I'm recovering from anorexia and trauma. Walking dogs at my local shelter has given me a reason to keep going.

• I was suffering the loss of someone important to me, and I also had an eating disorder.
• I signed up with the humane society to walk dogs waiting to be adopted.

After losing someone important to me last spring, I struggled to get through the day. I struggled with mental-health issues and had nightmares and panic attacks — and surviving 24 hours felt like winning a wrestling match with a broken arm.

I was also trying to recover from anorexia. Following a meal plan felt even more insurmountable amid the wreckage of trauma, but I knew I had to find a reason to keep going or I could die. So I signed up to volunteer at my local humane society.

Seeing the dogs wag their tails when I walked in was the best feeling in the world. They didn't care if I didn't have the energy to wear makeup or straighten my hair. They just wanted love, and that was exactly what I needed, too.

I related to the dogs

Spending time with the dogs helped me feel less alone because I knew many of them had also been abandoned by people they trusted.

My mind could easily find reasons for my abandonment: I wasn't good enough. I was hard to love. The person never loved me. But when I saw those beautiful animals, it didn't make any sense. I found it hard to understand how someone could give a dog away.

One Saturday, I met Trixie, a painfully shy puppy. She started to come closer, then backed away. "She wants to interact," another volunteer said. "But she's scared."

I blinked. It was like he was talking about me. Once Trixie decided I was safe, we sat in her kennel together. She had no reason to believe I wouldn't betray her, and yet she trusted me. I wondered how I could do the same.

Another beloved dog, a shepherd mix named Zaki, had been at the shelter for months. He'd play fetch in the yard for as long as I'd throw the ball, then smile up at me as if to say, "Wasn't that fun?" I couldn't understand why he hadn't been adopted. Someone compared me to Zaki once, in that others failed to see our good qualities. As a result, we'd been left behind. But another person's rejection didn't signify our worthlessness.

Once, a friend asked me to say something kind to myself. When I couldn't think of anything, she asked what I told my dogs at the shelter. Then, finding the words was easy: I told them how good they were, that they didn't deserve to be left there, and that they did nothing wrong. I make sure they know they're loved — unconditionally, permanently. I don't know why I can't seem to tell myself the same things. A friend once told me it's protective, a way to avoid future pain: If this person who was so important to me could leave me, so could anyone else. So I have trust issues.

But protection isn't always sustainable. I can't live life alone, even though it feels safer. So I think about the dogs. To them, love doesn't end when one person in the relationship stops caring. To dogs, love lives on despite the loss of it.

Volunteering hasn't permanently cured my eating disorder or resolved all my trauma symptoms. These are struggles I may always have to fight. But the dogs give me a reason to do so. Now, I can redirect all that lost love to them. And the dogs, in their reckless, selfless way, give it right back to me — unconditionally, permanently.