The Middle Place in Eating Disorder Recovery: How Slips Can Be Stepping Stones With Mallary Tenore Tarpley, MFA
Interview by Dr. Marianne Miller, LMFT, offering eating disorder therapy in San Diego, and throughout California, Texas, and Washington D.C.
Welcome to this interview post with Mallary Tenore Tarpley, who is a journalist and author from Austin, Texas. Mallary just published a book based on her experiences with an eating disorder, as well as hundreds of interviews with diverse peoples who both suffer or have suffered from an eating disorder. Mallary also included conversations with top eating disorder experts such as Dr. Margo Maine and Carolyn Costin. Learn about the middle place, where slips, recovery, and a full life coexist.
Your new book is called SLIP: Life in the Middle of Eating Disorder Recovery. What inspired you to write this book now, and what do you hope readers will take away from it?
It’s not an exaggeration to say that I spent more than half my life writing different iterations of this book, dating back to when I was 17 years old. Every five or six years, I’d write a different version. Each one was focused on my struggles with anorexia nervosa, which I had developed at age 12 after my mother died of metastatic breast cancer.
I used to think I had to be fully recovered to get my book published; all the books I’d ever read about anorexia were written from the perspective of people who had overcome their disorder. For so long I had told everyone I was fully recovered, even though I was still struggling. There was such a strong disconnect between the narrative I was sharing with the world and the one I was living out behind closed doors, and I eventually found myself wanting to tell a truer, more authentic narrative.
When I set out to write what would become the final iteration of my book, I decided to courageously embrace this authenticity and tell a story I hadn’t seen written before — not one about full recovery but about what it’s like to be in ongoing recovery, where slips coexist alongside progress.
As a woman who has been in recovery for 25 years, I wanted to address tough questions: What does it mean to be better, but not all better? How can those of us in ongoing recovery continue to move forward even when our disorder remains a vulnerability? And what if, instead of stigmatizing slips, we could see them as an inevitable part of progress? I wanted to answer these driving questions not just for myself, but for readers.
Above all else, I hope SLIP will help readers feel seen and heard. When we only ever hear and celebrate stories of full recovery, it can leave many who aren’t fully recovered feeling as though their narratives are invalid or unworthy of being shared. With this book, I want to help our field take a more inclusive approach to describing recovery by recognizing the many people who find themselves in the messy middle.
You use the phrase “the middle place” to describe a space between acute illness and full recovery. How did you come to name and define this idea, and why do you feel it’s an important addition to the recovery conversation?
When I was in my late twenties, I was the director of a small nonprofit aimed at helping journalists tell “restorative narratives.” These are stories that show how people and communities can make meaningful progress in the aftermath of trauma, tragedy, or illness. They explore messy middles and, in doing so, offer up quiet hope that progress is possible.
At a certain point, it occurred to me that this restorative narrative framework could be a helpful one for my own recovery story. I began to consider: Maybe if I shared my story from the perspective of my whole self, I wouldn’t have to choose a narrative of either sickness or recovery. Maybe I could tell a more honest narrative—one that allowed room for both. Rather than a story that had my healthy self talking over my eating-disorder self, I could let the two be in conversation with each other, as they were in my daily life.
This pivotal thought prompted questions I had never before considered: What if, instead of framing stories solely around the extremes of “sickness” and “full recovery,” we could explore the space in between? What if this space could invite conversations about the imperfections of recovery and the slips that happen along the way? It occurred to me that I had been living in this space with shame because I didn’t think I was supposed to inhabit it. But if the stigma were removed, then maybe this space could be defined not by guilt but by growth. It felt like I was onto something, and after not so many moons, I gave this expanse a name: the middle place.
By framing SLIP around the middle place, I want to show what it takes to engage with the world even as I traverse the space between sickness and full recovery. I don’t mean to suggest that full recovery is not possible; for many people, it is. Nor do I want to imply that people in the middle place aren’t trying hard enough or are somehow settling. Living in the middle place isn’t about giving up on full recovery; it’s about viewing recovery as an ongoing process rather than a final destination.
Many people are familiar with the term “quasi-recovery.” How do you see the middle place as different from quasi-recovery?
The field has long used the terms “quasi” and “pseudo” recovery to describe what happens when people are better but still struggle with some aspects of their disorder. Though well-intentioned, these terms can have the unintended consequence of being pernicious. They can make people feel as though they’re faking their recovery or that their recovery efforts aren’t real. They also further stigmatize those of us who are not fully recovered.
The middle place terminology is a more strengths-based way of describing the gray space between acute sickness and full recovery. It opens up avenues for honesty too. I think “quasi” and “pseudo” recovery are more apt for describing the situation that many people find themselves in when they say they’re fully recovered but are actually still struggling. I was in this situation for so long, and I yearned to be able to tell a more real narrative about my recovery.
As a woman who now honestly embraces life in the middle place, I’ve learned that recovery is not a return to who you once were so much as a retrieval of all you lost while you were sick: pleasure, possibility, some semblance of peace. It requires a ruthless commitment to hard work. It’s an accumulation of slow steps, with an acceptance that some steps will lead to slips. And it’s a promise that you’ll be honest about the slips, knowing they are an inevitable part of progress. As you move forward, you may or may not reach full recovery, but you emerge as someone who can lead a fuller life.
You interviewed over 175 people and surveyed more than 700 for Slip. What were some of the common themes or insights that stood out to you from those conversations?
Yes, I surveyed 700 people with lived experience, from 44 states and 37 countries, and I interviewed 175 survey respondents, clinicians, and researchers. As a journalist, it was really important for me to interview other people for this book so that it wouldn’t be about my story alone. I was also fascinated by the latest research on eating disorders — including studies on genetics and neurobiology — and I wanted to include this in the book.
