Medication and Eating Disorders: An “Anti” View
A diabetic isn’t considered weak for taking insulin. Why am I looked down on for taking medication to help my mind function? The right to take psychiatric medication — without having to justify it — ranks high on the anti-stigma agenda. There is a long way to go in achieving true mental health parity, but the frequency with which I see this particular plug leads me to believe that we’re making headway. So now I ask that same community of mental health advocates to expand your open-mindedness in yet another direction: my right NOT to take medication. Getting On the Medication I began...
Read MoreThe Medication Game
I have a longer piece in the works about my thoughts on psychiatric medication. The delay is due to the fact that I have a lot of thoughts on this topic, and I’m trying to pare them down from well over 2,000 words. While editing continues on that front, I thought I’d share a prologue of sorts. The following is a journal entry I’d written months ago and just recently stumbled upon again. I would say the timing is uncanny, given the other post I’m working on, but it’s not really a coincidence when the dice seems to be weighted on this genre of thoughts. The bias regarding medication here...
Read MoreYes, Recovery Really Does Get Better
Pushing Through the Final Phases of Recovery I haven’t written in a while, you might have noticed. I relapsed, and I was too ashamed to admit it here. It was a quick, steep backslide, and the trigger was very specific: I weighed myself. I went home for Christmas and encountered a scale. I thought I could handle the number. I couldn’t. I freaked out. My nutritionist dissected my meal plan in order to show me I wasn’t eating excessive amounts. We discussed the natural fluctuation in weight that bodies undergo. We even discussed weight loss and how it’s not necessarily eating disordered for...
Read MoreWhat an Eating Disorder in Recovery Sounds Like
Wait… You’re not over that eating disorder yet? During National Eating Disorders Awareness Week (NEDAwareness), I did a fair amount of preaching to the choir about early intervention. Presumably, some of it reached the general public, but since the overwhelming majority of my followers — if not all of them — are people who have been affected in some way by eating disorders, most weren’t new to this conversation. That’s not a bad thing. This population needs education and awareness, too. However, a somewhat jarring conversation at work toward the end of NEDAwareness...
Read MoreMore Than Weight Has Been Gained
The Road to Residential Two years ago today, at 5 a.m. on a frozen Tuesday morning, my fiancé and I rented a car and drove 100 miles from New York City to Philadelphia, where I would be entering residential treatment for anorexia. I’d been in a day treatment program for a little more than seven weeks by that point, but it had become clear that I needed more help. My weight, already dangerously low, hadn’t budged, so my treatment team determined that my best chance at recovery would be in a 24/7 care facility. I had no idea how long I would be gone. I didn’t tell anyone what...
Read MoreHope and Hopelessness in Early Recovery: A Look Back
I should call the emergency line. I should email my therapist. I should tell [my fiancé]. I know exactly what I should do. I just don’t want to. I don’t want to be stopped. – Journal entry from Jan. 6, 2014 (full excerpt below) On Monday the temperature plummeted here in New York. The smell and feel of the cold air — which has been rare so far this winter — brought me back to January of 2014. It was one of the worst winters in recent years for the Northeast. It was also the winter I spent in residential treatment. It’s hard not to think back on that ordeal this time of year. I...
Read More
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.
