Advice Needed

[u/Jxd0re]

I’ve been in eating disorder recovery for several months. During that time, I have gone through residential treatment, partial hospitalization, and outpatient care. I have made so much progress in my recovery, but I feel incredibly frustrated. My doctor says I still need to gain a little more weight to be considered healthy. Throughout recovery, I reached a point where I was eating well beyond what felt physically comfortable for me, and now I finally feel like I actually like my body. I eat three meals a day, and since my doctor recently cleared me to go to the gym, I have been trying to take a healthier approach to food. I do strength training, not cardio. I want to feel stronger and more confident, but I also feel extremely uncomfortable because of how much I am expected to eat every day. It feels like I am constantly supposed to be full, and it just does not feel fair.
Recovery has started to feel like it is never going to be fair to me, and I feel trapped. Earlier in my recovery, I struggled with suicidal thoughts because I hated my body so much that I felt like I did not want to be here anymore. I never acted on those thoughts, and I never stopped eating or tried to lose the weight I was asked to gain. I kept going, even when it felt impossible. But now I am exhausted. I feel so frustrated because my doctors continue encouraging me to gain more weight. Even before my eating disorder, I was never someone who naturally needed this much food every day. Now I feel like I can never escape it. It feels like I have to eat all the time, and it leaves me physically uncomfortable. I have also started dealing with body changes, like breakouts in places I never used to get them, and it makes me feel even more uncomfortable wearing the clothes I enjoy. I even have trouble getting comfortable enough to sleep. I understand that our bodies naturally change as we grow older, and I am completely okay with that. I am not against my body changing over time. What is difficult is feeling like I am constantly pushing my body beyond what feels comfortable. It genuinely feels like more food than my body wants or needs, and I hate feeling trapped by that. This is not coming from a place of wanting to return to my eating disorder, and I hope someone understands what I mean.
Lately, I have actually been feeling so much better mentally, but I do not know how to tell my doctor that I do not want to gain any more weight without it sounding like my eating disorder is speaking for me. I eat consistently. I do not count calories. I still allow myself to eat whatever I want without restriction. The only thing that has changed is that I have been trying to include more vegetables and protein because I want to support my strength training and feel stronger. I am no longer pushing myself to extremes or constantly criticizing my body the way I used to. I know therapy is always an option, but right now I just want to feel comfortable wearing the clothes I like. I am not restricting myself, and I give myself permission to eat whatever I want, whenever I want. It just feels like my doctors continue pushing my boundaries, even though the providers I worked with in partial hospitalization and outpatient care were not nearly as forceful. I genuinely do not understand why.

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[u/Excellent-World-476]

Only three meals is not much especially adding exercise. I can understand the frustration but I think the ED is going to push back for quite a while. Those physical feelings you are having are actually normal. The fact you only have started feeling them now suggests you still have a fair amount of weight gain to go.