Sara's Recovery Journey: Eating Disorders 2

In this episode of the podcast you hear from Sara about her disordered eating history and journey to recovery.

Here's some ED specific resources:
Body positivity movement
Health at every size
National Eating Disorder Association
National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders - free support groups

You can find Laurie and Sara on Instagram to follow their day to day lives even further @laurieanned and @saraswellnessway. You can also find the podcast on IG @boldbeautifulborderline

You can also find Sara's business as a Mental Health Clinician and mental health coach at thewellnesswayllc.com

If you like the show we would love if you could rate, subscribe and support us on Patreon.

For mental health supports:

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or Live Online Chat

SAMHSA Treatment Referral Helpline, 1-877-SAMHSA7 (1-877-726-4727)

OR find a local warmline to you at https://screening.mhanational.org/content/need-talk-someone-warmlines

Transcript

Laurie Edmundson: 0:32

Hi, everybody, and welcome to the bold, beautiful borderline podcast. My name is Laurie. And as always, I'm here with the most beautiful person in the world, Sara. And today we're going to be talking about disordered eating. So this is the second episode in our probably very long disordered eating series to be determined, but there will for sure be at least three episodes about this topic. And before we get started, I just wanted to say that I really appreciate all of the thoughts and feelings that came from the episode before about my experiences with eating disorders in the past, and present. let's not pretend it's the past. And all of the messages that you sent, I just appreciate it so much. I'm feeling really good. And I had like the most like, awesome, healthy meal this evening. And I just like feel great and nourished and happy. And I have a referral to a treatment program, that I'm just waiting on the call. So I just wanted to give that update. I promise I'm in a much better mood today than I was last episode. And Sara is going to talk to us about her experiences with disordered eating. And we anticipate it's going to be a lot easier than it was for me because I hadn't talked about it before. And Sara just kind of is living in recovery. So Sara, take it away.

Sara Amundson: 1:48

Yeah, um, well, first, I just want to say how effing proud of you I am like, you are just killing the steps towards, you know, making. I'm disconnecting yourself from the disordered eating so much. And I just think that that's really beautiful and incredible to witness. So I'm really proud of you.

Laurie Edmundson: 2:07

Thank you. Yeah,

Sara Amundson: 2:09

yeah. So I mean, like Laurie said, like, I talked about my, if you guys follow me on social media, you know that I talk about my eating disorder all the time, because it's, it's like a part of how I maintain my recovery. Once I start to hide any, like behaviors related to disordered eating, then I it's a slippery slope so

Laurie Edmundson: 2:32

well, I mean, I would like to know, kind of when these behaviors became obvious to you, like, in the episode that we recorded about my story, I was thinking back and I was like, I don't know if I've ever had a healthy relationship with food. You know, so when did that shift for you? Or did it shift at all,

Sara Amundson: 2:53

I was raised with a parent with an eating disorder, who has, you know, been in various forms of recovery, but like, certainly, very healthy when I was younger in terms of like, not starving and those kinds of things. But I was raised by a person with an eating disorder. So like, I heard a lot of body shaming and fat shaming behavior coming from them towards themselves. And I remember them, like always being on and off of weightwatchers. And I was in the sixth grade when I I remember going on Weight Watchers with that parent as like an accountability partner. So I started dieting really young. And I just remember like, as long as I've had cognitive thoughts, it's always been about like hating myself and hating my body. And I was always really aware of the fact that I was five, eight, and like, I'm, I'm just built like an athlete. My dad was a professional hockey player. My mom was a marathon runner. Like, my brother's six foot four, he played professional or he played college baseball, like we're a very athletic family. So I've never been in a smaller frame. And so yeah, so I just remember like hating my body and feeling too big. in grade school and middle school, and, you know, I remember being like, a size 10 or whatever, the largest size and Hollister jeans that you could be, and not no longer be able to buy them. And just like very acutely aware of how I had to buy larger things. So yeah, so my disordered kind of relationship with food started, right. Probably like 12 ish. Just trying to use food as a way to manipulate me into a smaller body. So, you know, various forms of like restricting or using exercise to burn calories and a ton of counting behavior over the years, but I experienced a sexual assault at 16, that afterwards, one of the really common symptoms is people will put on a lot of weight as a way of protecting themselves from other potential assaults. And so I followed a pretty traditional path with that of gaining a large amount of weight. And then really, like exiting my athletic career, I had played, you know, really intensive softball and soccer my entire life and never had to worry about gaining weight, really, because I was so active. And once I kind of after the trauma occurred, I really pulled out of like, organized sports the way that I had been. And I decided not to play college sports. And so I put on a lot of weight really quickly. And for many years, I think I lost the obsessive behavior around food and just started drinking a ton. And then I reunited with my eating disorder when I was 23. And in a really dangerous way.

