Hi! I’m Jenny!
If you are visiting this page chances are you or someone you care about is struggling with an eating disorder and looking to get help. I remember being in that place like it was yesterday. I was so scared and overwhelmed. I didn't think there was any hope for me. But, hear this: I did recover, and so can you.
I grew up as a competitive dancer, and was so studious that I was valedictorian of my high school class and attended UC Berkeley for college. I pushed myself hard and I appeared successful on paper, but, during that time, my needs and body were made to feel wrong and shameful. I started yo-yo dieting around adolescence and adopted other unnatural behaviors with food that ultimately spiraled into a full blown eating disorder. On top of all of it, I ended up struggling with exercise addiction as well.
The way I ate and exercised felt like something I could control when the rest of my life felt out of control. Eating disorders are inherently competitive, and I loved to compete. My eating disorder had completely overtaken the healthy part of my mind and body. Despite my best efforts to continue dancing and keep up with my studies, I couldn't escape the gnawing feelings of deep-seated inadequacy. My eating disorder spiraled out of control.
During my sophomore year, my dear friend and roommate confronted me about my eating disorder. She noticed the behaviors I had convinced myself were discreet or that no one cared about. She asserted a boundary: she would no longer live with me until I got the treatment I desperately needed. It was her courage that helped me make the hard and necessary decision to leave college and look into residential treatment.
Things were dire. I ended up in the hospital due to complications from my eating disorder, and I was in such a deep depression that I didn't care if I died. When I finally got help, I was lucky that I had a treatment team that knew how to strengthen my healthy self rather than duke it out with my eating disorder. This is now the same approach I take with my own clients. I now consider myself fully recovered. I started Recovered is Possible to give back to the same community that forever changed the course of my life. I enrolled in the Carolyn Costin Institute (CCI) to become a Certified Eating Disorder Recovery Coach. Coaching those who are where I once was in their journey feels incredibly full circle. I made meaning out of one of my darkest hours and my heart couldn't feel more full.
I subscribe to the philosophy that you can be fully recovered from an eating disorder, as I myself am recovered. I no longer have eating disorder thoughts or urges. In fact, I believe I have a better relationship to food, body, and exercise than most people who have never had an eating disorder. I wish the same for you: a full recovery. Let me help you get there.
Qualifications
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I am a Certified Eating Disorder Recovery Coach trained through the Carolyn Costin Institute (CCI).
CCI trains coaches how to best support a client and the client’s treatment team to assist clients in making the necessary day to day behavior changes necessary for recovery.
For years in her private practice and her various treatment programs, Carolyn Costin trained both licensed and non-licensed individuals skills not taught in traditional counseling and therapy programs, such as how to eat with clients, take them grocery shopping or to buy new clothes. These are tasks are now performed by eating disorder coaches, as an adjunct to traditional treatment.
The field of eating disorder coaching is rapidly growing, yet, until now, no formal, rigorous training programs existed, thus she realized the need and CCI was born. CCI is the first to offer a sophisticated, thorough, rigorous certification program.
The coaching program has attracted students from all over the world, with incredibly diverse backgrounds and life experiences: From therapists who desire more eating disorder training, to chefs, housewives and recovered individuals who want the skills to help those with eating disorders recover.
A CCI Eating Disorder Coach assists clients in reaching their treatment goals in real life situations, providing support, appropriate challenges, and serving as both role model and guide.
Coaching is an important aspect of an overall strategy for treating individuals with eating disorders. In essence, coaches provide a crucial aspect of treatment by accompanying clients in everyday situations and providing exposure and response prevention.
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Certification in process.
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University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public research university in Berkeley, CA. Founded in 1868, it is the oldest campus of the University of California system and ranks among the world's top universities in major educational publications. Berkeley offers over 350 degree programs through its 14 colleges and schools.
Antioch University
Built on the ideals of equality and progress. Since its founding in 1852, Antioch University has stayed at the forefront of social justice, inclusion, and equality for all people, regardless of ethnicity, gender, creed, orientation, or ability. Throughout its 165-year history, Antioch has attracted students who took the Antioch values out into the world. Many Antioch alumni, such as Coretta Scott King and Winona LaDuke, have stood for social and environmental justice, and made a difference in the policies and ideologies of the world to the betterment of all.