Livia answers a listener question about how to get rid of headaches, tinnitus, and dizziness in anorexia recovery. Want more? Find my books, courses, and coaching programs at livlabelfree.com Episode transcript: Hello my friends, well today is another Q&A episode and today’s question comes from jellyfish1093 on YouTube and they asked if I could do an episode on physical and mental symptoms no one talks about when in anorexia. And obviously there are an infinite number of things no one talks about – or rather, not enough people are talking about – when it comes to eating disorders, especially when said eating disorders intertwine with autism and LGBTQ+ identity and chronic illness and all the other things that well, no one talks about! And by this point, I do hope you know that a huge goal of mine with this podcast and with my books and my courses is to shed light on these underserved topics because they’re things I wish I had known during my own recovery. They’re the things my family wished they’d known because they would have been better able to support me. They’re things that all healthcare professionals SHOULD know so that they can help individuals unleash their full potential rather than trying to treat a “disorder” that’s merely a manifestation of, again, everything no one talks about. Anyways, all that being said, because we’ve of course gotta have some direction, I replied to jellyfish1093 asking if they could elaborate on what stage of recovery they’re in and specifically what symptoms they wanted me to talk about. And here’s what they replied: “I’m currently in quasi recovery. My weight is very low and I am still exercising every day and struggling immensely. I am eating 4 meals a day but have been experiencing headaches, dizziness, tinnitus, and other symptoms like brain fog, extreme anxiety and depression. I also have Autism. Just looking to find hope that if I can fully recover that these symptoms can go away. For 4 years I have been trying to find out why these symptoms are happening but now I am wondering if they are all related to anorexia? Just trying to find hope. Thank you.” Well we’ve got a lot to get into and I am super excited to get into it because, as you may have guessed, I did some research (which basically means I went into multiple research rabbit holes, a very autistic trait, I might add) and I paired my findings with my own lived experience and those of my clients to now bring you this podcast! So buckle up because I’m going to take you on a journey to what I’ve learned so that hopefully, jellyfish1093, this gives you hope, and to anyone else with similar experiences, I hope this gives YOU hope as well. So without further ado, let’s dive in! Alright so we need to establish the facts first. Based on what jellyfish1093 (I freaking love saying that username so thank you for gifting me this opportunity to have a laugh), we’re going to establish as a fact that you are malnourished. Your weight is low, you’re engaging in exercise that you probably shouldn’t be, and you’re not eating enough. So, you’re in a state of energy deficit. Quasi recovery aside, the fact is that your body is depleted. And the fact that I’m really hammering this down right now is because when the body is in a state of energy deficit, nothing can function correctly. And I mean nothing. Because the truth is that the human body is nothing more than a living organism that uses energy and requires that energy to be replenished. And if that energy replenishment – AKA eating and drinking – is hard for you, trust me, I am right there with ya my friend. The amount of times that I have wished that I could photosynthesize, the amount of times I have wished this body didn’t even have needs. The amount of times I have wished I didn’t have to drink or eat or sleep or shower or clean or whatever it is that we have to do on a daily basis just because we have bodies…my god, it’s fucking exhausting. But all those feelings aside, the bottom line is that we do have bodies. And these bodies do have needs. So what happens when we don’t give our body what it needs? What happens is that the body goes into energy conservation mode. It does everything humanly possible (no pun intended) to not use up its limited resources. Now, I’m not going to elaborate on the science behind this too deeply because I literally wrote an entire book called How to Beat Extreme Hunger explaining energy deficit and how this leads to energy debt and why extreme hunger is your body’s attempt at getting you back into homeostasis, and of course, in that book I also share my lived experience around all my recovery fears including mental hunger just being a bad habit, that I would become addicted to food and develop binge eating disorder if I gave into my extreme hunger, and of course, I share how to make peace with weight gain because I’m autistic and philosophical and the whole “oh just love your body and appreciate what it can do for you” NEVER resonated with me because to be honest my friends, I still feel hella trapped in this body. I mean for real, it’s too freaking constraining and demanding. But we’re not gonna go there right now because we were gonna talk about headaches and dizziness and tinnitus and all the things jellyfish1093 has asked about. But yeah, shameless plug for all my books right now because they’re awesome and I worked really hard on them and you can find them all at livlabelfreebooks.com or on Amazon. But now back to the episode and why it’s so important to understand that energy deficit AKA restriction causes the body to try and conserve energy is that this energy conservation causes all kinds of symptoms that, to put it bluntly, fucking suck. You weaken your digestive system which means that when you start eating again in recovery you’ll feel really sick and bloated. You starve your brain which means that there will be imbalances in ALL the neurotransmitters, so hello anxiety and depression. And if you compound energy deficit with being autistic, which I’m just gonna go off on a limb here and say you probably feel permanently burnt out just trying to navigate a world not built for you, well when you take all these factors into account, well no wonder you’re in so much pain all the time. But here is the plot twist: You’re not broken. You don’t need to be fixed. What you need is to create safety within yourself and your environment. But that’s of course just the overarching message of all of this. Because essentially, the trauma caused by being autistic in a non-accommodating world compounded with the trauma of an eating disorder, while ironically being the ED being a trauma response in and of itself, well all of this just creates a never-ending spiral of fight-or-flight mode, which is incredibly energetically demanding, and thus not sustainable. So how does all of this connect to anorexia symptoms, specifically headaches and tinnitus? Well, there are a lot of different kinds of headaches, but for me personally, my headaches were always tension headaches. This might sound kinda weird, but I felt my headaches from the front of my head all the way down to my lower back and this is because I carry so much stress with me all the time, and honestly, I still do. But when you are malnourished, your body is way more fragile so everything you experience is going to be experienced on infinitely high volume. This is why we have zero flexibility when we have eating disorders. The body and brain simply do not have enough energy to consider other options. So hello black and white thinking and what is often termed as “rigid” thinking. Now of course there’s nuance to this because autistic people often already have difficulty with change. So again, add malnutrition to that, and you’ve practically just turned that autism dial up a few notches. This is also why many people who are not autistic can actually display autistic traits during active eating disorders. But again, that’s a whole nother topic which you can learn more about in my Autistically ED-Free Academy at livlabelfree.com/group or you can book a 1-1 coaching session with me at livlabelfree.com/coaching if you’d like to work with me privately. So, jellyfish1093 and anyone else listening, I don’t know what kinds of headaches you’re experiencing or if there’s anything that makes them worse or better, but what I do know is that restriction is fueling your fight-or-flight response, which scientifically speaking can cause headaches! Why? Well, your body perceives restriction, so energy deficit, as a famine. When you’re not eating enough, your nervous system believes there aren’t enough resources. I mean, why else would you be starving yourself? As I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, a lack of resources is one of the greatest threats to human survival! But because your body is designed to do everything in its power to ensure your survival, it’s going to activate that fight-or-flight mode so you can fight or flee whatever is causing you to be malnourished. Of course, your nervous system that obviously doesn’t have a logical thinking organ cannot know that you’re not actually in a famine environment, and it doesn’t know that you’re purposely restricting for other reasons, including fear of weight gain, autistic masking, and all the other things I talk about on this podcast and in my books and courses. Now, why is this relevant? Because when you’re in a permanent state of fight-or-flight mode, your body is literally tensing up ALL the time! Your neck muscles, your shoulder muscles, your scalp muscles, everything is constantly clenched and ready for battle. And, well, can you guess what happens when those muscles stay contracted for weeks, months, perhaps even years? Hello tension headaches! Of course, tension headaches aren’t the only type of headache
