“She Thought I Was Dying!” – Obsessed with Starving: Zerina’s Eating Disorder Recovery

Even her parents were sure: Zerina would not make it alive through November and December into the new year. That was no exaggeration. It was the result of 13 years of anorexia, bulimia and rumination, and of being written off as a “hopeless case” by six different therapists. No clinic was willing to help her anymore.

Zerina came to me for coaching in November 2022. After half a year, in spring 2023, we recorded a podcast episode together.

So when she says “yesterday”, “last year” or “for six months” here, she means how things stood back then. Here you read her story in her own words.

How it all began

“I started developing eating disorders 13 years ago,” Zerina says. “Already at six, after my grandma died. For me it was bulimia first, and these addictions. Then came rumination. It started when I was eight and went away again, because it turned into bulimia.”

From the start there was the pressure to be good.

“I always wanted to be good at school. Looking back, I realised: so the others would like me, so I'd be something. I did the others' homework, and then I was the cool one. I still didn't get invited to hang out.”

“Between 10 and 13 I went through a very depressive phase, with suicidal thoughts too.” At 13 she went into a clinic, for about eight and a half weeks.

“From the start I told myself: I'm here now and I'm stopping. I didn't throw up at all anymore, and I felt good, because I was doing it for myself.”

For two and a half years that went well. “I started living. I was happy.”

Performance pressure and the relapse

“The performance pressure at school stayed. I still always wanted to be the best. If my grade average at the end of the school year wasn't better than 1.5, I wasn't good enough.”

After her secondary school exams, Zerina had her last appointment with her therapist at the time.

“Everything was okay, I was living my life. And then he says: You don't need to gain any more, that's enough now. He had always said: live your life, be happy. And now I was suddenly too much again.”

She was desperate to fit into her graduation dress and started losing weight.

At the last appointment in July 2019, her father joked with the therapist, who said: “Ask your daughter.” Zerina: “That gave me another push: okay, that's good, keep going.”

At the Gymnasium (academic high school) the pressure increased even further: “I'm not enough because I come from the Realschule. I'm nothing, I have to give everything now.”

And then: “How did I let that pressure out? From October 2019 I had the relapse. I started throwing up again because I had this pressure inside me. I want to be perfect.”

I know this cycle from my own experience. You slide into compensating, and often you only notice afterwards what is going on.

2022: “my final year”

“2022 was my final year. I was at the end, physically and psychologically,” says Zerina.

“I'm still grateful. Every time I ask myself how I managed to survive and how my organs stayed the way they are.”

“I always said: I can do this on my own, I don't need doctors or psychologists. But I stayed in the vicious circle. One day was fine, and in the evening I started with my old patterns again.”

She had looked for help many times: clinics, six different therapists, coaching, mentoring. None of it really helped her, quite the opposite.

Her first therapist told her, back when she was a young girl and talked about throwing up: “If you're doing fine with it, then just carry on.” Zerina: “After that I couldn't see anything anymore.”

Her parents stood behind her the whole time. “Their hands were tied. They said: if she's doing fine with it, then better that she lives than that we lose her.”

And: “Last year [2022] I didn't even have the strength to walk out of the car when I'd been at school until 6 p.m. My father carried me through the yard and the stairwell.”

“My father came to my door in the morning to see whether I was still alive. My mum checked at night whether I was still breathing.”

And: “The eating disorder changed my character, made it negative. I didn't speak to my father for three months because I suddenly hated him. I ignored everyone around me.”

Zerina and her family were certain: she would not live to see 2023 or her 20th birthday. Zerina says it herself: “I was at my worst point. I know I wouldn't have seen the year 2023.”

How Zerina and I found each other

“I'd been in touch for a while with a friend who does coaching herself,” Zerina says.

“I wanted to do coaching with her, because she was the only one I knew. She wrote to me that she knew someone who is similar to me.”

“I looked at your profile and at your highlights with a former client who also had bulimia. That moved me so much. I told myself: I can do this too. If someone managed it with her, she'll understand me.”

Zerina wrote to me that she had a history of eating disorders and competition ambitions and asked whether I would recommend it to her. I sent her a voice memo, and we arranged a first call.

After the first five minutes of our non-binding phone call she could hardly speak for tears of joy. Zerina: “After the first call I noticed that you understand me. I cried my eyes out.”

At last she felt understood and no longer alone. She cancelled every other first call she had planned with other coaches, because she knew: “Lina is my rescue!”

I felt the despair. I had goosebumps from head to toe.

I once stood at that point myself, and I always felt alone. I was aware of the danger. At the same time I felt: there is something there.

I never doubted her will. From the first second I felt that Zerina needed me and that I could give her what she so urgently needed for her recovery.

I did not want to look back one day and think: “If only I had helped her.” Abandoning her was out of the question.

The start: a fixed plan first

Zerina came to me for coaching in November 2022. “The first period especially was really difficult,” I tell her in the episode.

“When we talked about how to handle food, we said: a fixed plan first. You ate very little and had a bad feeling about it.”

Zerina: “When the meal plan came, at first it was: Lina, I can't do this.”

Me: “I got 100 messages. I can't do this, I don't want to anymore, I want to go back. And in between, again and again: I'd rather quit the coaching. Then we talked on the phone. And suddenly the world was fine again.”

“Going all-in would have been the worst starting strategy for me,” says Zerina.

“Because of the plan I noticed: I accept that I eat this much, and I'm full. After a week the feeling after a binge was gone, because I had enough. I gave my body what it was looking for.”

