When ‘Just Keep Trucking’ seems so hard

The last couple of weeks have been an increasingly hard time in my recovery, really pushing my journey towards full recovery. For awhile now I have successfully been able to stop eating disorder behaviors, while giving my body what it needs. But with this mental change there has also been an unexpected physical change.

My last two appointments with my nutritionist have been positive. I’m right on track with eating, my thinking is clearer than it has ever been, I am honest with her about any struggles as well as any accomplishments (something that is so hard for me and many ed patients)- but I’ve gained weight. Both appointments I’ve gained weight. Unexplained weight gain, weight gain past my restoration weight gain, weight gain not explain by my meal plan, weight gain that has left me feeling upset in recovery, uncomfortable in my body, and anxious about the future in recovery. My nutritionist wants to wait it out. My meal plan is meeting my nutritional needs and my activity level. She also is unwilling to change my meal plan right now since that would give into the eating disorder at this point in my recovery.

Funny thing is- I believe her, I actual see her point, and I know she has my best interest in mind. But that doesn’t make this any easier to hear, or any less anxiety provoking. What is actually even weirder is as uncomfortable as I am with this new weight gain, as unbearable as it seems at times, as hard as this ‘phase’ of recovery is- I don’t want to use those old coping skills of eating disorder behaviors.

This scares me.

I’m stuck in a phase of ‘I’m an emotional wreck-because I’ve been able to stop behaviors-but I still hate my body-but I don’t want to go back to the eating disorder-but I don’t know how to keep moving forward like this-and I’m drowning in emotions and feelings-phase’.

What people often don’t talk about is the recovery part of recovery where behaviors have subsided but the feelings, the emotions, the underlying issues are all coming to the surface. This to me has always been the part in my recovery journey where I turn back and reach for my unhealthy coping skills; my eating disorder behaviors. It’s so easy, they have been with me for over 15 years, they work- hell they work better than any other coping skill I have yet to find. And what plays into this whole game, making me feel worse, is that I’ve only ever heard about the struggle of recovery being the restoration weight gain phase, the treatment phase, the learning to stop behaviors phase; I’ve never heard anyone struggle with the ‘I’m an emotional wreck-because I’ve been able to stop behaviors-but I still hate my body-but I don’t want to go back to the eating disorder-but I don’t know how to keep moving forward like this-and I’m drowning in emotions and feelings-phase’.

So, yup that’s the phase I’m in. Gaining weight that I don’t need, refusing to use eating disorder behaviors for the first time, dealing with the icky emotions and feelings I’ve never really understood that are behind all of this, and feeling guilty and weak for not going back to my eating disorder.

It’s a yucky, gross, fucked up, wanting to be in sweatpants under the covers all day phase that I’m pretty sure others feel, but never talk about. And this time I’m determined to make it out, make it back into real clothes and out of the covers,. But for right now I’m going to try to keep trucking when it feels like ‘trucking on’ in the last thing I want to do.