Motorways Take Time to Grow Over

This blog might not be so helpful for people in the early stages of recovery. However, if you're currently doing well, or even if you're in a mid-recovery-clusterfuck, it hope it is :)

On a sunny Thursday morning, when driving back from a shopping trip, I saw a group of runners clustered together on the side of the road. I thought to myself"WOW. I'm genuinely excited to get back to that."

Although I'm excited, I still must wait because lingering with that excitement, is an underlying fear. Strangely, I'm somewhat terrified to return to it. I am so incredibly scared that my relationship with exercise will never heal and be what it used to be so much so that I hardly want to test it out to check. I am so scared once I start, it might become disordered again and I never ever want to go back to that hell. But thats exactly what will happen if I don't allow time for full neutral rewiring. All the progress I've made so far could be reverted, so I must wait. After so long of not exercising or compulsively moving, I have accepted that. Deep down I know that eventually I will be able to have a good relationship with exercise again, but only if I take my time.

When I saying that I'm waiting, I don't mean chilling until I'm weight restored and then I have free license to do what ever I want. Weight restoration isn't the only aspect of recovery. It's important, but only half of the story. I'm not just waiting until I'm at my set point 'healthy' physical weight, but until I'm completely mentally healthy too. I fully committed to unrestricted eating and therefore in theory, physically my body might be ready to return to exercise. But mentally, I am likely to still be a long way off it.

(Side note: I've mentioned previously that running used to be ~my thing~. In the most completely undisordered way, it was what I enjoyed most and was best at since I was young. Competing in events took up a lot of my time and I truly loved it. (This is before I over did the training with inadequate nutrition and slipped into and energy deficit which triggered anorexia). Then my relationship with it turned sour. It was no longer for joy. So when I began 'real recovery' eventually, very, very reluctantly, I went cold turkey. I haven't exercised in a long time. Perhaps 6 months now.)

So just as I was pulling up in my drive way after shopping this morning, I starting pondering the thought of going back to exercise. Not running necessarily, but some sort of movement. I watched some tv, wondering and considering the possibility of it. Am I ready? Is it safe? Is it for the 'right' reasons? I wasn't entirely sure.

And then, like magic, a notification popped up on my phone. A Tabitha Farrar upload answering my exact thoughts. Funny how often that happens actually. Early in the video, she speaks about how a year off of exercise is the minimum she would recommend to break the habit. A year??? My eyes widened as I watched. NO. That can't be!"But maybe because I genuinely loved exercise before my ED began, 6 months is enough??" I hoped. I took a deep breath and watched on. Of course, her justification of this minimum of a year of exercise abstinence was perfect. Therefore, I'll follow it and then assess my situation.

A fundamental flaw with the treatment system (in the uk anyway) is that they look at recovery very much from a nutritional rehabilitation perspective. If the patient has gained X amount of weight, and this is deemed as acceptable or 'healthier', doctors or teams might allow reintroduction of exercise regardless of psychological state. Healthy weight=healthy mind, right?? No, not at all. We all know that.

I have certainly restored weight and have come on leaps and bounds mentally, but I know deep down that I'm not 'there' yet. I still have a lot of cementing to do over the foundations I've laid down. Even if I have considerably improved physically, I can't ignore that the neural rewiring has not had enough time to become affirmative. Just because it might be physically 'safe' to exercise for me now, mentally it is not. Even if I began exercising with the best intentions, out of the sheer joy of movement, it is possible that unintentionally the associated emotions could return due to the neural pathways still being active. For some creeping behaviours might even go a bit unnoticed, but for me, they didn't. As soon as I previously tried to reintroduce exercise (too early) all of these niggling thoughts creeped back. There was still something present in my mind that linked exercise with food and therefore the suggestion to eat 'just a little bit less/healthier' took over. It's not a coincidence that urges of restricting re-emerge after beginning exercise. By exercising, I put energy into that dying neural pathway and revitalised it. I lifted up the whole neural network and awoke associated behaviours. So, simply put, because exercise is something ED associated and was being permitted, all of the other associated behaviours creeped back too.

Here's an analogy for you. As usual, you're going to have to use your imagination... What I've done in my recovery so far has been (a bit) like pouring jelly into a mould. Every day that it's left in peace in the mould, it's becoming firmer and stronger. This is like how my beliefs and actions are now stronger. BUT, if somebody where to violently shake the jelly mould before it's completely set, all of the hard work may go to waste. The not-quite-set-jelly may break up because it wasn't quite ready. Like my recovery, if I'm not ready mentally and I haven't quite broken the faulty neural pathways which connected exercise and food, I may fall backwards.

Superhighways

In the video and in her neural rewiring book, Tabitha talks about how she believes there are 2 'superhighways' which are basically 2 massive neural pathways. We don't have "highways" in the UK, but I'm picturing the M25 motorway as the equivalent. These 'superhighways' are the 2 primary behaviours that it are easy to slip back into, and to re-emerge if you go back to doing them too soon:

1) orthorexic eating.

2) over exercising.

They are the 2 behaviours that are hardest to break the pathways of, perhaps because they are most deeply ingrained. Maybe you're doing really well in recovery, you're winning, thriving even, but these pathways aren't completely shattered, they're underlying or maybe still dormant. Going back to the behaviours too soon, when they're not entirely gone, could cause the awakening of the associated behaviours.

She used the analogy of allowing the 'grass to grow over' the pathways entirely before you go back to them. If you try to drive on motorway/highway too quickly, it's still possible that you'll reenergise the pathway, awaken and strengthen it. This makes total sense to me. Other habits might be like minor roads. Perhaps like B roads (in the uk). They're easier to break and take less time for the grass to grow over. A personal example of this is like eating my dinner with small cutlery. This pathway and behaviour is not even a thought sent to me anymore, because I avoided it for an adequate amount of time. However, if there wasn't any normal cutlery clean and I was 'forced' to use a small fork once, I am no longer tempted to use a small fork the next time. That (minor B road) pathway has been broken and cannot be awoken.

However these 2 'superhighways' are things which take a lot of neural rewiring to heal. This rewiring takes time and should not be rushed. The bigger the superhighway/motorway, perhaps the longer it will take the grass to grow over so if, like me, you had a particular problem with overexercising, it might take a very long time. These pathways may be well used and well trodden if you engaged in the behaviours for a long time.

Before I went cold turkey, and tried to reintroduce exercise too early. Once I began exercising again, I immediately felt the restrictive urges returning. This is what will happen over and over again if I try to start before I am ready. The link between excerise and restriction was certainly still there 6 months ago. Physically, I might be 'able' to do it, but mentally, I don't think the pathways are quite set in stone yet.

This is the same as when you get those little thoughts to 'maybe start eating a little bit healthier now'. If you relationship with food isn't completely secure, this can quickly spiral into dangerous territory. You might even be well into recovery and have faced many fear foods, but those little thoughts of 'eating cleaner' can soon become overwhelming.

Tabitha's advice is once you eventually do return to it: tread very, very carefully. Don't go back to something if you don't have to and if you are doing it, make sure it's for fun. I certainly won't be returning to it for now and I have a wonderfully timed notification to thank for that. Upon returning, I will be sure to look for signs of slipping or emergence of old habits but who knows how long that will be. Don't hinge the question "should I go back to exercise yet" on your physical appearance. You need to have abstained from exercise and given time for your brain to heal and dissociate behaviours before it is safe to return.

When the grass is so grown I've that road that you can see no sign of tarmac anymore, you can do what ever the hell you want.

Always keep fighting,

Han xx