How Eating Disorders Heal
by Abigail H. Natenshon, MA, LCSW, GCFP
 

• Eating disorders are relationship disorders; They indicate a problematic relationship with food, with the self, with the nature of life as we know it, and with others.
• ED heal through human connections…between the patient with supportive others, and ultimately, between the patient and the self.
• Eating disorder healing happens within the context of systems dynamics ….through the family system, the personality system, through varied treatment and human resource systems.
• Even while healing through the integration of a vast diversity of resources, the healing process evokes differentiation within the structure of the victim’s otherwise undifferentiated, inflexible self.
• Eating disorders heal through learning, through change and through self determined behaviors.  Healing and eating disorder requires action; eating disorders are hardly passive diseases; always in motion, these disorders are either getting better or they are getting worse.
• Eating disorders heal through intention, through anticipation, and through emotional preparedness to handle the reality of the unpredictability of life as it unfolds. In many respects, the experience of the eating disorder practitioner is as emotionally challenging as it is for the patient.
• Eating disorders heal through self-awareness, emotional growth, and through the restoration of weight and physical health.
• Eating disorder are Life disorders. Recovery from an eating disorder upgrades the patient’s quality of function in all life spheres.