Men Get Eating Disorders Too – Jason Wood’s Recovery Story From Orthorexia

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Men Get Eating Disorders, Too

Unknown Speaker  0:00 

Jenny.

Unknown Speaker  0:10 

Hello and welcome back to the JenUp podcast that if you’re struggling with an eating disorder and feeling lost, you’ve come to the right place. So both myself and Becky stone are former sufferers of eating disorders, and we understand the challenges you’re facing. So join us for inspiring, educational and relatable content, whether you’re seeking support, guidance or just someone who understands, we are here for you. So today we have Jason wood on the podcast. So Jason wood turned his battle with orthorexia into a mission to break the stigma around men’s mental health by publishing his first memoir, starving for survival. He is proud to serve on the board for running in silence Michigan eating disorder, Alliance and soul pause Recovery Project. Jason is also the director of community engagement at the a n, a D, and facilitates the organization’s new men’s peer support group through speaking engagements, his writing and his work, Jason strives to start an important conversation that encourages everyone, especially men, to speak up, share their stories and get the help that they deserve. So thank you so much, Jason for being here today, and I think it’d be really good to kind of kick start this podcast off with explaining a little bit about what orthorexia is and your own journey with it. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It is one of those things where I was several months into my recovery journey before I’d even heard the term orthorexia, and that was a real turning point for me in my recovery, because I was finally able to put a name to what I had been experiencing for so long. And essentially, if you get down to the root of it, orthorexia is an obsession, or a fixation with healthy eating. So in my case, I was taking all of the different rules that exist from the various fad diets out there, or what we kind of just hear diet talk in general, and I molded them into what I thought was going to be this perfect diet that was going to give me total health, longevity is going to make me happy and popular, and all of those things that diet culture and diet talk like to sell us on. And for me, I was more a worry about the quality of the foods that I was eating rather than the quantity of the foods that I was eating now, as my list of quote, unquote, good foods continued to shrink and my list of bad foods grew, the what I was eating was also, you know, the quality or the quantity that I was eating was also diminishing, but that was a result of just being so hyper focused and hyper sensitive To the ingredients that were in my foods, or the macronutrient breakdown of the foods. So for me, there was just really This fixation around the quality of the foods that I was eating.

Unknown Speaker  3:13 

Okay, okay, great. Well, thank you very much for that and sharing that and everything, and also, orthopteraxia is not yet, I know it’s not yet a recognizable eating disorder yet on the DSM five, is that correct? That’s correct. And one of the reasons why I think that is is because it’s such a broad diagnostic criteria. And in order to be in the DSM five, it’s got to have that defined diagnostic criteria. But unfortunately, I think a lot of us fall victim to at least orthorexic like behaviours when it comes to really any type of dieting or relationship that we end up developing with with diet and exercise. And there’s this wide spectrum. There’s individuals where, yes, it might interfere with their day to the day lives here or there. But then there’s individuals like me, where it gets really severe, and it almost cost me my life. So I think it’s defining that spectrum, and what’s kind of that tipping point between, okay, this is a healthy, well balanced diet. This person just wants to take care of themselves, to oh, this has gone too far, and it’s starting to have impacts on all the other aspects of their life.

Unknown Speaker  4:23 

Okay, okay, thank you for that. And what, what do you think are the main sort of, what cause does anything cause orthorexia? What are some risk factors? I think that would be interesting too about that. Yeah. So I think orthorexia is similar to other eating disorders that are out there where it’s very complex. So there’s a magnitude of different causes that can contribute to the development of orthorexia. In my case, I like to refer to it as like a perfect storm where I was dealing with insecurities from bullies and being picked on in school. I was dealing with trauma and grief of.

