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realtalk-princeton · 4 years ago

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i'm recovering from an eating disorder and preparing to go into my freshman year at princeton. i'm super nervous for the transition! i noticed some of the contributors have also recovered from disordered eating, and i wanted to know what are the resources/tools available for a student recovering? is princeton a supportive environment for those who are recovering?

Response from Orion:

I myself don't have personal experience with the resources or disordered eating, but I'm a member of Letter to Strangers, a mental health group that is working on some advocacy for resources for recovery from disordered eating on campus. If you want to be involved, submit your netid and I'll reach out to you.

CPS has some resources and an ED team - I believe there may be an ED recovery group, but I'm not sure. Honestly, I've heard that their resources are subpar, which is part of the reasons we're working on reforms and increased training!

Other contributors and readers are probably more qualified to respond to your questions on personal experiences with resources and recovery at Princeton.

Response from Soup Cat:

seconding L2S (i’m also a member) - we’d love to have you! i *think* we’ll also be sending out some kind of survey to the general student body asking for suggestions on cps reforms, so that’s another way to have some input without the full commitment of joining.

CPS definitely gets...mixed reviews, but i think it’s still helpful to set up an initial consultation appt with one of their counselors on the eating concerns team to talk about which resources (on-campus therapy, off-campus providers that work with your insurance, the support group, etc.) would work best for you. also i’ve noticed that they tend to be rather gatekeep-y with their eating concerns team, so this is probably the best way to get access to the clinical dietitian (whom i’ve had a really good experience with), medical checkups/necessary lab testing, and so on, if any of that would be useful to you.

to be completely honest, princeton is not the most supportive environment for recovery. the atmosphere of ultra-high goals and narrow ideals of perfection extends to physical appearance, and imo unhealthy attitudes towards food and body are often normalized. campus dining tends to do a pretty good job of focusing their campaigns on wellness/sustainability rather than calories, but campus rec/dillon is more hit-or-miss (they do talk about wellness/fun, but they also have obnoxious weigh-in and calorie-guessing challenges that they refuse to get rid of despite repeated feedback that this is problematic). the good news is that there are lots of wonderful people at princeton and it’s not hard to surround yourself with friends who will do their best to be understanding and create a supportive microenvironment for you :)

princeton body positivity is a new group that’s seeking to change this overall campus atmosphere and start conversations about healthy relationships with food and our bodies. we recently sent an email to a bunch of listservs and posted in the ‘24 fb page with a list of ED resources and an anonymous ED support group chat -- if anyone can’t find those links, i can post them here. currently we’re pretty small and just have the support group, but we’re hoping to expand and do more with education/outreach/etc this year, so that might be something you’d like to get involved in as well!

on a final note, i’m proud of you for choosing recovery <3 feel free to drop your netid if you ever want to chat, or hit me up for a socially distanced meal when we get to campus!

(sorry for writing a literal essay lmao this is just smth that’s rly important to me and im always happy to babble indefinitely about it LOL)

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