Beating Ana by Shannon Cutts

You Can - and WILL - Figure It Out

From this month's Good News for Eating Disorders Recovery ezine - I hope you enjoy it! :-)

 

I will admit it.

To this day, I still get flustered by the unknown, the unexpected, and pretty much anything else with an "un" attached to the front of it.

You'd think by now I would have figured out that what the card I carry in my wallet says is actually true -

Everything really is alright.

But clearly I haven't. So instead I follow the routine:

Freak. Run. Cower. Hide. Repeat if the scary thing is still there.

And yet I am doing it. I AM.

You ARE.

We have loads - I mean TONS - of evidence in even our most recent past that we can, will, and do eventually figure it out....whatever "it" is.

There are many approaches that can strengthen your ability to recover

There are many approaches that hold promise for strengthening our ability to recover. In the beginning, middle, and end, it really all boils down to this: When we all work together—doctor, therapist, nutritionist, psychologist, psychiatrist, social worker, family, friend, sponsor, and mentor—in the name of saving a life, we cannot help but to expect and experience brilliant results. (-Quote from Beating Ana)

Whether or not you feel drawn towards mentoring in the specific form of matching a recovered person with a recovering person for extra support, the fact remains that the more support you have on your "Pro Recovery Team", the fewer folks there are to join "Team Ed".

And when it comes to saving your own life, you want the All Stars on your team. You want the best of the best - and the most of them you can get.

When to Add a Mentor to Your Support Team

You will know you are ready to consider adding a mentor to your support team when you can honestly realize and admit that your efforts on your own, if you do not have access to professional medical care, or in concert with your current treatment plan and support system, are not yet getting you to where you want to go with your recovery goals. (-Quote from Beating Ana)

There is not one single right time to add a mentor to your support team. A mentor is not a substitute or replacement for professional treatment. But a mentor can offer a perspective on eating disorders and recovery that is valuable and unique, and in this way can provide much needed encouragement and support.

Some of you may never want or need to add a mentor to your support team, maybe because someone on your existing team already fills that role or because you feel totally supported in different ways by your the team you have in place.

Which World Are You Inhabiting?

Welcome to our world—the world of overcomers, survivors, and thrivers. We are so glad you are here! (-Quote from Beating Ana)

Whether you see it or believe it or not on a daily basis, just the fact that you are paying attention to the recovery stories of others and dreaming of one day telling your own speaks volumes about the good company you are keeping.

Every person who is a part of the MC community, every recovering and recovered person who shares time and wisdom with new and longstanding MC members alike, plays a part in the recovery journey of all of us.

How active are you in cultivating good company from communities and individuals where recovery is the #1 focus? What can you do to cultivate more good company in your life so you have even less time and attention for Ed?

Who is the Star of Your Recovery Story?

In those moments of choice, when my memory of who I had been in the past went head-to-head with my unfolding awareness of the me I was becoming, it took even greater effort for me to stop—to notice, own, and celebrate the positive shifts in my personality, my rela- tionships, the ways I related to life, and the ways I allowed life to relate to me—and then, from that place of awareness, to begin to allow the new me to take the lead in living my own life. (-Quote from Beating Ana)

What we don't notice might as well not be real.

If we want to hang on to our recovery story - our RECOVERY story - we must REMEMBER.

We simply must remember.

Ed will continually be filling your head with other stories - stories that Ed assures you is true, stories that make you out to be small, powerless, and stuck doing Ed's bidding forever.

If you don't like that story, then keep telling the real story - the story of the you that you are becoming, the story of a you free from Ed.

What story are you telling? Who is the star of your story - you or Ed?

xo

Shannon