Wednesday marked Bell Let’s Talk Day and Move 100’s Katherine Dines shared her mental health journey with CTV Morning Live to help others navigate through the challenges that they might be facing.
Dines says her journey began when she was young. As a child, she says, she wanted to fit in and be accepted, noting that she was seeing a lot of media images.
“I remember being 10 and getting a hold of some diet pills that had belonged to a family member,” she said.
“I think I just figured, if I could just be thin, if I could just be skinny, if I could just be like the models on the magazine pages, (I would be accepted). I remember that going through my head. It kind of evolved from there.”
That was when she started restricting her eating until her weight dropped down to 80 pounds. She says she was hospitalized multiple times.
Dines notes that at the time, she did not correlate between the lack of food and nutrition and the need to be hospitalized.
Her eating disorder “continued a bit into young adulthood,” she says, pointing out “some stress induced anorexia” while dealing with stressful situations.
“I just couldn’t eat, didn’t want to eat,” she said.
“I felt like food was standing between me and just being successful. As a young mind, what I was reading, what I was seeing (and) what I was hearing, just felt like food makes you fat, and that’s not ok. And these are some of the things that I tried to sort through without any guidance either. It was a time that there wasn’t a lot available for young people.”
Dines says kids nowadays have access to more resources, where they can ask questions and receive guidance.
She recalls being a terrified child, with a lot of deep thoughts, high sensitivity, and not feeling like she could trust anybody. Dines felt she would be in trouble no matter what decision she makes, noting that she didn’t know who to talk to about things at the time.
“So, you try to answer some of those things on your own. And without that help and guidance, you make a lot of missteps and mistakes along the way,” Dines said.
Dines lost her mother when she was a four-month-old infant. The absence of the mother figure created a void in her life.
“Kids are resilient. But even now, not a day goes by that I don’t wonder what she would have been like,” she said.
“It’s like a missing piece. And mothers are supposed to nurture, love and guide their children and help them create that strong foundation. And I think a lot of times when that’s missing and there’s no replacement, it can leave a void or you just resort to other ways to fill that, and not always healthy ways, and that was a situation that I found myself in.”
In adulthood, some of the triggers have been related to relationships. Dines says she didn’t have a psychologist at an early age and not until after her children were born.
“So, definitely relationships have been a struggle,” she said.
Dines says after she became a mother, she “suppressed a lot of things” for many years.
Some of the challenges that she had never processed were brought back to surface, as she was reliving the emotions she had felt through her kid’s eyes, while she was helping and guiding them as a mother.
Journey towards wellness
Dines is a mother to two girls. She’s not only thriving, but also has a successful career. She notes that achieving well-being is a journey.
“I’m still on that journey,” she said. “Through years of therapy, reading and educating myself, I realized for a lot of us it’s just a daily journey that you just keep going. You keep finding ways to cope. I have to say that I’ve had a lot of panic attacks. I’ve had a lot of high anxiety moments even during my career. I’ve had to get through them.”
She encourages people to get the help needed. She says she’s used many resources, including the Distress Center of Ottawa.
Her psychologist helps her work through the feelings of shame and guilt, she says. Dines also learned how to forgive herself for making unhealthy choices through her psychologist.
The specialist has helped Dines realize that she did the best she could when she was a child and a young person, especially without guidance.
Dines says she was on a wait list for a long time before she was able to see a specialist, noting that she was diagnosed with CPTSD.
“I’m committed to getting stronger every day,” she said. “I’m probably the healthiest I’ve ever been in my life.”
Dines says sticking to a healthy diet, surrounding herself with a good circle of people and exercising helped her get to a better headspace.
Anorexia is an eating disorder that is treatable. People who have anorexia often have a strong fear of gaining weight and may think they’re overweight, even when they’re not.
The 15th anniversary of Bell Let’s Talk Day spotted the light on the growing youth mental health crisis in Canada. A report from Health Canada shows 1.25 million young people need help with their mental health in the country, noting that one in two youths are not getting the help they need.
