Anyone find the anxiety of Coronavirus triggering for their ED?

[AudaCityLimits]

I know it's really awful and the worst time ever for me to put my body under any strain. But I am.finding myself slipping back into bad habits. I am.worried about Covid-19 (and the ease of overeating when you're home all day) and I'm becoming dangerously controlling about food intake again. Also, very sad personal situation which doesn't help. But fuck. I need to sort this before it gets hold.
Anyone else.?

Anyone?

Yes I can relate ☹️. I’ve been having counselling at a specialist centre and things started to improve. Then my husband left me and now this 😭. Anxiety is through the roof with lots of physical symptoms. And being at home doesn’t help but then I can’t get to the shops 🤷🏽‍♀️.

Me, definitely. Exercising more, calorie counting, preparing x planning meals, eating less and less, watching numbers on scales go down....my only focus apart from reading about CV. All stress related, i look bloody awful and I am definitely on a slippery slope.

Yes, my bingeing is out of control.

Oh I'm so sorry you're all suffering too. I was absolutely fine until last Sunday (found texts on bf's phone ) and since then, I've been extreme. Plus walking a lot on very few calories. Because I can't see family and friends, this goes unchecked, I can get away with more. Ugh.

Yes. I'm confined with somebody who enjoys cooking but makes disgusting food. I have been hiding in tears in my room quite a bit because mealtimes are stressing me out. I'm not sure how I am going to cope for the next month.

Sadly, I’ve read your replies about constricted calories and more exercise and in my mind I’m “Yes! That is the answer!” I don’t have much control over anything but I can control my food intake😔

Yes. Had been doing so much better and now am back at constantly weighing myself, weighing food, counting food, organising food, spending hours and hours looking at food online, obsessing over food shops, worrying about not being able to get safe foods. Trying to be strict with myself as I absolutely cannot afford to lose anymore weight so trying my best to maintain. Argh. Sorry everyone is struggling, it’s horrible. But it does make sense, trying to create a sense of control when the world is so horribly out of
control.

Yes. I am already in the thick of an ED anyway, but while I am coping ok with CV, I am not coping with the situation I find myself in: can't get my safe food (near panic and crazy management of how I would be able to get more than 3 of my thing), how to exercise (which is head space and control rather than numbers on scale and body image) and finding myself with barely any time to myself.

I'm knackered trying to work full time, keep the household going and home educate 10 yo (lone parent).

I'm retreating in to myself when I see others doing their best to be upbeat and keep each other buoyant.

And the guilt about it all - how utterly selfish and pathetic to be so self-absorbed right now.

Yep, really struggling. Food obsession taking up a lot of the day and my obsession with exercise has ramped up. Having outpatient treatment but feel like all progress has been lost. Terrified about not being able to get my usual safe foods.

I'm really struggling too.

I was due to start OP treatment again in May as my ED has been really bad since miscarriage a year ago (I've had a combo of ana restriction, exercise bulimia & purging & extreme binge eating for 20 years - it goes in cycles & slowly got worse)

Not having access to my safe foods for recovery is terrifying as is loosing the structure I have for exercise which helps keep my anxiety down.
Trying to keep going and juggle teaching my 5 year old & having to face uncertainty head on.
I'm lucky my husband is very supportive but my critical voice is really battering me & depression is definitely heightened (as I'm sure it is for most of the UK ATM)

Just feel such a fraud that other people are loosing family members & I'm wrapped up in an illness that I've created for myself & don't have the willpower to stop (know my therapist would argue that's my EDs voice but it's flipping loud!)
Sending strength & love to everyone x

How are you all? Is anyone managing to turn things around? I am not improving at all and I really need to. Aware that my immune system will be hugely compromised if I go on like this. I keep saying to myself that tomorrow will be the day- but it's a complete addiction isn't it.

Beat posted some information on eating disorders and coronavirus, don’t know if anyone might not have seen/it might be helpful to anyone...here’s the link anyway:
www.beateatingdisorders.org.uk/coronavirus

There’s something on there about immune systems. My husband was very concerned for me for the same reason, when I spoke to my GP about it she said that having a chronic health condition (anorexia here) and being long term underweight are not ideal, my latest bloods showed my white blood cells to be holding their own so hopefully immunity is not compromised. Which was reassuring. OP, if you are very concerned could you have a blood test? It’s really the only way of determining if your behaviours are affecting your immune system. Having said that, routine bloods here are suspended at the mo.

