How Yoga Saved My Life: My Journey Through Eating Disorder Recovery
I was 16, curled up in a window seat on a flight home, shivering and barely present in my body. With a new journal in my lap and a pen in hand, I wrote the words: “I am anorexic.” That moment marked the beginning of my eating disorder recovery — a long, painful, but ultimately life-affirming journey that led me from silence to voice, from disconnection to embodiment, and from illness to healing through yoga.
The Shrinking Girl: Early Signs of an Eating Disorder
Like many, I didn’t recognize the early signs of an eating disorder in myself. I had no mental image of what I looked like back then, nor a true understanding of how dangerously close to death I was. What I did know was the pain of slowly disappearing, emotionally and physically.
As a child, I was bright and full of life. But as puberty approached, things changed. My body became unfamiliar, and the world’s gaze felt heavier. I started shrinking myself to go unnoticed. The idea of womanhood brought embarrassment and shame. I wasn’t trying to be thin, I was trying not to exist.
An illness in my early teens triggered rapid weight loss, and the comfort I found in that sparked a terrifying spiral. The final push came when my sister, healthy and radiant, returned home from college having lost some weight. I felt like I lost the only thing that made me valuable, being the “string bean” of the family.
Eventually, my parents brought me to the doctor. The puzzled looks on the professionals' faces made it clear they didn’t fully understand what I was experiencing. But my body told a different story. I was weak, freezing cold, blacking out, and headed toward cardiac arrest.
The types of eating disorder treatment that followed were intense: hospitalization, full-time monitoring, refeeding, and eventually transitioning to day treatment and intensive outpatient (IOP) care. I had therapy multiple times a week and regular weigh-ins. Each step was terrifying and uncomfortable, but each one saved my life.
Some treatment environments were deeply flawed, and some words spoken to me in those moments still echo painfully in my mind. But among the darkness were also the light-bearers: my mom, my sister, and the inspiring professionals who helped me survive.
Yoga For Eating Disorders: A Path to Recovery
One unexpected gift in my eating disorder recovery was the introduction of yoga. At first, I saw it as a form of exercise, a sneaky way to control my body again. But what I found instead was connection, softness, and eventually, healing.
Yoga helped me begin to feel my body instead of flee from it. It gently reintroduced me to my emotions, my breath, and my presence. Through practice, I learned to differentiate between my thoughts and my feelings. I stopped trying to numb and started trying to listen.
This mindful movement gave me back my voice, the one I had silenced for so long. With each posture, I spoke a little louder to myself. And that voice eventually became the foundation of a new purpose.
Years later, I met someone who helped me integrate my experience into something meaningful. With her guidance, I uncovered the subconscious beliefs that kept me sick and learned how to dismantle them with compassion. I began speaking openly, working through the shame, and reconnecting with my passion to serve others.
That journey led me to Eat Breathe Thrive, more specifically, their program that combines yoga with eating disorder recovery. I attended their immersion and connected with Melanie Taylor, a trauma-informed yoga teacher trainer who helped me become a certified yoga teacher. Since then, I’ve built my own business, I See You Movement. We have built a compassionate community where people reconnect with their bodies, amplify their voices, and embrace their true selves with love and resilience.
Today, I’m training to be a facilitator of Eat Breathe Thrive’s 7-week series, ready to use my voice, my story, and my training to support others in their own healing journeys.
What Eating Disorder Recovery Has Taught Me
Recovery is possible. It’s not linear. It’s not easy. And it’s certainly not a solo act.
What sustained me wasn’t just therapy or yoga or nutrition. It was people: my mom, my sister, the doctors who intervened, and my fiancé who held space for my truth without flinching. Their love, coupled with years of treatment and the grounding practice of yoga, created the foundation for the life I live now. A life not defined by illness but by embodiment.
I still work every day to be kind to myself. But I no longer live in fear of relapse. I live in pursuit of connection, truth, and growth.
Do You Need Support?
If you are in eating disorder recovery and interested in exploring how yoga might support your process, you can join our free Yoga For Eating Disorder Recovery course. It’s the course Cori participated in, and it runs every month. To learn more and register, click here.