into being someone’s body guard, and feeling SO misunderstood by everyone thinking it’s the problem.
And you may be thinking wait… aren’t you a dietitian? Why does any of this matter?! Which is a valid question.
But I think it really does matter. Recovery is SUCH.HARD.UNCOMFORTABLE.WORK. Every time a person is feeling the pull to restrict like a magnetic force and follows their nutrition plan anyway. Every time a person sits in the wildly uncomfortable feeling of finishing a meal and not using the behaviours they usually rely on after a meal to feel okay again. Every time a person even considers eating a food that they have seen as a danger for years.
Every time a client does any of these things in recovery, I want their eating disorder to know that these actions are not us trying to “beat” it. No, no, we see you trying so hard. Rather, these parts of recovery are actually us trying to give their eating disorder a little break. A really really really well-deserved break.
And so I thank you, eating disorders everywhere, for your service.
Looking for dietitian support? I offer virtual nutrition counselling
to adults in Ottawa and the rest of Ontario.
Learn more about my services.
Interested in this topic? Resources worth exploring:
Book:
No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model by Dr. Richard C. Schwartz
Podcast:
We Can Do Hard Things | Episode 170. “The Most Radical Way to Heal: Internal Family Systems with Dr. Becky Kennedy”
Podcast:
HealED podcast by the Balanced Practice | Episode “Internal Family System (IFS) for Eating Disorder Treatment
This blog post is not s substitute for personal eating disorder care and is intended for educational purposes only.
