Kait Answers Tough Questions About Living With and Recovering From an Eating Disorder

Welcome back to the Bite by Bite Podcast.

Eating disorders not only impact the person living with and struggling from an eating disorder, they also impact the people closest to that person.

In this episode, Kait and her best friend explore how Kait’s eating disorder impacted her friendships, relationships, and family. They also discuss what feels different about recovery for Kait this time around, and how her struggle first began. This is a conversation filled with honesty, vulnerability, and even a little bit of humor - you don’t want to miss it. 

Episode Topics

• Kayla sets the stage and describes her perspective of Kait’s struggle with an eating disorder(2:36)
• Kait shares what is different in recovery this time around (5:38)
• Kait describes what a good and a bad day look like for her presently (7:17)
• Kait shares her future hopes and goals for eating disorder recovery (14:53)

Content Warning: This episode contains brief mentions of eating disorder behaviors that Kait has previously engaged in. Please listen in a way that feels safe for you and your recovery. 

Related Episodes

THE SECRET THAT ATE ME ALIVE: My 10-Year Eating Disorder Recovery Timeline 

WHERE I'M REALLY AT: The Messy Reality of Eating Disorder Recovery

UNEXPECTED LESSONS: Lessons My Eating Disorder Taught Me About Healing & Self-Worth

Connect with Kait

@bitebybiterecovery

bitebybiterecovery@gmail.com 

Affiliate Links

COMFRT 

FIND THE GOOD 

Transcript

UNKNOWN: 0:00

Bye.

SPEAKER_00: 0:37

Welcome to Bite by Bite, the podcast that takes you step-by-step through the messy, beautiful, and real journey of my struggle with an eating disorder and my recovery. I'm Kate, and I'm here to share my experiences, lessons, and the wisdom that I've gathered along the way. Here, I share it all, the raw, the real, and the uncensored, so those who can relate know they're not alone in the tough moments. And for those of you who haven't battled an eating disorder, your attention is turned just as important in helping to educate and break the societal stigma. Before we dive in, please remember that while I hope my story and reflections can be helpful, this podcast is not a substitute for professional treatment. If you are struggling or need extra support, please reach out to a qualified mental health professional. Hey everyone, welcome back to Bite Bite Bite. I'm so grateful you're here. Today's episode is a special one because I've invited one of my close friends, Kayla, Hi, Kayla. I'll

SPEAKER_01: 2:12

admit I am not very good at this stuff, so bear with me. But I just want to start by saying I think you starting this podcast has been really positive for you as you work through your recovery. So congratulations. Thank you. On launching. And I'm excited to be here and ask you a few questions. So let's get into it. All right. So I was trying to figure out kind of how to start. And I came to realize as I I was thinking about us and our relationship and how far we go back that I've known you for over 20 years, which is just so weird to say. Like, I don't feel old enough to have known you for that long. But that just means we're not getting old, but we're getting older. So we go way back. We grew up playing sports together, travel softball. We went to high school together. And then we went our own way for college. Like, what was it for? Yeah,

SPEAKER_00: 3:38

it's common, like more common

SPEAKER_01: 3:53

than people think. were like super passionate about working out and I remember you telling me about your Peloton and the streak that you had and I can't remember the number but you were like I have to I was like over a year yeah it was in the hundreds and I was you know at that point I knew like it wasn't just a fun little competitive game that you played with yourself it was there was more to it and it was really consuming you and so for a long time I thought to myself like should I reach out to your dad and Iris like I'm concerned and what do I do but I didn't want to insert myself in parts of your life that maybe you know were very sensitive and vulnerable and maybe didn't want me to so I didn't and I knew you were looking to get help and because you had talked about it we had talked about it and then you told me about this podcast and so I knew that you wanted to set out to recovery and so here we are yeah and I have some questions for you so the hot seat My first question is, you previously went to formal treatment years ago and are now focusing on recovery again. What would you say is different this time around than your first time in recovery?