Laurie Edmundson: 6:37

So thank you for that context. I just want to kind of talk about a few points that you made there, because I think it's really interesting. So I'm 510 and a half 511 ish. I had no idea you were so tall. I'm super tall. Yeah. And so I totally like I can't believe I never, like related those two to like those body and security things. But like, I have huge feet, because I'm so tall. Like it would be weird if I had small feet. And like, I used to get made fun of in school all the time, because I was so tall, and I had big feet and whatever. And like, yeah, you're totally right. I feel like that's probably something that like tall women in particular, because we go through puberty so much earlier than men. Like we're kind of so insecure about that from the get go. So of course that would kind of you're trying to like shrink, like, like horizontally because you can't shrink vertically, right. And I remember like, thinking, Oh, I just was I was like short and chubby because I feel like short and chubby is cute, but tall and chubby is not cute. Like I anyway, so I just had to say that. And then for the people that are listening who don't know about the adverse childhood experience study, I highly recommend looking into that, because that's exactly what Sarah was talking about, about the sexual assault and the correlation with weight gain, it's, like, incredibly interesting, we should probably do an entire episode about adverse childhood experiences. But that's where they really like discovered that people who have a significant sexual assault history, like have significant issues with weight, so makes a lot of sense.

Sara Amundson: 8:14

It does make a lot of sense. And it did just compound myself hate over the years, I didn't really start gaining weight until about my senior year of high school. So it's pretty average for you know, all of those years. But I think one of the really interesting things about not necessarily disordered eating, but just development is that I learned really early on because I did develop like I had, like, you know, see cat breasts in like, the seventh grade or eighth grade or whatever. So by the time freshman year came around, I had a really like sexualized myself of understanding that like, because I have breasts, and that's something that like boys like or whatever, then it's a way for me to like, get attention or get positive reinforcement or what I perceive to be positive. And that was a way for me to kind of temporarily distinguish the self hate and so I think there began a long standing history of body checking, even though I didn't understand it was body checking then and that still to this day is one of the hardest parts about having a disordered eating history is like I obsessively body check. I'm still in recovery, you know, in terms of like, I don't count and I don't restrict but I like feel for my ribs and my hip bones. And I look in the mirror all the time and I'm constantly taking photos of my body and like comparing it to other photos of my body. So, yeah, I think like, realizing that I was developing this, this adult body as a young person is when I really became kind of obsessive about looking at it.

Laurie Edmundson: 10:13

Yeah. And then you add the sexual trauma on top of that, and like, what do you expect is gonna happen, right? Of course, you're going to become obsessed with that in one way or another, right? Maybe I'm jumping ahead here, but do you weigh yourself still?

Sara Amundson: 10:29

I try really hard not to weigh by yourself. Because if I start weighing myself, it's almost a we're gonna start weighing ourselves more. And again, I may be lunch, like, every single day. And like the, I would wake up in the morning, if I if I started to weigh myself, I would wake up tomorrow and be like, okay, like, there's gonna be such a dopamine hit if I've lost weight.

Laurie Edmundson: 11:01

And it'll ruin your entire day, if you didn't. Which is the vicious cycle, right? Like, even if you look the exact same your pants, but the exact same, like, if the number didn't go down, God forbid, the number goes up. But like, if the number didn't go down, then you're in like, significant, like, hard state all day, right?

Sara Amundson: 11:21

Yeah. So I try really hard not to weigh myself, I definitely don't have a scale on the van. Through my marriage, Tori would hide the scale, I would have to ask her for it. But I throw away my like, I tore apart my house finding it every single time. So um, yeah, I think you know, one of the things that's super important to acknowledge is that like, no matter how far into a level of recovery, you have you still, it's the first thought that you have in the morning, it's the last thought that you have at night. Like I'm constantly like, playing with myself of like, okay, tomorrow, we're going to, you know, get it together, because I just like most people put on weight during COVID, right? Like, I'm the biggest version of a body that I've had any years. It's not surprising to me that my thoughts are like leaning more and more that way, even though I know it's not a decision that I'm going to make. But even though I'm not starving, and even though I'm not counting obsessively body checking.

Laurie Edmundson: 12:30

Yeah, and I don't know about for you, but I know for myself, and for a lot of people, at least I think I'm kind of over it now. Because I'm like, you know what it is what it is we're trying to survive through a pandemic, we need to have a little bit of like, self love for ourselves to like, realize that this is not a normal situation. But I know that for a lot of people with eating disorders, and again, I would love to hear your experience with this. But there's a big like, focus on Oh, at this point, I'm going to look this way. So like, Oh, I'm getting married. So I need to lose 20 pounds are like, Oh, I'm starting, or like the summer semester is about to be over. So by the time my friends see me Next, I have to be whatever, right? And so I think for COVID a lot of people like felt that way. Because it was like, Oh, well, Once COVID is over, I need to be like the best version of myself because I had all the spare time and like that's not a reasonable thing to do, right? I don't know does is that something that you think of when you think about that during COVID?

