Eating Disorder Recovery with my Mom: A Video Interview
From the first few chapters of Running in Silence my mom doesn’t suspect anything is wrong as I embark on a raw food diet. She doesn’t question my intense obsession with food and running fast, mostly because I kept the worst of the obsession to myself.
And then you get to the chapter where I come out about my binge eating disorder. But we both don’t know what monster we are dealing with. We are confused and lost. She gives the typical answers to “cure” what I’m dealing with by telling me I can just eat less to lose weight again. It was a seemingly “normal” response from someone who doesn’t understand and just wants to help.
What did my mom do right? She offered to get me professional help. My mom brought me to an eating disorder support group to see a therapist and dietitian. She took on the role of eating disorder researcher, attended the parent support group meetings, and listened to me talk for hours about what I was going through.
My mom wasn’t there to “fix” me. She didn’t have to understand it all. She just had to listen, support, and love me, and she did exactly that. It was my mom who gave me a safe place to say everything I needed to say.
I thought it was important to share our story together in the latest YouTube video interviews below.
I’m the Mom. Wow, it is difficult to see yourself on video! I seem so stern and serious! It’s a serious topic, but wow. We laugh a lot too. :)
Also, I really want to add that another thing not to do to an eating disordered person is judge their plate! Do not make comments about how much they are or are not eating, comparing it to what you eat or what you think they should be eating or commenting on how how full you are as if to insinuate that they should be full too. You are not that person. So ZIP IT!