Trauma Analysis: How to change unhealthy relationships with food

Love Island star Zara McDermott released a documentary this week on disordered eating, raising all-important awareness over the explosion of people being diagnosed with eating disorders in recent years. In the documentary - which I would highly recommend - Zara explores some of the contributing factors that lead to disordered eating, which for many is the stage before a ‘full-blown’ eating disorder. Most strikingly for me, Zara took an honest and open view about her own role in perpetuating unrealistic ‘Instagram lifestyles’ and how she could use the experiences of those struggling to make her own content more authentic. In a society where influencers receive boundless praise and admiration for their picturesque lifestyle, going on the journey with Zara was fascinating. As the documentary covered the contributing factors in developing disordered eating, this week’s Trauma Lens will look at how we resolve eating disorders.

For many, eating disorders become lifelong afflictions which remain a hidden shame for years or even decades. The less commonly known ‘disordered eating’ refers to abnormal eating patterns that do not yet meet the official diagnostic criteria. But millions of people across the country struggle with their relationship with food to some degree, ranging from those who comfort eat to those who have an occasional binge eating weekend. Regardless of the specific issue, learning how to overcome difficulties with food can be invaluable.

The overview of the process that follows helps you discover the unconscious drivers of your behaviour, create new, healthier strategies, heal the traumas driving the issue and change old behaviour patterns. It’s recommended these steps be completed in order to maximise the probability of covering the main elements that keep an eating disorder in place. I’m also not suggesting in any way this is a quick, easy process, but the guiding principles help to make sense of the eating challenges and apply logic to the healing process.

Stage 1 - Discovering unconscious drivers

Most of us like to think that we are rational, sensible people who create plans and act in a logical way to move toward our goals. The research, however, does not support that. The Nobel prize winner Daniel Kahneman introduced us to the idea of Systems 1 and 2 thinking. System 1 thinking is automatic, instinctual, emotional and full of assumptions. System 2 thinking is slower, more effortful, and more energy intensive, but brings nuance, options and strategy to our thinking. What Kahneman showed is that we often make emotional decisions - then apply our logic to support and back up our decision. In essence, we’re a lot less rational than we like to think (as a side note, this is exactly why learning some simple, strategic models of thinking can make such a difference - because we learn to get better at engaging system 2 thinking).

This is where the current model of mental health breaks down in the resolution of eating disorders (yes, the current model fails at the first hurdle in my opinion!). By viewing eating disorders as purely an illness makes them ambiguous, vague, intangible and therefore incredibly difficult to help. We need to expand our understanding to begin to make more progress.

Disordered eating, abnormal eating and eating disorders are all strategic in nature. This means that they all serve a purpose for the individual. I appreciate that it may be a difficult idea to contend with, but please stay with me…

At some level, disordered eating provides the individual with more *perceived* advantages compared to drawbacks. For the vast majority of cases, this comparison of advantages over disadvantages will be totally unconscious. To be really clear here, the person has no conscious intention or awareness of the drivers. But they are there, hidden from view. To illustrate my point let's use a very simplistic example.

Sarah struggles with disordered eating; several days a week she binge eats junk food, and then purges the food from her system through laxatives.

Despite all the pains, negatives, drawbacks, disadvantages and costs of this eating pattern, it allows her to maintain her number one highest priority - keeping at a specific weight.?

Even though the need to purge the food from her system is due to a distorted body image, the fear of being ‘fat’ is so huge and all-consuming, even the most painful of strategies is worth it to avoid her fear. Here you may be thinking that this isn’t a logical or healthy strategy. That may be true. But… if it is an effective way of avoiding the worst-case scenario, and better, healthier approaches haven’t worked, Sarah will continue to use this strategy.

Often someone struggling with disordered eating reports they feel compelled to do the behaviour and lack any control over their actions. This can be very challenging to navigate but when the process has been completed this feeling of helplessness dissolves.

We know that disordered eating is very complex, so there is very rarely only one driver. Often the abnormal eating pattern has developed over years with many different contributing factors. But while these factors are unknown and unacknowledged - as in they are unconscious of them - they will never be able to see the eating pattern as a strategy and therefore will never learn how to overcome it.

Let’s use Sarah as an example of a recent client in the same situation (her real name has been changed). When we helped her discover her unconscious drivers, she identified 106 advantages of her eating pattern.

Yes, 106 advantages.

That’s 106 reasons to *unconsciously* keep the disordered eating pattern.

To give you a glimpse into hers, here are a few…

She realised when she was young her older sister would push her around and boss her about. When she started eating and putting on weight, she got stronger and her sister started leaving her alone. She learned she could eat food and feel stronger.

When she was a teenager her parents separated. This was very emotionally painful for her and Sarah used food as a way to comfort herself from those painful feelings. She adopted it as a way to self-soothe.

