5 Things You Gain When You Recover From Your Eating Disorder

When I spent a month at Renfrew, a treatment center, there was a girl who told me that the only thing you gain when you recover from an eating disorder is weight. For a long time, I felt like I agreed with this. When you are struggling in the depths of an eating disorder, or even in the midst of recovery, it can easily seem like there is not much good that can come out of recovery. It is really hard. You may have to gain weight, get a whole new body that you are uncomfortable with, and have to deal with that along with everything else. You will have to relearn so many integral things in your life: how to eat, how to deal with your emotions, how to deal with other people, and even deal with yourself. All of this can be hugely overwhelming, and it is easy to see how it would be hard to imagine a good and positive outcome. 



This statement is so false though. Recovery gives you so many things, it gives you everything you can imagine. Besides the obvious things it gives you, like weight, confidence, independence, etc, here are some less-thought-about, things that you will gain when you recover from your eating disorder.

1. Poop!

Okay, this may seem a little weird. How does recovery from my eating disorder give me poop? and why are we talking about it? Well, let me tell you from experience that you will never feel so grateful for such a simple bodily function as when you embark on your journey of recovery.

One of the many unfortunate side effects of having an eating disorder is constipation. I remember one time when I was really struggling, when I went six days without going number two. It was honestly one of the worst experiences of my life, I felt bloated, nauseous, sick, and just generally disgusting. This was a very common occurrence for me. So needless to say it was absolutely glorious when I started recovery, suddenly I was relieving myself every day! Was this a normal thing? did regular people actually poop everyday? I didn't know the answers to these questions, but I sure knew that I liked it. You may not think that this is a big deal, but trust me, this is one of the major perks of recovering from your eating disorder and eating normally. 

2. Your Period!

Babies! Who doesn't like babies, I mean come on. They are like tiny balls of cute! I know that at least in my case, I definitely want to have the chance to have my own children when I am older. However, an eating disorder can very easily take that from you.  If you are underweight, overweight, or your levels are all out of whack  you might lose your period for an extended amount of time. If this happens, it can cause all sorts of problems for you in the present, and in the future. For one, it can take away your ability to bare children. Right now you might be thinking you don't care about this, you are young, you don't want kids anyway, you don't want to gain weight. But that is taking away a whole plethora of options for you in the future. Not to mention all of the other benefits you will gain from getting back your period, such as healthy bones, hair, teeth, skin, etc, getting back your period will allow you, if you want to, to have little babies someday, which could end up being very important to you.

3. An insane knowledge of yourself

When I was trapped in my eating disorder, it was all that I knew. I had no idea who I was, what my values or beliefs were, who I wanted to be, or what I wanted in a relationship. I honestly just had no clue. Since I've started my journey in recovery though, and been through countless therapy sessions talking about nothing but myself and who I think I am and want to be, I can say that I know myself better than just about anything. Sure, Im not perfect, and all of my flaws are still present, I still have many self-destructive tendencies, but now I recognize them. Where before, I literally just had no clue anything about myself, now I know that I have a lot of problems with conflict, I am terrified of disappointment, and when I am in a situation I don't like I tend to rebel. I also know that I am really good at dealing with people, I have a passion for helping others, I want to travel the world, and I love tattoos. This is what recovery gives you. The ability to discover who you are, and even create yourself into the person you want to be. And thats pretty cool if you ask me, not many people get to create themselves when they are an adult.

4. A new relationship with your family and friends

An eating disorder can keep you trapped in a very juvenile state. You need to constantly be worried about, and taken care of by those who love you. They need to make sure you are eating or not purging, not self-harming, and just generally being safe. Along with  this, An eating disorder can be very manipulate and sneaking, and you can easily find yourself lying and hiding things from the people you love, in order to protect your eating disorder. When you take on the journey of recovery though, you begin to enter a more mature, independent stage of life, and you no longer have to lie to protect your eating disorder. Now you can develop more adult equal relationships with the people you love. These relationships can be built on trust, respect, and mutual gain, love, and affection from the other, rather than need, insecurity, pain, and distrust.

5. A second chance in life.

When You are restricting, purging, self-injuring, or engaging in any other sort of self-destructive behavior, you never know which time will be your last. At any minute your heart could give out, you could cut too deep, or your body could give out in some other way. In short, you could die. I know, you think it could never happen to you. Those stories you read about, those are about other girls, girls who are weaker than you, thinner than you, sicker than you. But guess what? Those are girls just like me and you, and any day that you are still wrapped up in your eating disorder, it could be you. You honestly never know. One more purge, one more skipped meal, thats all it takes. Thats why recovery needs to start now. not tomorrow, not when you lose xx pounds, not when you are finally sick enough. Right now. It really can't wait. Every moment you remain trapped is a moment you can't get back, and one more moment towards death. 

When you finally recover, you get a second chance. You get to proudly say that you beat this, you survived. this thing that so easily could have killed you, it didn't. You were stronger, and you survived. That is something to be proud of.