Do not help trauma starve you.

Trauma wants to starve you. 

It wants to starve you of resources. 

It wants to starve you of self-esteem. 

It wants to starve you of any memory that isn’t awful. 

It wants to starve you of physical energy. 

It wants to starve you of meaningful contact with other humans. 

And, yes: it wants to starve you of the physical fuel you need to live. Literally, food. 

Remember: the trick trauma plays is that it gets us to do the thing to ourselves. 

It gets us to talk to ourselves like our bullies and abusers talked to us. 

It gets us to behave toward ourselves like our bullies and abusers behaved toward us. 

And, yes: it gets us to starve ourselves. Literally. Physically. 

We are not going to recover from trauma while starving ourselves. 

We are not going to feel or function better if we’re running on empty. 

Trauma recovery is about repairing and rebuilding our relationship with ourselves. We are not going to do that while simultaneously starving ourselves. 

Trauma recovery is about dealing with our tiggers and trauma responses wisely and skillfully. We are not going to engage our wisdom or use our (damn) skills if we’re literally too hungry to think. 

Trauma recovery is built on self-awareness and self-acceptance. We are not going to increase our self-awareness while remaining unaware of our body’s and brain’s need for fuel. 

It’s not a coincidence that trauma and eating disorders co-occur so frequently. They operate in very similar ways, and they feed off each other. Er, so to speak. 

Both trauma and eating disorders try to tell us we need to take up less space. 

Both trauma and eating disorder try to convince us that what we do not deserve nourishment we naturally, normally require to survive or thrive. 

Both trauma and eating disorders try to convince us that we can solve internal emotional problems with external means. 

Both trauma and eating disorders lie to us. They lie to us all the time— but their lies about food, eating, and self-nourishment are particularly pernicious and destructive. 

Yeah. It’s uncomfortable to nourish, nurture, literally feed ourselves, in trauma recovery. 

It’s going to stir up all kinds of feelings that we have very often worked hard to bury. 

Many trauma survivors feel guilty when they try to eat in a way that meets their nutritional needs. 

Many trauma survivors feel shame that they even HAVE nutritional needs. 

If you’re reading this, you probably know, better than most, that realistic trauma recovery requires us to embrace a certain amount of discomfort— and eating is absolutely one of those things. 

You can recover from trauma. Yes, you. But you need to be thinking straight to do it. You need to be physiologically functioning well enough to do it. 

And that means eating. 

Eating enough. Eating regularly enough. Eating what you need to eat to meet your nutritional needs. To literally operate your body and brain. 

I know. Easier said than done. Just know that you are not the first, last, or only trauma survivor to struggle with the eating thing. 

But also know that realistically addressing the eating thing is worth it. 

You are worth it. 

You are literally worth feeding. 

Do not help trauma starve you.