Weekly Update #7: Stand Up, Live, and Be Proud

*As always, I want to make sure that I am never being a trigger to those who are struggling with an eating disorder or any mental illness, so I am including this disclaimer that I do bring up several behaviors in this blog post. I encourage you to make the best decision for your recovery.*

A red barn. A sign in the statistics building. A food truck. A song lyric.

Four seemingly ordinary, everyday sights and sounds. Yet four completely extraordinary sights and sounds that crossed my path over the course of this week and proved the incredible power of words. The incredible beauty, strength, and significance that words can hold.

Words seemed to jump out at me with every corner I turned. And not just any words. Just the right words, in just the right sentences, at just the right times, giving me the messages I needed to see and believe, right when I needed them most, to keep pushing forward.

A red barn with white lettering displaying a quote, and not just any quote, made its presence known as I struggled to fight the urge to walk and fell into the power of the eating disorder as I walked the extra steps. I stopped in my tracks and let the quote sink in. “Decide what to be and go be it.”

A sign in the statistics building painted in red and black letters popped out as I anxiously stood waiting to enter my statistics exam. I had struggled that morning to fight the urge to sleep in and skip my run, and instead had fallen into my eating disorder’s lies that the run would be the only way I would do well on my test, the only way I would do well in life. I stopped in my steps and let the quote sink in. “And I will live. And I will not die again.”

A food truck parked in the center of campus, named “Food for Thought”, plastered with not just one, but a multitude of quotes, caught my eye as I walked to the Student Union to catch up on some work. I was struggling with fighting the urge to go on my second walk after eating lunch, terrified that omitting this walk would influence my weight and appearance. I stopped in my tracks and let the quotes sink in. “To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art.” “Food is our common ground, a universal experience.” “One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”

A song lyric rang through my ears as I trekked up the hill to my car one last time for the day, exhausted mentally and physically from a day of academics and fighting for my recovery. A song lyric from a song, Just Imagine It by MKTO, I had just added to my playlist merely because it sounded catchy. I stopped in my tracks and listened carefully, and rewound the song, not just once, but several times. “And today is the day, stand out. Stand up, stand your ground. Be the "who" that you are and be proud.”

Just the right messages. At just the right times.

At my most vulnerable, most exhausted, most powerless moments, these beautifully inspirational and powerful messages made their presence within my path of difficulty and vulnerability and returned my mind and body to my path of recovery.

“Decide what to be and go be it.” And I decided that I want to be Shell. Not my eating disorder. I decided that I want to be a nurse. Not a patient. And not just any nurse, a psych nurse saving countless others struggling with a battle I know so personally. I decided that I want to be recovered. Not a prisoner of my eating disorder. And I am going to go be Shell, a psych nurse, saving others, and saving myself, living life in full, beautiful recovery.

“And I will live. And I will not die again.” For nine years, I have died to my eating disorder countless times, countless times too many, giving up half of my life to the deadly grasp of a monster in my head. I have died, giving up countless opportunities, freedom, independence, time, and happiness, all for the number zero. I will not let my eating disorder continue to strip me of my freedom, strip me of my happiness, strip me of my life. I will not die again. I will live.

“To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art.” Food is an art, eating is an art, so why do I fear so deeply such a beautiful, delicious form of artistry? The art of enjoying food is one of the most important, nurturing, and delicious parts of life, so why do I wish to skip out on such a vital aspect of the human experience? I want to learn to not only eat to live, but eat to enjoy life, exploring the sustenance, happiness, and love that are all encompassed within the beautiful art of food.

“Food is our common ground, a universal experience.” Food unites. Food creates connections. Food is love. So many life experiences revolve around the centrality of food. So many life experiences are enjoyable because of the delicious food involved and the significance that food holds within these experiences. So many life experiences, social gatherings, parties, ceremonies, dining at restaurants, family traditions, homemade recipes, cooking with family, exploring new tastes and flavors, living freely with food, are made enjoyable by being free around food. Why do I wish to miss out on the fullness of life experiences, the richness of human love and connection, all because I choose to believe the deathly lies of the eating disorder? I want to join in the love for food that unites and connects. I want to experience the fullness of human life. The full, delicious, enjoyable, love-filled, experience-filled fullness of life.

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.” Food is the sustenance of life. And not just of life, of intelligence, of love, of rest, of growth, of performance, of possibility, of happiness, of experience, of freedom. Food allows for success in all of these areas, allowing for the fullest of life potential to be achieved and enjoyed. I want to think well, love well, sleep well, and live well. And therefore, I will dine well, providing my body with the proper nutrients and flavors to feed my full, beautiful, free life in recovery.