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Using my parents at a young age, I was dealing with the

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financial and personal insecurities and problems that I was experiencing kind of in my personal life. Fell into drugs and alcohol. I had a health scare, a personal health scare, so I wanted to take care of myself. I didn’t want to die young like my parents had, and it was all of these different factors that kind of came together and created this perfect storm in which the eating disorder developed. So I think for everyone, it can be different what the cause of orthorexia is, but I think the scary thing about it is, is that it’s so normalised in our society these days, with the way that we talk about our bodies, or the way that we talk about food, that often times the signs are there, but people don’t recognise it,

Unknown Speaker  5:49 

yeah, because it’s become so normalised, isn’t it? But it also sounds like it’s the one thing that you can control,

Unknown Speaker  5:56 

right, right? It’s that my life was a mess. I was all over the place, and I was looking for any sense of control that I could find, and food seemed to be the easiest thing to control. I felt like I had no worth. I felt like I wasn’t good at anything, but I felt like I was pretty good at dieting and exercise. So I clung to that as like a badge of honour, and I wore it proudly, and unfortunately, the people around me applauded me for these disordered behaviours because they didn’t recognise they were disordered behaviours.

Unknown Speaker  6:29 

Wow, okay, that’s interesting. So how, what’s the diff? So what’s the line? How do you what’s you know, how can you distinguish between genuine, sort of being healthy or a harmful obsession, which is orthorexia, like, what’s you know, how can you find that balance? Yeah, so I think for me,

Unknown Speaker  6:50 

it’s when it started to impact my social life, when it started to really take a toll on my mental health. I would one time I share this story a lot, I go to a friend’s birthday party, and I lifted open the tray for the vegetables, and there was cheese on the vegetables, and immediately I panicked, and I was like, I can’t. That’s one of the foods I can’t have. I can’t I can’t be here anymore. And I left that birthday party, and moving forward, I started to decline invites from other people to go out for dinner. Whenever we would go on vacation, I would have to research time all the restaurants that we were going to, all the menus that I could possibly choose from to find the healthiest options that were there. So it was starting to take over my life. It was one of those things where I was isolating and I was just fixated on it every single day. Almost 24/7 I was thinking about that next bite that was coming up, or I was regretting the bite that I had just had, and that’s when it had gone too far. Maybe what had started off with good intentions by that point had taken over my entire life. Really exhausting, isn’t it? And it also sounds like it’s a very I can really, really relate to when I had anorexia, mine was my world got smaller and smaller and smaller, and everything was so controlled. So it’s very similar, but just in a very different way. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And I think that’s why I hit rock bottom during the pandemic and during the lockdowns, because all of our world kind of became a little bit smaller at that point. And that was maybe that, that push that I needed just to really crash into rock bottom, which is what happened to me in July of 2020, and by that point, yeah, I was at my lowest, mentally, physically, emotionally, socially, and I had just completely withdrawn from the world. I tell people a lot of times that orthorexia was like a hijacker, like it just came in and it took over my life and gave me that false sense of control that we just talked about. But in reality, it was in control the entire time.

Unknown Speaker  8:56 

Yeah, covid, you know, so many people had this at time. There was so much focus around fitness, healthy eating. Everyone was on their phone, tick tock. You know, skyrocketed. So there’s no surprise that people were, like, really struggling with that. And it was a it was difficult time. And I can certainly say, and thanks for sharing that, Jason, kind of being open eyes. I know it’s hard, like talking about these things, and I can only say that I went through a period of being upset because both Becky and I had anorexia. But I did go through a period, especially when I was when I was an athlete in my running, went through that obsession with gotta eat clean, kind of, you know, all the time, and there was very strict rules around that, and looking up things on menus. There was a period where I went through that. And I think mine was a lot to do with, like perfectionism with it, and I look back at it now, everything had to be perfect, and that control, sort of side of it, and there was that element of that, and kind of working through that, and learning to let let go of that as well. So and it is doable. Like anyone listening to this who’s struggling with this, you can do it.

Unknown Speaker  10:00 

And it’s, it just takes a bit of time and and actually, that flows perfectly into what I’m going to ask, how did you work through this and how did you come out the other side?

