Hello, my name is Ali. I am forty-five years old and fully recovered from a decades long struggle with an eating disorder.

 

I started this blog in late 2015 as I neared a full recovery. As I got stronger in my recovery, I felt pulled to share my recovery experience. I named my blog: Road to Recovered: Letting go of a long-term eating disorder by healing from the inside out. 

 

After years of trying to recover by primarily addressing eating disorder behaviors, I realized if I wanted to stop using those behaviors, I’d have to look at what drove me to use those behaviors in the first place.

 

Here are quick links to some of my first posts:

 

Writing Assignment #1: My Worst Day

 

Writing Assignment #2: Exploring my Phase of Recovery

 

The Most Compelling Reason to be Recovered is Me. It was Always Me.

 

 

The name Road to Recovered felt right at the time because I was still in pursuit of recovered and saw it as a finish line.

 

Recovered isn’t a finish line.

 

When I reached a full recovery, the work continued. Here are some links to my work during that time:

 

Food: Friend or Frenemy Part 1 

 

Food: Friend or Frenemy Part 2 

 

Food: Friend or Frenemy Part 3

 

A few years after I recovered, the name didn’t feel quite right. I was still on the road I created and nurtured during recovery. The skills and tools I developed and learned during recovery continue to serve me and help me maintain a full recovery.

 

In 2018 I changed the name to Road to Recovered; The semicolon, rather than a period, indicates that the road built during recovery continues. 

 

As I continue on this road, I’ve been able to reflect on my recovery and unpack and articulate some of the external issues that assisted the eating disorder in keeping me trapped for over three decades. You can read those thoughts here:

 

The Problem with Beautiful

 

Scale Trauma

 

Fitness Trackers Fuel Obsession and Dependence

 

 

On June 7, 2021, I started a blog series called, Revealing My Road to Recovered. It consists of journal entries, emails and essays I wrote before, during and after my 2015/2016 eating disorder recovery. 2015 wasn’t my first attempt at eating disorder recovery, but it was my last. I recovered. For the first time in over thirty years, I no longer had eating disorder thoughts or behaviors and I accepted my body. Because of the strategies I learned, practiced and developed during recovery I have maintained a full recovery for over five years.