Eating Disorder Recovery Coaching
Eating disorder coaches are emerging as an adjunct to standard treatment, filling a much-needed gap in traditional services by working in conjunction with the client’s treatment team, helping “at the moment” during real-time day-to-day struggles. Eating Disorder Recovery Coaching it’s the missing link in the current standard practices offered; Eating Disorder Coaches – just like Eating Disorders – operate outside office hours, and some of the most fundamental and at the same time challenging work is done beyond therapy and nutritional sessions. Eating Disorder Coaches are available to support those suffering beyond regular treatment sessions providing guidance and reassurance in “real time” rather than waiting until their next session. This is when the gap between an intention and an action surfaces. Within that gap is where your internal battle between your healthy and unhealthy self takes place.
As an Eating Recovery Coach, and your external healthy self, I can bridge that gap in the moment and be available in the Here and Now, to lift you and to remind you of your true nature and all from which you have been temporarily disconnected until you can find the strength to do it on your own. To support you, hold you, urge you, remind you, provide a reality check, and reconnect you to your healthy self when you most need it; during the moments when your eating disorder self comes forth full force. When the urges to engage in eating disorder thoughts, choices, actions, behaviors, and rituals seem the only way out.
“The challenging behaviors of eating disorders are entrenched in daily life, specifically around mealtimes, and cannot be avoided. Assistance during everyday living can make the difference between recovery or not.” (NEDC, 2017)
Eating Disorder Recovery Coaching is a game changer in the treatment of eating disorders and a growing aspect of an overall treatment strategy for treating individuals with Eating Disorders. A coach is a support and recovery assistance for a client, but not a replacement for therapy, treatment, or care by a licensed professional, like, a dietician, psychiatrist, psychologist, or medical doctor.
As a Certified CCI (Carolyn Costin Institute) Eating Disorder Recovery Coach, with a personal history of fully recovering from my long battle with an Eating Disorder, I help women, men, and children suffering from Anorexia, Bulimia, Binge Eating Disorder, Obesity, Emotional (over)eating, Orthorexia, Weight Obsession, Body Image Distortion/Issues, Disordered Eating, Dysfunctional Relationship with food and exercise, in reaching their treatment goals and reintegrate back to normal life.
I am the client’s everyday support person providing challenges and serving as both a role model and a guide. I provide a crucial aspect of treatment by accompanying clients in everyday situations, providing exposure and response prevention targeting behavioral changes. My coaching role is about being in the outside everyday world with the client. In other words, I assist clients in reaching their treatment goals in real-life situations, through exposure and response prevention (ERP) – meaning I am trained in how to progressively expose the client, under a controlled environment, to known triggers such as eating specific foods, eating in public, or eating without purging and I am trained to manage the situation, and the anxiety that may occur.
I am available via call-text-email outside of regular session times, at all hours, allowing clients to reach out when struggling. This ‘in the moment’ support not only provides help at inconvenient times but also teaches clients the skills of reaching out to people, rather than their eating disorder, which is a key to recovery.
It is an excellent resource for working with the HERE, NOW & HOW of recovery: A coach supports the treatment team, works in conjunction with the team, and helps the client accomplish the team’s goals. Coaches are taught to focus on HOW to help the client deal with the here and now, dealing with specific behaviors and avoiding discussions of the underlying issues or WHY the person has an eating disorder. This distinction creates a clear boundary.
Coaching is a huge adjunct to someone’s recovery repertoire, particularly for people who can’t afford intensive treatment, or they can’t stay in treatment long, or they live in places where they don’t have any access to treatment. I can also help clients transition home after inpatient treatment reassuring them, that they follow their recovery plan and helping them adjust gradually back to “normal” life. I work with treatment teams to help clients who require extra support and whose team or family would like to prevent them from going to day treatment or having to go into residential/inpatient. I might even accompany clients to social functions to help them get through the event without resorting to eating disorder behaviors. The most extensive and complicated form of coaching involves the live-in experience, where I can spend time at the client’s home, staying in the home or close by, which can be especially important during transitions, such as when a client leaves inpatient or residential treatment and is returning home.
In essence, I can provide support that licensed treatment professionals cannot or don’t want to provide due to time constraints or ethics. Often due to time limitations or legal limitations a therapist/psychologist/psychiatrist/registered dietician, are not able to be with clients, outside of the office, and support them when they must take a risk, cope with intrusive eating disorders thoughts, face a challenge, accomplish a goal, or merely stay on track (Please check the Services/How section for additional info).
Eating Disorder Coaching is targeting a more “take-charge” standpoint, so, I can support, guide, and assist a client through today, tomorrow, next week, and next month, as well as with something that a client may have come up soon. I am an everyday support person for whatever comes up for a client on his/her path to recovery. My task is to support the client with anything that he/she is struggling with, and which may be hindering his/her ability to recover. In short, my role is to help, encourage, support, and guide a client into integrating back into normal life. I can serve as a sounding board for the client’s thoughts, feelings, and other recovery-related challenges he/she may be facing, focusing on how to help and guide the client when dealing with his/her present Eating Disorder thoughts and behaviors.
Being a recovered eating disorder coach, I have a mission to be a role model for the client, meeting up to the expectations of a role model advantageously and beneficially for him/her. I am specifically trained in how to use my recovery to best help the client during his/her recovery journey, instilling hope when he/she feels like something can’t be done. I can share when suited, things that I did and ways that I approached my fears, and ingrained misconceptions around food, weight, and relationships. In other words, I can provide the client with a source of real-life skills coming from a real-life personal battle.