Sara Amundson: 13:31

Now, because I'm not returning to anything. Like I don't have an office to go back to Once COVID is over. So that hasn't really been a thought of mine. And I'm not returning to any like, events with my partner's work or friends because I don't have a partner anymore. You know, so not so much. Yeah, I mean, I don't have any kind of anything looming that makes me want to be like, I've got to do X, Y, & Z I've kind of thought about it for your wedding of being like, man, I really should, you know, but then I'm like, Sara, shut up, you know?

Laurie Edmundson: 14:09

Yeah, shut up.

Sara Amundson: 14:12

All those years in between, you know, high school, and when I was like, 23 I was just, you know, and I was like, in those thriving borderline years and a ton of substance use a ton of tons of sex, super inappropriate relationship. I've gotten engaged. And the relationship was super toxic and we broke up when I was 23. And yeah, it was like my 23rd birthday. We broke up like a week before. thing and actually another assault occurred the night on my birthday. And so there was just so much trauma at one sub, like, this fucking thing happened again in the app is over, I was super, super stressed out and I actually developed a few bleeding ulcers. So I was like, in the most pain I've ever experienced in my life during this huge transition, my symptoms were just out of control, my substance use was out of control, like I was just, I was out of control. And I was like, working full time in graduate school full time, all this was going on. And I lost like 20 pounds in a seven to 10 day period. And

Laurie Edmundson: 15:45

intentionally or because of stress, because of stress.

Sara Amundson: 15:52

because of stress. So the ulcers I was in, I basically couldn't get out of the bathroom. My body was just, it was not okay. And so I lost those 20 pounds really quickly. And then I was, it was right around like, New Year's ish that I that had happened, it was like through the holidays, I was getting sick. And so I set a new year's resolution, of course, that year to like, lose the rest of the weight. And I started meal prepping, and I started, you know, aggressively exercising for the sake of and I downloaded this PAL and I started, I started eating 1000 calories a day. And I would track every single thing away every single thing that I put in my body, and I would make sure that I was burning that many calories in exercise. So there was the YMCA by my work, and I had an LA Fitness membership. So at lunch, I would go to the Y and after work, I would go to LA before class. And I am not joking. Like I took photos of every single workout I remember I would go from walking hills to biking to be elliptical. I wasn't lifting any weights, it was just all cardio, just like I just need this out of my system. And then pretty soon I realized that My Fitness Pal would tell me that I was eating dangerously low. And it wouldn't let me log my food for the day if I ate. And my goal was to get under 1000 calorie Mark every single day. And I was on this trajectory of losing almost a pound a day. And I sustained that I lost if I count the first 20 from being sick. And then I lost probably another 40 in like a six to eight week period. And then I hit this plateau where I was like no matter what the fuck I did, I couldn't lose any more weight. And at that point, I was probably eating somewhere between five and 700 calories a day. And I was my body was starting to shut down in terms of like I couldn't stand up without my vision going dark. I couldn't recall. Like, I couldn't recall information. So I would forget things and I was not doing well at school and my hair started to fall out and but I think the most distressing thing to me was that my vision was going black and blurry and my eating disorder voice was telling me Good job, keep going. Like this is what is supposed to happen. I was practicing sobriety so I wasn't seeing any of my friends. I wasn't going out. I literally was just like work, school, gym, work, school, gym, work, school, gym, work, school gym.

Laurie Edmundson: 19:15

So were you practicing sobriety because alcohol has calories or were you practicing sobriety because you realized at that point that you had a problem with alcohol addiction or whatever you want to call it.

Sara Amundson: 19:28

I quit drinking because I needed to for the bleeding ulcers. So I was like on this gut healing journey. Oh, so I quit drinking alcohol. I quit drinking coffee. I literally just drank like water and tea and then by the time I might have started drinking alcohol again, I was terrified of the calories. And I had started being gluten free too. So they're like what it wasn't like I could drink like a mega lobe light or something that was super low in calories. Which is a disgusting beer. But I think that's the lightest calorie beer there is. Yeah,

Laurie Edmundson: 20:05

I don't drink beer. So I have no idea. But, um, question about the gluten free thing. So I in the last year have discovered that gluten just like does not do well, for me. I'm not celiac, I've had the blood tests and stuff. But I know that it's a very common. Yeah, it's a very common Well, there's a couple of common things, actually, it's very common for people who have mental health issues to have sensitivities to gluten, which is super interesting. But also, it's very common for people who have eating disorders. And I think particularly anorexia, to which I'm, I realize you were never diagnosed with anorexia. But clearly what you're describing is anorexia. You just didn't get diagnosed with it. It's very common for people with that kind of eating disorder to like cut out groups of food. And then say, it's like a diet like or it's on a diet. I'm just vegan, or I'm not a diet, I just don't eat gluten or, and I'm just curious, like, for you, the gluten thing is not like part of your eating disorder, it just literally gluten makes your body feel terrible, right?

