October 27, 2021 • 10 mins
Couch talks is the special bonus episode of You Need Therapy where kat answers questions that you send to kathryn@youneedtheraoy.com.. This week Kat addresses how to keep a body neutral outlook when you body changes during eating disorder recovery.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hi guys, and welcome back to another new episode of
Couch Talks. My name is Kat and I am your host.
And if you are like, wait a second, wrong podcast,
I thought I was listening to You Need Therapy, you are.
Catch Talks is the bonus episode of You Need Therapy
that comes out every single Wednesday, where I answer questions
that you guys send in directly to me. And if
(00:32):
you have a question that you want to send, you
can send it to Catherine k A t h R
y N at You Need Therapy podcast dot com and
then I will look through those and then maybe one
day your question will end up on the show. Now,
before we get into it, a little reminder that this
is not therapy. This is just a podcast where you
(00:53):
get a licensed therapist talking to you about things that
have to do with mental health and therapy, and we
answer one question a week. Now we'd like to go
a little bit more in depth. We used to do
to but one question a week, and this week, I
want to say before we get into it, um, I
just want to preface this. This could be a little
triggering for some people if you're not in a space
(01:14):
where you're ready to talk about and hear about bodies
and them changing. If you're in a eating disorder disorder
eating recovery journey process, this might be a little bit
triggering for you. So I just want to put that
out there. This might be an episode the skip Um,
but I thought this question was really important and I
really wanted to address it because I don't think this
has talked about so much so here to this. Hey cat,
(01:35):
So this is something I'm thinking a lot about, the
whole losing weight and changing body type process and recovery.
Since I've started to spin six months ago, my body
has changed so much and I'm having to size down
and close. How do we look at this from a
body neutrality perspective and not celebrate feeling smaller but actually
celebrate being healthy and taking care of our bodies. Okay,
(01:58):
so hot, thick, right, So really great question. Obviously, this
is something that probably a lot of people think about,
but maybe not everybody asks because it almost feels like
we're doing something wrong. It's tough because we can't just
unthink our thoughts and we can't just change him on
a whim. But what you practice and what you pay
attention to can and will become very prominent, And what
(02:19):
I really mean by that is that we're for focusing
on kind behaviors rather than the outcome of those behaviors.
We will start caring more about the behavior than the outcome.
So that is proven, that is truth right there. Now
we're talking about as we're moving into a space of
recovery and we're learning how to take care of ourselves.
Part of that taking care of ourselves process comes from
(02:39):
moving our bodies in gentle, kind ways and also practicing
gentle nutrition, which is something that we talked about last
week in the podcast with Crystal so offering our bodies
really caring, loving things when it comes to food and movement.
There are also has other things that we can do
in recovery that are very kind that have nothing to
do with those things like sleep hygiene and maybe taking
(03:00):
the medications we need to take, or spending time with
friends and family, doing joyful activities, self care, self maintenance,
all of that. But what we're talking about today is
like what do I do when like I'm doing these
kind things and recovery, I'm doing the work and then
my body shifting change and I have this automatic response to,
you know, celebrate that my body might be getting smaller
(03:22):
and in recovery, what our bodies look like aren't the
most important part about us, And that can be a
slippery slope because if we really start, like you know,
paying attention and giving a lot of power to our body,
if it is shifting and trending down, then are we
going to let go of some of our kind behaviors
and start using old eating disorder behaviors? Again, Yeah, that
is a valid fear, valid thought. So, like I said,
(03:46):
the cool thing about our brain and our bodies is
that what we focus on does become more prominent. We
can actually change the way we think. But we can't
do it immediately, right, We can't just be like, okay,
we're on recovery now now. I think that we do
tiptoe around this because when we move into a recovery
process sometimes it feels like taboo or wrong or like
(04:07):
we're not we're not doing good enough if we care
about what we look like. But the truth is sometimes
that stuff pops up and we can change our thoughts,
but it doesn't happen immediately. As we shift our behaviors,
there's this period of time where your brain hasn't fully
caught on just yet it's still thinking in the old ways,
even though you're acting in the new ways. There's this
period that we just kind of have to sit in
(04:28):
as we create these new neuropathways. And I don't know
if I've recently talked about this, but by repeating new
things over and over again, like by doing behaviors over
and over new ones, we can actually change our brain chemistry.
