Journaling Your New Healthy Habits

Part of coping with having an eating disorder is developing new, healthy habits that give 
you an alternative. Perhaps you have binge eating disorder and need something to 
occupy your mind instead of binging, or you need a better way to deal with your 
emotional turmoil aside from binging and purging with bulimia. Take a look at the 
different ways you can use a journal for these new healthy habits.

Make a Plan in the Journal

Begin by making your new healthy habits plan right in the journal. This should be related 
to recovering from your eating disorder, and incorporate anything your doctor or 
recovery counselor has advised you to do. You don’t want to have a strict diet or 
anything that is going to be more damaging to you in the long-run, but rather have 
things and actions that will make you better mentally and physically.

What you choose to plan out for your new healthy lifestyle is dependent on you, what 
areas you need to work on, and what eating disorder you are recovering from. Working 
together with a mental health professional on this part can also be really useful.

Begin Logging Your Daily Habits

Once you have the plan in place, you can start using the journal to log your daily habits. 
These should coincide with the healthy habits you have planned out in step one. You 
want to keep track of everything, whether it is something you did or not. If you skipped a 
meal when you are trying to recover from anorexia, or you binged and purged from your 
bulimia, be honest and write that down. Even something as small as counting calories 
during a meal when you have been told not to do this any longer. Also write about every 
good healthy habit you did as expected! Embrace the good and the bad with your 
journal in order to benefit the most from it.

Have a Score Card Related to Your Eating Disorder

You can also try having a score card on one page of your journal. This should be about 
one specific goal or habit you are trying to achieve or break. If you have binge eating 
disorder, keep a score card of how many days in a row you go without binging. Some 
weeks, you will have every day checked off, other weeks might only be a few days. 
Don’t use it as a way to punish yourself, but to reward yourself when you accomplish 
something.

