recovering from bulimia

A Look at Eating Disorders

I used to treat only eating disorders because I was the chief psychologist of an inpatient program as part of the teaching hospital of the medical school at the University of CA Irvine.  We were sent the toughest cases because of our reputation.  (Later I developed, chose the staff for and then directed an inpatient and outpatient eating disorder center at a prestigious psychiatric hospital in another state).  As a result of these experiences, I have many, many stories of extreme cases.  I remember one time a beautiful flight attendant came into the program (she had great pressure from the airline to stay at a particular weight and was taken off of a flight if she was weighed by them and found to be one pound over the limit).  She was a challenge because of her desperate internal struggle between “minding” the authorities and deciding to be a person with her own choices.  One day, she shared with me in a session at the hospital, she came home after a trip, drove to her home in one of the canyons where no stores stayed open very late and found that she had absolutely nothing in her cabinets or refrigerator to eat.  She didn’t keep extra food because she would devour it, no matter how full she felt.  It was late.  No possibilities were open to her to get anything.  She opened the one can she had of dog food and began to eat it.  Suddenly she caught a glimpse of herself in her mind, got very scared and called for help.  There are lots of experiences like that I could share with you.  No one but an eating disorder person could relate fully to this woman.  She wasn’t crazy, she wasn’t mentally ill, she had an addiction.  All of those who have any kind of an addiction, no matter what it is, can also understand her desperation at that moment in time.  It is powerful, it has taken over one’s life when it has gotten to this point.  What can a person do?  Not just because I am a psychologist but because I know this to be absolutely the truth – get professional help.  Go to someone who has experience for several reasons – they have the tools, they have the knowledge and they have a deeper understanding of the depth of your compelling desire to eat until you are overly full and then either purge or use laxatives or…  

Actually, there are two kinds of bulimics, which we are speaking about now, another day I will talk at length about anorexia nervosa but today, it is the bulimic I am describing.  The first kind is drawn to how it feels to get full – they erroneously think that getting full means they are finally feeling fulfilled.  Not a chance is that true, but it feels like it is true, until the next time they feel empty – which is most likely very soon, a day or less.  Then they must do it again, to get that false feeling of fullness.  I once had a bulimic say to me words that I’ll never forget:  ”I will binge to the point of unconsciousness until my Soul is no longer starving.”  Our work together could certainly begin in a deeper way once she had “gotten” it that binging was about a Soul-hunger, not a stomach hunger.  Her Soul was crying out to be listened to, to be honored, to be fed.  Soul-food is very different from regular food, as of course everyone knows. Or do they?  

The other kind of bulimic gets addicted to purging.  That person feels that if they vomit out all the food they had just binged on they would no longer feel the awful feelings they were feeling at that time.  They felt that they would be free of them if they just got rid of them by purging.  Again, not a chance is that true, but ut feels true to them at the moment – every moment- that they go to the food.  ”Maybe this time it will work and I won’t ever have those feelings come up again, or those images, or…”

What is the similarity between these  2 types?  They both have a belief that enough food or enough purging will “cure” them.  That they will never have to deal with emptiness or a myriad of horrid feelings again.  When either of those ways don’t work after awhile, they just do them again, hoping that this time they will have success.

Of course I have only touched on all the complexities of bulimia, but I wanted to bring these particular points up today to have you examine if you or anyone you know is battling with something that does literally take over one’s life.  If so, perhaps awareness will bring a bit of clarity as to what needs to happen next, not repeating the same pattern but interrupting it by getting help.  It doesn’t go away on its own.  It doesn’t solve any issues you may have, it only increased them.

One other thing, it isn’t a good idea for anyone in a family who suspects (or knows) that another member is having this challenge to get in between the bulimia and the behavior you know is going on.  You aren’t the one who can solve this kind of huge issue.  Make a phone call instead.  I have known partners who try to assist with this issue and the relationship suffers because of it.  

No matter how long someone has been having this major challenge, it is very possible for them to recover.  Never think that a person is doomed because they have an addiction of any kind (and I have dealt with really tough ones besides this one).  It is totally possible, with a willingness to reach out, not  for food, but for professional help.