Global pandemic be darned, the holiday season has arrived! With the festive spirit and cheer of the holidays often come stress and anxiety, especially for those in eating disorder recovery.
We hope that this season brings you connection with friends and family (even if you won’t physically be in the same place!) or time for reflection on growth or goal setting for the coming months or years. May these few recovery ideas help you successfully navigate this year’s holidays in recovery.
Episode description:
Brittany Braswell is a Registered Dietitian/Nutritionist (RDN) who runs a virtual private practice for those struggling with food and body image concerns. In both individual and group settings, she helps clients reduce their anxiety and disordered behaviors so that they can achieve lasting freedom from the bondage of their eating disorders.
Brittany joins us in this episode of Peace Meal to explore recovery from a faith-based perspective. For many, she explains, faith is a belief system more powerful than an eating disorder, one in which people can trust when distancing themselves from their illness.
To place trust in faith during recovery, Brittany emphasizes the importance of intentionality.
“I think being able to reconnect to those values or to your faith is really about turning down the eating disorder volume and getting really intentional about identifying and listening for those healthy voices,” she says.
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Episode description:
Kezia Reeder is a former Emily Program client and staff member and a continual advocate for eating disorder recovery. In this episode of Peace Meal, she joins host Dr. Jillian Lampert to describe her holidays with an eating disorder.
“I feel like I was constantly stressed from Thanksgiving through New Year’s Eve,” Kezia says. “It’s supposed to be a time of celebration and… in the United States, a lot of our celebration centers around gathering for a meal.”
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**Content warning: This post includes discussion of purging behaviors. Please use your discretion when reading and speak with your support system as needed. The following information is not intended as medical advice or as a substitute for professional treatment.
Dr. Jake Linardon (Ph.D.) is the founder of Break Binge Eating and works as a Research Fellow at Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia. Jake’s work involves trying to better understand and treat eating disorders, particularly through the use of innovative technologies. Jake has published over 40 peer-reviewed journal articles, across the world’s leading psychiatry and clinical psychology scientific journals, and serves on the editorial board for the International Journal of Eating Disorders and Body Image. Jake is passionate about increasing access to evidence-based care among people with eating and body image issues. Learn more about Jake on his website, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
When looking for resources to help you deal with binge eating, chances are you’ll come across content that discusses strategies to prevent or stop the behavior.
While I’ve personally covered what to do after a binge eating episode, little has been written about what not to do after a binge.
This is a very important oversight because many people are left not knowing how to behave after they’ve had a binge. Such knowledge is critical if you are to fully break out of the binge cycle long-term.
Let’s change this.
In this article, I’ll discuss five important things that you shouldn’t do after an episode of binge eating.
We’ve watched the polls and scrolled the headlines. We’ve heard the chatter and seen the ads. With our collective breath held, we’ve finally made it to Election Day. The 2020 presidential campaign may be behind us now, but left to linger are intense feelings surrounding the current sociopolitical climate.
No matter how we voted this year, we are sure to process feelings related to this divisive election for a long time to come. Highly politicized issues seem infinite. From the pandemic to race relations and natural disasters to the economy, we continue to witness and live out such issues in our daily lives. For many, the issues are inextricably entwined with our mental and physical health; for some, they’re linked to our very sense of self. Many people carry these intersecting parts of themselves into their relationships, including, more and more, with their healthcare providers.
Below, we’ll cover tips for managing election stress, as well as advice for mitigating political tension that may emerge in a healthcare setting.
**Content warning: This is one person’s story; everyone will have unique experiences in recovery and beyond. Some stories may mention eating disorder thoughts, behaviors, and symptoms. Please use your discretion when reading and speak with your support system as needed.
Caitlin Leigh is a life coach and author who experienced a multi-faceted eating disorder for over 14 years. She has now been recovered for over 5 years, and continues to heal through creative expression, solitude, travel, and reconnecting with nature. Caitlin recently published a new book of poetry, Boundlessness. She talks with us about it here.
My new collection of poetry is called Boundlessness, which was my intention and word for the year. I wanted to bring more openness and expansion into my life and release any resistance, and Boundlessness was a great way to encapsulate this. This book really expresses all the human emotions we experience on a daily basis, along with simple reminders of our inherent worth and beauty.
Here are two poems from Boundlessness, “Panna” and “And I giggle.”
Some days
It feels as though
My heart
Has left my chest
-I run-
Some days
My chest
Burns
As bright
As the golden sun
-I stay-
And some days
I sit with
The quietness
Of my heart
And bask
In infinite
Bliss.
-Panna (wisdom)-
