Mallary Tenore Tarpley, SLIP: Life in the Middle of Eating Disorder Recovery
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[0:44]Mallory to know our Tarpley is the author of slip, life in the middle of eating disorder recovery.
[0:50]She is an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin where she teaches journalism
[0:54]classes in the Moody College of Communication and writing classes at the McCombs School of
[0:59]Business.
[1:00]Previously, Mallory was the associate director of UT Austin's Knight Center for Journalism
[1:04]in the Americas, an international training and outreach center for journalists.
[1:08]Prior to UT Austin, Mallory was executive director of the nonprofit Images and Voices
[1:13]of Hope, where she developed a storytelling genre called Restorative Narrative, stories that
[1:18]show how people and communities are finding meaningful pathways forward in the aftermath
[1:22]of trauma.
[1:23]Mallory's articles and personal essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington
[1:27]Post, The Los Angeles Times, Dallas Morning News.
[1:30]Teen Vogue, Harvard University's name and storyboard, among other publications.
[1:35]Mallory holds a bachelor's degree from Providence College and a master's of fine arts and
[1:39]nonfiction writing from Gatcha College.
[1:41]She lives in the Austin area with her husband and two young children.
[1:45]Welcome Mallory.
[1:46]Thank you for coming on totally booked with Zibi to talk about slip, life in the middle
[1:50]of eating disorder recovery, congratulations on your book.
[1:53]Thank you so much for having me.
[1:55]The way you wrote about the loss of your mom in this book and the aftermath of your
[2:00]grief and everything that happened, it broke my heart into, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry.
[2:06]Yeah, thank you for that.
[2:07]It was a really difficult time in my life.
[2:10]Why don't you explain sort of the book in general and then we can delve in deeper into
[2:14]certain parts?
[2:15]Sure, so slip is really about my own experiences with Anorexia, which I developed after
[2:22]my mom died when I was 11 and looks at my sickness, my treatment for the eating disorder
[2:29]and really explores my ongoing recovery from the disorder.
[2:33]So in this book, I was really interested in exploring these driving questions of what does
[2:38]it mean to be better from your disorder, but not all better and what does it look like
[2:43]to live with the imprints of your disorder, knowing that it remains a vulnerability.
[2:48]And so as I explore these questions, I began to think a lot about what I call the middle
[2:53]place, which is this name I've given to this liminal space between acute sickness and
[2:57]full recovery.
[2:59]And I used to think I was the only one in this space and I began to do a lot of reporting
[3:03]for the book and ended up surveying hundreds of people and interviewing hundreds of people
[3:08]and realized that there are many people who also inhabit this middle place.
[3:13]And so in the book, alongside my own personal experiences, I bring in lots of perspectives
[3:18]from other people with lived experience, but also researchers and clinicians who can speak
[3:23]to some really fascinating research that's out there now about eating disorders and recovery
[3:28]from them.
[3:29]Wow.
[3:30]Well, I just love the way you told the story through your own experience, how at the end
[3:35]of each chapter you were bringing in more and more data.
[3:37]So we're getting a look not just what the landscape was when you were going through it,
[3:42]and how it is today and what advances have been made and what is still lacking and also
[3:49]how you take us back to this time in the world, right?
[3:52]The influences of 17 magazine, which by the way, I wrote four ones and all the pressures
[3:57]asideally that everybody was putting on girls and women at that time and how that has
[4:03]changed to all of which are compounded into your story.
[4:07]Yes.
[4:08]I'm glad that you just mentioned the research alongside the personal because that was a
[4:12]challenge structurally trying to figure out how do I write a book that is really equal
[4:17]parts memoir and reported.
[4:20]And so I was really interested in exploring that from a structural standpoint.
[4:25]So really tried to think through that and ended up adopting the split chapter approach
[4:30]where the first half is all personal and very deeply immersive.
[4:34]And then the second half is written from my present day perspective where I'm bringing
[4:39]in all of the research and insights from others.
[4:43]So in some ways, those two halves are always unified by essential theme, but I also think
[4:48]that that approach enabled me to be in conversation with my younger self and for me younger
[4:53]self and present day self to really converse in some ways on the page.
