Recovering from an anorexia, focusing on being healthy

It's sort of a catch 22. It's stupid to tell someone who thinks she is recovered that she's not, yet it's cruel to tell someone who is not and might never recover that she can and should. I was diagnosed at 12, and had intensive in patient treatment about 6 months in. After that I dealt with it on my own for another decade or so before I hit a point where I started thinking of myself as recovered. I think the early aggressive treatment was probably the key to my eventual recovery, and maybe my experience isn't typical, but I don't think anyone should be told that she is going to have to live with an ED forever. Lots of psychiatric conditions used to be thought of as lifelong and incurable, but I think that's outdated thinking and there was never really anything behind it to begin with.

I'm sorry, but I'm not going to let myself be defined as an anorexic or an addict or mentally ill, or anything like that. I think that sort of thinking and defining is helpful to a point, but at some point it boxes one into becoming something they don't have to be...

It depends. For myself, if I start thinking I'm not an alcoholic, it'll be real easy for me to go "Hey, it's Christmas! What's a glass of wine? I'm not actively an alcoholic anymore, what's the problem?" You'd think years of previous experience would prove me wrong, but it doesn't. So I have to have that in the back of my head in order to prevent myself from acting on it.

I can never have a normal drink. I can never go out bar hopping like other people do. The length of sobriety I have behind that will never change it. Therefore, while I might not be ACTIVE in my addiction, it is not "cured".

Cured means things go back to normal. Recovered is often thought of as the same way. As in, once you get to that point, you can do whatever it is that normal people do and not be addicted. Some people can. Most can't.

You may be different. I also have to concede to the point that ED's and drug addictions - while they share many, many similarities - are not the same. Your journey and what you may need from the language of recovery will be different. That is okay.

My continuing to think of myself as an addict doesn't box me in, anymore than most people would. The only thing it limits is my ability to use (and the way I used alcohol and the drugs I did use are not ones that normal people used anyways) and that's not a bad thing. It's when you start to use your disorder as your excuse that things start to go haywire in recovery.

EDIT: I'm not trying to be an *kitten*. I'm just trying to explain that when some people say "you won't be recovered", that doesn't mean they think you are weak or doomed to a life of addiction. It's just another school of thought.

In recovery from any addiction, the definitions of sobriety are probably as varied as the people who want to get better. You HAVE to continue eating. My drug of choice in my anorexia was control. Not necessarily food. It was manipulating my body to control my emotions. Although some of the tools that I used are sometimes used for weight loss, it couldn't be more different. Anyone that is addicted to a drug or substance can choose to eliminate that drug from their life. Not so with food. It's about letting go of control, surrendering to healthy thoughts, actions and eating.