Unknown Speaker  10:13 

Yeah, so it’s hard to believe this summer, it’s been five years since I started this recovery journey. And yeah, if you would have asked me, then if I could get to the point where I’m at today, I would have said, No way I because at first I had to understand that what I was doing wasn’t healthy, and I think that that’s one of the hardest barriers to break through when somebody’s dealing with orthorexia, because you’re convinced that what you’re doing is the healthy it’s the right thing. You’re being perfect. And when you’ve got outside forces suddenly telling you, hey, what you’re doing is not healthy. It’s it’s killing you that that’s a lot to comprehend. So for me, it started with working with a therapist and working through a lot of the factors that were contributing to the eating disorder. I actually worked with a therapist who had never heard of the term orthorexia until I did, and then I went to the appointment, and I told him about it, but we worked through all of those underlying factors, that need for perfection, that need for control, the suppressed grief, the suppressed pain that I was feeling, the insecurities I was dealing with, and through addressing those issues, suddenly I started to let Go of that grip that I’d had on diet and exercise for so long. And then I brought in a dietitian to the team, and I began to work with her on

Unknown Speaker  11:30 

healing that relationship with food and recognizing that all foods can fit. We did a lot of work around intuitive eating and trying to get away from that black or white thinking that I had for so long around food, where it was either good or it was bad, and then my morality depended on what I ate. So she kind of she developed this really cool system of, like a green light, red light, yellow light, so that I could look at foods, kind of through a traffic light lens and slowly introduce some of those foods that were maybe extremely triggering to me slowly, so we worked on it, you know, one kind of one bite, one meal at a time. It didn’t happen overnight. It’s definitely taken years of work. And I’d be lying to say that there’s still not those days where that orthorexia voice still pops into my head from time to time. But now I’ve got the resources and the team around me where I can can fight back.

Unknown Speaker  12:26 

I think the traffic light system is a really good idea because it breaks away the fear, and it sort of, you can focus on the amber instead of looking straight for like that that. I call it the red ones, the hot ones, the ones that you don’t want to go near. So I think because I use the traffic light system with my clients as well, and I think it is, it just breaks it down. It’s more manageable, yeah, yeah. And it’s nice because it’s like, I’m eating the greens, like, let me keep eating the greens. And it was nice because it was kind of like adding it on, layer by layer, and still giving me that kind of safety security net so that I didn’t feel like I was just being thrown out into this new world and being exposed and completely vulnerable. Thank you. That’s really inspiring for, like, anyone who’s listening to this and you struggling with this, to, like, listen to this and to know that you know that recovery is possible, and to you know and keep fighting and everything. So yeah, thank you so much for sharing that with us. Jason and and, yeah, I know it’s, it’s great to be talking about this, because I do. I have seen orthorexia like rising, especially with things like TikTok and get on social media and this whole healthy eating fight TikTok on people, you know, promoting protein powders, supplements, all these, you know, saying much on social media, especially on TikTok. And then, what do you think that? So in terms of that, I you know, there’s a lot of young people watching that kind of content who is influenced by that. And my concern is that, you know, and I’m sure you agree, that is going to lead to more things around obsession with clean eating, especially around this whole organic mood,

Unknown Speaker  14:06 

organic move, sorry, and everyone you know what, what’s your opinion on that? Yeah, social media is definitely dangerous because it’s causing this messaging to spread like wildfire. We can’t get away from it. Students can’t get away from it. Every day, they’re subjected to the influencers they follow, or even just their friends who are posting these highlight reels of their lives, and then they go and post their meal prep or their meal plan, or they take all the pictures at the gym, and you just think that they’ve got it all like their life is just perfect and they’re happy, but we’re not seeing what’s happening behind the scenes. We so often forget on social media that this is just curated highlights that people are sharing with us. So I worry about these students and these young adults who are being subjected to this messaging all the time.

