Voices--Not Bodies: What on earth does this mean?


When I was first hospitalized for anorexia, my doctor said to me "Claire, you are obviously in a lot of pain. Why don't you try using your voice instead of your body to tell me that you are hurting, to tell me what you need." This baffled me at that time--I didn't need anything. I was "above" having needs--I didn't need even the basics of food, sleep, attention. No, I wasn't hurting--I was just "fat". My problems weren't emotional or psychological, I didn't need therapy or medication...I just needed to lose weight and all would be fine.

After many years and a few more hospitalizations, I thought back to that doctor's advice and discovered that she was right. Not only did I have needs, I needed my needs to be met. Not only was I hurting, but I needed comfort, understanding and human connection. But how? I couldn't ask for help--that would be weak, lazy, slothful..."fat". To use my voice and say "I am hurting and I need help" seemed unfathomable. I was terrified to ask for love or attention. To even admit that I had needs at all. Having "needs" became weak and lazy in my head, but worse than having needs would be asking for them to be acknowledged. Who did I think I was? How dare I think that I deserve the time or attention from another person? I finally began to understand my need to disappear...

Looking back, I realized that I had been asking for help all along. I had been crying out, screaming out for help by starving my body--I found a way to ask for my needs to be met without actually having to use my voice. It worked--for awhile. It's easy for people to tell that you are in pain and that you need help when you are emaciated. Who can look at a skeletal young girl and not see that she hurts? Not see that she is asking, crying, pleading for something? That's the easy part. The difficulty with using your body to tell people that you hurt lies in the translation. First, many people mistakenly fall for the trap that the eating disorder sufferer sets up--they begin to believe that the eating disorder is purely, or at least primarily, an eating or weight problem. It is not. In fact, it has so very little to do with eating or weight that I believe a person can suffer from an eating disorder for long after their weight is stable and they have been eating healthfully for years. Secondly, using your body to show people your pain becomes a dangerous cycle...for what happens when your body "looks" healthy again? Anyone who has ever been inpatient for anorexia knows that the weight gain is the first piece of the recovery puzzle...the hardest work comes after the refeeding, after the weight gain...and it can take years and years. The trap is that the eating disorder sufferer has no other way than his/her body to tell people that she hurts, to tell them that she is still sick, to tell them that she needs something. As a result, the person retreats back to their eating disorder ways because they see no other way to say what they have to say. The whole system goes awry, begins to backfire...and the person begins to feel "stuck" in a cycle that is no longer working for them. But they feel trapped. How can they survive if they don't "look" sick? If they aren't using their symptoms, how will people know that they still need help?

They can begin to use their voice to say what their body can't.

It starts small--"I'm tired". The person must learn to identify feelings. What sad, mad, happy, scared, anxious all feel like. The eating disorder has numbed out the sufferers' feelings for so long that it can be difficult for him/her to even identify how they are feeling. Once they begin to identify their feelings, they can work on using their voice to express these feelings. For example, in the past, if I felt angry, sad or any variety of "negative" emotions, my immediate thought would be "I'll just lose weight and it'll be fine". While I didn't understand it at the time, losing weight was the only way I knew how to ask for help or to express my feelings. Instead of telling I was showing. Now, if I'm angry or scared or sad, I might call my therapist and say "I am so angry and here is why. I feel like I don't deserve to be angry or that I am a bad person for being angry. I feel like my anger is going to consume me and I want to take it out on myself." This is the difference between using your body and using your voice.

It's not easy and it takes a lot of work to develop the skills to use your voice. Sometimes it will seem easier to resort to your old habits of using your body to "show" people your pain. Sometimes people will not listen when you tell them something and you think, "They'd sure listen if I lost 20 pounds". Do not fall prey to old habits. Keep talking. If someone doesn't listen, say it louder. If they still don't hear you, turn to someone else. Use your voice. Say what you need, what you think, what you feel. You have a voice and it deserves to be heard. Don't let anyone "shush" you--you have spent too many years already without a voice. Say it loud and clear. "I have needs and they deserve to be acknowledged. I deserve to be acknowledged." Say it to yourself, because you are probably the one who doesn't believe it. Your loved ones have known for a long time that you deserve happiness, that you deserve attention and love...that you deserve food. Now it's time for you to begin to see that for yourself.

Use your voice, not your body. You might just be surprised how well it works...

Claire Stackhouse - March 2001





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