[4:58]Speaking of the voice of your younger self, you include some diary entries and excerpts
[5:03]from when you were young and as you went through a lot of the things in the book.
[5:09]And again, they were heartbreaking.
[5:12]Some of the longing for your mom and even when you had a two-way dialogue once, which you
[5:20]at the time felt weird about essentially, but then realized it was a very adaptive way
[5:26]of self soothing to have your thoughts and then have your mom respond in writing what
[5:31]she would think or say and help you through.
[5:34]When you wrote about that whole trigger, and I know that's just the trigger and the rest
[5:38]of the story follows with the disorder, but when you look back at the whole time and
[5:43]wrote about it, like were you crying over your keyboard type of thing or what was it like
[5:48]having to revisit this and talking to people who were involved, going back and meeting
[5:53]them and the nurse that, you know, all of that.
[5:56]Yes.
[5:57]So in many ways, it wasn't exercise and excavating my past and re-inhabiting my younger
[6:02]self.
[6:03]And so, as you said, I went back and looked at all of my old journals, which were just heartbreaking
[6:09]to read.
[6:10]I mean, I meticulously kept journals after my mom passed away and while I was sick and it
[6:16]became so clear and looking at those journal entries that I was just desperate to find a
[6:21]way to stay close to my mom.
[6:23]And I had conjured up this idea that somehow if I stayed the same size that my mother
[6:28]was when she was alive, maybe I could become closer to her.
[6:32]And so in looking at these journal entries, it was very clear that I found food restriction
[6:36]to be this warped form of time travel.
[6:39]And of course, the great irony of eating disorders is that they think we think they're
[6:43]going to give us one thing, but they completely strip it from our lives so that eating
[6:47]disorder really made me feel like I was out of control and farther away than ever from
[6:52]my mother ultimately.
[6:54]But it was difficult going back and reading entries related to that and going through all
[6:59]of my old medical records.
[7:01]I did a lot of re-visitation too, so I went back to Boston Children's Hospital where
[7:06]I was treated and interviewed the doctor who treated me there and nurses and really wanted
[7:13]to be able to experience all of that.
[7:16]And it did feel like I was climbing this emotional Mount Everest and wondering, how do
[7:22]I do this?
[7:23]How do I climb up this mountain?
[7:24]But I did go back to therapy when I was writing this book because I felt like writing
[7:30]can be therapeutic, but it's not therapy.
[7:32]And there was a lot that I needed to work on just off the page so that I could really
[7:37]come to the writing with a clear sense of focus and also with some real intentions around
[7:44]what I wanted to say and how I was going to write my story in a way that was vulnerable
[7:49]but also meaningful for readers.
[7:53]So when you were young after the death of your mom, you started restricting your intake.
[7:58]You started jumping, which I was wondering if there was ever an OCD diagnosis in there
[8:04]anywhere, you know, like these compulsions that you had.
[8:07]And anyway, just starting that out there as I am an armchair doctor in every way.
[8:11]And like later years, but anyway, you started jumping a lot and having, you know, picking
[8:18]your hands, like all these things, maybe something where your hands were all chapped.
[8:23]And by the time you got to the inpatient unit, which thankfully you were admitted to in
[8:28]time, your heart rate was down to 40 beats per minute.
[8:32]And you had leguno hair all over you and your fingers were blue.
[8:37]I mean, it was, it was almost hard to read your description of yourself at the beginning
[8:42]of your treatment.
[8:43]Tell me a little more about that.
[8:46]Yeah, so it was really helpful having my medical records and being able to actually look
[8:51]at those because I had certain memories of what my body felt like and what I was going
[8:56]through.
[8:57]But then to actually go back and look at the medical records for confirmation, it was heartbreaking
[9:02]in a lot of ways because I mean, my father took me to Boston Children's Hospital and neither
[9:07]of us knew what I was struggling with.
[9:09]We really didn't have a name for it because I thought people with eating disorders didn't
[9:13]eat anything at all and I was still eating, albeit not a lot.
[9:18]And my father, his only real point of reference for eating disorders was the death of
[9:23]Karen Carpenter and he thought that eating disorders only affected adults.