Me: “I don't do all-in at all. First we find the strategy that fits you, and then we invite intuition in. A meal plan doesn't have to be rigid.”

At the time of recording, Zerina swapped things out on her own without asking me: “I let much more intuition in. It feels so good to eat what I really feel like.”

Zerina remembers December 2022: “I had the advent calendar and was scared of the protein bars. We did it strategically: half a sweet from the advent calendar every day. That helped me. It's okay to eat what you feel like, just not to overdo it.”

The feeling of fullness was also an issue. Zerina: “I have to learn to eat this much because I need it. When I feel full, I accept that. I gave my body nothing for the last years. It has to get used to it.” We talk about that openly in coaching.

Another issue was the step compulsion. Me: “Every morning you walked steps for two hours. We reduced that week by week and dropped the compulsion completely in a very short time, without resistance.”

With sport we cut back and added yoga. Her mum told me she never would have believed it would go away.

We started very deep, with a detailed intake: nutrition, sport, eating behaviour, her way of thinking and, of course, her hormones and her health.

Zerina: “I started working on my problems and asking: where is the problem? And not taking the eating disorder as the symptom.” The eating disorder is just the symptom you can see from the outside.

Her parents

In February 2023 Zerina visited me together with her parents, shortly before her birthday. Her mother and father were very moved, and a lot of tears were shed.

“My parents keep saying: we're grateful to God that we came across Lina. Lina was our last hope. If we hadn't had Lina, we wouldn't have a daughter anymore.”

And: “You are an angel who came to save our daughter.”

Zerina: “My father says: I can't identify you with the Zerina from back then anymore. That wasn't you. That was the eating disorder. You're so much more than that.”

Six months later: what has changed

I am very proud of Zerina and of what she has achieved in half a year since November 2022.

Zerina in the episode: “Yesterday I got my new blood results. My doctor said she hasn't had such good blood results from me in the last three years, because there's no deficiency anymore. My hair isn't falling out anymore and has started to curl again, like it last did when I was 14.”

Me: “You've managed to stop doing steps in the morning, to not throw up since day 1, to no longer be stuck in constant performance thinking.” Zerina: “And this wanting-to-make-myself-thin to compensate for some problem isn't there anymore.”

The therapists and clinics who wrote her off as a hopeless case were wrong. I tell her: “You were never your eating disorder.”

Zerina: “My key point was that I learned: my performance doesn't define me, and neither does my appearance. People don't love me because of my grades. They love me because I am. I've felt this good for a month and a half because I've learned to love myself as I am.”

We started with the regular coaching and after a month decided to step it up and add 1:1 calls. That is when studying medicine came up.

Zerina: “I thought my family wanted that, because they always said: Zerina will be our doctor. Now I know: my path is something completely different. And that's okay too.” She also learned to set boundaries: “I always tried to please everyone and to save the world.”

Her hormones are improving too. Zerina wrote to me: “Lina, I notice a lot is happening.” And how does it feel when your strength for life comes back? Zerina: “You feel like experiencing things again.”

“I want to live. I want to travel, I want to love my family. Food freedom. I don't want to throw up anymore. This feeling of fullness is okay. I want to learn a proper squat.”

And: “I simply want to live. I'm slowly noticing how much is in me, and I want to live that out now.”

What the eating disorder took from her

Zerina does not want to hide this: “I had very beautiful teeth and I loved to smile. At some point my teeth suffered badly from the vomiting. Today eating, chewing and drinking hurt. With every apple I'm afraid a tooth will break off.”

“On top of that comes the oesophagus: inflammation more often, cramps at night. When you have to get up crying at two in the morning and your father doesn't know what to do, that's not nice. This pain reminds me of what I did to myself.”

And: “It robs you of quality of life. You can't laugh anymore because you're embarrassed to show your teeth.”

With anorexia you make yourself invisible. So I ask: “Why do you want to make yourself invisible, why do you want to disappear?”

And with bulimia: “What don't you dare to say, what don't you dare to feel, what's buried there?” Not eating, or eating and throwing up, does not solve any problem. “Maybe in those moments you're afraid of being you.”

Zerina's advice to you

Zerina's keyword is trust: “Trust that there's a way for you. And when others say you're not enough, you'll die: don't listen, listen to yourself. You only live once. Use this chance to live for yourself, not for other people.”

And if you are afraid of the first step? “Just try. Fear is our biggest friend. If you're afraid of something, do it. If you're afraid to talk to someone about your problem: that's someone who wants to help you. Maybe the person you have your first call with is the person who saves your life.”

My advice: if your gut says yes and your head says no, do it.

Zerina: “And if there's a problem, bring it up. You're in coaching so that you get helped.”

Zerina about us: “My mum says by now: you love Lina more than me, you write to her more. But you're allowed to build the bond, you're allowed to trust, you're allowed to go for yourself.”

And about the future: “I don't know what will happen. I've stopped playing fortune-teller. But I know I've been living for six months. That means the world to me.”

What Zerina wrote

Zerina's feedback after almost six months, in her words:

You will find more feedback here.

How Zerina is doing today

We recorded our episode in spring 2023. Today Zerina is a certified breathwork instructor and even part of my Female Balance Sisterhood, where she holds the space for the women in the group in her own breathwork session.

Her period, which had stopped during the eating disorder, is back. And instead of eating strictly vegan, she now eats what her body asks for.

I am Lina, a state-certified nutrition consultant, health coach for women’s health and an expert in cycle loss. I know eating disorders from my own experience. You deserve to live a self-determined life too. I am happy to help you with that.