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Contrasting the tales of new and veteran members evidences a significant transformation.
Through group participation, sufferers develop an ability to trust in one’s experience, a fortified
sense of self. Veteran members’ stories of recognition and tales of woe play a key role in
enabling new participants to recognize and name their experience (Cain 1991), as does the mere
power of group affirmation. Participants’ self-definition challenges a historical legacy in which
society denied women the right to play expert to their own body (Ehrenreich and English 1978).
Challenging “expert” opinion is tantamount to challenging male authority (Brown and Ferguson
1995). Moreover, in a society that typically doubts women’s ability to trust and label their own
experience, a fortified sense of sense has significant gendered implications. Trust in one’s
experience is crucial in enabling women to label the many remaining elements of sexism.
Challenging and Changing Relationships
Armed with a fortified sense of self, participants further learn to employ the eating
disorder as a narrative strategy in challenging the distribution of power in many hierarchical
relationships, particularly in marriage and in other family relationships (Hydén 1997). For one
college-age participant, having an eating disorder enabled her to reject responsibility for
planning family events, a common female responsibility. Rebecca explained to the group that in
past years, she had been responsible for planning her family’s Easter celebration. This year, her
grandfather and male cousin called to ask, while she was undergoing inpatient treatment for her
eating disorder, “What are we doing for Easter?” Rebecca reproduced her reply for the group
with pride and satisfaction: “I don’t know…what are we doing for Easter?” Both she and her
mother remained resolute. Neither would agree to plan the celebration. Rebecca’s eating
disorder provided a basis on which to challenge the gendered distribution of family
responsibilities.
The most striking examples concern participants’ relationships with significant others.
Melanie, a married mother of two, employed the eating disorder, and recovery, in challenging the
distribution of childcare responsibilities. Consider the following excerpt from my field notes:
Melanie explained to the group that she had started asking her husband to wait up
for her two teenagers on the weekend. She continued to explain that the extra
sleep is necessary if she is to properly “take care of [her]self” and, as a result, is
necessary for her recovery. Her husband agreed, leading Melanie to realize: “All I
had to was ask.”
Convention