recovery Archives - Everyday Chocolate | Libby Stenzel Nutrition

July 17, 2024July 16, 2024 by Libby

5 Recovery Challenges to Consider This Summer

If you are in the midst of recovering from an eating disorder (or any degree of disordered eating), summer can be a good time to challenge yourself a bit when it comes to your recovery journey.

While summer certainly isn’t always this way, oftentimes we might have a little more energy, space in our routines, and motivation to intentionally focus on something like our mental/emotional and physical health. Maybe you are a student in transition between semesters or school years, and your schedule is more open compared to the fall and winter. Maybe your job is a little less busy this time of year.

Any way you slice it, I encourage you to use the mood-boosting effects of all the sunshine, longer days, and summer outdoor-beauty to lean into your recovery more intentionally before the fall is here!

Today I’m sharing 5 recovery challenges to consider this summer. If you are walking through anorexia recovery, working on your relationship with food, or trying to prevent a relapse, then this blog post is for you!

5 Recovery Challenges to Consider This Summer:

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June 12, 2024June 11, 2024 by Libby

Ideas for Increasing Food Intake in Anorexia Recovery

One of the most challenging parts of anorexia recovery (specifically the weight restoration phase) is the AMOUNT of food that it takes to physically recover / get to a healthy-body-weight-for-you.

Clients I have worked with are often shocked by how much they have to eat to start gaining weight. It takes a LOT OF FOOD.

Most of the food/caloric intake early on in recovery is going towards normalizing your metabolism and bodily processes. This alone takes quite a bit of food before any weight gain will even be happening.

Eating this much can be quite difficult (to say the least). Your stomach and GI tract aren’t used to handling this quantity of food, so there is often significant discomfort. It can be hard mentally to increase your food intake that much and to be gaining weight as your goal when everyone else around you seems to be striving for the opposite.

What’s more, another challenge can be thinking of ideas to increase your intake when it comes to restoring weight efficiently and effectively. I’m guessing you don’t want to be in the weight restoration phase for forever!

You might be feeling…

Tired of thinking of yet another snack or breakfast idea
Unsure of how to get more “bang for your buck” by focusing on calorically-dense options
Like you don’t even enjoy food right now, so it’s hard to be creative

That’s where my comprehensive list for ideas to increase your food intake comes in!

Bookmark this page and come back to it as you find yourself feeling stuck, in need of a new idea, or in need of a little extra inspiration in your anorexia recovery journey. As someone who has been in your shoes, I am here for YOU!

(Note: If you aren’t already eating my recommended 3 meals and at least 3 snacks, you might want to start with this post first!)

Ideas for Increasing Food Intake in Anorexia Recovery:

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May 8, 2024May 3, 2024 by Libby

Ways to Increase Motivation in Anorexia Recovery

Recovering from anorexia is a long, challenging process. While it is normal (and okay!) for your motivation level to ebb and flow, it is vital to your recovery success that you work to keep your motivation as high as you can, more often than not.

If you are at the beginning of your recovery journey, you may have very little motivation right now. Anorexia is especially unique, when it comes to mental/physical illnesses, in that when we are stuck in it we don’t generally want to get better! (There are a variety of reasons for this, and this contributes to the danger/lethality of anorexia).

However, given that you are reading this blog post, I’m guessing that at least a small part of you does want to get better. Great – let’s start there! We can work with any ambivalence and hesitation you are feeling over time, no matter how strong. This is also normal.

On the other hand, if you are already full-force into your recovery journey, then hopefully the ideas in this post help you to keep building on and maintaining your motivation.

Ways to increase motivation in anorexia recovery:

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October 11, 2023October 10, 2023 by Libby

Different Factors to Consider in Eating Decisions (Beyond Hunger/Fullness)

Sometimes intuitive eating can get overly simplified to “eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are full.”

I think it’s super important to listen to your hunger/fullness signals. At the same time, I also think there are other key factors to take into consideration when deciding what/when/how much to eat.

If feeling biological signals of hunger –> a clear sign to eat!!

BUT there are other “signs” or things to think about that may also indicate a need to eat.