[9:28]And so we were both in some ways surprised to get the diagnosis of anorexia nervosa when
[9:34]I went to Boston Children's, but in looking back, it was quite clear that the doctors
[9:40]were quite afraid that I could suffer heart complications and other really serious medical
[9:46]complications if I wasn't hospitalized.
[9:50]And it is true too.
[9:51]To your point, I mean, jumping was my form of exercise, which looking back at it now.
[9:55]I mean, it seems so childish and I was only 12, 13 years old.
[9:59]So in some way.
[10:00]is it was fitting, but I did get to diagnose as well
[10:03]with anxiety and depression and severe obsessive compulsive
[10:07]disorder.
[10:08]And those are comorbidities that are very common
[10:10]among people with eating disorders,
[10:12]but it was very interesting reading.
[10:14]The doctor's notes about just how entrenched I was
[10:18]in my eating disorder and how I very much identified
[10:22]as someone with anorexia.
[10:24]And I distinctly remember this point
[10:27]where I moved from saying,
[10:28]I have anorexia to I am anorexic.
[10:31]And so for me, it became very much tangled up
[10:34]in my identity and that became even more so the case
[10:38]once I was living this institutionalized life
[10:41]of being in and out of the hospital.
[10:44]And then you detail all of the treatment.
[10:47]How many days?
[10:48]What was like 584 days, something like that?
[10:51]So many days in and out.
[10:53]And then in the treatment center
[10:55]that you were in after Granger House,
[10:57]something what was about Granger House?
[10:59]I was called Jermaine Lawrence.
[11:01]Jermaine Lawrence, sorry, I had the G, but anyway.
[11:04]And I was really struck too by your time
[11:07]on the eating disorders in a psychiatric ward,
[11:10]like the eating disorders, which I have worked
[11:14]at an invasion unit in the adolescent invasion unit
[11:17]at a psychiatric hospital.
[11:19]And I know how the kids would like swap different tricks
[11:22]for beating different systems and the levels of independence
[11:26]they got and all that.
[11:28]And you talk about the camaraderie amongst the girls,
[11:33]but also how that can backfire too
[11:36]when you're competitive and tricks of the game.
[11:39]And then when you looked back and found out
[11:42]that two of your good friends had passed away
[11:44]and they're like one in their 20s, one in their 30s,
[11:47]that kind of, it was just so sad, right?
[11:50]Tell me about those friendships
[11:51]and that particular experience and the role of friendship
[11:54]when you're struggling with something like this.
[11:56]Yes, so when I was on the psychiatric ward,
[11:59]it was really the first time I had met other girls
[12:02]and boys, there was one boy on the ward with eating disorders.
[12:05]And so in some ways it felt supportive
[12:08]because we could commiserate
[12:10]and we could talk with each other,
[12:12]but in other ways it was toxic
[12:14]because we did share tips and tricks on how to get away
[12:17]with exercising and or things of that nature.
[12:20]And this was also at a time
[12:22]where we didn't have social media.
[12:24]So this was the late 90s.
[12:25]And so we hadn't been exposed to this
[12:28]in the ways that some teenagers and adolescents
[12:31]are exposed to it now.
[12:32]And so in some ways I got all of these new ideas
[12:36]about how to get better at my eating disorder.
[12:38]And I think that I got the best treatment
[12:41]that I could have at the time,
[12:42]but I think treatment has also evolved
[12:44]to make note of that and to have more group therapy sessions
[12:48]where there are kind of more structures
[12:51]around the interactions that patients have.
[12:54]But it was difficult just being in that environment
[12:58]and feeling like I was really surrounded by people
[13:02]with the eating disorder.
[13:03]And again, I think that's part of why it really
[13:06]became part of my identity.
[13:09]And I came to feel like the psychiatric ward
[13:13]was a safe place for me because I felt like every time I left,
[13:17]I would fall back into the same behaviors.
[13:20]And so that was really challenging.
[13:22]And that was ultimately why they decided
[13:24]to have me go into residential treatment.
[13:26]And I was there for 17 months,
[13:28]which is almost unheard of these days.
[13:30]And I was very fortunate in that my public school system
[13:34]and the Department of Mental Health in Massachusetts
[13:36]where I grew up, they were able to cover the costs.
[13:39]Otherwise, there was no way I would have been able
[13:40]to afford treatment because that's one of the main barriers
[13:44]to care for folks with eating disorders.
