Alternatives to Acting Out Your Eating Disordered Behavior

• Listen to music or relaxation tapes
• Make a mourning wreath (start with black flowers and replace with colored flowers)
• Repetitive reality checking (It's April 1998, and I'm going to be okay)
• Negotiate with yourself
• Get to know others

 
• Recognize and acknowledge the choices you have NOW
• Offer options
• Carry tokens to remind you of peaceful comforting things or people
• Create and use mental safe places (beach, cabin in the woods, peaceful mountain)
• Get out on your own, get away from the stress

 
• Help someone around you (reach out on a bb, newsgroup, phone list etc.)
• Pay attention to the changes needed to make you feel safe
• Count yourself down (10 ... 9 ... 8 ... 7 ... )
• Take a different perspective (different vantage point)
• "I'm aware" Repeat 5 things you see, smell, touch, taste in your present surroundings to help ground you in the present

 
• Pay attention to your breathing (breath slowly, in through your nose and out through your mouth)
• Pay attention to the rhythmic motions of your body (walking, stretching, etc.)
• Move to music
• ASK FOR HELP
• Ask yourself inside, what YOU need

 
• Make affirmation tapes inside you that are good, kind, gentle (Sometimes you can do this by writing down the negative thoughts and then physically re-writing them into positive messages
• Journal
• Touch Something familiar or safe
• Draw
• Put your feet firmly on the floor

 
• Make something (craft, needlework, etc.)
• Meditate
• Make a phone list of people you can call for support. Allow yourself to use it
• Learn HALT signals (hungry, angry, lonely, tired)
• Identify what is causing you pain (other than food)

 
• Accept where you are in the process. Beating yourself up, only makes it worse.
• Do something FUN!!!
• Take a break from mental processing
• Take a SAFE risk
• Tear up paper (old phonebooks, newspapers, etc.)

 
• Honor your present anger
• Throw ice cubes at the bathtub wall, at a tree, etc.
• Give yourself permission to ... (Keep it safe)
• Lose the "should-could-have to" words. Try ... "What if"
• Choose your way of thinking, try to resist following old thinking patterns

 
• Notice black and white thinking
• Connect with others around you. Call a therapist or friend.
• Notice "choices" versus "dilemmas"
• Keep in touch with others who are fighting the same fight
• Check in with yourself and others frequently (try not to isolate)

 
• Make yourself as comfortable as possible (without using food)
• Take a bath or a shower
• Color in coloring books
• Hold a stuffed animal
• Write a poem

 
• Leave the room
• Leave the premises
• Write a letter, NOT mailed, to the person or problem upsetting you
• Play a musical instrument
• Plan regular activities for your most difficult time of day

 
• Call a friend or support group
• Listen to a comedy tape or video
• Reality check old messages (Those you supply and those you hear others tell you)
• Clean the house
• Plant flowers or pull weeds in a garden

To My Home Page Write me at: soskim@aol.com