A woman who recovered from anorexia has become a fitness coach to help inspire other women grappling with their body image.
Tia Ainsworth, 23, said years of her life were taken away after developing an eating disorder aged 18, during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Too weak to exercise when her illness was at its worst, Tia said once she felt stronger in her recovery she got herself a personal trainer – which changed her relationship with her body.
While her recovery is not linear, Tia said she now moves her body to be stronger not smaller, and thanks weightlifting for “finally feeling herself” again.
Tia, from Rhos-On-Sea in Conwy, described her recovery as “by far the hardest thing” she had ever done in her life.
With gyms shut during lockdown, Tia said she lost the endorphins she would get from exercise and tried to regain control with food.
“It took over my life, it took over me as a person, I was a shell of a person,” she said, adding: “I wasn’t the Tia everybody knew, it was a really hard time for me and my family.”
Tia’s breaking point came when lockdown lifted and the freedom to socialise unlocked a daunting lack of control for her.
It would bring her to tears with frustration, Tia said, and she decided enough was enough.
When physically and mentally ready in her recovery, Tia decided to get back into exercise with the support of a personal trainer, who she says shifted her focus from burning calories to building muscle and strength.
After almost five years of recovery, Tia said she finally like she has her life back.
“During my eating disorder I exercised for all the wrong reasons… to be the smallest possible version of myself”, said Tia.
“But now… I look at exercise to be strong, I look at exercise to be confident and I use it for a feeling.”
With the help of her personal trainer, Tia has been a qualified fitness coach for the past four years, and also uses her platform on Instagram to inspire others, by being open about her struggles.
Anorexia nervosa, also known as anorexia, is an eating disorder and serious mental health condition that can cause individuals to limit how much they eat or drink. People with the disorder can often have a distorted body image.
According to the NHS, men and women of any age can get anorexia, but it was most common in young women and typically started in the mid-teens.
Currently working with clients who have anorexia, Tia said she thinks her story has “given them a glimpse of hope that recovery is possible”.
Tia classes herself as a “confidence coach” above all, and said exercise for her now is about making herself feel good rather than look good.
“You could be in the best shape of your life, but if you’re miserable, what’s the point?”
“My main aim is to show women how weightlifting helped me and can help others – both physically and mentally.”
Sport and exercise professor Dr Hester Hockin-Boyers, of Durham University, has explored how women at various stages of recovery use weightlifting as a tool for treating their eating disorder.
Her research found that weightlifting in different styles helped shift their perspective on exercise, “from a focus on restriction and becoming smaller to one centred on gaining strength and muscle”.
“This shift was crucial in fostering a healthier relationship with their bodies,” said Dr Hockin-Boyers.
She added: “Weightlifting also provided a sense of structure that many women associated with feelings of ‘calm’ and ‘safety’, helping them compartmentalise exercise within their daily lives.”
Having structured workouts also encouraged rest days, she said, which played a key role in preventing exercise from becoming obsessive or compulsive.
She also found many participants established a strong sense of community in weightlifting, which provided social support throughout their recovery.
Eating disorder charity Beat said a positive relationship with exercise was possible for someone who had had an eating disorder once they were much further along in their recovery journey, but admitted it was a “very complex relationship”.
Umairah Malik, Beat’s clinical and co-production manager, said while not every person would struggle with exercise as part of their illness, “it’s important to recognise some of the signs that could suggest an unhealthy relationship with exercise”.
Ms Malik said the signs could include:
- Exercising when unwell or through an injury
- Exercising as compensation for eating
- Being preoccupied with exercise to the extent of sacrificing things like social events
For those in recovery and looking to exercise, Beat recommends regular check-ins, close contact to medical professionals and thinking carefully about your reasons for wanting to exercise.
Signs and symptoms of anorexia
- If you’re under 18, your weight and height being lower than the minimum expected for your age
- If you’re an adult, having an unusually low body mass index (BMI), missing meals or eating very little
- Thinking about food a lot and being very careful about what you eat, such as avoiding eating any foods you see as fattening
- Believing you’re fat when you’re a healthy weight or underweight
- Your periods stopping (in women who have not reached menopause) or not starting (in younger women and girls)
- Physical problems, such as feeling lightheaded or dizzy, hair loss or dry skin
Source: NHS
If you or anyone you know have been affected by any of the themes raised in this article, help and support is available on Action Line.
