Before joining Scarlett’s Eating Disorder Recovery Group, I had never participated in any group treatment method. I had many biases about what such a setting would involve, as well as the type of person I would encounter there. How wrong I was!

The group has become one of the most positive aspects of not only my current recovery, but of my life in general. Scarlett and the other girls have helped me to see my disorder as not a mere personal phobia, but instead as a greater fear and cultural distortion that affects many other women (and men). Through learning to trust the other group members, and to support them in their recovery, I have simultaneously learned to support and care for myself.

I can say wholeheartedly–with confidence–that thanks to Ramey Nutrition, I am now deep in the throes of recovery. It is painful and disorienting, this process of shedding the old identity of the eating disorder and building a new self, of GAINING power, confidence, self-esteem, ownership over my own desires. But this is also one of the richest moments of my life to date, for I feel like I am truly beginning to live for myself, not for my imagined expectations of other people.

Last week, I went to the doctor and stepped onto a scale face-forward for the first time in three months. The number leered at me, twenty pounds higher than my last timid step onto the scale of self-approval. Unlike last time, I did not feel the relief at the low number, or the mild mix of fear and pleasure at the thought–’oh no what am I doing to myself?’ Instead, I felt calm, and then surprised. Truly surprised! Because I realized that I felt too good to be that number. How could I feel happy and strong and beautiful and still see this indication of ‘fat’–a number that reminded me of five years ago, the last time I had weighed so much. The number must be wrong, I thought, for I was wearing many winter layers. But even subtracting that, I was still 10 or 15 pounds higher than my ’safe, underweight number.’ I realized that I felt too ‘okay’ for this number to be true, and stepped off, unswayed, unable to retreat into the depression that any weight gain would have previously inspired. I left the doctor standing tall, feeling strong and beautiful.

Now, I see this experience as the turning moment in my recovery, the snapping of the thread holding together the seam in my neurotically-stitched robe of disordered eating. The logic cracked–fat was not a feeling. My body did not have to determine my happiness or sadness or goodness. I just felt good. I am good.

LB – Seattle, WA