Unknown Speaker  15:00 

Time. And unfortunately, I think with social media, that the narrative right now is around physical health, and a lot of the influences that are on there think that health is solely based on food and diet, and then they start to take away from the Mental Health conversation or the spiritual health or all the other types of health that exist. So I think on social media, we’ve got to do a better job of community communicating holistic health and in that approach and that everybody’s nutritional needs and everybody’s body, it’s going to be different. It’s an individualised thing. So just because your favourite influence or somebody you’re following is eating XYZ or working out at this time or that much every day. It doesn’t mean it’s going to work for you too. And I worry that that message is not getting across right now on social media. No, I agree with you. Something I do with clients is I always say you need to nourish your belly, but you also need to nourish your soul. Mm, hmm. And if your soul’s not nourished and your belly is not you’re not in line, so you’re not really going to be truly happy, absolutely, absolutely, and unfortunately, a lot of times nourishing your soul is an Instagrammable, worthy or TikTok worthy. So those are the types of things that aren’t going to get the likes or the comments or the follows or the reshares. We’ve got to change that. We definitely have to change that.

Unknown Speaker  16:28 

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I, you know, I have a couple of schools, but I’m aware of and just things that I’ve heard from teachers, especially boys schools, thing that orthorexia is on the rise in boys, and that is mainly, probably due to, and you can add to that, Jason, mainly social media, or the culture, or if everyone else is doing it, maybe I should all the things are feeling left out like, you know, as as a parent who you know, who may be listening to this. Do you have any advice for parents who’s got a son who is struggling with this, or is in a school environment where they’re surrounded by this what you know, what would what would you say or do in in that situation? Yeah, the first thing I would say to parents is, don’t dismiss that your son could have an eating disorder, because I think that stereotype is still so rampant out there that they might be worried about their daughters, but they’re not worried about their sons developing an eating disorder. But the truth is, men and boys do develop eating disorders. So I think first, we’ve got to break through that stereotype, and second of all, we have to constantly check in with our children and with our sons to make sure we’re having those Holistic Health conversations and that we’re not just zoning in on diet and exercise all the time. You know, ask, what are you doing to feed your spirit right now? What are you doing to take care of your mental health right now? Like, encourage those types of conversations. Another thing is, we’ve got to be really mindful about the way that we talk about our own food and bodies. I know, all the time, just going out with friends and hearing a simple comment like, Oh, I’m going to be good tonight and get the salad, or I’m going to be bad tonight and get dessert. All of those things reinforce those orthorexic behaviours in our head, and while they might seem harmless to the person who’s saying them, if somebody is struggling with orthorexia, you could just be justifying their behaviours. So be really mindful about the way that you talk about your own relationship with food and body around your children. And then I would say probably one other thing to keep in mind is to just constantly check in, check in with your sons about how they’re doing around other guys, because there is a really difficult time right now for men to develop intimate or close friendships with other men, and I think that oftentimes, then we fall into the traps of, you know, talking about toxic masculinity or things along those lines. So check in with your guy, check in with your sons or your nephews or whoever, and see how they’re doing when it comes to their group of friends. Are they surrounded by guys that are building them up and make them feel better about themselves? Or are they surrounded by guys who are picking on them all the time and putting them down and and making them feel insecure about themselves? Because there’s definitely a problem there, I think, with teens and young adults when it comes to establishing friendships right now, yeah, making sure that their values and morals align with the people that they’re spending time with. I think that is really, really important. It’s like, I’ve got two young young men who live with me, and we all have a bit of a laugh. They’re my my son and my son in law, but we have a laugh about bromance. Like, I think it’s really important to have a bromance. It is. It really is. You know, I met another guy in eating disorder recovery around the same time that I was starting to share my story, and the two of us started meeting every single week, and we would just, sometimes we wouldn’t even talk about our eating disorder recovery journeys. We talk about sport.

