The Courage to Hope: Reclaiming Life on the Other Side of an Eating Disorder

By Julie Allen

I suffered from anorexia and bulimia nervosa for fifteen years. Fifteen long years. The Courage to Hope is my story of how I overcame. My goal in writing it was not only to share my struggles with an eating disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, self-injury, and rape but also to provide tangible pieces of advice on how to overcome such obstacl

• Language: English
• Publisher: Julie Allen
• Release date: Sep 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9780578984728

Julie Allen

Julie Allen, an author and sustainability awareness activist, is the CEO of Mary Rose Boutique and founder of the Mary Rose Foundation. Julie started Mary Rose Boutique because she recognized the need for a clothing shop that focused on body acceptance, self-love, and helping all bodies feel beautiful and confident in their clothes. The three pillars of her boutique include sustainability, inclusion, and social justice.The Mary Rose Foundation is a non-profit 501c3 designed to help people who are struggling with the financial burden of eating disorder treatment and works on the prevention side as well with their educational outreach programs. Julie's message is simply one of strength, courage, self-compassion, and most of all, hope.

Book preview

Prologue

The Courage to Hope has been completed for almost two years. I have let it sit for several reasons, and making the decision to publish it has been one I have not taken lightly. It was December 2019 when I finished writing it. At the time, I was five months pregnant and juggling an almost three-year-old, as well. My toddler was in preschool nearly full-time, and I was finally getting over  feeling sick everyday. This pregnancy started out difficult, and it ended even more difficult, but that is not the reason I sat on this manuscript for two years. 

Then came 2020. 

My second son, Hendrik, was born early May 2020. I was induced with him at 36 weeks and had spent my 35th week of pregnancy in and out of the hospital. I had severe preeclampsia and it was undoubtedly related to the stress of the world at this point in time. In March 2020, we closed our brick and mortar location due to the pandemic. We had a staff of six at that point, and we had to let them all go. My heart sank not only for the business and foundation, but for our employees. I was terrified of not being able to pay them. As I sat on Zoom with our manager, informing her that we were going to be closing the store, I could feel the weight of everything intensely. I had no idea what the next couple of months/years would bring. All I knew at this time was everything was about to change.

Running a business and nonprofit during a pandemic with a newborn, three-year-old, and partner whose job was essential and, not to mention, highly stressful, has been my life since March 2020. I am still processing everything. I know most of us are. We have all been through extensive circumstances, and the world has seemed upside down more often than not. It did not feel right pursuing publishing this book when so many other things were much more important. Our business has, so far, survived the pandemic, and I am beyond thankful for everyone that has showed up to support us. The Foundation was able to award three eating disorder treatment scholarships during 2020, and that was because of the support the boutique received. We were able to help three humans access lifesaving treatment that may not have otherwise been available to them. I am unceasingly thankful. 

The pandemic, the social justice movements, the division, the hate, the finding out so much about ourselves and how we respond to facing the worst in us  and in our society, has created such an intense experience that we are all dealing with collective trauma. I have learned so much about myself and all the ways I was unknowingly contributing to issues in our society. 

I am a thin, white woman. I have never experienced discrimination based on how my body looks. There is inherent privilege in being a white person in our society and even more privilege in being a white woman living in a smaller body. Acknowledging this privilege is important. In this book, I talk a lot about the different treatment centers I went to. Having access to treatment was a huge privilege. Eating disorders are thought to occur in affluent, young, white women. Here’s the deal, these are the people that are being recognized and referred to treatment. Black people are often not asked about food behaviors in doctor’s appointments. The problems are not recognized because they are not even asked about. Eating disorders do not discriminate. They can and do occur in people of all ages, sexes, races, and sizes. There is no one-size-fits-all in terms of an eating disorder, and I just so happened to fall into the stereotypical box. This is not good nor bad, it simply is. 

I want to make it very clear that my journey with recovery would more than likely have looked very different if I lived in a marginalized body. This is not okay. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses, and many result in suicide. Treatment saves lives. It is imperative that the narrative around who can have an eating disorder changes. Removing the barriers to treatment is critical if we hope to improve access. 

Privilege does not mean life is easy. It means my life was never made more difficult because of the color of my skin. My privilege, being white and thin, undoubtedly contributed to the way my life has turned out. I’m not saying any of us should feel bad about that, but acknowledgment does need to happen. This is me acknowledging the fact that my journey towards recovery was not made more challenging because of the way I looked. I’m acknowledging that the treatment I was able to receive is not readily available to people who do not fit the stereotypical example of someone with an eating disorder. My journey has been privileged, period. 

I needed to rewrite this introduction to include the acknowledgment of how my journey was impacted by living in the body that I do before publishing this book. It did not feel right to me to spread the messages of how I went to treatment knowing how so many people’s eating disorders go unrecognized because of the body they live in. We have to listen, we have to learn, and we have to do better. If the pandemic has taught us one thing, it is that the actions of one impact us all. We all have the responsibility to challenge our actions and innate biases to stop harming others, whether intentionally or not. 

Hope is something we need. Right now. Our world is hurting, and if my story can give others hope, then I am ready. I am scared, but I am ready. This book is raw, it is vulnerable, and it is me. Sending you all so much love and light. Thank you for reading my journey. 

XO

-Julie

Introduction

Writing has always been therapeutic for me. Journaling has been a part of my life since I was a young teen. I often found the written word much easier to express than the spoken word. The paper was a safe place for me to express my feelings. It was through journaling that I first discovered my love of writing and my desire to one day write a book.

The Courage to Hope is my story of how I overcame.