It’s funny. More and more, I’m steering to the belief that all this hype about eating disorders — barring those who are genuinely ill and dysfunctional — is largely a matter of focusing on labeling the problem so that you can keep putting off the hard part: gritting your teeth and STOPPING the bad behavior already! Because let’s face it, breaking a habit is HARD! It makes us cranky and irritable and we rarely see the kind of instant gratification results/reward we believe is commensurate with the effort we’re making. Which makes us even more cranky and irritable. 
It occurred to me this morning that if you look at something as simply a bad habit, it implies you have control over it and it’s simply a matter of putting your mind to breaking it. End of statment, no analysis needed, you either do it or don’t do it. They say, in fact, that people are surprisingly good at devising their own solutions to make this happen. No need for ”experts” to tell them what to do or offer guidance. If you’re trying to quit eating donuts and there’s a donut place en route to work that you seem compelled to stop at, common sense says you’ll be far more likely to successfully break this habit not only by acknowledging the desire to do so and making a conscious decision to stop, but also in choosing another route, one in which you avoid passing by the donut stand. Why put temptation in your path where you don’t need it? The goal is to break the habit, not to test your iron will “with one arm tied behind your back”!
But take that same behavior and slap a label on it — an eating disorder, for instance — and suddenly it’s complicated. Suddenly, you have an affliction, and depending on the degree to which you’re willing to believe this affliction affects your behavior, it may no longer be as simple as your being able to stop doing it when you want to do so. No, suddenly you have steps, and issues, and procedures, and counseling, and modes of treatment, and years of psychoanalysis (your own or someone else’s or both) and all sorts of outside factors that either leave you helpless or absolved, depending again on how you wish to perceive it. Which means suddenly you have all this drama, all this need to learn about this curious affliction and who all “has” it and what “causes” it…..AND now you get to figure out how to deal with your own issues that are driving it. In other words, why, you can be taking an “active” part in recovering from your bad habit….without even having to take a single action in stopping the behavior itself! All mental, no actual physical or behavioral change. Heck, you can put that “icky” part off forever! After all, there will ALWAYS be something “more” you can dig up, examine, discuss, strategize, buy a book on, etc. etc. etc. You’ll be the most enlightened person in the world…..while still being at the EXACT same place you were at when you first had the thought, “Gee, I’d really like to be rid of this behavior.” Methinks enlightenment is the booby prize. Forget enlightenment, let me remain soaked and immersed in my cocktail of emotions and personality and history, I just want to stop bingeing my face off after a period of clean eating, so that I can wear the clothes I love ALL the time, not just on non binge-recovery days, and end those horrible bloat days. Does it really have to go beyond that?
A long, long time ago, I rejected the notion that an eating disorder is a “disease.” I strongly disagree with the whole notion. It gives one an excuse to engage in behavior that would otherwise be inexcusable. Get drunk in public and make a scene at a bar? If you presume this person to be more or less a standard-issue adult, all the strengths and frailties and human history (the good the bad and the ugly) that comes with the package, then the perception of him/her is likely to be, “What an irresponsible buffoon.” But if we accept the idea that this person was born with the “disease” of alcoholism, well then…. gosh, it’s such a shame, he/she just can’t help himself/herself! What an awful way to perceive ourselves, that we could be so unable to change or improve. I pity the person who places such limitations on themselves. How would they feel if they come to realize that in fact they had no less a capacity to change, and all that kept them back was either fear or just not liking the discomfort that comes with making such changes?
I think a lot of this stems from our egos, and our need for drama and excitement in our lives. Let’s face it, life can be kinda boring at times. Oddly enough, I know a number of people who never seem comfortable when things are momentarily going well. It’s like they immediately need to look for a reason that things aren’t as good as they appear to be, or are doomed to change to the negative soon enough. I’m afraid I’m guilty of this myself, though I think through being aware of this I’m doing better. I won’t even try to speculate as to why. Probably a learned behavior/mindset.
But think of it. If you find yourself bouncing back and forth between eating very lightly — nothing outlandishly restrictive, but enough to maintain a thin body — and then eating way, WAY more than would be socially acceptable for most non-bingers to witness…..then quick snap yourself back on track in the days that follow with extra exercise to help offset the gluttony….well gosh, without a label all you’re stuck with is the uncomfortable realization that you simply don’t halt a pig-out at the point that you should, which is stupid both because of what it does immediately to your digestive system AND because of how it necessitates your compensatory measures (I won’t even go to the long-term nutritional/disease risk implications). You have not one but numerous reasons why you shouldn’t do this, and yet you do it anyway. In that regard you’re no better than a kid, in that you’re allowing yourself to “clock out” of what is normally considered part of becoming/being a mature adult. To be a mature adult means knowing that sometimes what you WANT cannot happen because it’s BAD for you — and in this case for many reasons. Yet you ignore that for the sake of instant appeasement, like a kid throwing a tantrum for a toy he/she wants. Who wants to see themselves that way? Not me.
But if I suddenly have an Eating Disorder, you have DRAMA! Poor you! Thanks to your inborn personality or genes or life circumstances or a combination thereof….YOU are inclined to cope DIFFERENTLY with life than everyone else. Ergo YOUR approach to eradicating this bad habit will have to be different from everyone else. Tell me. If for many years some single guy buys 2 pints of Haagan Daz every Friday night, eats them after dinner, only to decide one day that he doesn’t like this habit in himself and wants to change it, should he seek a counselor? Buy a book? Is there such a book on Friday Night Haagan Daz Addiction Recovery? (Don’t tell me, I don’t want to know the answer.) Should he seek a support group? Feh. None of the above. He’ll probably just cut them out and do or eat something else. Will there be a period of missing it, wanting it? Probably, after all this is has been going on for so long. Does the discomfort mean suddenly it’s “bad” to be making the change? No, not if he wants to make the change.
I believe this is the point I’m at in my own situation. I’m long past any genuine disorder, if I even ever had one in the first place. Now it’s just a matter of routing out bad habits. Of not allowing them to return.
Why complicate what is blessedly simple? It’s a BAD HABIT. Period.