Sara Amundson: 21:14

It does mess with my bowels and my digestion. I do also think, though, that I own to that as a way of getting bread and carb out of my diet, like all together. Right? So I think it's a it's a little bit of both. And I know because like in dating the last month or two, I've had more wheat like we've gotten pizza, or we've, you know, whatever. And I'm Mike, my bowels are so confused. So I do just generally try to maintain a gluten free diet, but it's not surprising to me that I became hard, fast gluten free in the middle of my eating disorder.

Laurie Edmundson: 21:56

Yeah. And I should say, like, again, not necessarily Sara's experience. But for a lot of people who have eating disorders, the reason that they take on diets like that is because it makes it less obvious if you're not eating, right, so you can go to a buffet with your family or you can go to Christmas dinner, and be like, Oh, well, I'm, it's not that I'm not eating. It's just that I can't eat anything because it's not vegan, or it's not gluten free or whatever. And so that's why I asked. It's kind of funny, because I thought that like going gluten free would cut out a lot of the like bread products, but instead I was just like, Oh my God, look at all these cool new gluten free things that I could try and I just like ate like, every gluten free things under the sun so it didn't really work for me. But yeah, I I'm eating gluten right now. And I feel like absolute shit. But....

Sara Amundson: 22:43

yeah, me too. It's pretty hard on the digestive system, because it's so processed. But yeah, so I mean, my fear of food just became a wildly out of control, I was eating a very small amount of food that was only meal prep to buy me. I couldn't purchase any pre packaged food, I couldn't go out for meals. I got on this. And I was smoking cigarettes, which was like my saving grace because I could smoke cigarettes and that would help the hunger. And there's still to this day food that I can't eat. Because that reminds me of my eating disorder. Like it reminds me of like the things that I obsessively ate over time very rarely will eat like a soft karma. And there's like very specific kind of sparkling water because I would go to stadiums roughly in Tacoma and get that sparkling water in Carmel for lunch, like a soft Carmel like the size of a nickel. Um,

Laurie Edmundson: 23:48

yeah, I remember you sharing a story with me, I don't know if it was on an episode about you going to a grocery store, whatever. And just being like super stressed because you couldn't find anything that you felt like you could eat.

Sara Amundson: 23:59

And that is that. So this is the thing that people don't understand about eating disorders is it stopped being about my body and it started becoming about safety. I just felt so unsafe. And it was like the eating disorder was a way for me to control right, I needed to make my world really small to feel safe after feeling like I wasn't safe. I'm sure I'm leaving out so many details to be honest with you. I like I truly didn't realize I had an eating disorder until I hit that plateau. And I started to see a nutritionist and I was like going in for my first appointment. And I said like, Listen, like I've had this 50/60 pound plateau. Like I have to lose the next 40 pounds. I just really need your help to do it. And we went through the intake and she was like, Listen, Sara, like this work that we're going to do isn't going to be about you losing weight. It's going to be about you developing a non disorder. relationship with food because you have an eating disorder. And I was like, excuse me, like, that's not what I came here to do. I can't have an eating disorder because I am X, Y and Z pounds. People like me don't have eating disorders, you know, because at this point, I was not far from the size I am now, right? I mean, I've lost a decent amount of weight. And I mean, maybe a little bit bigger than the body I'm in now, but by like, 20 pounds or something, maybe. But, you know, not a lot. And

Laurie Edmundson: 25:33

well, and if you're chubby, I don't know what you looked like. But let's say you were chubby before the world tells you that you should lose weight. So why would you think that you have any disordered eating, you're gonna think you're doing literally the right thing. Right?

