Ways to challenge your ED

Does anyone has any tactics of getting that "voice" to shut up, to be able to move on and continue a healthy life?

I feel like such a kid when I yell at the "voice" to go away.

I try to picture it as a solid mass. Like an imaginary "friend" so to speak, and I stare at a blank space of nothing, and i stomp and yell and tell it to eff of. Then I walk away and leave that mass behind me. If you can name your voice, that makes it easier too. Whatever you can do to try and make it not a solid part of you, the easier it is to make it go away.

Do I sound nuts to anyone else? Heh.

it was actually more damaging for me to imagine my ED as a different "person", or someone who is telling me to do things. i realized that it is me who is thinking like that, not someone else in my head. it's me. its my desire for something that i miss - respect, safety, attention. once i admitted that i was only manipulating myself, it gradually got better. and don't glorify your ED or your your weight. it's only a lie, a farce.

whenever i felt the urge to manipulate myself, i immediately tried to distract myself. i drew, painted, wrote, talked to muy hubby, kicked a pillow. things like that. what also helped me was remembering that ED is killing me, not someone else, that i can die every day i do this to my body. i did that my reading lots of reports, documentations and articles about mortality of anorectics and bulimics. quasi a shocktherapy.

"ED misses my bones..."

In response to that quote only, sometimes I tell myself that it's ok, my bones are still there. They haven't moved and they haven't changed. It's not healthy for me to be able to see them, but they're still under there. It makes me feel a little more comforted - I think 'bones' hold so many connotations, your eating disorder is attached to them because they are a sign that you're still 'special' or 'fragile'. You need to make yourself see the truth - they don't signify superiority or anything else ED makes you feel, they signify illness and bad health and ultimately danger for your life.

If you want that disordered voice to shut up, have you ever actually TOLD it to shut up? As in, out loud? "Shut up ED." YOUR voice is then more powerful because Your voice exists in reality but the voice of your eating disorder is less dimensional, it exists only in your head. You could even say, "ED, this is MY mind and I don't want your stupid deceptive thoughts inside of it." You are in control of all your thoughts and (although it takes time) you can override anything ED tries to make you believe.

lol I don't know if any of what I said made any sense.

I just really try to personify my ED; just like some of the other posters here, I talk to it—well, scream at it—and tell it to: "GO AWAY YOU RETARD AND LET ME LIVE MY LIFE."  Sometimes it gets expletive, too, but we won't go into that.  ;)

In response to fayxo, that's a really good idea: your bones are still there!  It puts it in a great light: yes, bones are a part of my body.  They are beneficial and hold me up inside and give me structure.  Everyone has them and everyone knows I have them, so it's just fine if they stay inside, where they belong.  :)  I really like that, thank you.

Original Post by okgo:

 

In response to fayxo, that's a really good idea: your bones are still there!  It puts it in a great light: yes, bones are a part of my body.  They are beneficial and hold me up inside and give me structure.  Everyone has them and everyone knows I have them, so it's just fine if they stay inside, where they belong.  :)  I really like that, thank you.

you worded that a lot better than i could have :) so thank YOU haha. xxx

Actually fayxo, you made a lot of sense. And you seem to understand me a lot. Sometimes I feel foolish because I argue with myself a lot...well the disordered part and the healthy part. But it does help so I guess it's worth the embarassment...it's not like I do it in front of people lol. Is that normal?

I think it's definitely normal to feel a lot of conflict between 'your voice' and 'your disordered voice'.. A lot of people on this forum who are recovering from eating disorders talk about their thoughts in a kind of "me vs. ED" style.. even typing out the dialogue sometimes in conversation.. "Ed said this and I said NO!" lol. So yeah it's normal. :) It's really positive that you can tell which thoughts are disordered though.

Mhm, don't worry mars_0112, it's normal.  :)  Like fayxo said, it can be really helpful to separate your thoughts from your ED's.  I do that especially at meal times; I try to say: "What does ED want?  Okay, ED wants a salad with no dressing.  What do I want?  I want a burrito.  Okay, let's go for the burrito."  It's insanely hard at first, but it gets easier and easier as you do it more often.  ED quiets down once you keep proving that choosing what you want isn't going to make you fat.  :)

The hardest part for me is getting through my head that fats are good for me when I'm eating nuts or adding a little olive oil to a meal. That was one of my main fears during the worst of my ED, that fat makes you fat. It wasn't until I got a little older that I learned that wasn't true. But I still find them difficult to eat without a little ED resistance. That's usually what I argue about. "BUT I LIKE ALMONDS! SHUT UP!"