Unknown Speaker  20:00 

Sports, or we talk about things we were interested in, and it’s great because we formed like a bromance, and now still to this day, years later, we meet every single week and we just talk. And it’s so nice to have a friend like that, because so often, I think we just think of our friends as like a drinking buddy or a sports buddy that I’m going to go to the game with, and then that’s it. But guys can have tough conversations with other guys too, and it can be a really healing thing when you open up. Yeah, I do think it’s really important to have a good support network. And it thinks when you’re recovering from eating disorders or eating disorders like disordered eating, you’ve got to have a good support network around you. And it’s about that balance as well, having people that haven’t got eating disorders around you as well, because you don’t always want to be talking about eating disorder. Yeah, yeah. That’s a really good point, and that’s another great thing to share with parents too. Is like, if you’re supporting a child who’s who’s struggling with an eating disorder right now, don’t constantly talk about the eating disorder, or talk about food talk about other things. That was really important for me when I was in my treatment was that my family and those around me, or even my providers themselves, would ask me questions outside of the eating disorder, because it helped me remember that I’m a person and that I’ve got interest and hobbies and a life beyond this eating disorder, and sometimes we need the people around us to remind us of that.

Unknown Speaker  21:26 

That’s so true. Otherwise, if it’s constantly talked about, just going to keep reminding you of it, and you don’t want to being reminded of it. Yeah, right. Trust me, I have no problem remembering what I remembering the eating disorder, so you don’t have to bring it up all the time, yeah, and it becomes really boring as well talking about the eating disorder all the time. It’s just like, it’s draining. Like, I mean, I know that me and Jen work alongside to get people recovered and but it is really draining because the eating disorder ends up feeding off you. So you want to be able to have that balance

Unknown Speaker  22:02 

Absolutely, absolutely. And that’s one of the things that I tell anybody who’s providing any support to someone with an eating disorder, is bring in those other interests and get to know them as a person, because that was crucial for me and my support team.

Unknown Speaker  22:19 

Yeah. And also it’s interesting that you said about toxic masculinity. I’ve had a couple of schools mentioned that to me, so it’s interesting. So

Unknown Speaker  22:30 

it’s one of those things where there’s just a lot of competition amongst guys, especially and especially young, young guys, where they want to be the alpha in the room, and oftentimes being the alpha in the room means putting down every other guy that’s in the room, and it can be really harmful. One of the things that I share when I talk to students is that masculinity, in and of itself, is not toxic, but we make it toxic when we start to say, Well, men only do this, or men only do that, and real men do this, and real guys do that and that, if we do anything outside of those stereotypes, then you’re acting like a girl, or I’m going to take away your man card. And there’s all of those different things out there where guys feel like they have to fit into a certain box in order to be a real man. And the truth is, it’s a spectrum, just just like I was talking about with orthorexia, is there are guys out there who maybe are less in touch with their emotions, and they’re just more of the stoic type to begin with. And then there’s those of us who are more in touch with our emotions and maybe a little bit more openly sensitive or talk about things, and that doesn’t make us any more or less of a man?

Unknown Speaker  23:42 

No, of course not. No, that’s really well said. I think that with that, that’s addressing it as a whole school approach, with that, that’s what it feels like. It’s education needs to go in there, I guess around there, and kind of how you explained it there, is amazing. And that’s what you know, I think that we should all be working towards, really, because clearly, I’ve heard it been mentioned a couple of times now, so that says to me, it’s something that needs

Unknown Speaker  24:07 

addressing. So yeah, thank you for that. I mean in in terms of, you know, nutrition and kind of speaking to both boys and girls about this, you know, how, how can we talked about, I know, how can we talk to students around fitness and nutrition in a positive way that doesn’t promote obsession?

Unknown Speaker  24:33 

Yeah, so I think, for starters, it goes back to just being really mindful about the way that we talk about food again, making sure we don’t apply any of those labels to food that are so often, there it starts. I don’t know about across the pond, but over here in the US, like it starts in very early on, at five or six years old, where kids are starting to learn, these are the good foods, these are the bad foods. And you know that just continues to kind of grow.

