How I Overcame My Eating Disorder
as a Track Athlete

By ZP

“Why do I run track?” Personally, I would answer this question by saying, “I just love getting to spend time with my teammates, venturing around different places, and challenging myself. It not only relieves my stress but it augments my appreciation for life”. As a 21 year-old senior about to start my last semester as a track athlete, I’ve finally re-established a healthy relationship with running. It’s almost hard to believe that it was a full 7 years ago that I was diagnosed with obsessive exercise disorder and anorexia. Although I used to find myself trying to suppress or ignore this part of my past, I have come to realize that this experience has not only made me stronger but it has given me the perfect opportunity to help other athletes win their battles with eating disorders. I hope that my story will help you develop a sustained healthy relationship with food, your sport, and yourself.

My relationship with my sport started off innocently. Since grade school, I knew I had a passion for running. My interest in the sport of track stemmed from my desire to impress others with my athletic abilities. At that point in my life, I not only enjoyed running fast and feeling accomplished,
but I loved getting to do it with friends. Later on in my athletic career, I became fascinated with overall fitness. I progressed from body weight training to lifting weights, dedicating my time to increasing strength and endurance. Each year after, my commitment to improving my physical
performance heightened.

My transition from sprinting to distance running initiated my concern with body image. In the 8th grade, I started cross country with the intention of keeping conditioned for the 800 in track. However, the immense amount of pressure that I put on myself to improve, sucked the fun out of the experience. My desire to achieve overall fitness while still enjoying competing with friends transitioned into an obsession with achieving the “perfect” body.

To make matters worse, I started to consciously limit my caloric intake. I have always been a healthy eater, but constantly seeing thin girls at practice, and women with unrealistic body shapes on social media instilled in me this idea that I needed to eat better. I found myself doing internet searches on every food that I touched before I even thought about putting it into my mouth. After a few weeks of reading unreliable sources, I constructed a set of rules that I abided by religiously. I paid no attention to hunger cues and oftentimes stopped eating well before I was satisfied or full.

In combination with my restrictive eating habits, I started to exercise compulsively in addition to track practice. While I told myself I was working out to prepare for high school track and cross country, I was really doing it to lose “fat” and perfect my body image. Oftentimes, I would be ravenous at dinner time, leading me to consuming more than I normally would. Of course, I would feel so much guilt that I would go up to my room and workout again. I weighed myself almost every day and felt a sense of relief when the number on the scale dropped, meaning that I “earned” more calories that day.

My restrictive and compulsive behaviors got in the way of my relationships with family and friends. Not only was I losing weight and putting my own health at risk, but I was concerning my parents and isolating myself from my friends. I refused when my parents offered to take me to restaurants. The uncertainty of how food was prepared put me in a state of panic. I didn’t see any of my friends for the entire summer because I was too wrapped up in my exercise regimen to make time for them.

Right before the start of High School cross country, I was referred to a registered dietitian and a therapist, and advised to limit physical activity. I remember being unable to hold back tears just after hearing the phrase “limit physical activity”. My whole life was consumed by my fear of gaining weight and losing fitness. Although I was put on a 3 day per week running plan, I used every practice as the opportunity to run as hard as possible to burn as many calories as I could. If my teammates were running “too slow” I would run ahead of them and essentially be running alone. I did not treat running like a sport. I treated it like a compulsion to feed my irrational desire to be ‘perfect’.

Over The Hills: Where I Am Now

Today, I am still a competitive track and field athlete. However, I am no longer fighting to win the competition for “the perfect body”. My current relationship with running more closely resembles that of my grade school years, when I ran to challenge myself in the presence of friends. Track and field is not my whole life, but rather an exciting portion of it. Unlike my 15 year old self, my 21 year old self can say that running track is fun! It’s not a mandatory obligation that will result in dire consequences if I don’t devote my entire life to it. It’s an opportunity to escape life’s little stresses for a while, breath in cool air, and think about the exciting parts of life that are yet to come.

How did I get to this point in my journey as an athlete and as a person? The road was long, winding, and definitely had its ups and downs. I also wouldn’t say I’ve reached the finish line. I’m still learning and becoming stronger with my experiences. Although everyone’s recovery journey is different, here are a few mantras that helped me recover and re-establish my love for track and field.

Getting Over the Hill: The Long Road

“When I eat, I will gain strength.”