SPEAKER_00: 5:20

I think this time around, just there's like natural things that have changed. Like I'm older, I'm more mature, I've already been through it. So I kind of have, I'm a little more prepared in that sense. But I think the first time around, I just thought, okay, something's wrong. I have an eating disorder, I'll just go to treatment for, I don't know, X amount of weeks or months that they tell me I need. And then once I'm discharged, it'll be fine. It'll just get back to life, whatever. But I don't really think I understood or even knew. Maybe I did know, but I didn't want to admit the real depth of the eating disorder. So when I left treatment, I wasn't recovered. But I think this time around, I am just for the most part, just like tired of dealing with it, tired of being tired, tired of having every second be that bad all the time. And I also think I'm more, I've done a lot more work within the past two years where I'm more self-aware, more honest, even just with myself, and definitely more committed. And I know what it takes, I guess, as compared to I didn't before.

SPEAKER_01: 6:34

So this time around, besides doing this podcast, what has helped you the most in your recovery now?

SPEAKER_00: 6:41

So aside from the podcast, pretty much the same thing, just being honest, even if that's just to myself to my family admitting to my dad again that I was struggling was hard but once I did that I felt like that was almost a big part of the battle because now I didn't have to waste all this energy like being secretive again and a big thing too was just accepting it admitting it and then once I labeled it again that takes some of the power back because it's kind of like okay this is the thing now what's next

SPEAKER_01: 7:17

And so what does a good day in recovery look like

SPEAKER_00: 7:21

for you?

SPEAKER_01: 7:21

A

SPEAKER_00: 7:22

good day in recovery is just not really having any thoughts around food or exercise or anything like that and being able to go about my day without that distraction being able to deal with change unpredictable things happening stress just normal lifetime stuff and not turning to the eating disorder for as a coping mechanism and but a good day also includes maybe having some thoughts but not spending time I'm focusing on them and listening to them. And

SPEAKER_01: 7:58

so what does

SPEAKER_00: 8:01

a bad day look

SPEAKER_01: 8:24

like? How long has it been since you've had a bad day? And you said a couple months. That's pretty awesome. Yeah. And when you have bad days, is it like, is it, you know, the whole day? Is it part of the day? Is it, you know, more than one day? Like, what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00: 8:45

So before it used to be all or nothing. So like if I had a tough morning or I had like a tough mid-morning or night, whatever time of day it was, it would be, I would choose to like wash the rest of the day. Whereas now, if my day starts off bad or I have a bad part of the day, Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01: 9:33

or you're able to really kind of get through it yourself?

SPEAKER_00: 9:37

Or a combination, I don't know. It's a combination. Sometimes I go to a support group still like two to three times a week, even when I'm doing good because I have a bad habit of not doing the things I need to do when things are going good or when I feel good. But obviously if like that only goes so far because you may not even, I may not even be addressing whatever you're struggling with that moment or that day. I'll just... get through it myself.

SPEAKER_01: 10:04

What are some signs that you're doing well that others might not see? Because I think a lot of times and probably most times people associate success with this as in gaining weight and there's obviously way more to it. So what are some signs that you're doing well that can't visually be seen?

SPEAKER_00: 10:26

This is going to sound kind of weird, but specifically for my stepmom and my dad, when I don't stay at their house for dinner, because I do go up to their house a lot after work and let the dogs play and chit chat, whatever. And my dad will always ask me, are you staying for dinner? And I'll say no. And just from living with this for over 10 years, I'm assuming that from their perspective, it's kind of like, well, is she going to eat on her own? Why is she staying for dinner? She used to. And it's because... Me staying for dinner, not all of the time, but especially more so during the week, I would stay for dinner because that was the easier way when I was struggling. I didn't have to worry about what I was going to make. It was just there. So now I try to like wean back on that because that's not really real life. So I try to like make my own dinners, eat at home by myself as much as I can, just because that's in reality is what's going to happen. What happens most of the time, my mood, just, I feel like I'm not as uptight anymore or bitchy or like snarky.

SPEAKER_01: 11:31

Yeah. I

SPEAKER_00: 11:36

just feel like I'm more easygoing, more, more myself and also my social life. That's a big sign because I will just do nothing and just hang at home. And I mean, there are times I do like doing that. I am a homebody, but I feel like this past summer I've been like just going a million miles a minute. And that's a big sign when like I'm doing nothing for like a long period of time.

SPEAKER_01: 12:02

Yeah. You definitely don't isolate as much as you used to.

SPEAKER_00: 12:05

No.

