My Journey Overcoming an Eating Disorder
Trish Bennett
National Eating Disorder Awareness Week is February 26th – March 3rd. 28.8 million Americans will suffer from an eating disorder in their lifetime.
Eating disorders can affect anyone and carry an increased risk of suicide and medical complications. I want to share my personal story with all of you, hoping it may resonate with you or someone you love.
Suffering from bulimia and then anorexia for a decade, I weighed 79 pounds at the height of my disease. To put it bluntly, I should be dead right now. At age 30, I thought I had overcome it, but I would then trade one obsession for another (isn’t that always the case for addictive personalities).
This is me when I weighed 79 pounds.
In my 30s and early 40s, I started over-exercising and restricting my food intake. I would often only allow myself 200 calories at a time, or on the rare occasion I would be dining out, I would restrict food all day to “enjoy” a night out.
Over the course of several more years, I learned exactly what I had been doing to my body through working with a functional nutritionist and coach. The fact of the matter is that the abuse that you put your body through will catch up to you at some point. That’s precisely what happened to me.
I consider myself lucky to say that I was able to pull myself out of it finally. Yet, I lost a lot of my life in the process. I will always consider myself in recovery and not fully recovered…because after an addiction grips you. It’s begging for you to come back.
This is what Recovery looks like!
It’s extremely important to surround yourself with supportive people in your life.
This isn’t a journey that I would recommend going through alone.
If anyone out there is suffering from an eating disorder, know that you are not alone. We are here for you at Thrive. If anyone would like to reach out to me personally, understand that I am here and would be happy to talk to you about my experiences through this journey.
Best,