Sara Amundson: 25:50

Well, and that's so interesting, too, is that I was being watched fairly, very closely by people who are like, like, Oh, good for you, Sara, you look great. Like, I'm so proud of you. You're doing the thing. You're losing weight, you know, whatever. And people were like, asking me a lot about it. And I was getting a lot of compliments. And that just was fueling this isolating illness that I had. And I remember getting to a place where I was weighing myself like seven times a day, like I would leave work and go home to weigh myself. And I was spending hours and hours at the gym. So she was like, we're gonna we have to work on your your fear of food, like you're, you have an eating disorder. I'm diagnosing you right now is eating disorder. NOS? Like, I couldn't give you a diagnosis of anorexia because you don't meet the BMI requirement. But like, you are severely restricting, and the damage that it will do to your organs into your body will be irreversible. And I just started bawling. Like, I was like, Oh, my God, like I, I just like, this is not what I was, I came here to do, I felt like she was attacking my eating disorder or whatever. And I was like, I can't I'm not ready. And she started seeing me twice a week. And of course, I was like, I would run from my office to see her like, and then run back. And I was kind of starting to, like, play around with implementing feelings here and there that shooting but not really. And we set an agreement with each other, which was like, okay, Sarah, you're gonna keep fucking around, that's fine. But we're going to hit a rock bottom. So what does rock bottom look like for you before you take recovery seriously, because it doesn't matter if I tell you, whether this is an app or not, until you work close, you know, it's not it's not going to work. And I remember I went on like a day trip with my mom to the beach, and I was just crying because I couldn't, there was nothing I felt like I could eat. Like, there was nothing I felt like I could eat except for candy from the candy store. Like I was like, I will save all of my calories. Just eat this fucking fudge like, and I my body started to crave the quick carbohydrates of of candy and I couldn't not eat candy that was like placed around the office. Because I was working in Cube City at that point. So you know, everybody has like the minutes are snicker bars and like things like that everywhere. So my body was starting to have these crazy cravings for just quite quick fats because it was I was starving and my hair was falling out. My Everything was everything was really bad. And I got I developed strep throat and it was like antibiotic resistant. Like I was so sick that my body couldn't fight off illnesses. And they had me on like three different antibiotics. I had to take like two weeks off of work. And I was so so sick. They ended up prescribing me liquid oxy cotton. I was the first time in my life where I was like, Oh, I'm an addict. Like, I remember being like, okay, I could do this. Yeah, totally drug but, um, so yeah, so we had to find what rock bottom was for me. And like I was on this trajectory with my career of like, I knew exactly what I want. So if the eating disorder was going to impact my career, especially because I was like halfway through of graduate school, prepared to let it so I continued to lose another 30 or 40 pounds in probably a six month period of working with her and then it was the spring of my senior year of graduate school. And no is this it was, it was the spring, summer of my second year of graduate school. Because I was I went to the hospital in August and I showed up To my session with her his call, like, I was like I have any Mondays. I could, it was point in my office to her office and I would go see her like on my lunch break. And I was like, I couldn't even run to the, like the light across the street without like, blacking out, I feel like I'm gonna pass out. And she was like, How's work been? And I said, I've never done this before. But I forgot I was supposed to build a presentation for a meeting and I lied to my boss about lied and have the presentation done. And she was like, what does this sound like to you? And I said, it sounds like my rock bottom. Because at that point, I was like starting to develop heart palpitations, I would run my fingers through my hair and like a giant chunks of hair were falling out. And when I told her about the heart palpitations, she was like, Okay, so we're here, it's time. What are we going to do about it? And I was like, Okay, I'm gonna go to the hospital, a friend of mine at the time, I'm not friends with anymore, we had a pretty maladaptive friendship. But she had had an eating disorder history. So through this entire year, period, less than a year period of the really bad disordered eating, was the only person that said, I know what's going on with you. I know what's going on with you, Sarah, and I'm not gonna let you do it. So she was the only person that was like, I know what's going on with you. It was never this bad for me, I'm really worried about you. And I remember calling her on a Friday after work. And I said, so my nutritionist and I agreed, like, I've hit rock bottom, and I need to go get checked out. And I said, Can you please go with me? So she went to the ED with me, I had to have like a full cardiac checkup, they found a regular cardiac functioning. And they were like, you know, your malnutrition is at a point where you may have to consider going into an inpatient program. And if you continue on this road, like the only way that your nutrition can get back to a standard that is functional as to be fed via g two. Yeah, so Hospital in August. And I was like, I'm not, I'm not you guys are not going to put me in an inpatient program. So I'm going to start to take this more seriously. But of course, like the next day, I was back in the gym. It took me a few months to really get it together. But in terms of like being able to eat, but I was pretty motivated by not having to drop out of graduate school. And quickly thereafter, I met Tori, and meeting Tori was the game changer. So that happened in August, and I met Tori and novar. And I was still actively restricting, still really in a like intensive relationship with my eating disorder. Although i'd thrown out my scale at that point. And that was really helpful. Tori, and my eating disorder fought like, and there was a day where she sat me down, she was like, look like, I'm not doing this anymore. I love you, I want to do a thing with you, but I know that you're hiding. And it's not gonna work for me. And that was like, the moment where I was like, okay, you're right, like, I love you. And I'm not gonna hide this from you. And I started to talk more and more about it. And ever since I've been just like, using my DBT skills and reframing like food as fuel and noticing. Am I exercising for punishment? Or am I actually exercising to act off and I like running was like, probably the most healing thing I could have ever done for myself, because I wanted to train for my first half and the first full marathons. And those required me to eat so that was like a protective factor. Yeah, sure. Yeah. So that is my disordered eating history in a nutshell.

Laurie Edmundson: 33:57

Yeah. Well, thanks for sharing all of that. I while you were talking, I had this memory of going and visiting a friend of mine in the inpatient eating disorder program down in Vancouver here. And I just remember being like, it was the first time where I realized that not only is this disorder, like so lethal, but also the treatment is literally doing the thing that you want to do least, like in order to heal from anorexia, you're going to have to gain weight. And, and that it's like, it's not like most other therapies were like that. I guess maybe phobias to an extreme would be similar, but like, most therapies, or like most recovery looks like what you want it to look like, right? So it's like, Okay, well, you're going to go into treatment for anxiety so that you're less anxious, you're going to go into treatment for depression. So that you're happier, you're going to go into treatment for BPD. So that you have more control over your emotions. And then, and then you go to you're going to go into treatment for anorexia. And you're going to eat and gain weight. And you're like, that's not what I want to do. But the alternative is you die, right? Like it's, I remember to sitting there with her and being like, holy shit, I don't. I don't really blame you for wanting to leave, because that must be like the hardest thing ever to think about. Yeah, so I just I always have so much respect for people who have like really overcome, like, restricting, like severe restricting behaviors in food, because it's so hard.