When she would feel emotionally ‘empty’, food was a way of giving her a quick, albeit temporary sense of fullness.

Sarah had a high-pressure job in finance, which could be very stressful. After a difficult day, eating chocolate and crips gave her a temporary respite from the stress and calmed her down.

Although becoming overweight, Sarah was often complimented on how nice her skin looked. The fullness of her face achieved through overeating gave her skin a smooth wrinkle-free appearance she liked.

Sarah was in a long-term relationship with a partner who didn’t treat her well. She did not have control over many elements of her home life, but she did have control over when and what she ate. Using food in this way gave her a small sense of control.

And there were many, many more.

After revealing these 106 advantages, Sarah’s perception of her disordered eating transformed.

She still had a huge desire to change it, she still felt incredibly upset at all the pain and physiological suffering she had gone through. But she could see how that strategy had given her so many different benefits and it became understandable - even if still painful - as to why up until now it had been so difficult to change.

Stage 2 - Alternatives

The brain can be considered a psychologically cybernetic organism. This means that when the brain has a clear goal and focus to move toward, it will use all its resources in the attainment of that goal.

When we set the goal of keeping a certain weight, looking a certain way, having a certain body composition etc, regardless of whether that goal is well-formed or not, if the goal has enough emotional energy behind it the brain will search to find ways of achieving it. As so many people are hugely emotionally invested in their aesthetics and outward appearance, it’s easy to see how that huge emotional drive can create the search for unhelpful or damaging strategies.

Once the brain finds a strategy that achieves its goal, it will not easily give it up. The brain will only accept and integrate a new strategy when it is certain the newer strategy is more effective. Just like when you learn you’ve got a new job, you don’t hand in your notice straight away, you wait until you’ve signed the papers before you tell your boss, the brain will not release an effective strategy until a better one has been found and established. This is not simply finding a strategy that ‘makes more sense’, it must provide more, greater or bigger rewards than the old one. In Sarah’s case, she had to find alternatives to her 106 advantages.

Stage 3 - Trauma Resolution

A high proportion of disordered eating and eating disorders will stem from emotional trauma or emotional difficulties. This spans a vast range of different issues from bullying, family separation, abuse, physical trauma all the way to grief. There is no definitive list of the challenges that exist in this section, but it is often events and circumstances that cause low self-esteem, low self-worth or impact a person’s body image.?

The number and severity of these traumas will also be unique for each individual. However, these events can be divided into two categories;

• Emotional charges directed to external individuals (e.g mother, brother, preacher, teacher etc).
• Emotional charges directed internally at self (shame, guilt etc).

Working through and processing these painful perceptions liberates the need for many of these benefits the old eating strategy fulfilled, therefore making the pattern of disordered eating easier to change.

It's also important here to consider how the subconscious mind primarily works - repetition. If you have low self-esteem and you continually get bombarded by the same messaging over and over again through social media, that idea turns into a belief, which often means it sticks.

Stage 4 - Finding the Why

Once traumas have been resolved and alternatives have been identified, we now need to create the intellectual and emotional drive necessary to shift the focus and attention toward the new strategies.

This involves finding how the new, alternative strategies will help the individual achieve what is most important to them in life (unique to that person). Tapping into the deeper reasons, the powerful, emotive ‘why’s’ for how these new strategies will help them. This can be expanded to see how these new strategies will also benefit them in every area of their lives.

In Sarah’s case, we spent several months working through and resolving previous traumas, followed by stacking up nearly 200 why’s of the new behaviours/strategies.

Stage 5 - Detaching from the old strategy

Finally, we work on releasing the old strategy (which in many conventional methods is the first step).

At this point, the undesired behaviour or ‘illness’ has been transformed into a strategy that fulfils needs but also causes significant damage along the way.

The newer, healthier and more effective alternative strategies to fulfil those same needs are identified so that the brain has certainty that the newer approach will be equal to, or greater than, the old strategy.

Then the emotional pains and wounds that were the original drivers of the compensatory eating patterns have been processed and neutralised. Clearing the old emotional baggage away and helping the person think and apply new strategies (System 2 thinking).

We then help the person to see - both intellectually and emotionally - the advantages of the new strategy until so many have been discovered the ‘why’ driving the change is powerful enough to maintain it over the long term.

Finally, we bring our consciousness to all of the pains, disadvantages and drawbacks of the old strategy. We help the individual (and their brain!) to become cognizant of all of the ways the old disordered eating has held them back so that the old strategy becomes relegated down the list and the new, healthier strategy can take hold.

Conclusion

Disorder eating is complex, difficult and multifaceted. But at the same time, the primal drivers are based on strategic ways to fulfil a goal shrouded in trauma and low self-worth. By going through the process step-by-step, people can transform their relationship with food and begin to enjoy both themselves and their bodies in new ways.

#thetraumaexpert #disorderedeating #mentalhealth