[13:46]But yeah, that was a really challenging time
[13:50]in my life because you've worked on one.
[13:52]You know what a psychiatric ward is like.
[13:54]But most people don't write and it's hard to really
[13:58]describe that.
[13:59]And I actually tried to go back onto the ward
[14:02]when I was doing these re-visitations.
[14:04]And the clinician who was walking me
[14:06]through the halls of Boston Children's, she worked there.
[14:09]But she didn't even know quite how to access the ward.
[14:12]It was always very hidden and still remain so today.
[14:15]And so I thought, well, some places in our life
[14:18]can sort of be part of our past,
[14:21]but they don't necessarily need to invade our presence.
[14:24]So I thought maybe in some ways it was a gift,
[14:27]but I wasn't able to access it or wasn't even
[14:30]able to see the entrance to the ward
[14:32]because that was a really painful part of my past.
[14:36]I had a very, very close friend in high school who
[14:40]ended up taking her own life.
[14:43]But she struggled with anorexia.
[14:45]And Blimeon was hospitalized and I visited her
[14:48]at two of her hospitalizations and got to see.
[14:50]And you were allowed on those wards, I guess,
[14:53]because I remember seeing her in bed and everything.
[14:55]And just how vulnerable you are when
[14:59]you're hospitalized or something like this.
[15:01]And of course, with eating disorders like this,
[15:04]you are so frail physically.
[15:06]You're just, I just like wanted to go in and hug everyone
[15:10]there, because it's just seeing somebody
[15:14]and knowing that it's not because they are fighting cancer,
[15:18]but it is something in their brain that is causing this.
[15:21]And having, it's just as much a struggle, right?
[15:25]It's just as much a sickness.
[15:27]And I feel like, unfortunately, anorexia
[15:31]and it's such a, not a bad rap.
[15:34]I mean, that's the wrong way to say it,
[15:35]but that people can misconstrue it as something
[15:38]that's just about how you look.
[15:40]And that's not it at all.
[15:41]I mean, it's about so many things.
[15:44]And then as you say, especially when it happens early,
[15:47]it really changes your brain chemistry and your body
[15:50]and your development and all of it.
[15:53]Yes, very much so.
[15:54]And I mean, to the point where scientists now
[15:57]refer to eating disorders as brain disorders,
[16:00]because there are kind of these alterations in the brain
[16:03]that occur when one does have a severe eating disorder.
[16:06]And this was not known at the time
[16:09]when I was in treatment.
[16:10]And there's so much more research that's out now,
[16:12]but there's a lot of sort of these brain-based alterations
[16:16]that can keep people stuck in a cognitive rut
[16:18]and that can keep people from getting better.
[16:22]And it's interesting what you had mentioned earlier
[16:25]about two of the girls I was in treatment with
[16:27]who passed away.
[16:28]And I remember I had an interview
[16:31]with the mother of one of those girls.
[16:33]I had reached out to her several times and thought,
[16:36]oh, she probably doesn't want to talk with me.
[16:37]I don't know her.
[16:38]I don't want to conjure up these painful memories,
[16:40]but we did end up talking.
[16:42]And I include this in the book,
[16:44]but she talked about how much she tried to help her daughter
[16:47]and how much treatment she provided for her daughter
[16:50]and yet ultimately couldn't save her.
[16:52]And so I think it was this really sort of powerful moment
[16:57]in heartbreaking moments in which again,
[16:59]I remember that eating disorders are not a choice
[17:02]and they're not about a diet.
[17:04]They are these really harmful disorders
[17:09]that are so easy to get caught up in.
[17:11]And they can take lives.
[17:13]And I've seen that firsthand.
[17:15]And so I have a lot of just empathy for people
[17:18]who are really struggling and acutely sick
[17:21]and a lot of empathy for my younger self
[17:23]because I look back and I just realize
[17:26]how toxic the eating disorder was in my life.
[17:29]And it's still something I contend with to an extent,
[17:32]but I'm grateful that I'm in a far better place
[17:35]than I was when I was younger.
[17:38]How do you feel now because you take us
[17:40]through the rest of your story, falling in love,
[17:44]having kids, which of course also,
[17:46]I mean anyone having a child has to deal
[17:49]with what their body looks like,
[17:50]changing shape and being essentially out of their own control.
