Falling into anorexia's trap

It scares the absolute hell out of me, just how easy it is to fall back into anorexia's trap, without even realising it. The thing is, no matter how hard you try not to, relapsing or even just moving backwards a little in your recovery can happen to anyone, without you even realising it.

Over the last few days, I have come to the realisation that in a way, this has in fact appened to me. Fortunately I have realised that my anorexia was starting to control me a little more again before it actually caused me to lose any weight or hurt myself in any other way but iit has still been a huge eye opener to me, to see how easily relapse can actually happen.

I never thought that I was at risk of relapsing. I felt as though I was too aware of the warning signs and would never let my anorexia get any worse again but that is exacttly what has happened, ever since I cut my intake down a little and decided to stop trying to gain weight.

All of the things were only tiny, almost unnoticable to most but I can now see how doing those things meant listening to my aorexia, which was giving it strength. I can also see how this could quite easily have gotten out of hand and lead to me relapsing. I am just so grateful that I have realised what was happening, before this happened. Afterall, I have worked way too hard and come too far to throw it all away now.

I think that the reason anorexia started to creep back in is because I decided that I no longer had to gain any more weight, which made me start fearing weight gain once again, just as much as before. This lead to me using my kitchen scals to check the weights of things like muesli bars and fruit and a few times I even weighed out portions of nut butter for my toast.

I can see now how dangerous behaviours like these are whilst in recovery frm an eating disorder however at the time, it didn't feel dangerous. When I asked myself whether  I should weigh the food or not, I ad a voice reply and say that it was completely fine to weigh the food, afterall it was only a one off thing. Now I can see, plain as fday that it was my aorexias voice telling me that and not my own.

Before I cut my intake down and I was trying tto gain weight, I was not as compelled to know exactely how many calories I was eating as I knew that if i did by ny chance eat a little extra, this would only lead to the tiniest bit of weight gain, if any at all and that it was ok as that is what I was trying to achieve anyway. But once I stopped trying to gain weight, I started fearing eating too much again and I also stared fearing weight gain.

Also, I have found that since I have started exercising more most days, I am feeling more compelled to exercise more naad more. I feel guilty if I dont get for a long walk and I have also started taking more notice if my 'daily steps' counter on my phone. I never actually put this counter on my phone, it was just there when I got it but in the last few days, I have decided that I need to turn it off.

At first I actually found this little app quite interesting and it wasn't harmful as I didn't actually really care how many steps I took each day. But since I stopped restricting my exercise as much, I have started to feel guilty if I do not reach my usual amount of steps on any one day. This lead to me going for longer walks then I necessarily felt like some afteroons, just so tthat I could reach that articular number of steps.

Once again, at the time I didn't actually rrecognise the fact that this was actually me listening to my anorexia but now Ican see it. Yesterday morning as I was planning out my day, I realised that I would only havee enough time to take Tess for one big walk. Thoughts started to appear in my mind about whether or not I should compensate for this by eating less, or whether I should go for an extra long walk that morning.

I am so glad that I recognised that it was my anorexia making me think those things and that I therefore needed to take action and fight it. I decided to take Tess only for a very short walk yesterday morning and reiminded myself that there is absolutely nothing wrong with exercising less, or even not at all some days. Healthy exercise is not about reaching any silly goals like calories burned or steps taken, it is about exercising as much as you enjoy on any partcular occasion.

In a way, I am actually glad that this has happened as it is the exact wake up call that I needed. Even though I thought I already knew it, this has actually shown me that recovery does not stop once you reach a healthy weight. In order to make a full recovery, you need to keep fighting your thoughts and challenging yourself, even after you have reached a healthy weight.

My goal always has been to reach my natural setpoint weight so I should not stop myself from gaining any more weight if that is what my body wants to do. This just indicates that I have not yet quite reached my natural set point weight. I think I have made myself an easy target for over the last few weeks as I made the mistake of letting my guard down when I thought I had reached a healthy weight.

Now I know how easily letting your anorexia back in can be I am not going to make the same mistakes again. I have decided that my intake is going to be a daily bare minimum and that if I ever feel like extra food, I am going to eat it as that is exactly what my anorexia doesn't want me to do. I also feel as though this is a good step to take to prepare myself for eating intuitively in the future and for reaching my natural set point weight, if I have not already reached it.

I have also taken it upon myself to turn off my step counter on my phone and to take a step back when it comes to exercise. It is not healthy to feel guilty for not exercising as much which is exactly why I need to face this fear and not exercise as much, if at all some days. f I ever feel as though I am not motivated to exercise or am not enjoying it, I will simply stop and I will refuse to listen to that voice in my head, telling me to go further or faster.