Sara Amundson: 35:36

Yeah. I, I mean, I'm obviously the one that did the work but loving Tori was, you know, the most important part of the recovery for me, because, one, I was excited to go out and do things with her right. And of course, when you're first dating someone, a big piece of it is like going out to dinners and going out to movies, and, like making cupcakes together, like whatever. Um, but also, like, I felt like for the first time in my life, I had a secure attachment, and I'd never had a secure attachment before. And I if Tory told me, I had to get my eating disorder under control to be with her. I like what I was gonna do sounds super maladaptive, meaning to sort of want to kill me. I, I have the most full and fun life. Because I eat food, the things that my body can do, you know, is there just gotten real, like, I've backpacked 20 miles a day, like, ag back to I couldn't get through a point of an because my vision was blacking out and I couldn't see, you know, so. It's given me so so much. And I just try to never lose sight of that.

Laurie Edmundson: 36:53

Yeah. And I think that, like, it's difficult, especially with the exercise thing, because of course, like anybody that has had a disordered eating problem in the past, like, they think exercise and they go like, Okay, so this is how many calories you gained from walking. This is how many are sorry, lose from walking, whatever. But I know even before you and I were doing this podcast, and like when I was following on Instagram, and we were just kind of getting to know each other. Every day, you would post like, have you moved your body today? And, you know, have you honored your body with movement today? And honestly, I'm not joking. For some reason. That was like, so powerful to me. That's the difference. You didn't say, Have you exercise today? Have you got your 30 minutes of exercise in? Because like, that's, you don't need to quantify it, right? Like, just have you have you moved? And have you moved to honor yourself, not to punish yourself. And I really, like I part of me really blames gym classes in high school, or elementary school or whatever, because as a bigger kid, it was always competitive. And you always felt like it was punishment. And you were always trying to get out of it. And like, movement shouldn't be like that. I love movement now, you know? Yeah, I, I love that you have gotten to the point where you're like, if I if I didn't eat, or if I didn't eat enough, I wouldn't be able to do all the things that I love. You know? And that's it like,

Sara Amundson: 38:25

yeah, it's such a conscious refraining process of food is not bad food is fuel, food gets to be fun. There is no cheat food. There are no cheat days, like there is just food. And exercise is not a way to manipulate this body into being smaller or bigger or different. It is a thing that we do because our body craves it, because we're literally animals, right? Like because it produces dopamine, it produces serotonin, like it helps me regulate. It's something I have so much fucking fun doing like those that that rape, that cognitive reprocessing has been such an important part of my recovery. And it's a thing that I know I will likely do the rest of my life. You know, some people say like, you don't, if you're a person with an eating disorder, you'll be a person with an eating disorder forever. Other people don't believe that. It doesn't really matter what other people believe. I know for me, I'm always going to be a person because of my borderline personality disorder. who hates myself sometimes, like there's always going to be days I hate this body, no matter what this body looks like. It could be the socialized ideal of what beauty is, and I would still have days where I hate this body because I have a disordered brain.

Laurie Edmundson: 39:52

Where what happens is literally like

Sara Amundson: 39:55

unstable self. Yeah, exactly. leaning into those Cognitive reprocessing and reframing tools and strategies as the only way that I will maintain recovery. So I just keep I keep doing the work and like talking about it, noticing it. Being willing to be vulnerable and vulnerable about it. Like that's, that's me being accountable to myself, like showing up on Instagram and talking about like, all bodies are good bodies, all bellies are good. belly is like movement is to honor like, that's just me coaching myself through it.

Laurie Edmundson: 40:33

Yeah, and that's what sometimes we need to do, right? Like, I know, Sara loves a good crop top. And we're like in the process of figuring out some podcast merge right now. And she's like, we need crop tops, we need crop tops. I'm like, Can we have one like non crop top people that aren't there yet? And like, because of you I bought my like,

Sara Amundson: 40:53

of course, bythe way,

Laurie Edmundson: 40:54

I know. But like, I bought my first crop top this year, because of Sara just ike constantly being like crop ops are for everyone. crop tops re for everyone. And you're ight, like I think that is olding, holding yourself ccountable. And if like, if hat's what's working for you, hen that's awesome. The thing hat I the thing that I struggle ith on social media in articular is the opposite. ell, it's the people that are olding themselves accountable y constantly posting before and fters constantly talking about heir diet constantly promoting heir diet to other people onstantly taking pictures in he gym, like every single day. nd that's where I mean, they ould say, Oh, I'm holding yself accountable, but it's ike, Yeah, but you're taking ther people down with you don't now what to say.