[17:53]Again, as it's like inhabited by somebody else,
[17:56]but as you raise your kids
[17:58]and as so many people struggle now
[18:00]with the TikTok of it all
[18:03]and the rise of eating disorders during COVID and all of that,
[18:07]like what is your perspective on making sure
[18:10]the next generation has it a little bit easier
[18:12]or has the supports they need
[18:14]or how do you view your role in this whole system?
[18:18]I think about this a lot as a mom.
[18:20]So my kids are seven and nine.
[18:22]And I know that there are lots of factors
[18:26]that go into eating disorders including genetics.
[18:28]So research does show that females
[18:31]who have a relative with anorexia
[18:32]are 11 times more likely to develop the disorder themselves.
[18:36]But even though this is a really scary statistic,
[18:39]it's also important to know that we don't inherit
[18:41]eating disorders, we inherit a vulnerability to them.
[18:44]So in other words, we're not doomed
[18:47]if we're the child, if someone within eating disorder,
[18:49]nor are children doomed, if we have an eating disorder.
[18:52]But knowing all of this, I try really hard
[18:55]to just provide a really safe environment for my kids.
[18:59]And I'm sure especially once they're of the age
[19:02]that they can go on social media,
[19:04]it's going to be a lot harder to sort of control
[19:06]that environment so to speak.
[19:08]But right now, I really think a lot about this
[19:11]and I try to teach my kids that all bodies
[19:14]are worthy of respect, no matter how short or tall
[19:17]or big or small.
[19:19]And even though I still have a lot of bad body image days,
[19:23]I never put my body down in front of my kids.
[19:26]I really don't want them to be immersed
[19:29]in this home environment that is rooted
[19:32]in any sort of diet culture or fat phobia.
[19:35]And so sometimes it can feel a little bit
[19:37]like I'm faking it till I make it.
[19:39]But I really try to be respectful toward my body
[19:43]and not put it down in front of them.
[19:45]And I'm also really conscious
[19:47]about how I talk about food with my kids.
[19:49]So I don't talk about foods as being good or bad
[19:53]or healthy or unhealthy because kids oftentimes
[19:56]think in terms of black and white,
[19:58]it's harder for them to capture nuance.
[20:00]And so sometimes when we talk about food in this way,
[20:03]it can be easy for kids to think,
[20:04]well, I'm bad if I eat quote unquote bad foods
[20:08]or I'm good if I eat quote unquote good foods.
[20:10]And I know for my own experiences,
[20:13]when I was in the seventh grade,
[20:14]I was in a health class that really kind of taught us
[20:17]about good and bad foods quote unquote.
[20:20]And that was one of the many factors
[20:22]that led me to think about food restriction
[20:25]as a way of controlling my body and the way it looked.
[20:28]And fast for 25 years,
[20:30]and my kids have had similar assignments in school.
[20:33]And so we're still talking about foods
[20:35]in these very black and white ways
[20:38]without a whole lot of nuance.
[20:40]And so I'm very conscious about that
[20:42]in terms of how I interact with my kids and my kids.
[20:46]I mean, I also want them to know about my story
[20:49]and I've been thinking about this a lot
[20:51]as the book goes out into the world.
[20:53]So I have begun to have pretty basic conversations
[20:56]with my kids about eating disorders and my own story
[21:00]so that they're at least aware of what eating disorders are.
[21:03]And so that they feel like they can come to me
[21:05]if they're ever in a place where they're not treating
[21:08]their bodies with respect or not giving their bodies
[21:11]the food or fuel that they need.
[21:13]It's great.
[21:14]I know I feel like as parents we always have to be
[21:16]checking what we say, what are we modeling?
[21:19]What are we doing?
[21:20]I mean, the other day, my daughter was taking a picture of me
[21:24]and I looked at it and I was like,
[21:25]wait, let me do it again.
[21:26]Let me like second my stomach and I was like,
[21:28]I cannot believe I just said that.
[21:30]I can't believe I thought it.
[21:31]I can't believe I even set it out loud.
