Body Image

We spent one of our therapy sessions going over body image and how our own perspective of ourselves is often distorted and not how others see us. Sufferers of bulimia always focus on the negative and never the positive.

This session has changed a few things for me. Admittedly it didn’t during the therapy, but, afterwards when working through the “homework” sheet it made me see things much differently.

I had to leave the session early so assumed that our homework was to go through the whole booklet (4 A4 sides) and work through it. So I did. However, at the next group session we were only supposed to complete the back page. I am glad I did the whole thing as I don’t think I would have managed the final page very well if I hadn’t. Basically, the 2 homework exercises were to firstly list 5 things you like about your appearance and secondly 5 things you like about yourself not related to your appearance (e.g. personality). You were allowed to ask a friend/relative if you got stuck but, seeing as I was doing the worksheet at work I couldn’t! What enabled me to do it was the fact that on the previous page it was all about body functions (e.g. I like me legs as they enable me to walk). This REALLY made me view my body in a completely different light. It made me see that without body functions I take for granted (and abuse) I am very limited in what I can do. I have already had a lot of health problems over the years and I know that some of them could have been avoided or not been as bad if I hadn’t been abusing myself in this way. Now, I am NOT going to dwell on this because what is done is done. However, I AM going to keep it at the back of my mind and use it to make sure I don’t inflict any more health problems on myself which are in my control.

Since Friday’s session in which I broke down when talking about this (my Dad lost both his legs before he died…I still have mine) I have been much more positive, enjoyed the weekend and consciously been eating a lot better. Subsequently, I haven’t even wanted to binge. I know I probably will have a few more “wobbles” as that is all part of recovery but I really believe these are going to become less and less and eventually STOP.

First off though a foot operation on 5th March…