Aka feeling stuck.

Last week I was setting my intentions for the New moon. Whilst beginning to manifest and set in place the foundations of those intentions, I had a realisation.

When we are experiencing an eating disorder we are living in a state of “arrested development”. Loosely this is defined as a cessation of growth, this can be both psychological and physical. Initially ALL of our focus and energy is used in sustaining our eating disorder, then it becomes recovery orientated, both requiring substantial energy and attention.

I’m in the process of some major life changes and upheavals over the coming months with a ton of uncertainty. I’d been ruminating over the fact I wasn’t where I wanted to be, in terms of the standards I’d set myself for my career, my life. I was feeling resentful to the time lost to my eating disorder and to some extent recovery.

It dawned on me, for the last two years I have been fighting for my recovery, fighting to have a life not dominated by and eating disorder and before that I was expending all of my energy on the disorder itself, leaving room for very little else. I was feeling frustrated that I was now “no longer considered the best doctor of my cohort”. This is an egocentric attitude I need to work on anyways, but I have always been a perfectionist and through uni I had never settled for second place. Now, academically I am viewed as “capable”, but not excelling. There is nothing wrong with this, it’s how my brain processes this that is the problem. Now, I’m the doctor who has the good rapport but hasn’t necessarily recalled every hazard ratio from every journal ever written, but this was me, a long time ago. Before my life priorities had to change.

I realised some of the standards I’d set myself had become external expectations and now I don’t match those either. Again, this is not a problem, it’s how you react to this. The thing is I have been trying to be “that standard”, but I’m not, I can’t be right now. I essentially took two years out. If I was a professional athlete I couldn’t expect to compete at the same level after two years out, it’s the same here. The difference is, the people with those expectations don’t necessarily know I have been trying to survive and recover again, this was because I kept my eating disorder hidden through fear of stigma and so why would they? It was only recently I felt able to be open about my journey.

It’s only now that I was beginning to feel “bored of having to be recovery orientated” and have so much more mental capacity I could see unmasked I had been living this state of arrest. It’s releasing, I’m ok with who I am. I’m proud of what I have overcome and where I am. Letting go of unrealistic standards and expectations is what’s helping me in my health legacy and provide my patients with care. I think it would be unhealthy and unrealistic to want to be the same person we were before recovery.

How can we develop and grow when our worlds are so minute and focused on such specific details such as weight or that grade. I didn’t have the energy or time to be reading the journals I now am, when I was merely trying to survive.

I worry about my colleagues, the pandemic will fuel burnout, but unless the healers have a place to heal themselves this won’t go away. I wish for the unforgiving environment that is the healthcare profession to become a more open and compassionate one. One that does not depict personal struggle as failure. I shared my struggle not so long ago, because this unrealistic image of what a doctor should be is harming those that look after you, the more we normalise the narrative the healthier the healers.

I do think recovery burnout is a thing, it’s emotionally, physically draining, it becomes tedious but for the days where recovery is not boring it’s important to keep recovery orientated.