I took a year off exercise and here's what happened

Do you or someone you love struggle with compulsive movement?

I've been there – excessive exercise was a massive player in my eating disorder’s game. 

I have always been athletic, growing up playing a multitude of different sports.

It was this athletic identity – and wanting to be the best at everything I did – that laid the foundation of my relationship with movement during my restrictive years.

When I was eleven, I went on my first diet and self-created exercise regimen.

My perfectionistic tendencies as well as my autistic desire for routine spiraled into a non-negotiable daily movement protocol.

It no longer mattered if I had the energy or not; exercising a certain amount at a certain time each day was simply my identity.

Recovering from my ED required me to disentangle my identity from restriction.

A critical component of this process was stopping all forms of movement.

This was terrifying and difficult for multiple reasons, including the heightened restlessness of fight-or-flight mode and my brain’s pushback at disobeying long standing habits.

Just like eating more and eating more of what scared me was necessary for me to make peace with all food, resting was necessary for me to make peace with movement.

For over a year, I did nothing but take short walks.

At first, I didn’t know how long I could sustain it – but then, I was hit by a wave of relief 🌊

I no longer had to push my body through exhaustion or engage with the nonstop mental turmoil of fitting in more minutes and reps.

I had finally given myself permission to heal.

At the same time, I feared that I would never have the motivation to workout again.

I feared that letting myself rest would turn me into a discipline-lacking couch potato 🥔 

In a way, I was taking a huge risk – but was it really a risk if I had nothing important to lose?

After many months of doing physically nothing (well not nothing, as my body was doing a TON of internal healing!), something unexpected happened: I wanted to move my body.

Rather than “giving in” to a ceaseless urge to exercise, an indescribable innate force nudged me that it was time to bring more physical flow into my routine.

Sometimes, we have to step away from something to appreciate it again.

After all, you can’t read the label when you’re inside the jar!

Temporarily giving up exercise is scary, yet it’s also the only option if you have any chance of making peace with movement.

If you want ALL the details on how I healed my relationship with compulsive exercise, be sure to grab your copy of my book Rainbow Girl!