QUESTION: Dear Shannon, how many years did it take for you to recover from an eating disorder?

ANSWER: Hi – what an excellent question – thank you for writing! First, a few thoughts on what defines ‘recovery'. As our Good News community is well aware, recovery is an ongoing work-in-progress. The most important determinant of when recovery is complete points back to the goals we set for ourselves going into the recovery process. For instance, when I began my recovery work in earnest, my basic goals for recovery were as follows:

1. Regain my ability to play, write, and sing – I wanted my music career back, which meant I wanted the physical stability and health to develop and maintain my career goals.

2. Be able to live life one day at a time, without resorting to my eating disorder when a particular day got tough. In other words, my goal was to develop and use other coping skills to successfully manage my life!

So I knew I was basically ‘recovered’ from my anorexia and bulimia when, after eight years of sustained recovery work (it doesn’t take that long for everyone, but since I had no access to inpatient or outpatient care, it took longer for me) I recorded my first CD and began regularly performing concerts again.

So as you work on developing your recovery goals, and set benchmarks for yourself that will indicate progress towards attaining those goals, it may be helpful to you to consider what I feel are the two most important criteria for a successful recovery:

1. Finding what I call a ‘key to life’ – something that matters more to you, that you want more, that is more important to you, than your eating disorder. For example, music was my ‘key to life’ – when my eating disorder robbed me of this great love, I got mad enough to finally fight back! So grab your journal and, if you haven’t already, write down what your 'key to life' is. Then remind yourself of it every day of your recovery journey, until the day you reclaim it for yourself!

2. Deciding that you’d rather give your recovery everything you have and still fail, rather than die never knowing if you could have overcome your eating disorder. The day I was told my health would not allow me to pursue music further was the day I decided that, even if all hope was lost, I would not die a coward’s death. I would FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT, and give my recovery every last ounce of my strength and energy – because I simply could not die without knowing it if could have been done. I decided I was willing to risk it all because winning the recovery jackpot was worth it to me!

Hope these thoughts help you. If you have more questions feel free to write.

Much love,

Shannon

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