Overcoming Eating Disorders

I had a terrible relationship with food pretty much my entire life. I come from an over weight family so not being able to control how much I’d consume was always a problem for me. I was prescribed Adderall in grade school and I first started experimenting with skipping meals to avoid bloating and snacking which eventually led to anorexia. I used my medicine as a way to keep myself thin all through high school. Fast forward to college and that’s when I first started drinking alcohol which led to me binging fast food at 3am and eventually became a binge eating disorder. Then once I started to gain weight and feel overwhelming shame and pain after binging it then turned into bulimia. It got to a point where after every single meal I would take a trip to the bathroom hoping nobody would notice. Whether I was out to eat, at the bar, you name it. It wasn’t until I had a roommate hear me throwing up one day and sat me down that I realized I might of had a problem. At the time I denied it to her and honestly tried to convince myself there was nothing wrong with it. But there was. I had no control over how much food I was eating and I had such a fear of “getting fat” that I would internally shame myself for anything I ate that wasn’t “healthy” and end up eating way too much of it and hate myself.

Then I went through a period after college where I was addicted to working out and would eat whatever I wanted but would have the tiniest potion sizes. At this point I thought I finally figured out how to control myself even though I was severely under eating due to how much stress I was in from my job. I was the thinnest I’d ever been and I got so much praise for my body, truthfully I loved it. That’s honestly what fueled me to keep going with the disordered eating all those years because I loved being praised for being thin. Around this time I then I became consumed in a super toxic “situationship” where he convinced me that I needed curves to be sexy. This took me from loving my tiny little body that I had been dreaming of for years to then force feeding myself to grow a curves. All just to feel worthy enough.

It finally got to a point where I was just so sick of constantly trying to change my body and I began to wonder what life would be like without constantly thinking about and tracking my food. This is when I moved to Pittsburgh and decided I wanted to take control of my eating and finally learn how to cook. It was honestly super overwhelming at first after finding out about green washing and how most products that are marketed as clean really aren’t. I was beyond frustrated and would do hours of research to figure out what I’m really supposed to be eating. It eventually got to a point where I figured the best way to learn would be to actually take a nutrition course and I did when I got certified as a personal trainer. I was actually shocked to see that carbs are not only good for you but SO necessary for your diet! A food I had been so afraid of for years I should actually be eating, amazing! Every day since learning that I’ve had a bagel with either eggs or avocado for breakfast and I look forward to it every morning. Learning this made me realize that so many other women are probably just as confused as I once was and knowing things like this are crucial on your fitness journey. This is why I think having basic nutrition information available at BODY is going to help women understand the basics of food better so they aren’t constantly drowning in the misinformation on the internet.

Healing my relationship with food has been a life long journey and I’m going to use everything I’ve learned to help you avoid making the same mistakes I once did.