So I like to explain this as like a river.
Like think of a neurow pathway and your brain as
a river. So if we're going one way, if we're
(04:48):
going to this one river our whole life or even
like five years, let's say five years, say we have
been in this process of disordered eating, maybe even a
full on eating disorder, and we have been behaving in
ways to manipulate our weight, and that is why we
engage in behaviors, and so we have these behaviors that
we do, and then we have these thoughts associated with
(05:09):
the behaviors that are all weight focused and maybe even
like smaller is better focused very diet culturally. So you
have this river and it's been going for five years,
it's going to be pretty deep right now. The cool
thing about rivers is if you stop giving them water,
(05:30):
if you stop flowing water down them, they will dry
up and they will become overgrown and the river will
go away. So in our recovery process, as we're creating
new behaviors attached with new messages, as we start to
believe these new messages, start to repeat these new messages,
we start surrounding ourselves with new messages associated with these healthy, carrying,
(05:50):
kind behaviors. We are creating a new river, and so
we're giving more attention to that river, and we're flowing
water down that river. And the cool thing about all
of this is when you do that, the old one
does dry up. So over time we do actually create
change in our brain. We actually have the power to
do that, but it takes time because at first river
was not formed in one day. It was formed over
(06:11):
let's say those five years, So it might take some
time now to answer this question. Pretty simply to come
with this from a body neutrality perspective, what you can
do as you are in the process of changing these
neurow pathways in your brain is you can celebrate your behaviors,
start creating more kind thoughts aligned with what you want
(06:31):
to believe, even if you don't fully believe them yet,
and then what you can do is continue to celebrate
the behaviors and continue to look at your clothes close.
So when you look at yourself, instead of saying things
like wow, I look smaller, good job, you can say
something like, wow, you've been caring for yourself so well
and you look brighter. You can complement your body and
so so, so, so so many ways that have nothing
(06:53):
to do with your looks in your size. So you
do that, and then as you continue, that will become
the automatic tape that plays in your head. It's just
gonna take some time. You're gonna have this automatical like,
oh you look smallgo job. Okay, hold on a second. Also, Wow,
you've been caring for yourself really well and you just
look brighter. That feels way more kind to me. Now,
(07:14):
the old Steff will continue to pop up every now
and then totally. It will do that, and you're gonna
be better equipped to bounce back from those thoughts and
do that thing that I just did two seconds ago
where I had that thought and then I actually was like,
hold on a second, here's this thought. I also would
suggest starting a journal where maybe all you write in
it are kind words towards yourself, but none of those
(07:34):
things can be about your looks. So start a little
affirmation book or wall or jar, and just keep a
running tab on speaking kindly and gently. Now, another thing
that I just like, that I have actually implemented for
myself at times when I've needed it, is to just
remove tax just like cut them out. So there's this
like metaphorical thing that's happening as you do that, where
(07:54):
you're just like these pants as just pants. The sizes
don't really matter, and so you can your pants be like, oh,
there's my black jeans with the holes versus the size
six pair or the size tent pair, or the size
four pair, the size two pair, or the size fifteen pair,
Like you're taking that out and just looking at them
for what they are. Oh my black jeans, Oh my joggers,
(08:16):
oh my gap dress or whatever. I don't know what
I'm even talking about now, but you know what I mean.
