A Runner’s Balancing Act

This week is National Eating Disorders Awareness week. I have mentioned my struggles with ED on this blog before. This is a running blog, but the topic is still very relevant to the running community. There are so many ED sufferers in the running community, but they are often mistaken for being dedicated runners or “health nuts”. There are differences. You can be concerned about eating healthy without being underweight and food obsessed. I think one major difference you will see with runners with ED, is that they are not usually concerned about getting faster, getting PR’s, doing speed work, hard days, easy days, etc. Basically, their running is not really “training” for anything. They are running because they feel they have to. Usually in their minds it’s to burn calories, but it’s doubtful they would admit that to a fellow runner.

I hope that in reading my story, you might be able to better recognize the warning signs in yourselves and others. I hope that this story does not glamorize EDs, but shows how truly destructive and debilitating they can be.  I wrote this a while back before I spoke at a local community college health class. I am posting it because I think that it could provide hope to those suffering and education to those who are not.

Its hard to keep it short, so my apologize for the length.

The beginning…

The seeds of my ED were planted the summer between my freshman and sophomore year of college, which was about seven years ago. That was the summer, I took a job with friends of my parents who owned a private golf club in northern Nevada near Reno.  I moved up there with just a suit case and lived with my parents friends in their huge house that was right on the golf course where I worked. I didn’t have a car, and I didn’t know anyone there.  It was a lonely four months, especially considering I had been away from home for almost a year by that time, living in the dorms freshman year at a small college in California. Dorm life was loud and something was always going on, and it was hard to really feel homesickness in that environment. When I got to Nevada that summer, homesickness hit me hard.

Living with my parents friends was an all around awkward experience. They were wealthy, somewhat pretentious, and they had never had children. They were also my bosses.  I was so stressed out by the situation at first that for the first month I was there, I had a hard time eating. I honestly wasn’t dieting, I just felt like my stomach was in knots. After a few weeks, my hunger returned, but by that time I realized my pants were fitting a little loser and the light bulb clicked on that this experience would be a great way to lose some weight. I had gained the freshman 15 over the last year and wasn’t too excited about it.

So I started to run a mile or two around the golf course in the evenings after work and started watching my portion sizes.  My parents friends were big dieters and had lots of diet literature in the house.  I was bored, so I read a lot of it. The woman I lived with saw a diet doctor regularly and I can remember at one point he put her on an all liquid diet where she drank 5 shakes a day that totaled 500 calories. I remember very vividly reading the literature about that diet. I didn’t know a lot about calories at that point, and I remember thinking, “well if a doctor put her on this diet, it must be okay”.

The other weird thing about my parents’ friends was that they very judgmental towards people with weight problems. They often made comments to each other about other peoples’ weight. They noticed when people’s weight went up or down and they made rude comments to each other when they passed an overweight person in public.
I took notice of this and was deeply embarrassed by those 15 pounds I’d gained my freshman year of college. For the first time, I felt like everyone could see those extra pounds.

By the end of that summer, I was  a few pounds less then my pre-college weight and feeling pretty good about it.  When I got back to school, I got so many complements on my weight loss, I was actually surprised how many people noticed. It really scared me how much people noticed. I was afraid I’d gain the weight back and they’d notice that too.

I decided I’d do everything in my power not to gain that weight back, and that’s when I really started slipping down the slippery slope of anorexia.

The downward spiral…

My sophomore year was the first time I lived in an apartment with a kitchen of my own.  For the first time in my life, I had complete control over every calorie and every ingredient that went in my mouth. I loved having that control. I read as much as I could about diet and nutrition and I spent hours at the store memorizing calorie counts and discovering low calorie diet food.

At first, my goal was just to follow my self designed diet and running plan Monday through Friday. Then I would allow myself to eat a little more freely and go out to eat with my friends on the weekend without guilt. Those weekend indulgences didn’t last very long. Very quickly, I realized I couldn’t relax around food on the weekends, even though I wanted to. Eating outside my diet caused too much anxiety and it just didn’t seem worth it.

