A blog by Pepetoe.

Romantic love gets a lot of credit. Especially around Valentine’s Day. It’s framed as the ultimate proof that you’re doing life “right”. That you’re wanted, chosen, complete. But when I look back at what actually carried me through my eating disorder and into recovery, it wasn’t romance that saved me. It was friendship. It was family. It was the quiet, unglamorous love that stayed when I was no longer fun to be around, no longer easy to talk to, no longer impressive in my achievements.

There’s a version of illness people find palatable. The before-and-after story, the inspirational arc, the “strong” narrative. But recovery isn’t neat. It’s repetitive. It’s boring and exhausting and deeply inconvenient in so many ways. When you’re in that place, you don’t need grand gestures. You need people who can sit with you while you eat. People who don’t flinch when you cancel plans. People who don’t take it personally when your world becomes very small.

Some of the most loving moments of my recovery didn’t look like love at all. They looked like my mum making food when I couldn’t decide. Like friends not commenting on my body when it changed. Like someone texting “I’m proud of you” without asking for proof. Like being allowed to exist without entertaining anyone.

Eating disorders are isolating by design. They convince you that needing people is weakness, that independence means doing everything alone, that being “low maintenance” makes you more lovable. Recovery asks you to unlearn all of that. It asks you to let people see you on days when you’re withdrawn, irritable, anxious, or scared. And that kind of visibility can feel more vulnerable than being in love with someone romantically.

Friendship in recovery isn’t about being the best version of yourself. It’s about being your most honest one. It’s about letting someone see you when you’re not productive, not glowing, not progressing in a way that looks good on paper. It’s about trusting that you don’t need to earn your place in someone’s life by shrinking or performing.

I think we don’t talk enough about how radical platonic love is. How healing it can be to be chosen without expectation. To be cared for without being desired. To be loved without being assessed. In a world that so often ties worth to attractiveness, productivity, or emotional availability, friendship offers something steadier. Something safer.

There were days in my recovery when romance felt impossible. When my body didn’t feel like a place anyone else should be invited into, when my energy barely stretched far enough to get through the day. On those days, friendship held me. People didn’t ask me to be exciting or optimistic or “better”. They met me where I was. And that mattered more than I knew at the time.

Recovery also changes friendships. Some deepen. Some fall away. Some struggle under the weight of honesty. And that can be painful. But the relationships that remain – the ones that adapt, that make room for slowness and boundaries – those are the ones that teach you what safe love actually feels like.

This kind of love doesn’t rush you. It doesn’t comment on your body. It doesn’t make your recovery about them. It doesn’t disappear when you stop being convenient. It stays. It listens. It reminds you who you are when your eating disorder tries to erase you.

If you’re in recovery and you feel lonely, or behind, or disconnected from the glossy version of love everyone seems to be celebrating, you’re not missing something. You’re learning something different. You’re learning that love doesn’t have to be loud to be life-saving. That the relationships that hold you together might not come with romance, but they come with safety.

And sometimes, the love that actually saves you isn’t the one that sweeps you off your feet.

It’s the one that sits beside you while you learn how to stand again.