Do you have any support for your ED? I’m still having phone therapy with my psychotherapist, and have phone appointments with MH and ED services too. So feels like a support system in place even though it’s no longer in person. Hope you have some support too. Maybe we can all support each other a bit through this as well.

I have BED and I haven't stopped bingeing for a couple of weeks. I'm trying to have regular meals and eat breakfast, but it's tough.

The irregular eating is keeping me awake at night which is making me tired and skipping breakfast from waking up late. It's just so hard, and my husband has never had an issue with food. He can eat the same foods every day for weeks without a second thought and he just thinks I'm greedy :(

Hi everyone. How are you all holding up? I had a bit of a binge last night. Had nothing but a banana and a digestive every day for 7 days, then made myself sick with crisps, bread, chocolate etc. Horrified with myself. Just feel like I can either be extreme one way or extreme in another. That space in between just does not exist for me.
I don't have support glittering. No doctor knows the extent of this (my fault- I only mentioned it in passing to my doctor a few years ago when discussing ADs.) I've never been diagnosed. The only person who knows the extent is my bf, and our relationship is now fucked really. he does check up on me, and he is trying, but as we know, we can only help ourselves.

I'm sorry about your struggle starta . Bingeing is a bastard. I think it's so impossible to understand if you haven't been there, but to call it greedy is just unfair and uninformed. I completely understand the panicked overeating. I know that if I allowed myself to eat anything today after yesterday's binge, that would be it- I'd be bingeing daily for days, probably weeks. The self-hatred and disgust that comes with it is absolute hell. Hugs to you x

My ED therapist called. I was right in the middle of a work Zoom call so sounded a bit flustered.

We will have phone appts from now.

How does ED therapy actually work TheOrig? This may sound silly, but do they weigh you? And how were you referred? (Don't feel the need to answer if you don't want to btw.)
Am starting to realise that part of why I'm so bad now is that societal change means that there's less culpability. No family members to notice the weight loss.

You can ask CityLimits, I don't mind.

Do you mean how the therapy works now in lockdown or normally?

My initial referral was direct from GP to ED team, this referral was from GP to Well Being (sort of MH triage?) who referred to ED. I can't work on my MH issues while I'm unwell (physically and mentally) or while the ED is so dominant. Does that make sense? Maybe not cos it's so frickin' hard to make sense of it at all, isn't it.

Yes, I am weighed (not over the phone obv!) and I HATE it. But if I refuse it indicates I am not ready for recovery.

How is everyone doing? @AudaCityLimits how are you? Have you managed to speak to your GP?
I’m finding things tough going at the moment, anorexia has got a good grip on me. I’d just started to do a little better before all this. I just feel so hopeless.

Yes. It had been fine for ages and now those voices that punish me for the bowl of cereal before bed ha e come into my head loudly.
I just wish I could just sit and enjoy my food without all this neurosis.

Hope nobody minds if I join?
I've been in recovery from AN for a little under 12 months now (was discharged from OP treatment last summer)
It was all going so well until lockdown but the fear of everything else now being out of my control has had a massive impact on eating & exercising in that I'm doing too much of one and not enough of the other.

My ED is a symptom of other MH issues which I'm also really struggling with.
After a suicide attempt last year, I've spent the last 12 months getting to a place where I have something of a hold on my life yet within a couple of weeks, it all seems to have fallen apart.

My psychotherapist has offered phone appointments but I really struggle speaking on the phone. I don't even have a care-co at the moment as mine went off sick back in October and I've been crying out for a medication review since last summer as what I'm currently prescribed (quetiapine) knock me out for hours after taking them.

All this pales in comparison with what some are going through though so at the moment it's a case of put up and shut up..for me at least.

Thinking of everyone struggling with a shitty ED.

My therapist sent me this article that I found helpful, I thought I would share:

medium.com/@lucy.aphramor/understanding-how-trauma-impacts-eating-can-help-us-cope-with-the-covid-19-crisis-a2f73c60c723

Thanks glittering, that's a great resource.

Reality, could you push yourself to having the phone appointments with your psychotherapist? I know its scary not he phone but maybe better than nothing?

I let go of my normal low sugar/ carbs rules over the past few days for easter and am working hard not to restrict/ over exercise over the coming days to punish myself.

It's hard and the ED voice is loud on some days.