Eating disorders on the road

[Koala]

I've been curious for a while to see if anyone else has experience dealing with eating disorders while traveling or in general, and if not I figured I'd at least share a bit about my experiences.

I've had a wide range of eating and exercise disorders my whole life. During the worst of it, I was severely underweight (anorexia) & depressed and was having daily panic attacks. I've since made a lot of progress in recovery and maintain a semi-stable healthy weight and have healthier relationships with food and exercise and my mental health and body are much healthier.

Traveling is inevitable unstable, sometimes with varying lack of access to food and long periods of physical exertion / long sedentary periods. I find the extremes most triggering of my compulsive overeating/undereating/overexercising tendencies. I benefit from acquiring each meal as I need it and trying to aim for a moderate amount of physical activity every day.

It would be cool to hear if anyone else has had similar experiences/advice! Also if anyone has any questions I'm open to answer anything

 

[Deleted member 16034]

I had the opposite. I've had problems with anorexia and usually because I've never had enough privacy on the road to get totally naked and look at my body I don't get as unhappy with how my body looks.

The weeks after I get off the road, however, are a totally different story.

 

[sd40chef]

^^To me, real beauty lies in the soul. Although it is important to treat our body as a temple, I feel we need to be more conscious of the appearance of our minds than our bodies.
I definitely had some stomach problems on the road. Had a few episodes of really bad food poisoning in Burma and India, one being hospitalized and nearly dying of dehydration from puking and shitting so much and my body not being able to retain any fluid intake, all that with an intense tropical climate to live it through.
After coming back to north america, I was diagnosed with Hepatitis E after visiting the hospital after noticing my eyes and skin turning yellow, a sign of jaundice. Turns out my liver was really inflamed (hepatitis) and E is the virus that caused it, one that is not found in north america. Definitely picked it up in India and 6-8 weeks later the effects started to show, once I was back in Canada. since then, it has been going away.
As for traveling in north america, as well. Definitely a lot healthier feeling that certain times in Asia but still has its moments. What really irks me is the amount of communities that accept tap water fluoridation and, as a transient, i have no choice but to consume it, unless, i want to buy all my water, which i do not.
The fact that I don't eat three meals a day and tend to snack throughout the day or eat a shit ton at once messes with my stomach as well and sometime gets upset and really nasty farts haha.
I am vegetarian for the most part although when dumpster diving or picking through garbages in cities, if i find meat (wings, ribs, sandwiches with meat, etc), i feel strongly about food waste and i will eat it, despite never purchasing it. I have gotten really upset stomach and gas recently in calgary from eating a bunch of ribs that were still hot in a leftover box in a city garbage. hehe. i feel better now but yeah, definitely had my fair share of eating disorders and whatnot on the road.

 

[Ori]

I am pretty excessive when it comes to working out and eating properly. I can work out up to 14 x a week (twice a day), which is an awful thing to do on the road when you don't get the proper nutrition and your energy is already low to begin with. It's kind of counterproductive and my body will just shed muscle since there's no fat to shed.

So, it all comes down to fighting your brain, mentally and telling yourself it's okay to not do it and overcoming that, at least for me..