Only a few months into my sophomore year, my personality started to change. I became very withdrawn from my friends and roommates. I would get up every morning early enough that I could leave the house before my roommates got up, and most nights, I stayed in the library, went to the gym, or worked a part time job, late enough that I could just go straight to bed when I got home.  Every time I opened the door to my apartment, I hoped that none of my 3 roomates would be home. Being social just took too much energy.

I became very emotional and easily agitated. I had some nasty fights with roommates. I enjoyed the feeling of hunger late at night when I was lonely. Somehow, it comforted me.

I started doing really strange things with food – things I didn’t even understand at the time. I could only eat  when no one was watching. I would sometimes sneak little granola bars or snacks to my top bunk and try to eat them unnoticed. I hid my food in my desk instead of putting it in the cupboards in the kitchen.  I liked my food very hot and sometimes I would warm things up in the microwave four or five times just to keep it from getting cold while I ate very slowly. I thought about food all day long and read cookbooks at night like they were novels.

By Christmas sophomore year, I’d lost another 12 pounds or so putting me in the underweight category by most doctors charts. It had never been my intention to lose more weight. My goal had always been to not gain it.  But this new weight loss felt very empowering and only heightened my fear of gaining it back.

My roommates sent a concerned email to my parents that Christmas break.  My parents talked to me about it and  I promised them I was going to eat better. It wasn’t hard to do it when I was there at home. Something about being at home soothed my anxiety around food. That Christmas I did come to the conclusion that maybe I should ease up on the dieting since it seemed to worry everyone so much.

Second semester through the following summer, things got a little better.  I stopped going to the gym and started running more outside and trying to not worry about food so much. The depression lifted a little bit and I felt more like myself.  I maintained my weightloss, but I didn’t lose any more.

Round Two: Junior Year

When the Junior year rolled around, I thought I thought that my eating problems were over, but little did I know, round two was going to hit even harder then the first. It was a very stressful year for me between working 3 part time jobs, being a student and living in very cramped living quarters with two girls and their practically live-in boyfriends who I did not get along with.  Running became my escape. I got very depressed and moody and I only felt happy after I’d been running.  The high I felt after a run made me feel invincible, euphoric and completely self sufficient.  Just like a drug, it started taking more and more of it to get the same high. I gradually increased my long runs up to about 15 miles on the weekend, and 6-9 miles daily. I rarely wore a watch while running and didn’t know how fast I was running at this time.

For the amount I was running, I was not eating nearly enough. I became so starved, that I started to have uncontrollable binges. It usually happened on a Friday or Saturday night when my friends were out having fun and I was home alone in the apartment. I would lose all control around food eat everything and everything I could get my hands on. It seemed like I could eat forever and never get full.  I never threw up, but the morning after a binge, I always woke up early to run for two or more hours. In my mind, the long run “erased” the binge and I was relieved of the intense guilt. Despite my occasional binge, more and more pounds melted off.

By Christmas it was very bad. I was really underweight and I was miserable. I could not run enough to keep the euphoria alive and I was completely exhausted and depressed. I made multiple promises to family and friends that I was going to stop the madness and start gaining weight. I bought protein bars and other foods with good intentions but I couldn’t ever bring myself to actually eat them.

After Christmas break, my roommate somehow talked me into seeing a counselor at the university counseling center. I met with a lady there once a week for several months. She diagnosed me with Anorexia Nervosa, and gave me several pieces of literature to read about the condition, one of which was the Minnesota Starvation study.  By reading that, I realized that the dark depression, the intense moodiness, and the crazy behaviors around food were all symptoms of starvation. It was a startling realization. My personality had been completely changed – all because I wasn’t eating enough.

While I learned a lot, I did not gain weight and I did not stop running. The counselor required me to see a nurse at the university health center every week, who also weighed me. They knew I was still losing weight.

Turning it around…

Then one day in the spring of my Junior year, I arrived  for my usual appointment and I was met by both the nurse, and the counselor. They told me that the dean of students was aware of my situation and was prepared to make me leave school mid semester if I didn’t stop losing weight and start gaining.