While surveying people, I was struck by the fact that 85% said they could identify with the middle place. And yet, many said they’ve inhabited this place for years without ever knowing what to call it. In the presence of a place that seemed ineffable and is often stigmatized, they remained silent. Some said they never had the words to describe this place and felt as though they should have been “over” their eating disorder but weren’t.
I talked with dozens of clinicians about the middle place, and I include their perspectives throughout the book. I did speak to some who think it’s limiting to suggest that people should strive for anything less than “full recovery.” But to my surprise, far more said they thought the middle place was an important contribution to our evolving understanding of what it means to recover from an eating disorder. (As I explain in the book, still today, our field doesn’t have a consensus definition of “full recovery.”)
I was also struck by how many people I interviewed appreciated the language of being “in recovery” in the middle place as opposed to “fully recovered” (which can seem like a fixed state). The phrase “in recovery” has become acceptable when speaking of alcoholism, drug addiction, or perfectionism. But if you say you’re “recovering” from an eating disorder over a prolonged period, there can be an assumption that you’re somehow not trying hard enough or you’re undermining yourself. Many of us in the middle place are trying hard as we can, though, all the while knowing we remain at risk.
Storytelling plays a big role in your work as a journalist and professor. How has writing about your own experiences with eating disorders shaped your healing and your perspective on recovery?
Some people have asked if writing this book has caused me to slip. Others have asked if it has helped me move forward. The answer is yes and yes—and yet, I’m still very much in the middle place. In writing this book, I realized that the longer I navigate this place, the bigger the space becomes and the less temporary my inhabitance seems. I am not sandwiched between the extremes of acute sickness and full recovery; I roam between them at my own pace and on my own terms.
Writing gave me the freedom to explore the middle place and to shed the secrecy around it. Putting this book into the world has been an act of vulnerability and courage, especially against the backdrop of a society that tends to prefer redemptive narratives with protagonists who triumph over their disorders. My narrative isn’t redemptive in that I haven’t overcome anorexia; I’m far better than I ever thought I’d be, but my disorder remains a vulnerability. My story is much more of a restorative narrative in that it explores the messiness of recovery without sugarcoating hard truths or forcing endings with pretty bows.
I am not a soldier fighting a losing battle, nor am I a survivor who defeated a disorder. And I am no longer a girl who believes she needs to be sick to be special. I am a woman who works hard to keep moving forward in the middle place. I sometimes look back at the long distance I’ve traveled and wonder how it’s possible I still have so far to go. On days like this I remind myself that even though I haven’t reached full recovery, I am in full progress. And for me, for many of us, that’s a good place to be.
You were very intentional about including diverse perspectives in Slip, across diagnoses, identities, and body types. Why was that representation so important to you?
SLIP follows my own story, but it is not my story alone. In many ways, I fit the stereotypical mold of someone with an eating disorder in that I’m white, I identify as a cis-gender female, I’m middle to upper class, and I live in a smaller body. I really wanted to broaden my own scope of understanding about eating disorders by interviewing a range of people, and I wanted to include a diversity of perspectives to help open up points of relatability for a multitude of readers.
It was important to me to talk with a diversity of people with all different types of eating disorders so that I could dispel misconceptions and raise awareness about the various ways eating disorders can take shape and the diversity of people affected by them.
I talked with many people who felt they were discriminated against by the medical community because of their gender, race/ethnicity, and/or body size, and who didn’t get the care they needed because they didn’t “look the part” of someone with an eating disorder. This is compounded by the fact that, on average, doctors get zero to two hours of training on eating disorders during medical school and residency. Beyond the book’s primary audience of people with lived experience, caretakers, and clinicians, I also hope the book ends up in the hands of medical providers, educators, and others who may not know as much about eating disorders but would benefit from learning more about them.
If someone reading this interview feels like they are living in the middle place, what words of encouragement or practical advice would you want to offer them?
It’s important to make sure the middle place doesn’t become a space where you settle for stagnancy rather than striving for growth. You don’t want it to become a limbo where you get by without getting better.
To make progress in the middle place, you need to be honest about your slips — moments when you engage in eating disorder behaviors or succumb to disordered thoughts. When you stay silent about slips, it’s easy for every slip to turn into a slide. Constant slipping and sliding can lead to relapse. Instead of stigmatizing your slips or blaming yourself for them, give yourself grace when you slip. You can do this by recognizing that slips are an inevitable part of the recovery process and by asking: Why did I slip? Who can I talk to about the slip? And what kind of support do I need to get back up now? (Not tomorrow, or next week, or next month, but now.)
Develop the mindset that slips can be opportunities for growth, rather than grounds for failure. Also, remember that we often slip when we’re making hard choices in service of recovery and when we’re trying to move forward in the middle place. The very word “slip” suggests some sort of movement; you can’t slip, after all, if you’re standing still. Instead of demonizing your slips, celebrate the progress you made and the ways in which you got back up.
About Mallary Tenore Tarpley
Mallary is a journalism professor at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of Slip. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Teen Vogue, and more.
Mallary publishes a weekly Substack newsletter on personal writing at mallary.substack.com and shares openly on Instagram at @mallarytenoretarpley.
📖 Slip is available wherever books are sold. Support your local bookstore, or find it on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
Other Interviews or Stories on Mallary
Live 1A interview about SLIP: https://the1a.org/segments/eating-disorders-and-the-space-between-sickness-and-recovery/
Nieman Storyboard podcast: https://niemanstoryboard.org/2025/08/14/mallary-tenore-tarpley-writing-about-eating-disorders-recovery/
NPR story about SLIP: https://www.npr.org/2025/08/10/nx-s1-5495664/eating-disorder-recovery-anorexia-slip