So just calling the the item of clothing as the
item of clothing rather than the size, and just taking
that power away because we don't really need to know that,
we don't really need to focus on that. So awesome question,
and I'm glad that we are creating a conversation around
it because again, I think it is something that we
(08:37):
like don't want to acknowledge as a thing, But you know,
I think it's important because if you don't acknowledge something,
you can't heal it and you can't change it. And
so by acknowledging this, we can say, hey, this is
something I've noticed that I've been doing. It might lead
me down a dark path. I need to take some
control and ownership of it. And so this is something
(08:58):
I'm gonna do. I'm gonna start looking at myself and
saying kind things that have nothing to do with my appearance.
I'm going to affirm myself for continued kind behavior change.
I'm going to take the power from my clothing and
put the power back in me and how I'm carrying
myself when I'm having those feelings and those thoughts, I'm
also going to talk about them. So there are safe
(09:20):
people in your life own it. Like I say clients
all the time, like I can't help you. This goes
along with you. If you don't acknowledge, we can't heal it.
I can't help you with a behavior. If I don't
know if it's happening. So if you're struggling and maybe
you're you feel like you're backsliding, or you feel a
relapse coming on or something like that, a safe person
is not going to offer you shame for engaging the behavior.
(09:43):
They're going to offer you support and and help. And
we all need help because recovery is not a like, oh,
I've decided to do it, so I'm just gonna do it.
It's not that easy. We need some accountability sometimes, and
so if you are struggling to bring that stuff up,
whether it's in therapy or with friends, I would just
encourage you, even name Matt, even say like, hey, I've
noticed there are some things that like I want to
(10:04):
share with you, but I have a lot of shame
or I have a lot of fear or have a
lot of anger around sharing them. So I just want
to talk about that so I can get comfortable and
maybe open up and talk to you about what I'm
going through because I need some help. So thank you
for offering this question. If any of you guys have
your own little tips or tricks that you do, or
maybe affirmations that you say to help you stay in
(10:27):
in the lane you want to stay in, go ahead
send them in. You can DM me on Instagram at
at cat dot de fata um. You can DM the
podcast page at at you Need Therapy Podcast, or you
can email me at Catherine at you need Therapy podcast
dot com. So, as always, thank you for being here,
thank you for listening, thank you for being on the
(10:49):
journey with me, and I hope you have the day
that you need to have. By guys,
Hi guys, and welcome back to another new episode of
Couch Talks. My name is Kat and I am your host.
And if you are like, wait a second, wrong podcast,
I thought I was listening to You Need Therapy, you are.
Catch Talks is the bonus episode of You Need Therapy
that comes out every single Wednesday, where I answer questions
that you guys send in directly to me. And if
(00:32):
you have a question that you want to send, you
can send it to Catherine k A t h R
y N at You Need Therapy podcast dot com and
then I will look through those and then maybe one
day your question will end up on the show. Now,
before we get into it, a little reminder that this
is not therapy. This is just a podcast where you
(00:53):
get a licensed therapist talking to you about things that
have to do with mental health and therapy, and we
answer one question a week. Now we'd like to go
a little bit more in depth. We used to do
to but one question a week, and this week, I
want to say before we get into it, um, I
just want to preface this. This could be a little
triggering for some people if you're not in a space
(01:14):
where you're ready to talk about and hear about bodies
and them changing. If you're in a eating disorder disorder
eating recovery journey process, this might be a little bit
triggering for you. So I just want to put that
out there. This might be an episode the skip Um,
but I thought this question was really important and I
really wanted to address it because I don't think this
has talked about so much so here to this. Hey cat,
(01:35):
So this is something I'm thinking a lot about, the
whole losing weight and changing body type process and recovery.
Since I've started to spin six months ago, my body
has changed so much and I'm having to size down
and close. How do we look at this from a
body neutrality perspective and not celebrate feeling smaller but actually
celebrate being healthy and taking care of our bodies. Okay,
(01:58):
so hot, thick, right, So really great question. Obviously, this
is something that probably a lot of people think about,
but maybe not everybody asks because it almost feels like
we're doing something wrong. It's tough because we can't just
unthink our thoughts and we can't just change him on
a whim. But what you practice and what you pay
attention to can and will become very prominent, And what
(02:19):
I really mean by that is that we're for focusing
on kind behaviors rather than the outcome of those behaviors.