I really didn’t want to get kicked out of school. It must have scared me more than gaining weight because I stopped running immediately and started trying to eat more. I binged without running it off which caused such intense anxiety that after about three days I developed startling heart palpitations. It scared me to death. I thought I was going to have a heart attack and die at any moment. Also right about that time, they ran a blood test which came back with all sorts of things either too high or too low. I was severely anemic among other things. It was a dramatic wake up call. I finally wanted to recover and I finally was headed in the right direction.

Slowly I put on some weight over the next few months and I was allowed to stay and finish out the semester. When the semester ended my counselor and I found an intensive outpatient treatment center in the area that I could attend over the summer. I went there for 8 hours a day for four months over that summer, and continued at 4 hours a day for another two months after school resumed in the fall. All the time I was there I did not run or exercise.  It was a long, and very difficult journey.

When I started there, I didn’t have the strength to eat normal when eating alone. All I knew how to do was restrict or binge. By eating two meals a day at the treatment center, I was forced to process the emotions  that were stirred up by eating normal sized meals. I learned a lot about nutrition and I had to process a lot of the personal issues that were behind the eating disorder in the first place. I also met a several girls who had stories very similar to mine. It was so helpful to know that I wasn’t the only one struggling through the meals and dealing with the anxiety of gaining weight.

By the time I left, my weight was in the healthy range again. I didn’t love my new self, but I could live with it. And over time, with continued outpatient visits, it got easier. Even though I still mourned for my thin body, I realized that I did not want it back with all the turmoil that it brought to my life. I won’t lie and say that from that point on it was easy because it was not. I still struggled with binging and negative thoughts for several years after treatment.  It took awhile for those things to fade, but they did.

I just want to close my story with a warning. You can’t dabble in an eating disorder and come out unscathed. Recovery is so hard, you just can’t flip a switch one day and decide you don’t want the eating disorder any more. Its an a self defeating downward cycle that is extremely difficult to reverse. It can take years to get back to eating and thinking normal again.  If you or someone you know starts to develop the symptoms of an eating disorder, I’d say, get help and do it as soon as possible.

2002                                             2008

Last week was my first forty mile week in quite awhile. The only week I hit 40 during the training for the Nike Women’s Marathon was the week we ran the 20 miler. This time around I’m trying to get in a few more 40 mile plus weeks, since I’ve read several articles (here’s one) that suggest 40-50 miles is the magic threshold for marathon training. Don’t know if I fully believe it, but marathon training is always an experiment to me, so I thought I’d give it a try and see what results I get.

I feel like my body is giving me signals that it is ready for these higher mileage weeks. My legs seem to be recovering faster, and my mind isn’t bored with the routine since I’ve been mixing it up a lot with tempo runs, track workouts, treadmill and group runs (thanks to the Garmin, I can finally do these workouts outside with the certainty that I am doing them right). Just 6 months ago, running three days in a row made for a very difficult run on the third day. Four consecutive days was nearly impossible. It seems that I’ve finally moved beyond that three day barrier in my training.

I remember the first time I hit a 40 miles in a week. It was back in college, a little over 5 years ago. I wasn’t training for a marathon at the time, just running for a variety of personal reasons. I remember having to go out on the last day of my training week to run 2 miles on very heavy legs just so that the my total milage would reach 40 for the week. It seemed like a gigantic accomplishment. After that I put in a lot more 40 mile weeks that year. For some reason 40 became my magic number.  At that milage the pounds just seemed to melt off. I was already underweight so the result was not good, but at the time I liked it. For a long time after that, I didn’t think it was possible for me to run 40 mile weeks and not lose weight.

I’ve learned a lot about nutrition since then, and my relationship with my body has changed so much.  Food and running occupy separate parts of my thought life now. I run because I’m training for a marathon, I want to get faster, gain endurance, challenge myself. I eat because I don’t like being hungry. And magically, if I listen to that hunger the weight doesn’t fall off like it used to. Pretty simple!

