- Hey everybody, happy Thursday.
And because it's Thursday that means I'm on Twitter.
And it's almost Friday, hooray!
Cause I've been tired this week, I don't know why.
I guess actually it's just been a long week with the filming
and all the anxiety build-up with that and then
like it's done and now I'm pooped.
So anyway, I've been on Twitter and you've asked
your question using the hashtag KatiFAQ.
I have found them and I'm gonna answer them.
But I only have three questions today because
I tend to make my videos really long.
I'm trying to shorten them a little bit.
And I have a journal topic at the end.
So stay tuned for that.
Okay, without further ado my first question says
"Kati, can you ask to go to impatient for anorexia,
or does someone else have to admit you?
Do you have to meet all the criteria?"
The first thing I wanna talk about is the fact that
it differs country to country.
Now impatient in the States is what I know the most about.
Now for those of you who are out of the country,
can you let us know anything that you know about how you get
into an impatient or residential treatment facility?
Cause I'm not as well-versed in that.
I know a lot of it has to do with referrals
and meeting criteria and stuff like that.
But in the States the way that it works at the two
places that I've worked at is you call
and you say you wanna come in.
Now, the only ... You don't have to meet any criteria
other than the fact that you have an eating disorder
of some type and you would like to get help.
Now where you run into having to meet certain criteria
is for your insurance to cover it.
And so, you'll have to meet a criteria for
one of the four eating disorders.
That being anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder,
or EDNOS which is now called something else.
But it's still the same type of criteria.
So as long as you fall into one of those categories
you're most likely to get coverage.
Now I know EDNOS is sometimes hard to get coverage for
because it's kind of that bucket that I talk about
for when you have a bunch of different behaviors
that fit into all sorts of different eating disorders.
And insurances like to be assholes and be like
"No, we're not gonna cover it."
And so as a therapist I've done many calls to insurance
where I get it covered by stating it ...
You know they're doing this 'x' amount of times
and they're also doing this and that's why they
don't fit either of those criteria quite.
But they definitely really struggle and I
haven't had any trouble getting that covered, okay?
So I hope that answers your questions.
I know it's kind of a two-parter.
You can get inpatient treatment if you
don't have to worry about insurance.
And if you do have to worry about insurance
you do have to meet some kind of criteria, okay?
Question #2: Hey Kati, my question for you is,
is it normal for your appetite to increase
when starting recovery?
Good question!
As I've started eating, I didn't feel hungry at all.
But now only a few hours after eating I'm beginning to
feel really hungry and wanting more food, is this normal?
I've found that I'm a lot more hungry throughout
the day even though I ate more.
I used to go almost all day without food
and I didn't even feel hungry at all.
But now only a few hours after eating
and I'm getting to feel hungry again and wanting more food.
Is this normal?
And this really scares my clients and makes
them really stressed and anxious.
Yes, it's normal.
And the reason for this is, our body, when we don't feed it,
goes into kind of a starvation mode.
And it honestly believes that sending you that
hunger signal is a waste of energy.
Why tell it when it doesn't think we can get
it food and we haven't given it food.
Our bodies are really adaptable.
So instead of spending the energy doing that,
they try to conserve energy and kind of
go into this like hibernation mode where
we do the least amount of things that we have to do.
Now when we start eating again,
our metabolism starts to kick in and we're hungry.
Every couple hours we need food
like a regular eating person, like myself.
I'm hungry every ... I mean Sean can voutch the fact
I'm hungry every three like three hours.
Yeah, unless I have like a huge meal maybe four hours then.
But I'm hungry all the time because my metabolism
is going and I'm doing all these things
and my brain is working all day,
which honestly uses a lot of energy.
And yeah, it's very normal.
Know that you're listening to your body and that's great.
You're noticing that you're hungry which is amazing.
And use the intuitive eating kind of scale
where you rank how hungry you are.
And make sure you're eating when you're ...
You know start planning food when you're at like a five.
Or a four, and make sure you're eating around that.
