Steve McCrea wrote,
“It is misleading to tell someone who was raped by his dad repeatedly for 15 years and whose mother didn’t protect her and who later got into an abusive relationship because this guy put her on a pedestal at first and she had no way to screen his behavior for abuse that if she just ate better and got some exercise, all of that past trauma would no longer concern her.”
This is how many eating disorders begin – through the misuse of diet and exercise to manage other problems.
As a survivor of sex-trafficking and ritual abuse, I developed anorexia as a way to become sexually unappealing and therefore of less value to my traffickers. In addition severe starvation caused amenorhea, which prevented me from being used as a baby breeder for the sadistic cult I was raised in. While I can not underestimate the value of nutrition in my recovery from anorexia, I also can not discount the necessity of ongoing psycho-dynamic therapy with a compassionate and trauma-informed therapist. I realize how fortunate I’ve been to find such a person.
For me the trauma therapy came first. I needed to learn how to counteract the lies I was told about my body, my worth and my abilities, before I would even consider allowing myself to eat healthily and maintain a normal weight.
Eating Disorders like most other conditions, have numerous causes which differ for each person. There is no single modality that works/ doesn’t work for everybody.
Steve McCrea wrote,
“It is misleading to tell someone who was raped by his dad repeatedly for 15 years and whose mother didn’t protect her and who later got into an abusive relationship because this guy put her on a pedestal at first and she had no way to screen his behavior for abuse that if she just ate better and got some exercise, all of that past trauma would no longer concern her.”
This is how many eating disorders begin – through the misuse of diet and exercise to manage other problems.
As a survivor of sex-trafficking and ritual abuse, I developed anorexia as a way to become sexually unappealing and therefore of less value to my traffickers. In addition severe starvation caused amenorhea, which prevented me from being used as a baby breeder for the sadistic cult I was raised in. While I can not underestimate the value of nutrition in my recovery from anorexia, I also can not discount the necessity of ongoing psycho-dynamic therapy with a compassionate and trauma-informed therapist. I realize how fortunate I’ve been to find such a person.
For me the trauma therapy came first. I needed to learn how to counteract the lies I was told about my body, my worth and my abilities, before I would even consider allowing myself to eat healthily and maintain a normal weight.
Eating Disorders like most other conditions, have numerous causes which differ for each person. There is no single modality that works/ doesn’t work for everybody.