Feeling Unlovable in an Eating Disorder

One post I wrote posited that love is the antidote to an eating disorder. I’m rethinking this concept. Perhaps, a better way to understand this part of eating disorder recovery for many people is that feeling unlovable is at the core of many people’s eating disorders.

It’s not uncommon for children to interpret challenging formative experiences as signs that they are unlovable. For some, it is a stage they flounder in until they find value in themselves as they get older. This self-worth can translate into feeling worthy of love.

For others, the core of unlovability grows into something with deeper roots in one’s psyche. Adolescence, especially for girls, is very frequently tied up with looks and self-image in our current culture. When the lack of self worth is matched with a powerful urge to perfect one’s looks, two things happen.

First, the risk of an eating disorder goes up significantly. Equating personal value with body image sets up a constant desire to lose weight or perfect looks in order to escape the feeling of not being lovable. However, this battle can never be won.

Second, the growing power of food and weight and the impossibility of fixing the problem justifies the fact of being unlovable. Since this person can never achieve her goals, she will always be unlovable. This is no longer an internal feeling. It begins to feel like a fact.

And so treatment for an eating disorder often involves countering this belief that, at the core, the person is unlovable. Separating self-worth from body image is a part of recovery that is very much achievable, if long and hard.

But convincing someone that they truly are lovable underneath is even harder. It demands an intensity in the therapy to question how someone sees themselves. And it puts pressure on the therapy to essentially prove that the eating disorder has always been wrong.

This work in therapy is very much possible. It demands a consistent treatment structure, significant trust and a complete understanding of the issue at hand. With these three pieces, therapy can undo the underlying and usually long lasting belief of feeling unlovable and free the person from this self-doubt that has often dominated their sense of self.