Mindfulness Training for Anorexia- Bulimia
By Dr Irina Webster
- Dr Irina Webster MD is creator of Women health Site and Eating Disorder Home Treatment Program that she developed based on her own personal experience with an eating disorder and many years of experience in this field. She has been working with eating disorder sufferers for 10 years.
Eating Disorder is horrid, it plays tricks. It tells you that everything you feel is serious and paints everything in black and white, but reality is opposite.
Dear Readers,
Mindfulness is inherent to Islam and it can really change your life. Eating disorders are almost always accompanied by other disorders. You can use Mindfulness to overcome anxiety, depression and many other symptoms of Eating Disorders. I was asked a question on using mindfulness to beat eating disorder and whether or not it works. Mindfulness is the ability to exist in the present and it is often practiced via meditation and yoga. I use Prayer, Meditation and Recitation of Qur’an to practise Mindfulness. I think if I had discovered mindfulness earlier, the road to recovery could have been a little shorter. In my case, Mindfulness helped improve symptoms of anxiety and depression and re-connecting with my faith and food.
Please Watch this wonderful Video on Mindfulness by Sheikh Faraz Rabbani, scholar and researcher of Islamic law.
It is important to note that eating disorders usually cannot be treated by only one provider using one approach. A common approach to treatment is to use the treatment team approach. This team is usually comprised of a nutritionist, psychiatrist, physician and a counseling practitioner. Using mindfulness approaches is just one of many promising treatments to help treat the complexity of eating disorders.
To Learn Mindfulness – Learn how to apply mindfulness in your day-to-day life, outside of meditation, to raise your self-control. The more awareness the better.
Some Useful Information/Downloads:
Mindfulness based Approaches to Eating Disorders
Eat Drink and Be Mindful– This is a basic overview for a 10 week mindful eating group based on the work book, Eat, Drink & Be Mindful by Susan Albers
Enjoy this wonderful Article by Dr Irina Webster on Mindfulness in Treating Disorders.
Most eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia are linked to significant stress, mood disturbance, anxiety, phobias, substance abuse, and physical complications. All these factors have to be addressed when people are trying to overcome their Anorexia- bulimia.
Mindfulness training is a technique which can help to cope with all these factors. Mindfulness means a calm awareness of body functions, feelings, emotions, thoughts and sensations. Mindfulness consists of paying attention to an experience at the present moment — without moving into thoughts from the past or concerns about the future. Using mindfulness training, people with anorexia – bulimia can attain control over their body and mind.
What exactly does mindfulness do for the mind and body? The main benefits of mindfulness are:
1.Calm and quiet the mind. This will bring more happiness, joy, positive feelings, appreciation and gratitude in people’s lives. It will also increase kindness to yourself and others which is necessary for ED people as they are often bad to themselves and others due to their conditioning.
2.Diminish the grip of habitual responses that causes suffering. ED sufferers all have certain habitual responses to their feelings, thoughts and emotions. For example, bulimics have habits to binge-purge at a certain time a day; anorexics have strict habits and routines about their diets and exercising.
Mindfulness can diminish these habitual behaviours to the point that the sufferer is able to choose how she/he is going to behave at a particular moment.
For example, instead of realizing 10-30 minutes later that you’ve been lost in bad thoughts about your body, weight, food, or your bad memories or fantasies from the past, you as a person can stop her/himself after only 30-60 seconds. With practise, people can increasingly observe these habitual responses and choose to respond in other more constructive ways.
3.Develop a stronger “observing self”. This means to observe what one does . It is like becoming a third person who sits inside your own chest and constantly watchs what you do.
Mindfulness makes a person become an observer of what one does, think and feel. This helps you to have better control over anorexic or bulimic thoughts and behaviours.
For example, when a person gets stressed, instead of reaching for alcohol or going on a starving or binge –purge cycle , the person could simply sit and observe the negative emotions and sensations which were brought on by the stress until they go away.
Unlike relaxation techniques, mindfulness can be developed to the point where it can be practiced in the middle of stressful situations. So instead of reacting to stress a person starts to respond wisely. While being mindful a person can still remain alert and respond appropriately to the situation at hand.
4.Slow down the pace of thoughts and become more attune to the present moment. Anorexia and bulimia sufferers often complain that they have too much continual inner “chatter” and images from the past or from the future in their minds.
This chatter and images don’t simply go away, because that’s the nature of the human mind. But they can settle down with practice. This settling down of mental processes bring relaxation and freedom. With practice one will have the ability to choose what to think about instead of being dragged along with uncontrolled thoughts and feelings. This effect can be experience just after 8-12 minutes of a mindfulness state of mind. So, if one practices mindful awareness at least 10 -15 min a day, it may be possible for him/her to choose what to think instead of their thoughts going uncontrolled.
Mindfulness will also increase your concentration and people can perform tasks , study and work with better accuracy. It also improves the immune system and general health. It regulates the autonomic nervous system which control automatic functions of the body organs. Mindfulness is a great anti- aging factor as it improves metabolism of the cells.
Most of anorxics and bulimics who practice mindfulness find it an incredible tool to beat their problem right at its root.
Dr Irina Webster
Source: http://www.eatingdisorder-institute.com