Unknown Speaker  25:00 

Of them once they get on social media and they get subjected to all this messaging. So we’ve got to take a very neutral approach to nutrition, I think, in the first place, and make it fun again. We need to realise that food is something that brings us together. It’s there during those social occasions. It’s there during the holidays and the fun times. There’s cultural connection that comes with food depending on your background or your ethnicity. Like, there could be cultural traditions around different food types. So we need to make food fun again, and we need to make it just approachable again, rather than being the enemy, rather than being this black or white, good or bad. Like, I think that that is so important. When I started with my therapist, I said something about, you know, Food is fuel, which is the one thing we share a lot in eating disorder recovery. And he said, No, let’s take it one step farther. And he said, Let’s try food is fun fuel. And that was really important for me, because it took me back to some of the fun that I used to have around food, especially as a kid, before diet, talking diet culture stole it all away. So I think it’s important that we we bring fun back to back to food. I think that’s a really good point, because it’s something that I’ve been doing with clients recently, is what foods did you use to love when you were younger and then really focusing on that to then bring those challenge foods back into the amber.

Unknown Speaker  26:29 

I think they’re the easier ones to pull back in because they’re less fearful, because there’s something that, as I say, nourishes your soul. You enjoy them absolutely, absolutely. I at my presentations, I always bring two of my favourite foods, which are a donut and a banana, and I’ll hold them up for the students, and I’m like, which one is healthier? And they’re always like, Oh, it’s the banana. Why is he even asking me this? And then I give them some context around it, and I talk about the challenges I’m having around mental health with the banana right now, and I’m worried if it’s organic or not, and that might be the only thing I can have all day if it’s if it’s not organic, because it could contaminate my body. And then with the donut I’m like, It’s reminded me of my childhood, when I would go to the donut shop with my parents on Saturday morning, or when me and my friends would make runs to the donut shop in high school, and suddenly they realise that, oh, health is a lot more than maybe just the nutritional information that’s on that package or what we’re being told is good or bad food wise, that health does nourish our soul, it’s our mental health, it’s our social connections, it’s all those different things, and we need to bring that in into food again, because When we do that we can really heal those relationships. It’s proper bonding, isn’t it?

Unknown Speaker  27:46 

I love that. That’s really awesome. I

Unknown Speaker  27:50 

think that’s really good that you do that within the school. So I love that.

Unknown Speaker  27:54 

It’s a really great idea.

Unknown Speaker  27:57 

Yeah, no, that’s really good. I think coming towards the end, I think it would get just to kind of really go over, like, if anyone’s concerned, like a school about about a student or a parent that’s concerned, just, it’s just kind of recap on some early signs of orthorexia.

Unknown Speaker  28:16 

Yeah, so some early signs are that fixation, if they’re always talking about food when they’re sitting it’s one thing to talk about food when they’re sitting down for a meal or you’re getting ready to go out to eat or something, but it’s another thing if throughout the day, all they’re talking about is food. If they’re starting to

Unknown Speaker  28:34 

become obsessive about searching for nutritional information online or reading the numbers that are on the menu, and they’re constantly making remarks around that. That’s something to be concerned about. If you start to see changes in their personality. For me, I went from a very kind of bubbly, optimistic person to all of a sudden, just a very negative, angry person all the time, and part of that was because I was malnourished by this point. But I would say if you start to notice any of those drastic changes in personality, if you’re dealing with an athlete who has become, you know, fixated on their sport and their athletics have become their sole identity, and they pour everything they’ve got into that athletic competition and endurance and stuff that could be a red flag as well. They could have some sort of disordered relationship there with food, because we’ve got to remember that our identities are made up of so much more than just being an athlete or just whatever we do in our careers or in our passions or hobbies. So I think that’s another thing, and probably one other one that I’d throw out there is Be mindful of the overachieving students in your lives, because we’re often the ones that are going to be striving for that perfectionism. So if you’ve got a student who’s always kind of looking for that validation and always trying to overachieve and you know, a top score is not good.