[21:33]In front of my impressionable daughter,
[21:35]I feel like I need to be arrested by the parenting police
[21:38]for this move because I'm so conscious
[21:40]of never saying anything, like being so,
[21:43]because I, you know, you always do in response
[21:46]to like whatever you had sometimes, right?
[21:48]Or what, you know, we all have our things.
[21:51]So, but anyway, I was feeling like such a failure
[21:53]because at least we all now try to protect
[21:57]in the ways that we can, except for slip ups like that.
[22:00]Yeah, slip.
[22:01]Yes, exactly, but it's hard.
[22:03]I mean, I grapple it with it all the time
[22:05]and my kids are asking me, mom, can I have a snack?
[22:08]Can I have a treat like when it's 10 minutes before dinner?
[22:10]I mean, those conversations can be hard to have
[22:13]because I don't want them to have a restrictive mindset,
[22:15]but sometimes there are moments where I'll just say,
[22:17]just ask your father, right?
[22:19]And knowing that my husband can step in and support
[22:22]in those moments where maybe it feels a little overwhelming.
[22:25]I have found that to be helpful.
[22:27]Yeah, that's a good, that's a good trick.
[22:29]I know, I feel like I'm so permissive with like,
[22:32]oh, can we get a nice cream
[22:33]and then we're gonna have dinner now?
[22:34]And I'm like, sure.
[22:36]You know, because I don't want to say no to any of it.
[22:39]Are you, do you do, it's your body?
[22:41]Tell me if you're hungry?
[22:42]Like, yeah, you think you'll eat dinner?
[22:43]Yeah, how are you gonna get your protein?
[22:45]Like, I don't know, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's always a mess,
[22:48]but, but of course eating disorders are late,
[22:52]you're eating disorder on top of the baseline stress
[22:56]of raising kids with positive body image is a lot.
[23:00]And I know that, you know, you didn't devote
[23:03]too, too much time to this in the book.
[23:05]And the bulk of it was sort of,
[23:07]you're coming of age story and how you survived,
[23:10]which at times felt like not a given at all
[23:14]and how you worked through it.
[23:16]But I don't know, I feel like right now,
[23:20]the moment that you're in, especially about to have
[23:23]teenagers and kids going through that.
[23:25]Like, how are you gonna, how are you stealing yourself for that?
[23:28]Like, how are you, do you look to external help?
[23:32]I know you've interviewed a thousand people for the book.
[23:34]Like, what is something that you took from it
[23:36]that you're gonna use to help yourself?
[23:38]So it doesn't drag you back down into a dark place.
[23:43]Yeah, so I think one thing for me is that I am a perfectionist.
[23:47]And so I used to think I had to be really perfect
[23:50]at my recovery.
[23:51]And I see that trickle into my parenting as well.
[23:54]Or sometimes I think, oh, I've got to be the perfect mom
[23:57]and do all the things and work and be with them.
[24:00]And write a book.
[24:01]And so I do have to watch that just as I think about how
[24:05]I talk about bodies and food with my kids
[24:08]because I recognize that no matter how hard I try,
[24:11]they're probably still going to have bad body image days.
[24:13]They may end up developing behaviors
[24:17]or they may end up going on skinny talk
[24:20]or seeing some things one day that I would prefer
[24:23]that they not see.
[24:24]And so I think for me, just I have realized
[24:28]that secrecy can keep us stuck.
[24:30]And eating disorders really thrive in secrecy.
[24:33]And so I think silence and secrecy not only keeps us stuck,
[24:36]but can also keep us sick.
[24:37]And a big part of my own recovery has been
[24:40]just being open about my own experiences
[24:43]with an eating disorder and the fact that I'm not over it.
[24:46]And that's sometimes I still do slip.
[24:48]And so I think for me, that's been really healing
[24:51]to be able to be super honest about that.
[24:53]And I think the book is the most honest piece of work
[24:55]I've ever put out into the world.
[24:57]And so as I think about how that translates to my parenting,
[25:00]I really want my kids to feel like they can have open
[25:03]conversations with me about moments where maybe
[25:07]they're not feeling so great about who they are
[25:09]or what they're putting into their bodies
[25:11]or what their bodies look like.
[25:12]And I never want them to feel like, oh, well, mom
[25:15]has had an eating disorder.
