The dangers of relying on reassurance.
“I promise you; your body knows what to do with the food you give it,” I consoled her for (what must have been) the fortieth time.
“All of it?” She asked.
“Yes, all of it. Your body is very smart. It knows what to do. Don’t worry,” I replied confidently, even in the shadows of my own insecurities.
The “her” was me. I was reassuring myself. It was the best I could get because I didn’t have anybody else offering the confirmations of future truths I sought to pacify the overwhelming fears bubbling up inside for (what must have been) the fortieth time that day. Like a frightened kitten, I needed an unbelievable amount of reassurance and persuasion… or so I believed.
Reassurance (noun): the action of removing someone’s doubts or fears; a statement or comment that removes someone’s doubts or fears.
The first time I remember hearing something similar to what I mentally repeated to myself, and relying heavily on the validity behind the words offered, was exactly 20 years prior. At the time I had already been struggling with orthorexia, anorexia, and exercise addiction for two and a half years.
I remember feeling like my willpower had simply cracked. I’d pushed myself and starved myself for so long that everything about my soul was screaming for food and sleep. I was exhausted.
Skin and bones (for the second time at that point), I’d moved back for with my parents after the end of my second year of college and actually dropped my classes because I couldn’t keep up. All I wanted was to eat, yet I didn’t trust my body enough to let it have what it wanted: unbelievably big portions of everything, then seconds, thirds, dessert, more dessert, leftovers, and cereal (typically in that order!).
Extreme hunger had latched on like one of those monkey babies on their mum’s back at the zoo. I could have been hanging upside down, literally, and I’d still have been trying to eat.
At the time, all I wanted was to hear and really believe “it will be okay”. My mother offered those words to me then- words which I never forgot and were the same I would rehearse some twenty years later when, again, I needed to hear them.
And, it was okay. My body recovered beautifully.
Unfortunately my recovery that round didn’t “stick”. Stress, perfectionism, emotional trauma, anxiety, loneliness, and life insecurity channeled me back into disordered eating which transitioned through various combinations of disease form for the next twenty years.
When I was ready to recover once and for all (in my mid-thirties) it became imminently clear that fear was in the driver’s seat of my life. Once again I sought reassurance. And I did so with the repetition of a stuck disk in the DVD player.
“Will I be okay one day?” “Will I get my life back?” “Can I still recover?” “Is it okay to eat?” “Will my body know what to do with the food?” “Is it too late?” “Are you sure?” “Will my body gain weight forever if I let go?” “Can I heal after all this time?”
Repeat.
The track on a loop played the familiar tune of desperation and lack of trust for more than four long years before things changed.
It’s not that reassurance wasn’t needed. It was desperately needed. But I learned (much) later that a few things had been occurring:
I had been asking and searching for reassurance as my primary mission towards health. It wasn’t being offered to me.
I was so deprived of true HOPE that my feelings of anxiety over the future were pacified more through reassurance than through my own faith and plans for objective change. Somehow I believed that, at some point, I would feel reassured enough that fear would abate and I would have the courage to change.
Though I was asking for reassurance regarding my body’s ability to heal, it was actually more about wanting to feel connected, seen, and cared for. And it was a way of asking for guidance and help. To me, feeling loved and helped meant someone got into the trenches alongside of me and helped me find my way rather than assume that, as an adult, I knew what to do but was choosing not to. (Which is bull shit btw for anyone suffering from chronic dieting cycles or unintentional body abuse, let alone disordered eating!)
Reassurance works best when it’s offered rather than asked for directly or sought through research and self-help books.
Its offering between friends and peers is one of the most recognizable and consistent means of developing closeness in bonds of relationship, and in feeling secure. Everybody– from newborns to the oldest and wisest elders– feels a strong need to be reassured in situations that provoke fear, guilt, anxiety, stress, sadness, and other unpleasant feelings. It is how humans connect and help each other through life. It’s hard to imagine how we would get through life without it.
