How to Nourish Yourself During Eating Disorder Recovery When Eating Feels Challenging
Recovery burnout is an unfortunate reality for those on their journey toward healing from their eating disorder. This leads to a lack of motivation to continue making decisions that align with their recovery and catapults the individual towards making decisions that are pro-eating disorder.
What can we do to help slow the burnout accompanying eating disorder recovery? Here are some of our tips on how to nourish yourself when eating feels challenging.
How To Nourish Yourself: Reach Out To Support
It can feel challenging to reach out for support when your eating disorder thoughts are loud, but it is essential to hold yourself accountable to get the support you need, especially during meals and snacks. This can look different for everyone, but you can call, FaceTime, or meet someone somewhere to eat a meal or snack together. There are also online meal support groups available that give you a sense of community and peer support. These are great ways to have both support and distraction to help you stay on top of making recovery-oriented decisions.
How To Nourish Yourself: Write Out Your Motivators and Reasons For Recovery
It can be helpful to remind yourself of the “whys” and purpose of recovering from an eating disorder, which can serve as a jumpstart for improving your mindset. Try journaling or writing down your motivators, mantras, or affirmations on small pieces of paper or sticky notes, and place them in your bathroom or around your house or apartment. Reading positive reinforcements will help you to rewire your neural pathways that previously led to negative thoughts, actions, or behaviors.
How To Nourish Yourself: Do What Feels Comfortable and Doable
The idea of needing to eat can seem like a chore, making it more difficult to buy groceries, bake and cook meals, or prepare snacks. This can sometimes feel like too much for someone with an eating disorder, and this barrier becomes nearly impossible to climb. Having precooked foods that require little to no preparation at home during these challenging moments is okay because it removes that barrier. Buying prepared snacks that you can grab from the fridge or pantry can make meal plan compliance more accessible.
How To Nourish Yourself: Incorporate New Foods With The Support of Your Team
While this can feel overwhelming and scary for someone in eating disorder recovery, trying new foods and recipes can make a significant difference in recovery. With the support of your treatment team, you can work together to make eating feel less of a chore and something to look forward to.
While working with your team, look up recipes that you can make for meals and snacks online. If buying groceries seems too challenging now, you can work with your team to order them online or explore meal kits.
BALANCE eating disorder treatment center™, located in New York City, offers free consultation calls to help you explore next steps. We provide in-person programming seven days a week and are in-network with UnitedHealthcare (UHC), Cigna, Emblem, and Oscar, with Aetna coverage coming soon. Support is available, and recovery is possible. Schedule a free consultation call with our admissions team here and stay connected with BALANCE on Instagram here.
This post was written by BALANCE Blog Contributor, Tori Barkosky (she/her).
Tori is a recent graduate of St. Catherine University, having earned a B.A. in Psychology and a minor in Nutrition Science. Tori is passionate about all things related to intuitive eating, HAES, mental health, body respect, eating disorders, and disordered eating. She also geeks out on neuroscience and loves studying the brain and its anatomy. Tori currently works as a Mental Health Practitioner at an eating disorder clinic. Outside work, she enjoys practicing yoga, exploring nature, and drinking coffee.
