What Psychedelic Research Is Saying About Eating Disorder Recovery
In this current post-Covid world where it seems like eating disorders are on the rise, it is time to reconsider how we go implementing eating disorder recovery treatment plans.
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Plant medicine and psychedelics have great ability in expanding our mind, aligning our hearts, and attuning our bodies so that we can find ways Nourish ourselves on all levels, and envision a world where eating disorders don’t exist.
The post-Covid world has triggered an upsurge in mental health issues. The troublesome blend of social isolation, society anxiety, increased fears of getting sick, more time on social media, and uncertainty about the future, has created a perfect storm in many people’s lives.
As a result, we are seeing a concerning increase in those struggling with depression, anxiety, anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge-eating disorder, and other eating disorders.
Many people around the world are affected by some kind of food or body issue. And there are probably more people than we think, since many eating disorders and disordered eating are hidden in shame or go unnoticed in a culture of diet culture that normalizes many toxic food and body behaviours.
We have yet to find a treatment for eating disorders that seem to work. This is worrying since anorexia has the highest mortality rates among psychiatric disorders, due to physical complications that come with being at a low weight and suicide risk.
I believe that the rise of psychedelics in the collective awareness is because it is truly time to find our way back to the body – and ultimately to the body from which we all came from, the Earth.
The times that we are collectively living in is calling for us to release old, stuck, survival energies from past traumas so that we can reclaim our vitality, remember our purpose, restore trust in our bodies, and reintegrate the fragmented parts of ourselves into embodied wholeness.
It seems that there are universal knowings that psychedelics share - and that on a deep level we also know - when it comes to understanding what eating disorders are and how to navigate recovery (aka nourishment).
The potency of psychedelics is that they go beyond the symptoms and go deep underneath, looking at both the symptoms and what led to them. A lot of traditional treatment will focus on changing the symptoms but without looking at why and how someone landed up where they are at.
Anorexia nervosa, for example, is defined clinically by low body weight and a fear of weight gain, but that is the tip of the iceberg of what is going on underneath. And going underneath the tip is where psychedelics can guide us towards.
Psychedelics also seem to support a shift from rigid and constrained thought patterns that come with eating disorders to more flexible ways of perceiving, thinking, and understanding.
The psychedelic experience is characterized by opening one’s ability to perceive the world around them and breaking the rigidity of thought patterns. Brain networks that never connected to each other in the past are able to communicate with each other leading to fresh insights and perspectives.
Areas of brain that govern one’s sense of self and ego that are usually highly active seem to quieten. For people with eating disorders, getting a break from the internal oppressive, critical voice is a relief.
And in that space, something new can arise.
This is the power of neuroplasticity. After a psychedelic journey, the brain is still plastic, meaning that in the days after of the journey behavioural, cognitive, and somatic changes are more accessible to make.
Incorporating psychedelics for recovery, when done with thorough and safe preparation (check out my psychedelic preparation handbook here), and with the right support, can change the way people see themselves and the world around them.
With a lot of hype around psychedelics and how it’s like “10 years of therapy in a night”, it’s important to remember that eating disorder recovery is a long process, and that integration takes time and is a non-linear process.
Commitment, courage, and self-compassion are needed for the journey ahead.
Recovery isn’t easy. In a society that hurls weight loss ads, #transformationaltuesdays, social media, calorie counts on menus, diet plans for kids, and the pressure to go-go-go at the expense of the body’s natural cycles, it makes the inner journey of one’s own heart, mind, and body even tougher. As such recovery is a revolution against the generations of oppressive diet culture. This journey is both individual and collective.
For a long time, eating disorders have been viewed as complex conditions to recover from and work with. And we still have lots to uncover when it comes to getting a grip on how psychedelics can support eating disorder recovery.
From my own explorations and from talking to other people, psychedelics can help us see the complexities of eating disorders in a new light that is clear, accessible, encouraging, and direct. And from my experience, they have led me to believe that recovery is right. here. right. now.
I feel optimistic that psychedelics have immense and immeasurable ability in helping us open minds, align our hearts, and attune our bodies so that we can envision and activate a life - and a world - where eating disorders don’t exist.