The recovery path out of anorexia often runs through hazards, most of which exist in my own head. True enough, greater society, as I like to point out, broadcasts anorexic ideals almost every second of every day. Social prattle frustrates me enough on its own – I not only have to silence the life-threatening tickertape in my mind, but I have to navigate through a world that reinforces and replenishes that tickertape almost all the time.

NOW would be a good moment to decide to give greater society a fond “up yours,” even if that society includes all of my loved ones. I do not advocate actually abandoning family, friends, and all others around me, but when chatter and activity around me turns to food and weight and exercise, I need to check out mentally.

But wait! Once I check out mentally from greater society’s iffy beliefs, and after I begin to silence the tickertape of my mind (which is like trying to stop the Amazon conveyor belt), what remains inside? What thoughts do I have? If I do not distract myself with 1) calorie-counting and dreaming of what eating 10,000 calories would look like for me, but never actually eating such; or 2) devising a plan to distract myself from the 10,000-calorie thoughts; or 3) wondering whether I should vacuum that thing on the floor which is nothing but a speck but still, it bothers me [and takes up mind space], etc., etc., etc. If I shut down this factory, truly: what is left?

A big blank.

So many of us in anorexia recovery have this problem. My particular brain has become so pickled with anorexic ideals and thoughts over all the years that I do not know what else to think about most of the time. And this emptiness leads to an overall identity crisis as I go through recovery. Panic sets in after some weight gain, when I start to realize my old self has commenced its exit, and the self I now have appears quite unfocused, amorphous, and scary, like a malicious phantom.

I note that I just called the new self a “malicious phantom.” This negative attribution comes from the pickled thought-pattern that has not entirely stopped coursing through my mind. Since this new business (i.e., eating unrestrictedly and gaining to an unsuppressed body weight) threatens the old one (i.e., the anorexic lifestyle), the old business retaliates with every nugget of pseudo-wisdom in its stash. The old business has A LOT of tricks up its sleeve, having played the game so long. For example, the old business can block recovery by sending out automatic, negative judgments. Especially negative judgments about the new business. Therefore, describing the not-quite-yet-focused new business as a “malicious phantom” stems completely from anorexia.

All right: spotting the old business’ funny business helps me shut down the negativity I feel about my changing self. But what about all these unknowns, these blanks?

They remain blank.

I do have an identity – we all have identities. And I propose that most people’s identities evolve through life, whether or not an eating-disorder is in the mix. But since the old business really wants to know what lies ahead and manipulate my actions in order to temper future events, the big blanks look like big problems, too terrifying to experience.

Why do the big blanks have to be bad? Once again (repetition helps), the old business holds all the stock in negativity. So what if I feel, temporarily, unfocused and unsure? Why do “unfocused” and “unsure” have to be wrong? They are very much not wrong. They simply describe the way I feel in this part of recovery. I invested many years in the old business, and now I am investing in something else – something that, overall, looks a lot more sustainable and enjoyable than the old business. The “crisis” of identity does not amount to a crisis, after all.

The “Who am I?” question is valid but not a precursor to something dire. I simply have to live blankly for a time, until the new business acquires definition, acuity, and stock of its own. Something that can raise the stock of the new business is a load of food, and a lot of tuning out every kind of negativity: from myself and from the world around me.