Beginning eating disorder recovery can be overwhelming. For many, beginning recovery signals an active choice to relearn the body’s cues, often the first thing to go when developing or maintaining an eating disorder. Because of this tendency to see one’s body as an enemy, learning to love your hunger cues, rest cues, energy cues, and discomfort is exhausting. And while there are many components to recovery, yoga has recently been studied for its focus on being present and listening to your body.
By: Elizabeth Foot
Recovery Isn’t Easy
Anyone who has watched a loved one begin eating disorder recovery has seen how difficult it can be. And for those of you reading this who have started recovery, are exploring recovery, or are any number of years into recovery, I’m sure the feelings of taking those first scary steps are unforgettable. Being open to listening to your body and your needs can be intimidating, especially if you’ve built your life and habits around actively ignoring your naturally occurring cues. While there are many recovery methods, from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), refeeding practice, journaling, realigning exercise regimes, and more, yoga could be a great addition to treatment.
How Can Yoga Be Beneficial To Eating Disorder Recovery?
Yoga has long been a practice to prioritize listening to the body and practicing stillness. Specifically, yoga encourages individuals to experience their bodies and directly engage with their feelings during poses or the aftermath, savasana, or relaxation. Research on the role between eating disorder (ED) recovery and yoga is still evolving, but preliminary studies are promising. For example, research in 2018 looked at individuals struggling with bulimia nervosa (BN) and other specified feeding or eating disorders (OSFED) and how incorporating an 11-week yoga intervention during recovery impacted eating disorder symptoms such as restraint and eating concerns.¹ Results showed that after the intervention – where participants engaged in 90 minutes of yoga twice a week — ED symptoms of restraint and eating concern had decreased. Furthermore, the differences between the control and yoga groups increased for restraint and eating concern measures at the six-month follow-up.1 This is promising for yoga’s impact on those looking to recover from an eating disorder.
A meta-analysis published in 2020 assessed 43 studies to look at yoga’s effectiveness in treating eating disorders.² According to researchers, results indicate yoga’s statistically significant effect on global ED psychopathology, a moderate-to-large effect on bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder (BED), and a small effect on body image. However, there was no significant difference in levels of dietary restraint.² This meta-analysis builds on results from a 2016 study, which found that in the outpatient setting, weekly yoga classes (in addition to existing treatment) significantly decrease individuals’ anxiety, depression, and body image disturbance.³
In Conclusion
Of course, not all research finds these significant results, and more work is needed to best understand when and how yoga might be the most effective in treatment and in what cases it might not add much. However, sitting with one’s body and listening to what it tells you is a core component of a successful recovery, and yoga’s ability to engage with this practice is powerful.
At BALANCE eating disorder treatment center™, we offer a variety of programs and services targeted at helping clients overcome disordered eating and develop a healthy relationship with food and their body. Clients in BALANCE’s Day Treatment Program do weekly yoga as part of their treatment.
Our admissions team would be happy to answer any questions you may have regarding our programs and services. Book a call below, or read more about our philosophy here.
This post was written by BALANCE Blog Contributor, Elizabeth Foot (she/her).
Elizabeth is currently pursuing her Master’s of Public Health in nutrition and dietetics from the University of Michigan, on track to become a registered dietician. Prior to returning to school, Elizabeth received her B.A. in Public Policy from Hamilton College in 2020.
Since graduating Hamilton, Elizabeth has worked for an infertility insurance company as a marketing associate, has volunteered with Multi-Service Eating Disorder Association (MEDA), and has advocated on Capitol Hill for expanding insurance coverage to registered dietitians as part of the Eating Disorders Coalition (EDC). Elizabeth is also a strong supporter of intuitive eating, HAES, and is excited to become a licensed practitioner working in the ED field. In her free time, Elizabeth can be found creating recipes, practicing yoga, or counting down the days until she can get a dog.
References
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Karlsen, K. E., Vrabel, K., Bratland-Sanda, S., Ulleberg, P., & Benum, K. (2018). Effect of Yoga in the Treatment of Eating Disorders: A Single-blinded Randomized Controlled Trial with 6-Months Follow-up. International journal of yoga, 11(2), 166–169. https://doi.org/10.4103/ijoy.IJOY_3_17.
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Borden, A. & Cook-Cottone, C. (2020) Yoga and Eating Disorder Prevention and Treatment: A comprehensive review and meta-analysis. The Journal of Treatment & Prevention, 28 (4): 400-437. https://doi.org/10.1080/10640266.2020.1798172.
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Hall, A., Ofei-Tenkorang, N.A., Machan, J.T. et al. (2016).Use of yoga in outpatient eating disorder treatment: a pilot study. Journal of Eating Disorders, 4(38). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40337-016-0130-2.