Sara Amundson: 41:41

Well, and the thing that they don't realize is that Fitz Bo kind of culture is so doctor are weighing your food and you are counting your macros, and you are afraid to eat pizza, because it's not fitting into your macros, let me tell you why that's not a healthy relationship with food. And that's not a healthy relationship with your body. And the stress and the anxiety around making sure that you know, every fucking ingredient that goes into that piece of pizza that you didn't make homemade is disordered.

Laurie Edmundson: 42:15

Yeah. And Sara and I have both been there. Guaranteed we have avoided eating

Sara Amundson: 42:19

People don't ealize people don't realize t at and they don't get the suppo t they need to reframe the r relationship with food, becau e that fits both cultures that o r communities is the wanting pho o me that I post, not naked, li e a photo of me and underwear a d bra. Haha. Whereas a picture f my van on a beach, which is w y cuter gets like 40 likes, righ? Like, it's just the culture th t we live in. And people do n t understand the damage that th y are doing to millions of viewe s and especially young people wh n they post those before a d afters because they're telli g us that we we can only e celebrated in a smaller bod. And it's not tru

Laurie Edmundson: 43:07

And I've been that person and I I'm sure I was hurting people when I was that person, you know? And if you were one of the people that I hurt by that that I am very sorry. And just know that I was also struggling like yeah, the the counting the macros the counting all the calories, you're burning all the time. Having to go to the gym, before and after work seven days a week, like none of these things are good, like having cheat days, once a month. Those are just binges, right? Like, call it what you want. But you're still restricting what you eat and bingeing. And while I think like, I mean, I strive really hard, other than when I'm like having like serious eating problems, obviously. But I try to, like eat whole foods when I can, right. So like, I would prefer to eat things that I know, I got in the like basic form, and then made them into something amazing, as opposed to buying like, pizza pops, right? But at the same time, like not that I don't really like pizza box. But like if I wanted to have perogies or whatever, that were made by somebody else, I'm trying really hard to not read the label and like stress forever about what's in them. Because I mean, I probably spent like hours in grocery stores, reading labels, and I remember at the beginning of COVID, I was so stressed because you weren't able to like loiter, and you weren't able to touch stuff. And so I would go to grocery stores, and I'd be like, oh my god like, well, if I can't read the label, like if I touch it, and then what if it has something in it that I don't want to eat like, and I was it caused me so much anxiety just because you can't just touch things now. So maybe it's good. Maybe at the end of the day, it's good for all of us.

Sara Amundson: 44:48

Yeah, I try really, really hard to not flip the label and look at my calories or what a serving sizes. Like I try super, super hard. And one of the things that I try to do As I just tried to make sure that my diet is colorful, like, just colorful, that's all like if I'm eating a diet full of color and I'm moving my body, I'm gonna be okay.

Laurie Edmundson: 45:13

Yeah, I will say sometimes I do look at serving sizes, because I have binge eating problems, right. So, for me, it's helpful to be like, Okay, well not that serving sizes mean anything, but like, it's almost a reminder to be like, okay, Laurie, the whole box is not a serving. But, but I'm not like tracking the calories or weighing out the serving size anymore, which is the difference. It's just like, being mindful of what the serving size is. And I love colorful food. Love it. Like I was thinking about my like dinner today. And I was like, oh, like I had blueberries and cranberries, and spinach, and like all of these like super, super bright, yummy things. And it's just like, nothing makes me happier. I don't know why, but like colorful food is the best.

Sara Amundson: 46:00

Like, yeah, I wa explaining to this person that I've been dating. I thin making pretty makes it more fu to eat. Like, it's like, i makes it feel safer. makes it eel safer. And it's fun. And ike, I want to have

Laurie Edmundson: 46:20

Yeah, totally. One of my best friends has like an incredible Instagram page where she just puts like the most beautiful food up ever. I'm just gonna find it. It's Elizabeth Whalley Nutrition. Follow her for some very, very, very gorgeous looking vegan food. I'm not even vegan. And I just like stare at the page. Just like oh my god. So yummy. Yeah, so yeah, colorful foods. Good shit. Okay, so right. Okay, for a more tangible thing. you said, you say that you say that you talk that you use your DBT skills when it comes to eating, and I know that you and I talked about this. Last week when we were I was going through my like crisis. But what DBT skills in particular, do you find the most useful to your recovery in this area?

Sara Amundson: 47:19

fact checking. fact checking is huge. where food is concerned. The PLEASE skill, which is a physical exercise, a sleep, avoid substances. Yeah, that is kind of something that I just based my life around. And I think the best preventative back there for me. I like to practice beach. So just like living that kind of holistic health and wellness, like lifestyle makes me feel accountable to myself and in my work in my recovery.

Laurie Edmundson: 48:06

And I think that's where recovery is sustainable, right? Where it's like just part of what you do now. Whereas you're not sitting there. Like, I can't think of an example in this context. But, you know, like, constantly like going over all the skills every single day, and you'd need to do that at the beginning. But at a certain point, like they just become natural. And that's how you've probably been able to sustain it. And I like 100% think that you're reframing from like, reframing from food as bad exercise as punishment to food as nourishment, and exercise or movement is honoring your body. Like, that's, that in itself is huge. And I think that that in itself is recovery.

