Topic Tuesday: Acceptance

“Overcoming Jeans” (By: Mackenzie Fox)

We (collectively, as people in recovery) make a lot of commitments during recovery. We have different commitments but they all center on overcoming this eating disorder. Throughout my recovery, my commitments looked like this:

• I will stop weighing myself
• I will learn mindful eating practices
• I will take steps towards loving my body

The list went on and as I went through my recovery, I could mark things off these lists of promises to myself. Then I started to struggle. I would realize that marking items off my list, in the Type A personality way that I am, didn’t mean that the work was done. Sometimes I had to add it back to the list because I would hit a fork in the road.

In regard to the list above, I struggled a lot with feeling comfortable in my body and how it changes. In the thick of my eating disorder, I received so much praise for ‘losing weight and getting healthy’ because I’ve always been plus size. People on the outside didn’t know about the disorder inside. And even though I’m almost 5 years into recovery, sometimes I have to remind myself that our bodies change. Not ‘good’ or ‘bad’, just a way of life. I recently started to struggle with my favorite pair of jeans and how they fit. I’d do the shake and shimmy dance to try and get into them. It had me down one night and I found myself almost obsessing about these jeans not fitting as perfectly as they have before. It took me a while, maybe a few tears, but I finally took them off and added them to a ‘donate’ pile I had in my room with old clothes. I decided that my body changes and this is normal. These are just jeans and they don’t change. So I bought some new jeans because my changing body is way more important than the overwhelming anxiety.

At the top of my commitments to recovery now is “Acceptance”. Plain and simple, and this brings about so much freedom.

About the Author

Mackenzie is a Nashville native currently pursuing her Masters of mental health counseling from Trevecca Nazarene University. She has special interest in LGBT groups and body image issues & eating disorders. Full time she works in multifamily property management as an assistant property manager. She spends her free time weightlifting, yoga and spending time with friends and family.