How Do I Know If I Have An Eating Disorder? (Outweigh)

and I am joined by Cat Defada, licensed therapist. She co hosts The Fifth Thing with Me and she's also the host of her own podcast called You Need Therapy and Cat and bring you on Outweigh Today. Because I got an email that's to both of us. It's a listener she must listen to four Things, Fifth Thing and Outweigh. And her name's Abby and she's thirteen years old. And I thought this was the sweetest note ever. So here it is. Hey, Amy, my name is Abby and I

am thirteen. As of a few weeks ago, I am somewhat of a new listener and I absolutely love your show. I was wondering, how do I know if I have a neating disorder? Do I actually have to talk to a professional or is there a way I can find out for myself. I also want to say that you're so brave for sharing your story. I haven't been able to benefit from it, but I know there are a bunch of people out there that have gotten good results out of your podcast. You and Cat are a blessing.

I like to listen to you while I do chores, and I love all the recommendations you make, whether it's about food or clothes or TV. I most likely won't be able to make it to your live podcasts because of school, even though I would love to come. Once again, I want to thank you and Kat for everything you do. Your friend Abby smiley face. I love that she's so smart. She does chores, she has chores, she listens to podcasts. Why she has chores basically us Yeah, And so this

is outweigh. I feel like when we do the fifth thing, we talk about all kinds of things, but we'll focus on the question that she had in there. And this is for someone listening whether you're twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old or you're sixty, sixty five, seventy years old, because I've heard from listeners that age range having curiosity about disordered eating behaviors, and so Kat, being the licensed therapist, I'm going to throw it over to you. How does

someone know they have an eating disorder? And then should they actually talk to a professional to find out or diagnose themselves in a way or can we find out on our own? So I like that we're addressing this piece. I think this is a question that comes up a lot, especially because there's not just one eating disorder. It's not like you have eating disorder. There's like a million, not really a million, but there's a lot of ways that it can be a diagnose. And then it looks how

I feel about this. I think this bleeds from professional to even how I think as a human. The real issue when it comes down to people asking the question, how do I know if I have eating disorder? Isn't so much do you have this eating disorder that according to the Diagnostic Statistical Manual that we can diagnose you and write this in your medical chart. The real issue is your relationship to food, or your body, or exercise or a combination of those. Are any of those affecting

your quality of life? Are any of those things keeping you from doing the things you want to do, or being the kind of person you want to be, or experiencing the things in life you want to experience. That then is enough to say that, Okay, this is an issue for you, and there is hope and there are other ways to live outside of that box you're in

right now. So rather than looking do I have all of the things that meet the criteria, it does my relationship to any of these things affect my quality of life. I know you did a recent episode about this because we actually talked about it last Saturday, And by we, I mean I did with my listeners. I feel as

though anyone listening it's a wee. So because it was need a week and you had your Monday episode on Unique Therapy, but then your Wednesday episode is your Couch Talks, you pretty much answered this question along with others, and that's what I encouraged people to go listen to if

they have that. I was on Nita's website and then that got me thinking about all the other different resources out there, and I started clicking around to different things, and it was in the show notes last week that I linked it, and it was questions you can ask yourself, like like you were saying, Okay, do I have an unhealthy relationship? Or is this getting in the way of my life? And sometimes it's even hard to tell that.

And so that questionnaire or other questionnaires, if you were to search some up might just get It's like a prompt. It can help you flore how you really feel, because I feel like there was times in my eating disorder where it just seemed like, Okay, I thought, kind of, this is just how life is, so I didn't know

it was a red flag. Yeah, especial everybody probably feels this way, right, yeah, or well, there's definitely some thoughts I had where I was like, oh my gosh, I could never share this thought that I just have because it's so crazy, or I can't believe this behavior I just did. Oh, like I had so much shame around it. And then thankfully other people started to share their story for their stories, and I was like, oh, yeah, I'm

not alone in hiding food. I remember kale Junkie, that's her handle on Instagram, but she started talking about her Binge eating disorder and like when she really had a feeling like, Okay, this is out of control. I need to get some help. He was either her boyfriend at the time or her husband. But he came home and she had like hidden bread in her bed. He walked in and she was like, oh my god. She didn't want him seeing her devouring a loaf bread because she

thought she was going to be alone. And that was a moment where she thought, oh, I mean there were several other things she had done, her just getting vulnerable and sharing that one story where she had so much shame. It was very embarrassed for her significant other, her partner, to see her in this light, and then how she was able to eventually open up to him and how supportive he was of what she was going through. That story stuck with me is oh, okay, I'm not alone

in some of the things that I've done. So anyway, little tangent there about the different thoughts, but wondering if your thoughts are normal or thinking is this a needing disorder thought or is this a disordered behavior? We don't know because sometimes society even tells us working out this much or dieting this much is not disordered, So it's

hard to decipher. I was going to say, I remember a specific experience where I went to lunch with my family it was me, my grandma, my mom, and my sister, and they chose to go to chilies, which back then I loved chilies. But I had an internal breakdown where I thought, I'm not gonna be able to eat anything, and I'm not gonna be able to get food, and then when's the next time I'm gonna be able to eat?

