Surrendering the Skinny Skinny Jeans
I returned home from 40 days of residential treatment this spring to a predicament no one warned me about: my jeans. I’d spent the last month and a half carefully unearthing my past, examining and grieving it, and then finding it a final resting place within myself. But I’d forgotten about the parts of my past that were hanging my closet. Most of the clothing I owned was rather old. There were even several relics from my teenage years. My natural frugality said these pieces were perfectly wearable clothes, while my eating disorder lurked in the background scheming a perverse reward system to...
Read MorePhotoshop Used in Music Videos?
Thanks to widespread awareness campaigns, we’re getting better at spotting media fakes. We know that, because of Photoshop “enhancing effects,” the women and men we see on posters and in magazines whose physiques seem too good to be true are just that—untrue. But would we think to turn that same suspicion onto videos? Apparently, the reach of Photoshop has extended beyond still-life. Over the weekend, I caught up with a cousin whose son Evan is a successful film student in California. When I asked what Evan was doing at his current internship, my cousin told me that he was working with a...
Read MoreNo One Should Die of An Eating Disorder: Justice for Averil
Today, Nic Hart launched a website seeking justice for his daughter Averil, who died at 19 of anorexia nervosa. Like many eating disorder patients (both here in the U.S. and in England, where the Harts are from), Averil was discharged too early from an inpatient treatment center to less expensive outpatient treatment. Despite being labeled a high-risk patient, she received insufficient care from her cash-strapped and ill-equipped facility. She died December 15, 2012. Ever since reading it this morning, Averil’s story has haunted me. It’s not the first time I’ve found myself unable to...
Read MoreVulnerability in Eating Disorders: Cause or Cure?
To feel this vulnerable means I’m alive. – Brené Brown Your responses to my post on Monday floored me. I admit, my inner critic was on the rampage as I wrote it, given that it was much more personal than any of my previous posts. Words like “dramatic,” “indulgent,” and “awkward,” were being hurled about. So you can imagine my shock when encouraging comments flooded in. When I told my therapist about it the next day (that persistent, vocal one I’ve mentioned), she immediately said, “You were being vulnerable.” She pointed me toward a TED Talk that Brené Brown gave in June of 2010....
Read MoreAcceptance: The Only Way Out Is Through
“Len says one steady pull more ought to do it. He says the best way out is always through. And I agree to that, or in so far As that I can see no way out but through…” — Robert Frost, “A Servant to Servants” I’ve written a lot of topical pieces here so far, most of which allude to my own story in some way or another. But I suppose it’s time to throw in something entirely anecdotal—my moment of acceptance. Acceptance at the Prison Door One month into partial hospitalization treatment, my team told me that 25 hours per week just wasn’t going to cut it. If I was going to kick this...
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I'm a writer, a mental health activist, and a 20-something in recovery from an eating disorder. This blog chronicles my journey through the middle ground toward full recovery.