When offered, reassurance truncates fear pathways that are in progress. But when it must be asked for, the fear has already rooted itself deeply, and, like asking to be hugged, the authenticity and sincerity of the “gift” is not as secure. So constantly seeking reassurance can never provide the same peace of its offered equivalent.
Reassurance offers hope that positive change can occur. In itself it cannot create the change.
Significant, purposeful change away from destructive behaviors and life patterns results from having courage. Courage does not mean having no fear. It means having fear and doing something despite the fear.
You might rightfully pivot back to the definition of reassurance and wonder then why someone needs courage if they’ve received reassurance, since, theoretically, it seems that reassurance removes doubts and fears.
The chances that a girlfriend can reassure you that, based on your study sessions together and the fact that she took the test earlier in the day, you’ll do fine on a math exam is highly probable. Likewise, when a parent reassures a child who’s fallen and skinned a knee that they are fine, seldom will the tears continue for long.
But inexistent are the chances that anyone will be able to completely pacify the food- and body- related anxieties that mask an even more complicated internal matrix of life and emotional insecurities. Even the best of therapists can only do so much. Most of the change must happen from within.
For most people, the need for reassurance is strong at times, but not persistently strong. And, even when the desire for the comfort it can offer is really strong, most “healthy” individuals know there are other ways to proceed, besides temporarily getting rid of unpleasant feelings, and regardless of the level of support.
But when it comes to anxiety-driven states of dis-ease, no amount of reassurance is ever enough. Extreme insecurity and resulting excessive reassurance seeking is associated with a number of mental health conditions, including depression, OCD, disordered eating, and anxiety disorders.
Adults who suffer many times turn to partners, family members, or friends, routinely seeking reassurance about their concerns. Often they are met with the finding that their loved ones are exhausted and sometimes frustrated from providing constant reassurance to the repetitive and seemingly endless cycle of worries.
Instead individuals must learn to face life and to embrace all of the uncertainty that dwells within it, rather than continually seeking reassurance and safety. But how does one learn to embrace uncertainty when it feels so terrifying? How does one learn to tolerate the doubts and perpetual fears that follow us around each day?
The difference for me the second time around was that, though I continued to seek reassurance, still hoping that my husband and family will one day “just know” what to say that will really sink in and provide that hug of true comfort and security, I had realized that if I stayed stuck in the loop of asking and waiting for the waves of fears to retreat, change was never going to happen. I needed to step out into my fears and have some courage.
Anxiety and distress is unpleasant but not harmful.
In my post titled “Fear is not the same as harm” I discussed the neurological changes that occur in the brain over time when conscious decisions (as unhealthy and self-defeating as they may be) in the frontal lobes “train” the amygdala to have a good/bad emotional response to thoughts and actions which, over time, create and solidify fears. These “learned fears” are not easily unlearned unless opposing actions are decided upon by the frontal lobes and the amygdala is taught new lessons.
By facing fears head on, we develop confidence in our own ability to cope.
Recovery from chronic dieting, circular attempts to change body shape or size away from its genetic norm, or full blown disordered eating requires habituation to the distress caused by uncertainty that comes from challenging destructive behavior patterns and thoughts by not engaging in them and/or doing the very opposite of what someome feels like doing. And habituation cannot occur when reassurance keeps the person from getting exposure to uncertainty.
Over time, and as your body proves to you that it is trustworthy, the need for reassurance as a prerequisite for action becomes slightly less. We learn that anxiety comes and goes, and sometimes the waves rise up like a voracious tempest. But we trust in our ability to ride the waves and keep afloat. We no longer need to rely so much on therapists or our loved ones to keep us feeling safe and hopeful.
The offering of reassurance throughout life is no less valuable and impactful. But only when extreme reliance on reassurance is brokenness and courage enables action despite fear does healing have a solid chance and we learn to navigate our stormy seas.
Feel shit, do it anyway.
It won’t feel like this forever… but only if you tame the waves of fear with courage. They won’t retreat on their own. And if you wait for enough reassurance, the DVD player might just burn out.