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".

Years later, I look back and realize 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". I was terrified of using my voice to ask for ask for love or attention or t even admit that I had needs at all. 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...

Through treatment, I realized that I had been asking for help all along 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 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. The problem comes when she has not learned another way to express her pain and voice her needs. This is when relapse often happens. The whole system begins to backfire...and the person begins to feel "stuck" in a cycle that is no longer working for her. But she feels trapped. How can she survive if she doesn't "look" sick? If she isn't using her symptoms, how will people know that she still needs help?

She can begin to use her voice to say what her body can't.

It starts small. The person must learn to identify feelings that have been numbed out by the eating disorder for so long before she can begin using her voice to express these feelings. In the past, losing weight was the only way I knew how to express my feelings. Instead of telling, I was showing. Now, if I'm angry or scared or sad, I might call my therapist or a friend 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."

It's not easy and it takes a lot of work to develop the skills to use your voice. Sometimes when I am not being heard, I think think, "They'd sure listen if I lost 20 pounds". Do not fall prey to old habits. You have tried to use your body in the past and it doesn’t work. Do not stifle or suppress it. You have spent too many years in silence. You have spent too many years denying your body and your mind. You deserve to have feelings, opinions, rage … you deserve attention, love, and food. You deserve space in the world.

Join me. Use your voice … not your body.

Claire – Spring 2001 (revised Autumn 2004)

Home