And there's not gonna be anything on this menu. And I remember ordering a salad without any of the stuff that came on it. It was I think, just lettuce and chicken something like that, and I remember my sister saying something to me. I don't know what it was, but I had this very like aha moment of everybody else is enjoying themselves except me, and I'm actually impacting their ability to enjoy their meal right now because I'm so worried about what I'm going to eat. And that

was very helpful for me to see. Wait, all these behaviors that I thought were going to help me, they are keeping me from having conversation. At this lunch with my grandma was in town to visit. I could not focus on anything else than what I was going to eat and then what I was going to do about what I was going to eat, and so I share that example kind of similar to what you just said, and that was like when I had already been I mean,

I was in the value of all of it. And one thing that is really helpful, and I like that this listener is asking this question now. Is one of the most helpful things we can do is get help before, like get ahead of it. So when we notice, hey, I don't know if this might be something that I should be doing, or I don't know if my relationship is healthy or unhealthy, I don't I don't really know. I don't know if I'm missing out on stuff, if I'm even wandering those questions, get ahead of it, go

reach out for help. And if you don't have a neating disorder or disorder eating, great, well, now you have a relationship with a therapist and you can work on other things. But if you do great, now you can kind of get help and work on the things that you need to work on before you're in the bottom of the pit where it's going to be even more hard or harder or more challenging to reach out and

ask for help and change behaviors. Oh yeah, I mean there's times where so far down in a hole that I was trying to climb my way out and it seemed daunting and overwhelming and not doable. But the good news is there is hope, there are sources. It is doable.

And earlier I mentioned just getting the prompts or taking online like if some of these online resources that are dedicated to eating disorder, you can take that as a prompt or take the quiz or whatever, but look at some of those questions and then maybe journal through them. And something I did was four days in a row, journaled about different questions but they were all sort of the same in the same vein. But it was an exercise.

And then I went back and was supposed to go through and circle the words that kept showing up over and over. And it was bizarre because by day four I'm journaling, I didn't really honestly remember everything I had written at day one, and they were different questions, but I was parallel. If you would do that with food back in the day, you would be able to circle some things that would have been like WHOA, yes, who

I didn't realize that this always is in my head. Yeah, And you mentioning not being able to connect around the table at Chili's, or enjoy that time, and that's what Britney Spencer. She sings the theme song at the beginning of this, and it's you know, I won't let my body outweigh outweigh everything that I'm made of. I won't spend my life trying to change. I'm learning to love

who I am. That's part of the I guess there's a chorus, but the verse is missing out on family meals around the table because what Grandma made is bad, So I'm not able, and I missed out on so many family meals because yeah, my brain was somewhere else thinking about all the things, Oh, if I eat that, I don't have to go work out, or if I eat that, or or not enjoying what everybody else is having, and bringing my own plates like to a family meal, my own function and my own tup aware are going

to the store so I could control everything, and then also then trying to force everybody else to eat it. When they're like, no, I'm good, they're like don't. I don't want that. I don't want that. So abby, Thank you so much for the note. You're very brave at thirteen to send a note and to be curious. I think that's one of the big guess things that we can do in life when it comes to all things

is be curious. And you're curious. You don't know where you are, but I think it's super cool that you're asking and continue to do that in all areas of your life. And if you have access to a professional amazing, absolutely do it. I don't know what your relationship is like with your parents, but that might be a good place to start to see if you can have some resources or talk with other friends, or if you have

cool aunt in your life. Sometimes it's easier to talk to someone that's not our mom or a dad, even if you do have a good relationship. I found that to be true. One time. My mom's best friend took me out to lunch and I really looked up to this person. I thought it was so cool and I was I was able to open up to her way more than I did my mom. And it's not because my mom did anything wrong, just the way it is. Okay. I hope y'all are having the day that you need

to have. That's what Cat loves to say, and definitely check out. You need therapy. Podcast, especially last week's Nita episodes, which I guess for this Saturday would be not the last week that we just had, but the one before. But all of Cat's episodes are good, all of them. Download, subscribe single, like and subscribe. Also like and subscribe to Outway too while you're at it. Okay, all right, bye bye