“And today is the day, stand out. Stand up, stand your ground. Be the "who" that you are and be proud.” Today is the day. The day to allow all of these messages that have crossed my path to transform my life. The day to make the decision to make the change, to take my life back, whatever that may take. The day to begin my journey towards being Shell, in full recovery, living, not dying, embracing the beautiful art of food, participating in the fullness of human experience, standing up and being proud of my full, free life in recovery.

Today is the day. It is my moment to follow my promises to myself and take back the life that holds so much potential for happiness, possibility, freedom, and love. The “who” that I am is not my eating disorder. The “who” that I am is Shell, free from her eating disorder, pursuing her hopes and dreams, living the full life in recovery that can result from the strength, determination, and perseverance she has developed through her journey. And the “who” that I am is someone I will be one hundred percent proud of because I have persevered through the powerful, constant, exhausting, deadly battle of an eating disorder and have made it out alive and stronger than ever. This is my journey, and this is my life. And because I am standing up, I am proud.

Although I struggled this past week, I surrounded myself with these messages and kept going. I embraced the power of words and allowed them to transform my path into a path of recovery. And, by allowing these words to become the basis of my recovery, I made each struggle, each setback, each moment of exhaustion, anxiety, and frustration, a turning point, a learning lesson, a base upon which I can build my recovery even stronger than before. This week was not perfect. But the importance lies in the fact that I used the difficulties of this week to better my recovery in the long run. Not every week is going to be a picture perfect version of recovery. But every week, I have the goal of ending on the note that I tried my best to navigate the goals I set for myself and struggles I was given, I tried my best to learn from my mistakes, and no matter what happened during the week, I will start this next week with a clear mindset of one hundred percent recovery. And with the amazing support of my family, boyfriend, treatment team, friends, and each and every one of my supports, I will not fall, but I will stand tall.

And although this week presented struggles, this week was also characterized by successes on many levels. In terms of academics, I not only survived but thrived through my first exam by learning the study methods and exam strategies that work for me and my academic success. I also learned that no matter how stressful a week looks at the start, a week is always possible, especially if each day is taken as it comes, focusing on the moment and staying present rather than escaping into the future and worrying about the unknown. Mindfulness is key to success, especially academic success.

Successes were also evident in my eating disorder recovery. I challenged myself to vary the foods that I ate at not just one meal, but several meals, incorporating foods that had previously been attached to my “fear foods” list and challenging my long held beliefs that these foods will negatively impact my body size and weight. And I survived. And thrived as I began to not just incorporate these foods but enjoy the new foods, the new flavors, and explore even further with tastes and flavors that had been absent from my life for so long.

My most significant moment of the week was both recovery oriented and a celebration with my boyfriend of Valentine’s Day and our nine month anniversary, and luckily for us, our nine month landed on a Friday, so we were both able to see each other on the actual day! And to his pleasant surprise, I asked him if he’d like to celebrate by going out to dinner, a date night he knew was a challenge for me, but a date night he knew would be significant step towards my recovery. So, embracing all of the things we had to celebrate and appreciate, I conquered my fears as we ate at Bertucci’s, enjoying flavor, enjoying the extremely special time spent with my boyfriend, savoring each and every moment and not letting any part of my eating disorder take the night away from me.

And now, here lies a new week ahead of me, a week completely within my control and completely capable of success, happiness, freedom, and recovery. A week to stand up, stand my ground, and be who I want to be. As always, I have a list of goals to serve as an outline of my hope for recovery this week:

Take the step to decrease my steps even further: listen to and follow all recommendations regarding exercise and nutrition from family, counselors, dieticians, and friends regarding what is best for my health and recovery.
Write out a list of each “who” I truly want to be, all of the identities the eating disorder masks and strips me from, all of the identities that I can have again with recovery.
Find flavor, not fear: focus on discovering the flavor in food, not the fear that is induced by challenge foods, continue to expand on foods that I eat, especially by incorporating challenge foods.
Fuel on campus: continue to push myself to eat more while on campus so that I have the proper fuel to perform academically and to sustain the movement involved with being a college student.
Fill free time with distractions: use time that would originally be spent walking to write, read, sleep, play piano, watch Netflix, etc. Believe that resting my body is a good thing, not a bad thing.
Get ready for National Eating Disorder Awareness Week!
Stand up, Live, and Be Proud

The power of four incredibly inspirational sentences that crossed my path this week have formed a backbone within me, giving me the strength to stand up, stand tall, and be who I am meant to be: Shell, an aspiring nurse, living, experiencing the fullness of life and the fullness of recovery.

Today is the day. I will stand up. I will live. And I will be proud.