Being thin created intense anxiety that I wouldn't be able to maintain that weight for life, and I couldn't.

Recovery is about making room for the real me to exist.

Oftentimes, especially during my recovery, I didn't need to think about everything I was doing wrong; instead, I needed to focus more on what I was doing right-and then do more of the right stuff. I needed to live more in the solution.

Intense pain often pushed me to make changes. The pain of the eating disorder pushed me into recovering from eating-disordered behaviors, and then the emotional turmoil I experienced without those behaviors (not knowing how to cope with perfectionism, feelings, and life in general) took me even further, so that I ultimately found serenity.

Anita Johnston, Ph.D., author of Eating in the Light of the Moon, taught me to look in the mirror with curiosity rather than fear. So I may look at my reflection and think, 'That's interesting. I wonder why my body seems bigger today than it did yesterday. Maybe it's water weight. Maybe it's my outfit. Or maybe my eyes are just playing tricks on me.' I know it's not possible for me to gain a noticeable amount of weight overnight, so I will go no further than that. I move on with my day without skipping a beat-and definitely without missing a meal.

I went from really hating my body, to disliking it, to accepting it but not exactly liking it, then accepting it and liking it, and now I love it.

I would not encourage you to go through the sweat, blood, and tears of the recovery process only to reach some kind of mediocre state where you were just 'managing' the illness. It is possible to live without Ed.