A Letter from Francie to a Client  

Entering Residential Treatment…
 
Gosh, you have been waiting a long, long time to go and finally have the treatment you need from residential care.  I have patients go in and come out so regularly that I have seen some areas that I might give you advice about.  How you choose to use treatment will have an enormous impact on what happens.  In other words, this is an active process on your part, not a passive one.  Many go into residential feeling like they will just go with the flow and come out well.  I have learned that such is not the case....

One of the common errors I see girls making is to "eat what they tell you to because you have to".  They just followed along and dealt with it, but as it turns out they never CHOSE the harder food choices, or CHOSE to go for it for themselves.  They were “good girls” and didn't know better than to just follow the rules.

When they got out, they realized they relapsed into restricting and eventually binging and purging because they never transitioned from the ridiculous belief that eating less is "better", to the belief that eating has nothing whatsoever to do with worth, that any remote form of restriction results in a restricted connection to self, soul and life and that the place to set such boundaries (I will/I won't) should be with how well one treats oneself, how much we need to become familiar with our inner life, our inner truth, our intuition or gut feelings. It takes a LOT of strength to follow one's own internal signals which is our guidance system. As long as anyone thinks that salad and brown rice makes one better or thinner or stronger than having a burger (veggie or meat) and fries (potato or fried organic yams) and chocolate is someone who is putting their precious power into a bottomless pit.

So, as you work in there to free your-Self and find your Self...I recommend that you take any opportunity to "go for it"...risk choosing the scary food and confront those ED demons, see how they initially were protective but then became the same thing as heroin or crack.  Go for it with others in the groups, as in, do things you would NOT normally do.  What the heck, you may never see those people again :) Keep choosing what is not "safe" and I promise the rewards will follow you every day for the rest of your life.  I will be thinking of you as will all of us! 

Blessings...Francie