Dana xo

Hopefully, if your parents google eating disorders they will come across quality sites like NEDA, NIMH, and Something-Fishy.

Anyways, I also have experience in web design (and blogging- but not about personal issues) and I have been contemplating starting a blog about the insights I am steadily learning about my ED on my journey to recovery. So thank you for this post as I think I may just start a blog in the New Year (when I make my major steps to recovery) as I am already questioning my behaviours and have learnt some things that are quite shocking and honest. A blog would be a good outlet and I hope other people who have suffered/are suffering from an ED can relate to me (if they ever stumble upon it).

I also think it is important to start to tip the scales so to speak on the number of pro-ED blogs and communities out there. It’s great to read blogs from intelligent people who aren’t attention-seeking in that respect. <– I am dreading my parents and people that I love finding out about my ED but mostly because of the ‘information’ that is out there on the web. If they searched “eating disorders” in Google I would be so ashamed if hundreds of pro-ana websites came up because I am not from that segment of the population with an ‘eating disorder’. Mine has been a secret for years because it is a deeply private (and at times, humiliating) problem.

So thank you, for you have certainly inspired me

Rachel — I am VERY interested to read the results of your study. I think it is great that you have been able to use your blog to aid in your research. There are so many intelligent people who frequent your blog and I think that their insights and personal experiences would be very valuable.

Lola — I like your comparison between ED blogs and group therapy. While I think that physically interacting with (and reacting to) others plays an important role, blogs avoid a lot of inherent group therapy problems (competitiveness specifically comes to mind).

Thanks for everyone’s feedback, as always!

“It really helps far beyond any therapy or medication that I have tried. it’s not just being able to record thoughts and dispatch of them, the commenting and recieving of comments is a brilliant alternative group therapy method. It makes me feel both useful and cared about. I think I am able to be honest about things on my blog which I would never have the courage to admit to someones face.

It is also a fantastic resource of information, and just knowing that ideas which in my head seem so twisted and unique, are shared by numerous others, eradicates the element of shame surrounding mental illness. When I have an appointment which does not go well and I am made to feel small or that my opinion is invalid because of my mental health, it helps to be able to share it with others who understand. It confirms that just by having a few beliefs which may not fit into a psychiatric matrix as being well balanced, doesn’t negate the validity of my opinions, nor my status as a human being. It is a double edged sword most definiately, but the risk has been worth it so far, and I hope it continues to prove therapeutic to everyone else.”

And that says it all really. It’s doubly helpful from an ED perspective, just because of the isolation that en ED brings. Cutting myself off from people is a classic sign that I am slipping, and my blog helps me feel considerably less alone. Plus the sense of recovery morale is awesome, in the ED corner of the blogosphere.