So here’s the break down of my workouts in the last week:

Monday: 7 miles with my friend, average pace 9:24
Tuesday: 6 mile tempo run, average pace 8:39
Wednesday: 4 mile recovery run: average pace 9:30
Thursday: 7 miles with my friend, average pace 9:26
Friday: Rest
Saturday: 16 miles, average pace 9:25, pushing the pace the last three miles at 9:00, 8:40 and 8:30.
Total: 40 miles

This week, I’m trying to hit 40 again but it will be harder since we are planning a shorter long run on Saturday of just 10 miles. After the long runs get over the 16 mile mark, I like to do them every two weeks with shorter long runs on the weekends in between. My husband is acting a little neglected lately and I might need spend some time with him tonight instead of doing the 7 miles I’ve got planned. Gotta keep it all in perspective. It’s a balancing act for sure.

Happy running!

After reading all the comments on my “Blogging: Its cheaper than Therapy” post, I started to put together a final comment and it turned into something long enough to become a post. So many of you took the time to write very thoughtful comments on this topic and it was so encouraging to read them all, I had to take a moment to address them as much as possible.

Em, I just wanted to say that struggles with body acceptance are very much the same thing. I mean, that’s how it all starts for most people. For me the ED was something that developed after several years of struggling to accept my adult body after being effortlessly lanky during my early teen years.

And thanks for pointing out that I shouldn’t feel guilty for taking some time for myself to run. I think I tend to feel guilty because when I was in treatment I got it pounded into my head (because thats what you have to do with EDs) that running is bad for me if I am 1.) completely emotionally dependent on it, or 2.) Not able to maintain healthy relationships because of it, or 3.) Using it to lose weight even when I do not need to lose it.

But I’m learning that it is not all that black and white in real life. Sure when you are trying to kick ED’s butt, you have to be a little stern and lay down the black and white rules. But after a few years of sanity, maybe its okay to explore the grey areas. Even truly healthy people sometimes feel guilty for running instead of spending time with loved ones, or need it to be a natural antidepressant.  All your guys’ comments are proof of that. Thank you all so much for helping me realize that.

I really like how Alien pointed out that there is nothing wrong with the “vanity” of training. I feel like its now okay to admit that I like the body that running has given me. Its a healthy body that I’m proud of, so I think that’s okay. I had to put on about 30 pounds during treatment 5 years ago and originally it made me feel like a soft round marshmallow. Running has helped me become more muscular and defined again. Even though I have not lost much weight, running has helped me re-proportion myself and that is something I take pride in.

I think running to lose weight is okay too if you are actually overweight. In fact, if you really need to lose weight, I think focusing on exercise, not a restrictive diet is the best way to to do it. If you can find exercise you enjoy, it rewards your body and your mind without being punishing.

Lastly, I really think its interesting the connection that Irish pointed out between marathoners and people who have struggled with ED’s. She’s right, marathoning is a socially acceptable form of extreme exercise. But I don’t think we’re trying to mask our obsession with the guise that we are training for a marathon (at least not those who are seeking recovery). Instead, I think marathon training gives us an organized running plan that relieves us from obsessing. We don’t need to worry about when and how much we will run because its all on the training schedule. Rest days and long runs are built in and both are equally important when following the schedule.  Personally I’ve found that when the race is the number one goal, food becomes fuel and is no longer a moral decision. Eating is dictated by listening to my body for natural hunger cues, not watching a scale.

And Irish, I love, love loved how you described the difference between then verses now. I want to close with what Irish said because I feel the exact same way, but I couldn’t have said it any better.

Here is the what she said:

“I just feel like I have so much more respect for my body and what it can do, and the way I feel about myself is far more positive. I use my training and running to improve as an athlete and a person, and to discover what great things my body is capable of. I still think about food, but I do so in a much healthier way–I think about what the best fuel will be for my engine I take great pride in the strength and endurance I have developed over my years of running, and I know I would never do anything to compromise them.”

Thanks again everyone!