We will start caring more about the behavior than the outcome.
So that is proven, that is truth right there. Now
we're talking about as we're moving into a space of
recovery and we're learning how to take care of ourselves.
Part of that taking care of ourselves process comes from
(02:39):
moving our bodies in gentle, kind ways and also practicing
gentle nutrition, which is something that we talked about last
week in the podcast with Crystal so offering our bodies
really caring, loving things when it comes to food and movement.
There are also has other things that we can do
in recovery that are very kind that have nothing to
do with those things like sleep hygiene and maybe taking
(03:00):
the medications we need to take, or spending time with
friends and family, doing joyful activities, self care, self maintenance,
all of that. But what we're talking about today is
like what do I do when like I'm doing these
kind things and recovery, I'm doing the work and then
my body shifting change and I have this automatic response to,
you know, celebrate that my body might be getting smaller
(03:22):
and in recovery, what our bodies look like aren't the
most important part about us, And that can be a
slippery slope because if we really start, like you know,
paying attention and giving a lot of power to our body,
if it is shifting and trending down, then are we
going to let go of some of our kind behaviors
and start using old eating disorder behaviors? Again, Yeah, that
is a valid fear, valid thought. So, like I said,
(03:46):
the cool thing about our brain and our bodies is
that what we focus on does become more prominent. We
can actually change the way we think. But we can't
do it immediately, right, We can't just be like, okay,
we're on recovery now now. I think that we do
tiptoe around this because when we move into a recovery
process sometimes it feels like taboo or wrong or like
(04:07):
we're not we're not doing good enough if we care
about what we look like. But the truth is sometimes
that stuff pops up and we can change our thoughts,
but it doesn't happen immediately. As we shift our behaviors,
there's this period of time where your brain hasn't fully
caught on just yet it's still thinking in the old ways,
even though you're acting in the new ways. There's this
period that we just kind of have to sit in
(04:28):
as we create these new neuropathways. And I don't know
if I've recently talked about this, but by repeating new
things over and over again, like by doing behaviors over
and over new ones, we can actually change our brain chemistry.
So I like to explain this as like a river.
Like think of a neurow pathway and your brain as
a river. So if we're going one way, if we're
(04:48):
going to this one river our whole life or even
like five years, let's say five years, say we have
been in this process of disordered eating, maybe even a
full on eating disorder, and we have been behaving in
ways to manipulate our weight, and that is why we
engage in behaviors, and so we have these behaviors that
we do, and then we have these thoughts associated with
(05:09):
the behaviors that are all weight focused and maybe even
like smaller is better focused very diet culturally. So you
have this river and it's been going for five years,
it's going to be pretty deep right now. The cool
thing about rivers is if you stop giving them water,
(05:30):
if you stop flowing water down them, they will dry
up and they will become overgrown and the river will
go away. So in our recovery process, as we're creating
new behaviors attached with new messages, as we start to
believe these new messages, start to repeat these new messages,
we start surrounding ourselves with new messages associated with these healthy, carrying,
(05:50):
kind behaviors. We are creating a new river, and so
we're giving more attention to that river, and we're flowing
water down that river. And the cool thing about all
of this is when you do that, the old one
does dry up. So over time we do actually create
change in our brain. We actually have the power to
do that, but it takes time because at first river
was not formed in one day. It was formed over
(06:11):
let's say those five years, So it might take some
time now to answer this question. Pretty simply to come
with this from a body neutrality perspective, what you can
do as you are in the process of changing these
neurow pathways in your brain is you can celebrate your behaviors,
start creating more kind thoughts aligned with what you want
(06:31):
to believe, even if you don't fully believe them yet,
and then what you can do is continue to celebrate
the behaviors and continue to look at your clothes close.