In an attempt to get over my restrictive eating tendencies, I told myself these words to replace the thought, “when I eat, I will gain weight”. Every time I noticed myself feeling guilty about the food that I ate, I made a conscious effort to shift my way of thinking. I told myself that the calories I took in would be used to help me build muscle or store energy to fuel my athletic performance. I realized that I had to take in even more calories to both replenish damaged muscles after workouts and prepare them for the next training session. On top of that, I learned that I needed to consume more than other girls just to support my general growth and development. I knew not having a menstrual cycle was problematic. For this reason, I opened myself up to the idea of consuming more dietary fats. Rather than irrationally assuming that eating fats would make me fat, I thought about how they would add fat soluble vitamins and essential fatty acids to my diet, making me healthier. I gradually increased the variety of my food choices rather than sticking to the exact same meals everyday, letting go of the idea that I had to ensure I ate the same amount of calories every day and instead realizing that more variety meant more nutrients. Now, I think of eating food as a pleasurable means of obtaining energy and/or nutrients to enjoy life in general. Importantly, I learned to focus on the benefits of all foods.

“Listen to your body”

At the same time that I was getting over my restrictive eating habits, I learned to stop over-exercising. I was constantly being told by my parents. “Your body needs rest. You don’t need to exercise this much”. While the compulsive thoughts in my head overpowered that advice at first, I realized how detrimental my behavior was to my health and athletic performance. I felt so sore, exhausted and weak during track practices and meets due to the unnecessary extra workouts. I was overtraining. Rather than getting faster and stronger from training, the excess bouts of vigorous exercise was causing my performance to plummet. I know now that overtraining, especially in combination with under-eating, can lead to increased risk of injuries such as tendinitis and stress fractures, a suppressed immune system, and health consequences such as iron deficiency anemia.

Eventually, I considered rest days to be beneficial rather than detrimental. I told myself that decreasing my workout frequency and taking time off from exercising would allow my muscles to recover and get stronger. Having to take long periods of time off from running due to injuries has helped me realize that rest does not equal weight gain. Instead, it gives the body a chance to recuperate and allows me to focus on things other than athletics. Now, if I feel overly sore, sick, or even just need a mental health day, I talk to my coach and he usually lets me take an easy day or off day.

“Exercise should revolve around life. Life should not revolve around exercise.”

I actually stumbled across this quote on social media and it has been one of the most helpful messages. These words helped me realize that I shouldn’t be scheduling my life to fit my training schedule, but I should be altering my training schedule in order to get the most out of life. Slowly, I began to silence the voice inside my head that said “you can’t go to the movies, you have to exercise”, or “you can’t go to the sleepover, you have to run in the morning.” I started saying “yes” when opportunities presented themselves to me. I don’t have to think twice before jumping at the chance to go out and have fun with my family, friends, and teammates.

“Learn to adapt”.

Similar to the previous quote, these words have helped me let go of some of my obsessive compulsive tendencies in regards to exercising and eating. My parents would reiterate these words to me when I would complain about there not being a gym at the hotel we were staying at, or no healthy food at the restaurants we visited. While this phrase was infuriating at first, eventually, I enjoyed myself more at social gatherings and vacations. Now, I can go on vacation, travel to meets, parties, dances, and make due with whatever food is available, even if it’s pizza, chips, and cake.

“Find a balance”.

My former therapist, high school track coach, guidance counselor, and parents emphasized this to me. They all wanted me to find a balance between athletics, academics, and a social life. The advice seemed trivial at the time, but I grew to realize its significance and still find myself abiding by these words today. As a matter of fact, this is one of the most important pieces of advice that I have taken. I slowly started weaning away from isolating myself from the world by spending less time in my room, less time working out alone, and more time with family and friends. This subsequently opened my eyes to new opportunities such as getting a job with my friend, going to social gatherings with my teammates after meets, and eventually, going off to college. I developed new friendships and passions. While I still put in a good effort at track practices, my life improved significantly. It helped me put less stress on getting the perfect grades and achieving the perfect fitness. My love for my family and friends outweighs my desire to be perfect.

More so than developing a better relationship with running, I developed a better relationship with myself. I realized that my sport does not define me. There is so much more to life than exercise and having the “perfect” body. I put less pressure on myself to reach perfection in every aspect of life. I developed new passions like cooking, yoga, traveling, drawing, and enjoying nature. I am finishing up my last semester as a Health and Exercise Science Major and taking steps to further my studies and reach my goal of becoming a Registered Dietitian.