Unknown Speaker  30:00 

Enough, it’s got to be even higher. Those are the ones you’ve got to really be mindful of, because those same habits, whether it’s in school, in the classroom or at work, can translate into their relationships with food and body too.

Unknown Speaker  30:14 

Incorporated failure is okay. I think when you’re looking at somebody who’s got that be perfect driver, as I call it. It’s been able to look at what mistakes you’ve made, what what could you do differently? Instead of that, I’ve got to get it perfect. I’ve got to get got to get seen. Mm, hmm,

Unknown Speaker  30:34 

yeah, because I was convinced that, like, even just one wrong bite was going to cause disease or was going to cause me to be a bad person. So it had to be absolutely perfect my diet, and that was just that’s kind of how I’ve been throughout my entire life, whether it was when I was in school or at work or whatever I do, I always wanted to be seen and be perfect.

Unknown Speaker  30:56 

And what about weight loss, but not always with orthorexia, not always, and not always with any eating disorder, really, I think that that’s kind of one of those stereotypes that we still have out there that eating disorders have this specific look. But especially, I would say, with orthorexia, because again, it’s not maybe necessarily based on restriction, whereas it’s based on just the quality of the food that someone’s eating. So weight changes really make it I would say that’s probably down, you know, ways on the list, if your child has suddenly lost a bunch of weight, yeah, it’s definitely a red flag there. But I would never use that as, like, the determining factor as to whether someone has an eating disorder or not. Okay, okay, good. Because a lot of people would, so I would have for the longest time. That’s why I didn’t think, that’s why I didn’t think it was happening to me, because, you know, I was at, I guess, a quote, unquote normal weight, yeah. And thanks for mentioning athletes and orthorexia as well. Because I think that that they I think that’s overlooked. I think that is definitely on the rise like, and I think that is due to like, social media, that part as well. Like that’s added to it. I think so. So thank you for mentioning that, because I think it’s that part is overlooked, I think, and it’s such a slippery slope for them, because they’ve got their coaches and their trainers and their parents telling them to eat these different foods so that their body can perform a certain way. So it’s very easy to fall into the slippery slope of orthorexia when you’re an athlete.

Unknown Speaker  32:27 

Yeah. Thank you so much. And then Becky. Is anything final question you want to ask Jason before you finish up,

Unknown Speaker  32:34 

everything’s being really covered. I think the biggest key, I think, is like, nourish your belly, nourish your soul and trust like just because an adult is saying something doesn’t always mean it’s right, or whatever you’re watching on social media, it’s trust your gut instinct. There is a like your vagal nerve, that funny feeling in the pit of your stomach. Trust, if it doesn’t sound right, it’s good to be curious Exactly, exactly. I love that, yeah, because a lot of us, for a long time have basically been brainwashed by the messaging of diet culture and diet talk. So yeah, even if it’s an adult you look up to in your life, sometimes they might be saying the things they shouldn’t be saying about food and body, that’s for sure. So yeah, trust, trust that instinct inside, yeah,

Unknown Speaker  33:24 

yeah. Thank you so much, Jason for coming on. You been absolutely amazing. And thank you so much for sharing your story. And I hope everyone benefits from this podcast. It’s been a pleasure to have you

Unknown Speaker  33:36 

on Awesome. Thank you so much for having me.

Unknown Speaker  33:39 

Thank you so much for listening to the Gen up podcast. Please subscribe, share this podcast so others can benefit. You’ll find us on Facebook and Instagram, at ask JenUp or on Jenny’s website, at JenUp.com

Unknown Speaker  33:53 

if you visit the website, you’ll find lots of different resources available there. Please like, subscribe and share you you.

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Jenny Tomei is a Nutritional Therapist and Eating Disorder coach. See all her credentials on her About Jen page and then should you need help then make contact with her today. Your road to recovery can start now!