One Day You'll Realise It Was Never About Food...

One day you'll realise it was never about the food, not really. The food was just what your eating disorder used to control you because when i look back at my own eating disorder, the thing that hurt the most wasn't the meals i avoided or the fear foods i couldn't face. It was everything that came with it, the opportunities i turned down, the time i spent trapped inside of my head and the constant feeling that life would somehow begin once i was thinner or in more control.

For years i believed food was the problem but the real problem was how much of my life i was sacrificing to keep my eating disorder happy. Eating disorders are clever like that, they convince you that everything would be better if you could just changed the food. Eat less, eat differently, follow the rules and be more disciplined and for a while you'll believe them. Every time life feels difficult your eating disorder gives you something to focus on... the food, the calories, the meal plan, the next goal and anything except what is really happening. Whilist you're busy focusing on food, life quietly carries on without you, people are making memories, friends meeting for coffee and you're there physically but your mind is somewhere else. Of course your mind is counting, calculating, planning and worrying. That's the part nobody talks about enough, the food was only ever a symptom... what the eating disorder was really taking from me was my freedom.

This is why recovery is so frightening because if it was never really about the food then i had to start looking at everything i was using my eating disorder to avoid. The belief that happiness was always just around the corner if i could only change myself a little more. Recovery forced me to realise something uncomfortable that no amount of weight loss was ever going to heal the things i was carrying inside, no number was going to make me feel worthy and no version of my body was going to suddenly give me the life i was waiting for. The life i wanted was never on the other side of changing my body, it was on the other side of letting go of the eating disorder and this is the part i didn't understand for years.

So let me ask you, what is your eating disorder promising you? That you'll be happier? More confident? More lovable? That life will finally begin once you reach a certain number? This is what mine promised me and for years i believed it. I kept thinking happiness was just one more rule away, one more change away and one more goal away. Every time i reached the thing i thought would finally make me feel better, the eating disorder moved the goal because there was always something else to fix, something else i needed to change about myself.

That's when i realised something heartbreaking, the eating disorder was never trying to help me find happiness it was trying to keep me searching for something i was nevver going to find through it because eating disorders don't give you freedom. They give you an endless list of conditions you must meet before you're allowed to feel good enough and that day will never come.

That's what i wish someone had told me sooner, one day you'll realise it was never about food. It was about the life your eating disorder was asking you to sacrifice in exchange for a version of yourself that was never going to feel good enough. It was the coffee dates you spent worrying instead of laughing. The memories that became overshadowed by food, numbers and rules. The years will keep passing and one day you'll look back and realise that the thing you were trying so hard to control was never the thing that mattered most. Your body was never supposed to be your whole life, there is so much more waiting for you than calories, scales, food rules and body checking.

There is a whole life outside of your eating disorder and i promise you, it's far more beautiful than anything your eating disorder is promising you.

So if you're reading this right now I hope you remember this:

🤎 You don't have to earn your life through weight loss.

🤎 You don't have to earn your happiness through food rules.

🤎 You don't have to spend another year waiting for your body to become worthy of the life you want to live.

You are already worthy, not when you reach a goal and not when your body changes. Life is happening right in front of you, the people you love are here, the memories are waiting to be made and so much more. Don't let your eating disorder convince you to sit on the sidelines of your own life. One day you'll realise it was never just about food, it was about freedom and i hope when that day comes, you've given yourself permission to choose it.

With Love, Niomi 🤎