We may think we are doing something “wrong” if we are eating when we aren’t technically feeling hungry, yet this may be just what our bodies need! If you *only* eat when you are feeling physically hungry, I’d bet you most likely aren’t eating enough.

In this post we will explore…

A few personal examples of me taking into account “other factors beyond hunger/fullness” when it comes to eating
Different factors to consider when making food decisions, including:
- Tuning into your bodily signals
- Thinking about your daily life situation / overall life circumstances
- Trusting your overall intuition
Some closing thoughts and questions

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July 12, 2023July 12, 2023 by Libby

10 Thoughts About Anorexia Recovery {From Personal Experience}

Happy Wednesday!

Today I’m sharing some thoughts on my experience recovering from anorexia (the most intense part of my recovery took place when I was in high school).

While this was an extremely difficult time in my life that I would never want to repeat, I am also thankful for it because of all the personal growth and healing that has resulted from it! While painful at times, beginning recovery has been the gift that has kept giving.

I hope you find the following thoughts and reflections both helpful and encouraging if you are currently recovering from anorexia, or if you are thinking about starting recovery.

If you are recovering from a different eating disorder (or any degree of disordered eating), I think you will also find this post encouraging!

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June 28, 2023June 27, 2023 by Libby

Some Thoughts on What to Do After a Binge (or Overeating in General)

Experiencing the aftermath of a binge eating episode is typically incredibly uncomfortable both from a physical and emotional/psychological standpoint. Not only are you likely working through feelings of guilt, disgust, and possible shame/embarrassment, but you also have the physical sensations of over-fullness and bloating to tolerate. NOT FUN.

In this post, I want to provide some tips on what to do if you find yourself in this scenario. This could be post-binge OR after any sort of uncomfortable degree of overeating.

To review, an actual binge eating episode is defined as eating (within a 2-hr window) significantly more than most people would eat under similar circumstances. It is also accompanied by feeling out-of-control.

Even if you don’t struggle with “technical binge eating,” regularly experiencing chaotic eating and/or regularly reaching the point of unpleasant fullness is also quite distressing. You may feel a sense of shame, wondering why do I find eating so hard when others seem totally fine??

You are not a uniquely flawed human being if this is something you are wrestling with. There are legitimate physical and emotional/psychological reasons why you may experience your eating spiraling out-of-control at times.

Next time you find yourself feeling overly full or struggling with the aftermath of a binge, I hope you find the following ideas useful!

(Note: a lot of the following ideas/thoughts can be applied to other eating disorder behaviors, including restriction and purging).

Thoughts on What to Do After a Binge (or Overeating in General):

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September 21, 2022September 19, 2022 by Libby

A Few Things That Helped Me in Recovery

Recovering from an eating disorder was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. I don’t even think there is a particularly close second?? There is a reason recovery rates for anorexia are generally estimated to be below 50% (and I would argue probably considerably lower, depending on one’s definition of “recovery”), and that it is the mental illness with the highest mortality rate. Not only is it a severe mental illness, but unlike other mental illnesses, the sufferer is literally physically starving themself to death as a result of the internal mental and biological processes gone astray. To make matters worse, the person generally doesn’t realize they are even sick (at least not initially or for a while), and the “anorexia brain” causes the person to not want to get better and to maintain the eating disorder at all costs (again, at least initially).

IT IS A TERRIBLE THING, LET ME TELL YOU! And I have tremendous compassion for anyone reading this post who is suffering or who knows someone who is.

From my own experience and considering the experiences of other people I have talked to or read from, the downward spiral into full-blown anorexia is usually very sharp and sudden. While I have a lot more insight now, when I broadly look back on my experience, it is like I was walking…walking…walking…going about my life, and then suddenly it was like I fell off a cliff and was helplessly consumed by this devastating thing in my mind I had no control over and didn’t even realize was there. Anorexia, from my experience, was like this out-of-body, dissociative experience of devastation taking place inside my mind with drastic physical consequences. While the downfall into anorexia is often sudden, the full climb out is long and challenging, taking a tremendous amount of motivation and perseverance.

However, I believe that full recovery is possible for anyone, no matter how serious the illness or how long it has been a problem in your life.

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Tag: recovery