So when you look at yourself, instead of saying things
like wow, I look smaller, good job, you can say
something like, wow, you've been caring for yourself so well
and you look brighter. You can complement your body and
so so, so, so so many ways that have nothing
(06:53):
to do with your looks in your size. So you
do that, and then as you continue, that will become
the automatic tape that plays in your head. It's just
gonna take some time. You're gonna have this automatical like,
oh you look smallgo job. Okay, hold on a second. Also, Wow,
you've been caring for yourself really well and you just
look brighter. That feels way more kind to me. Now,
(07:14):
the old Steff will continue to pop up every now
and then totally. It will do that, and you're gonna
be better equipped to bounce back from those thoughts and
do that thing that I just did two seconds ago
where I had that thought and then I actually was like,
hold on a second, here's this thought. I also would
suggest starting a journal where maybe all you write in
it are kind words towards yourself, but none of those
(07:34):
things can be about your looks. So start a little
affirmation book or wall or jar, and just keep a
running tab on speaking kindly and gently. Now, another thing
that I just like, that I have actually implemented for
myself at times when I've needed it, is to just
remove tax just like cut them out. So there's this
like metaphorical thing that's happening as you do that, where
(07:54):
you're just like these pants as just pants. The sizes
don't really matter, and so you can your pants be like, oh,
there's my black jeans with the holes versus the size
six pair or the size tent pair, or the size
four pair, the size two pair, or the size fifteen pair,
Like you're taking that out and just looking at them
for what they are. Oh my black jeans, Oh my joggers,
(08:16):
oh my gap dress or whatever. I don't know what
I'm even talking about now, but you know what I mean.
So just calling the the item of clothing as the
item of clothing rather than the size, and just taking
that power away because we don't really need to know that,
we don't really need to focus on that. So awesome question,
and I'm glad that we are creating a conversation around
it because again, I think it is something that we
(08:37):
like don't want to acknowledge as a thing, But you know,
I think it's important because if you don't acknowledge something,
you can't heal it and you can't change it. And
so by acknowledging this, we can say, hey, this is
something I've noticed that I've been doing. It might lead
me down a dark path. I need to take some
control and ownership of it. And so this is something
(08:58):
I'm gonna do. I'm gonna start looking at myself and
saying kind things that have nothing to do with my appearance.
I'm going to affirm myself for continued kind behavior change.
I'm going to take the power from my clothing and
put the power back in me and how I'm carrying
myself when I'm having those feelings and those thoughts, I'm
also going to talk about them. So there are safe
(09:20):
people in your life own it. Like I say clients
all the time, like I can't help you. This goes
along with you. If you don't acknowledge, we can't heal it.
I can't help you with a behavior. If I don't
know if it's happening. So if you're struggling and maybe
you're you feel like you're backsliding, or you feel a
relapse coming on or something like that, a safe person
is not going to offer you shame for engaging the behavior.
(09:43):
They're going to offer you support and and help. And
we all need help because recovery is not a like, oh,
I've decided to do it, so I'm just gonna do it.
It's not that easy. We need some accountability sometimes, and
so if you are struggling to bring that stuff up,
whether it's in therapy or with friends, I would just
encourage you, even name Matt, even say like, hey, I've
noticed there are some things that like I want to
(10:04):
share with you, but I have a lot of shame
or I have a lot of fear or have a
lot of anger around sharing them. So I just want
to talk about that so I can get comfortable and
maybe open up and talk to you about what I'm
going through because I need some help. So thank you
for offering this question. If any of you guys have
your own little tips or tricks that you do, or
maybe affirmations that you say to help you stay in
(10:27):
in the lane you want to stay in, go ahead
send them in. You can DM me on Instagram at
at cat dot de fata um. You can DM the
podcast page at at you Need Therapy Podcast, or you
can email me at Catherine at you need Therapy podcast
dot com. So, as always, thank you for being here,
thank you for listening, thank you for being on the
(10:49):
journey with me, and I hope you have the day
that you need to have. By guys,
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