[25:16]So I can't talk with her about these things.
[25:18]And so the open communication was so helpful for me.
[25:24]And so I want to encourage my kids to feel
[25:26]like they can come to me when they have these concerns.
[25:29]And that we can really just have dialogue about them
[25:33]so that they're not secretly or silently struggling
[25:37]or wondering what the content they're seeing on social media
[25:40]or elsewhere means for them and their bodies.
[25:44]And what does your support system look like right now?
[25:47]So I do still see a therapist in a dietician.
[25:51]And five years ago, I probably would have been
[25:53]sheepish about saying that.
[25:54]But I do think that it's really just been helpful
[25:58]in terms of being able to stay active in my recovery.
[26:01]And I always say that I'm kind of in recovery
[26:04]as opposed to fully recovered.
[26:06]It's hard to even know what full recovery means
[26:08]from an eating disorder, especially in our society,
[26:11]which is so steep and diet culture.
[26:13]But I have the therapist in dietician.
[26:17]I also have an amazing husband who is super supportive
[26:20]and really understands my own lived experience
[26:24]and can really just help me in times
[26:28]when I feel like I need a little extra support.
[26:30]So those are my main support systems.
[26:34]And I'm lucky to have just a great family and friends.
[26:38]And so I am fortunate in that sense.
[26:40]And I remember when I was in residential treatment,
[26:43]I was there with a lot of girls who did not have a home
[26:46]to go to.
[26:47]They were in and out of the foster care system
[26:50]or they'd been abandoned by their parents.
[26:52]And so even then I knew that I was fortunate
[26:55]to have my father, I had a loving grandmother,
[26:58]had stepped into help after my mom passed away.
[27:00]And so support is really critical
[27:03]when you're dealing with an eating disorder.
[27:05]And I think when you don't have support,
[27:07]that's when you can slip into the secrecy and silence more.
[27:12]I'm so glad that you have that whole system
[27:14]because the image of you coming home from school,
[27:17]the day that your mom died to an empty house
[27:19]and just like putting on some Arthur cartoons
[27:22]because it was just so quiet and like not having a snack
[27:25]for that.
[27:25]Oh my gosh, I feel like I'm gonna be haunted
[27:27]haunted by the sadness of that.
[27:29]I'm just so sorry you went through that.
[27:31]Anyway, I'm also glad we're doing an event together
[27:33]at the core club.
[27:34]I'm excited to introduce you to the other authors
[27:38]and have an open talk about all of this
[27:41]because their stories are not the same,
[27:43]but there are similarities in the journey.
[27:46]So yes, I can't wait to hear you all talk about it.
[27:49]I just wanna be a fly on the wall
[27:51]and just like let you all talk.
[27:52]So I can't wait for that too.
[27:54]Yeah, so I'm so excited about that.
[27:56]Amazing.
[27:57]Okay, Mallory, congratulations.
[28:00]It's been such a pleasure to have met you
[28:02]on one of our retreats
[28:03]and have you say I'm like writing a book
[28:06]and then seeing the cover
[28:07]and now it's about to come out
[28:09]and it's just so exciting.
[28:10]I'm so excited for you.
[28:12]I hope that it brings you everything that you hope and more.
[28:15]Thank you, yes.
[28:16]And it feels like a really special moment in time too
[28:19]because I'm about to turn 40
[28:21]and my mom was 40 when she passed away.
[28:23]And so I've been thinking a lot about
[28:25]what does it mean to outlive your mother
[28:27]and to enter a phase of life
[28:29]that she never got to experience.
[28:30]So in many ways, lip feels like this ultimate
[28:33]way of honoring her memory
[28:35]and also beginning this next phase of life.
[28:38]Oh, I love it.
[28:39]We're congratulations.
[28:40]Thank you so much.
[28:42]Thanks, Mallory.
[28:43]Okay, I'll talk to you soon and bye bye.
[28:47]Thank you for listening to totally booked with Zibi
[28:50]formerly mom's don't have time to read books.
[28:52]If you loved the show,
[28:54]tell a friend, leave a review,
[28:56]follow me on Instagram at Zibi Owens
[28:58]and spread the word.
[29:00]Thanks so much.
[29:01]Oh, and bye the books.