And then working your way back up to like a 7 or an 8.
Where you're kind of comfortably full.
And it might be good to work with your dietician
to have like three meals and three snacks.
Cause I myself even find that very helpful.
Cause those snacks kinda get me through to meals.
Otherwise I feel like I'm always trying to find food.
And I just, it doesn't work, so you know ...
Dried fruit and nuts and bringing apple or banana
or all sorts of goodies like that that are easy.
Or yogurt, I eat a lot of yogurt, and granola bars
and stuff like that are good in the meantime.
And so yes, it's normal.
Breathe, talk to your therapist and your dietician
about it and just let them know.
But yeah, you're body's healing and that's actually really
good news, that means your metabolism is up and running okay
Question #3: Hey Kati, great job on TV.
Oh, thanks, I actually felt like,
I know I stuttered at the beginning.
They don't give you any time to be like
"Well, uh" Cause I was gonna say there's a lot
to take into consideration but it's like
"What's your opinion, and tell me now!"
So I felt kind of silly at that point.
When we watched it I was like "Oh my god."
But thanks you guys for all your support.
Quick question, why do we watch triggering things?
It's almost like I want to self harm or puke, thanks.
We watch it as a way to ...
There's a couple things.
Everybody's different, right, so if you have
a different experience, always let me know.
But we do it for a couple of reasons.
Number one, being that we like to know we're not alone.
So we'll watch things with other people doing it to be like
"Yeah, I understand" and also it can feel really calming.
We usually do these behaviors as a way to cope, right?
We talk about this a lot, like if our emotions are feeling
really overwhelming, we're using these things being like
self-harming, binging, purging, exercising,
whatever we do, we're use those as a way to deal with it.
And so watching people do it can be calming as well.
And it's almost like it triggers that same part in our brain
They call it the reward system of the brain
and give us that same probably endorphin rush
or whatever it is, adrenaline, whatever it is
that we get out of the actual behavior.
We get a little bit of that by just watching it.
And so we tend to trigger ourselves a lot
because we crave it, and so ...
I would encourage you, if you're able,
to cut back maybe twenty minutes a day of
watching that kind of stuff or,
as soon as you notice "Hey, why am I watching all this?"
Maybe we should 'x' out of that and maybe get off the
internet for good hour or so just to try
to lessen the amount cause we all know it does end up
triggering us and it does end up sometimes causing us to
do the behaviors that we're trying to fight against.
But yeah, it's very normal.
Know that a lot of people do that and it's
because of that kind of reward system in our brain
and that we crave that feeling.
Now, my journal topic today is one of my own
and someone sent me one on twitter and I saved it
in my little journal topic folder so
I will use it at a later time.
I am addicted to this song, "Am I Wrong?" it's called.
By Nico Ivenz or something like that I think.
The lyrics are fricken amazing and I think
that it could do us all a little good to listen to it.
I love the fact that he talks about like, the whole ...
If you haven't heard the song, he says
"Am I wrong for thinking that we could be something real?"
And he's not talking about a relationship,
he's talking about himself.
We each have a chance to be something real,
we can make a change, we can think outside the box,
we can do more than we ever thought.
And he talk about that, and it's so motivating.
And he rambles off a bunch of things, and he's just like
"That's just how I feel, that's just how I feel."
And it's so powerful for us to que into how we feel.
I'm pissed off, I'm frustrated, I'm sad, I'm whatever.
I would encourage each of you today
to journal about how you feel.
What is it?
Am I excited, am I happy, am I enthralled,
am I pissed off, am I just enraged?
What is it that I feel?
And then just own it, it's okay to feel that way.
We all have feelings and the better we get at expressing
them and getting okay with them, and knowing
that they're just part of our lives,
the better able we'll be to manage them.
We won't find the need to use other things to cope,
and that song is just, crank it up in your car and jam out.
That's what I've been doing, so I hope you enjoy.
I will see you all tomorrow, cause it's finally Friday.
And I'll be on Facebook so ask your questions there.
Bye!