I don't ever want to stop throwing up. I feel like it's a part of me.

I can totally relate to this because I have been there. It does feel like if you don't have it, then, well, what do you have? What will you do? Like physically, in its place. If you're not binging and purging, then what will you actually do? And that's a big reason why so many people don't actually recover and heal is because they don't actually want to. And it certainly was the case for me for a very long time. There wasn't a big enough motivation for me to recover, I didn't actually want to deep down because it was like a part of me. It was like my best friend. And it was always there for me, even though it made me feel terrible, it was still always there for me. I felt like there would be this big hole in my life, this big gap, if I let it go.

It was like my best friend. And it was always there for me, even though it made me feel terrible, it was still always there for me.

So it's quite a paradox because why would you keep doing something that makes you feel so bad? It's a strange one to understand, but there are lots of underlying reasons that make us do these things, even though we don't really want to (but even though we kind of do want to). So it is a part of you and according to IFS theory, which is Internal Family Systems or Parts work, which I wrote a blog on previously, it is actually multiple parts of you. It's the Exile in you, the one that holds onto pain and distress and brings up these feelings of hurt and shame and guilt and loneliness. It's also the Firefighter in you, the one that's trying to put out the fire that the Exile has lit. So it tries to help and protect you by making you distract yourself or disassociate or numb out. So it helps you by making you binge. And it's also the Manager in you, the part that's trying to control things, the one that worries about the future, and worries about you gaining weight, so it wants to undo the damage that the Firefighter has just caused. So then it's tells you to purge or it tells you to overexercise or take laxatives or whatever it is that you do to compensate.

So it is a part of you, it's multiple parts of you. Your eating disorder is you, so the question then is not how to get rid of it because it's not something that you want to get rid of (and you can't get rid of yourself anyway). It's something that you want to transform. So how can you transform that part of you into something else? Something that's more productive, something that's better and healthier for you? That's a question for another blog post :) .

I started enjoying just sitting and being without having to be doing something all the time, without having to distract myself or numb myself out with food.

Today's post is about how to want to stop throwing up, when the bulimia feels like a part of you. Well, you could think about what other things that you could do instead of the throwing up. If you're worried about that hole that it's going to give you in your life, then just think about what other things that you can do instead of filling that hole with throwing up. I found that it was just so nice to be able to relax, just to read a book, just to sit in peace and not have on my mind, this feeling of wanting to binge and purge.

I then found more energy when I'd stopped binging and purging, to discover things that I love to do, I started practicing yoga, meditating, going for long gentle walks outside in nature. I started enjoying just sitting and being without having to be doing something all the time, without having to distract myself or numb myself out with food. I also found energy to do things like start multiple businesses. I have three now (I actually have a bit too much energy now sometimes, which is a good thing).

So how can you find pleasure in other things in your life? And maybe it's just the little things for now. Maybe you just need to find pleasure in the little things. And I know that it won't happen just like that. I know that you need to work on the actual underlying issues that are causing this in the first place, but maybe for now, you can just find motivation to work on those issues by first focusing on the little things that you enjoy in life. Maybe enjoying those things instead of throwing up will give you enough motivation and enough incentive to actually stop throwing up.