Post-Recovery Shopping

July 9, 2014 by Arctic Hare! 2 Comments

(First of all, I wanted to say sorry for the donut pic overload yesterday. I couldn’t decide which were best, and I was so excited that some turned out well! Sorry!

Second, I started a Twitter account – I actually read Privacy Policies, and although I wanted to make a YouTube account the policy (Google’s) was far too invasive for me to be comfortable with. Most of the YouTuber’s I follow have Twitter, so I can interact with them on there. Like submitting questions for Malinda Kathleen Reese’s FAQ’s. 🙂 I have absolutely no idea what I am doing on there, but if you want to find me, I am GigglePop! @NaturallyDreaMe)

Now to the main course!

Shopping while recovering from anorexia can be really stressful. Your brain wants to heal, but your mind is telling you all sorts of falsehoods.

It was stressful to me to know I had been fitting in a size 0, and was now shopping in 6 & 8’s. Numbers mean a lot to me, and I couldn’t get over it.

So, the first few trips I took were awful. It ended with my head bashing me about everything. Horrible. I was deflated and felt fat.

So when I went shopping several months later, I asked my mom to go in with me on a new plan. And it went okay! (Healing Phase was: Weight Gain recovery)

The Plan:

1. Go in – (this in itself is stressful.)
2. Locate the item.
3. — I almost had a meltdown at this point, Mom stopped me from fleeing out of the store by saying — “Just point out the ones you like.”
4. Have your helper select them off the shelf/rack. They will select a couple of sizes.
5. I personally melted down most when I looked in the mirror at my clothe-less self. So I didn’t ever look in the mirror while changing – this prevented a meltdown and many self-judging thoughts.
6. Also, never look at the sizes. If you don’t look at the sizes, you can’t care about the number!

Wallah! Did you find anything? I didn’t on my first trip, but I tried.

I avoided shopping for a while after that just because I was unsure if I could have a repeat positive experience. But I started really wanting some shorts. I had none. I had a rough and tumble job during recovery, so when I had to go shopping, I bought pants.

For families of the recover-ees, I insert this insight into what was going on in my head, in case it helps.

I had searched all over the thrift shops for shorts that worked. I couldn’t find the right size and right style. So to get an idea of what was out there, I stopped by Ross on a family day out.

I found great selection, and a few I liked. My family asked if I’d found anything: “Yup!” Do you wanna go check them out? “Nope, that’s fine. I just wanted to know what they have.”

To convince me to use people’s time, effort and money to get a passing need for myself is very hard. You almost have to make it that it would be good  for you in order for me to take a shot at it.

So they said, “Let’s take 10 minutes and see if we find something. And then we’ll go. Okay? Let’s go!”

So we went.

We used the same game plan.

I found the section. Pointed out my favorites, Mom advising me on style (we agreed already, just looking on the rack confirming I had the right idea), asking me what colors I was looking for, and then selecting them and holding them.

I actually got to be involved in size a little more this time. The type of store leant itself to this without me feeling like it was a size-pronouncement on me. Plus it was go-go-go; we had 10 minutes! 🙂

So after searching all the shorts we ran to the dressing room. (Healing phase: Redistribution)

1. Select a dressing room away from the main path. Give yourself some additional privacy where you don’t feel like people will be waiting on you.
2. It was on-off, on-off for me. If it felt comfortable, it went in the maybe pile. My goal was to find lounging shorts, so it had to be comfortable.
3. I had several in the maybe pile – now I didn’t look at the sizes.
4. Re-try, now look a little at how they look on me. Which feel and look best?
5. Only 2 remained. How do they look? They both feel amazing.
6. Do whatever test you need – for jeans, it is a gap test; shorts – a bend over test.
7. They passed.
8. Mom bought me both 🙂

Recovery and post-Recovery shopping can be really hard, but I hope I’ve given you some tools you can use to make a somewhat fun successful shopping trip. ‘Cuz I am digging these new shorts and I want you to have that, too!

Q&A:

Have you ever had to deal with having trouble buying stuff for yourself? What did you do?

Do you have a way to post-Recover shop without a helper? Do share… 🙂 Not everybody has an awesome family like me, to help them, at which I am most saddened 😦