SPEAKER_01: 12:07

I know you talked about this already in one of your earlier episodes, but how did your eating disorder start? So for

SPEAKER_00: 12:15

the longest time, I thought it was like 2015, like my senior year of college. But as I was like, honestly, a lot of my podcast episodes forced me, like the topics forced me to like really think about things. So I actually remembered, I didn't necessarily, I don't think I had the eating disorder back in high school, but there was like thoughts and symptoms and feelings that are relatable. So I think it slowly started to manifest. But I was like when you're in high school, like life is busy. So I feel like it was just easy

SPEAKER_01: 12:55

to be

SPEAKER_00: 13:05

distracted from it. society but I think once I was in it it was easier to stay in it because society reinforces people who are in smaller bodies and what about now

SPEAKER_01: 13:24

you know I don't care because now like we have all these different kinds of social media outlets like I remember back in high school Instagram just came out

SPEAKER_00: 13:34

yeah

SPEAKER_01: 13:35

and now we have you know everything TikTok Instagram Snapchat Facebook like it's everywhere and so I can't I can't even imagine being a kid in high school now and you feel so much pressure as a high school teenager already and having all of these influences. I just, I feel for those kids.

SPEAKER_00: 13:57

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. just like perseverate on it and like oh well if i eat that like i won't gain weight or that's healthy or whatever whatever the freaking idiot was trying to tell you and that shit's not real and then i've never gotten into tiktok thank god but apparently there was like this thing that went around on tiktok like skinny talk i like people who like endorse or like kind of encourage eating disorders. And I can't speak to that because I never saw those videos, but even just hearing the mention of that, like that's scary.

UNKNOWN: 14:52

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01: 14:53

How do you think your eating disorder has affected your relationships?

SPEAKER_00: 14:59

I think, like, for my friends, most of my close friends, unless they, like, heard it through word of mouth, like, a lot of them didn't know about this or at least the full depth of it until recently. So the friendships, those friendships, thankfully, like, I don't really think they suffered aside from, like, the times I would isolate my family. I don't know. So I know that it put a lot of stress on him, a lot of worry, a lot of blame for how does this happen? I don't even know. So I think it put a lot on them, but then it also makes me feel guilty. Romantic relationships. I don't know. There's... When I was in treatment the first time, I was in a relationship and that was a great relationship. But with eating disorders, you often tend to put everyone else's needs first. So I was in that relationship for longer than I should have been because I didn't want to hurt the person. But as you know, that doesn't work out. But through recovery, you start to learn what's right for you and what's not. So, I mean, overall, all my relationships suffered in some way because for a better part of the last 10 years, it was like the only The eating disorder was the only thing I really cared about. And that's awful. Where do you see yourself in a year? Oh, my God. Is this a job interview?

SPEAKER_01: 16:36

On podcast number three?

SPEAKER_00: 16:37

No, number three. Good God. Where do I see myself in a year? just I not that I want to be in the same place but I want to be in the same place in terms of like where I'm at just happy like yeah spontaneous

SPEAKER_01: 16:53

and living a fulfilling life right now and feel happy and you're doing things that you want to do and you're surrounded by people that Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 17:05

Nothing drastically changed in this next year. I don't feel like I'd be missing out on anything. What would you

SPEAKER_01: 17:13

tell your younger self? I didn't tell you I was asking these questions.

SPEAKER_00: 17:19

I know. Honestly, if I could tell my younger self anything, I would just somehow convince her and make her believe that you can't control every outcome and life is great and life sucks for everyone at different times. And you might as well just not fucking worry about it. I think it's not that serious at the end of the day. Mm-hmm. there's bigger things than being anxious about silly stuff. Should probably tell that to myself now too. Yeah. Same.

SPEAKER_01: 17:50

Those are all the questions that I have. Great. Good. Okay. Thank you for taking the time to answer them. I know some of them are probably questions that you get a lot, but I appreciate you creating the space for it in your podcast. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00: 18:06

Yeah. Thanks for coming. See you at work tomorrow. comfort, or maybe even a sense of community. Remember, no matter what you're healing from, healing isn't perfect, and every step you take does matter. If you enjoyed this episode, consider sharing it with someone who might need it, leaving a review or subscribing on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode. And if you want to connect more, you can find me on Instagram at Bite by Bite Recovery. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Your stories are just to say hi. Until next time, let's keep taking life by bite. See you later.