Sports/fitness has been a passion of mine for as long as I can
remember. From toddler dance and gymnastics lessons, running competitively for
my school, skiing lessons and exams right through to developing a love for the
gym- weight lifting in particular. I’ve always loved being active and challenging
my self physically.
When I was unwell and in the depths of my eating disorder-
my love of exercise was never going to be a positive. My eating disorder
manipulated things and made me believe that I HAD to exercise to burn off the
little amount of food I was eating. The competitive part of the illness was
strong- if I knew someone was training 5 times a week I’d think – watch this I can
train 7 times. I would spend so much time on a treadmill not allowing myself
to stop until I’d burnt X amount of calories- and it goes without saying that I
was burning off a lot more than I was putting in. My thoughts around foods were
extremely distorted. It came to a point where I had to stop all forms of
exercise because it was helping me to destroy my body.
So now on my journey through recovery – do I train again and
has my relationship with fitness changed? YES!
Of course people around me have occasionaly voiced
concerns about me getting back in to fitness. I’m not narrow minded so I can
see exactly why they would be concerned. They watched me slowly disappear and
become a shell of who I was, so to hear me talk about exercise may appear to
them as warning bells of old behaviours returning.
However, they now understand completely and have seen a
gradual but significant change in my mind set. I no longer exercise to ‘punish’
myself. I exercise because it makes me feel good and it allows me to celebrate
what my body can do!
Of course nobody has waved a magic wand and got rid of any
disordered thoughts- I still have to battle with them on a regular basis.
However I’m getting much better at challenging them and going against them. I’m
now able to recognise when my thoughts are telling me I HAVE to workout to be
able to eat. When this happens, I push to avoid exercise and eat exactly what I
wanted. If I was to give in and follow through on these thoughts, I’d be
allowing them to get stronger and stronger- so instead I’m the one becoming
stronger.
If I wake up tired and not fancying the gym- I won’t go. If I
go for a run and have to keep stopping I’ll still go home feeling good about my
self and my food intake won’t change. I’m by no means perfect and still sometimes
get what I call ‘resting guilt’ but I didn’t come this far to only come this
far. So I continue to challenge it. I promised my self earlier this year that I
wanted to measure the year in smiles and memories not calories and pounds. I
don’t ever weigh myself- I no longer exercise to be a certain weight- I do it
because it’s something I enjoy and that’s a statement I’ve not been able to say
in a long time. It also helps that I’ve
developed a love of cooking – getting creative in the kitchen makes it all a
lot more fun!
So ultimately, why do I love fitness so much? Well, my
trainers turn my cant’s in to cans, my frustrations in to achievements and my
stress in to happiness. Pretty good trainers eh!?
Both running and weight lifting benefit me physically in
becoming fitter, stronger and support me to becoming the healthiest I can be.
However, the benefits mentally outweigh the physical by far. Fitness teaches me
that I can carry on even when my minds telling me I can’t, it makes me
stronger, happier and more mindful than I could begin to explain.
Not only that but my fitness keeps me on track with my food
intake- which again I’m not claiming to be any where near perfect at- but it’s
a working progress! Fitness has become far more important to me than starving.
I used to sit worrying that I’d eaten too much- now I sit worrying that I’ve
not eaten enough!! The table has turned and I cant begin to explain how good it
feels. I put a constant effort in to make sure I’m fuelling my body enough so
that I am able to workout and do the things that I love.
Last year fitness was the enemy- my eating disorder may as
well of handcuffed me to my most hated cardio machines in the gym- it made me
cancel plans and avoid social occasions so I didn’t ‘fall off track’ and my
life was completely consumed by ‘clean eating’. Right now, fitness is just a
part of my life- I choose coffee with friends, birthday parties, cocktails,
days out over it many of times but I also make time for it because why would I not
when it makes me feel so good?
The message I want to get across from this post is that
fitness is huge all over social media and the media in general- I think it’s
great that so many of us are passionate about health and wellbeing and looking
after our bodies. Just please remember that there is a fine line between
passion and obsession- avoid the term ‘clean eating’ because please… the only
time a food is dirty is when you drop it on the floor!!! It’s so easy to become
sucked in by some of the unhealthy messages online- just remember that life is
all about balance and there is so much more to life than being a certain
weight.
As for me, I’m falling back in love with fitness and it’s
slowly but surely getting back to being my therapy rather than my enemy. Now excuse
me why I go and demolish some eggs…. And I’m talking about the Cadbury kind!!!
Happy Easter x
No comments