As someone battling an Eating Disorder, there is so much confusion in hearing these “voices”… they speak from a place within us that is filled with low self-esteem, that wants to believe we deserve not to be happy, and to believe that we are worthless. I’ve heard them described as “loud thoughts”, “my own head” and as “a voice/voices”. They speak those things that convince us we’re stupid, worthless, deserving to be unhappy, not to eat, to keep eating or that we have to get rid of what we ate. They tell us “the world would be better without you.” They come from that place within us plagued with negativity and self-hate, encouraging us to continue with our Eating Disorder, and convincing us that we do not deserve recovery, that we deserve a life of pain.

The voices of our Eating Disorders also convince us we have no will power, that we are weak when we’ve eaten, and that no one will ever love us. They harass us with guilt and even berate us for the Eating Disorder behavior itself. It is no wonder recovery is so difficult and such hard work. We are battling with ourselves over what we are convinced we deserve (and that our negative voices keep reminding us of) as opposed to what we truly do deserve (recovery, happiness and self-love!).