Sara Amundson: 48:55

Yeah. And just asking myself, like, Am I living this? Or am I lying to myself about this?

Laurie Edmundson: 49:00

I wouldn't know anything about that.

Sara Amundson: 49:03

I mean, listen, there's still times where I like, I'm not gonna say it's been a smooth road with recovery. I've gotten in and out of like, re downloading that stupid app and tracking things and whatever. But for the most part, like it's, I have no motivation to do anything. And I'm so emotionally disregulated up, yep, haven't been eating, you know, like, so. It's just not worth that hours of your life every week, which will add up to 1000s of hours and days of your life, like in an intense relationship with your eating disorder and never feel joy. Or you can just do the hard work and face it and realize like the freedom that comes with that and like actually, that you gain control over your life again, because like, I didn't experience joy for so long, because all I could think about was food and exercise and there was nothing else.

Laurie Edmundson: 49:52

Yeah, I've definitely been there and exercises, so like I mean, but all of it losing weight and exercise is so like, praised. And I know so many people who have, they may or may not have purging behaviors anymore, but they're purging their calories through exercise for through intense exercise that's causing them harm all the time.

Sara Amundson: 50:18

It's orthorexia is a celebrated eating disorder. And it's not currently diagnoseable in the DSM-5, bu they are working towards ma ing it a diagnosed eating di order that would like people co ld get reimbursed treatment fo. But it's celebrated because of social media. And because it s a way to manipulate the bo y. And it's really, it's re lly sick, it's really un ealthy. And it's important to re ember that it happens because we live in a culture that's be efiting from our weight loss, li e it's a billion dollar in ustry, right, like, like we ght loss, diet pills, like,

Laurie Edmundson: 50:55

they know full well that you're going to gain all that weight back. Like if I get another ad, I'm not even going to say their name, because I get so annoyed with the amount of ads that I get for a particular fitness or weight loss app that has four letters in it. If I get another ad for that stupid app, I am going to rage. Because like, here, I am actively trying like don't open My Fitness Pal, don't open My Fitness Pal, don't count your calories, don't weigh your food. And then I get an ad for the stupid app every single day. Like I lost this much weight bla bla bla. And it's just like, I don't know, anyway, sorry, maybe a little bit of a rant. But like as somebody who's actively trying to not be like a victim of diet culture. And I really think that like victim is the right word. The fact that they are allowed to advertise to me seven days a week is very frustrating,

Sara Amundson: 51:47

because it plays on something that you've hated about yourself for your almost your entire life, right? I mean, that's some pretty intimate desire to spend money on something, it's pretty wild. And and here's the thing, too, is like, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with weight loss, right? Like if people need to lose weight for their health,

Laurie Edmundson: 52:08

right. But the difference is healthy, sustainable weight loss, not crash diet, right?

Sara Amundson: 52:15

Supported with a ross systems treatment team, l ke with a doctor, with a nu ritionist, with a trainer wi h all of these people that can w rk in tandem to make sure that it is a program that can acilitate healthy sustainab e weight loss, like you said, wh ch is one half to one pound per eek. That's very, very slow. nd most of the time, people don' want to do that. And that's ow this industry has gott n to be so big. And like you said, we've all become victim of it, especially women hat want to like love themsel es. And were told that they we e in a body that was unlovabl.

Laurie Edmundson: 52:55

Yeah, and I have to say that, I really believe that the body positivity movement, especially like on Instagram and ad campaigns is helping. And I know that that this is going to be an episode that we kind of do a whole episode on, or a topic we do a whole episode on because like, I just made a conscious decision in the middle of the pandemic to delete everybody that I follow that promotes a diet pill or a diet gummy, or a diet, whatever, and only follow people that look like me, essentially, like within reason. I mean, obviously I follow a few people that don't, but like, there's some incredible, incredible people out there that like have bodies like mine. And that was not something that we had when we grew up at all. Like if you didn't look like Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears, like you were too fat and

Sara Amundson: 53:44

nobody would love for other people listening I would always say like, try to find a program of support. And if you have any questions and want some like resources or places for where to start, let me know send me an Instagram dm we can problem solve together because it is the most deadly mental illness that exists. And you know, the damage that is done to our bodies can sometimes be irreversible. So please, please, please take it really, really seriously.

Laurie Edmundson: 54:17

Awesome. Thanks for sharing your story, Sarah. It's a I think it's interesting because we have such like distinct challenges with food, but in some ways they align and in other ways they're completely the opposite. Awesome.

Sara Amundson: 54:30

I love you.

Laurie Edmundson: 54:31

Love you too. Thanks, everybody. And we will have another episode at some point more about eating disorders in some way or another.

Sara Amundson: 54:41

Anyway, did it