#6

Share your Story #6

Although blame is often placed on society and culture, eating disorders are complex destructive forms of mental illness that manifest themselves in our self worth and image, and the detrimental effects they can have on the lives and relationships of those who suffer from them are very real. My story with my eating disorder begins as early as I can remember - I have vivid memories of sitting in my car seat and looking down at my thighs, hating the way they looked when they flattened out on the seat. As a child, I was never happy with the appearance of my body, but it wasn’t until much later that I made the connection between what I ate and how I viewed myself. In fact, I was a really healthy kid, playing sports and becoming very involved with competitive swimming. My mom placed an emphasis on healthy meals, and I was never overweight. However, my discomfort in my body continued to grow, and I remember “dieting” as early as third and fourth grade.

Another important element of my story; I love food. In fact, I adore it. My family is Italian, and I grew up around some of the most delicious, incredible and meaningful food there is to try. My love for cooking and baking began early, so as you can imagine, my relationship with food became a little complicated. I started to worship and become obsessed with food, mostly because I loved it so much, yet restricted myself from enjoying so much of it in fear of it making me “fat”. Eventually my restricting would lead to cycles of bingeing and guilt, which led to more restriction. I would alternate between periods of eating normally and “dieting”, and this pattern continued up until about 8th grade. As my body changed and I grew, I hated everything about my body, all the things I am learning to love now; my curvy stature, strong legs, big butt, my natural waist, small boobs, and muscular arms from years of competitive swimming. Despite being a very healthy weight, I saw myself as too big or too small in all the wrong places, and I wanted desperately to change the way I looked.

Around this time I learned what a calorie was, and I began to label foods as good or bad, ruling out all bad foods. I can remember throwing away the entire contents of the lunches my mom lovingly packed for me. But my extreme restriction led me to binge; I hated the feeling of losing control of what I was eating, yet my body was so starved of nutrients if I even had a small amount of a “bad” food I would give up and eat until I felt sick. My sophomore year, I went vegan in an attempt to be healthier and loose weight. Because my diet changed so drastically, I dropped ten pounds, and my parents became concerned. I was elated; I thought I had found the cure to my relationship with food. I ate as much fruit and vegetables as I wanted, but inside I was still craving freedom and restricting what I was eating. My mom begged me to see a nutritionist, and I begrudgingly agreed. I learned about how to eat a balanced vegan diet that would nourish me, not restrict me. Slowly but surely my relationship with food improved, and by senior year I was finally comfortable with the way my body looked, mostly because I felt good from the inside out. I was healthy, I worked out regularly, and I was happy, building a strong group of friends at school and feeling content about the future I had ahead of me.

Little did I know, my freshman year of college would contain some of the lowest lows I have ever experienced; I felt immense pressure being on a college campus to look a certain way, and eating in a dining hall amongst my new friends made me anxious. I was worried they would judge my food choices or think I was eating too much, so I began to subconsciously restrict. I quit being vegan and began to be influenced by the way girls around me ate. However, because I was not eating enough, I started to binge eat, and before I knew it I fell back into old patterns with food. Thanksgiving of 2017, I made myself throw up for the first time ever, feeling so guilty about the amount of food I had “binged on” (who doesn’t feel full after thanksgiving dinner?!). I felt so disgusted with myself, and vowed never to do it again.

Going back to college in the spring, the pressures and stress of being away from family, social life in my new sorority, and a manipulative relationship with a boy all took an immense toll on me. School was hard, and I was struggling. Although I was at a healthy at the time, I realized food and my appearance was the one thing in my life I felt like I could control. I made strict rules, again labeling foods as good and bad. I was restricting like I never had before, and after joining a sorority, partying like I never had before. I began to feel guilty after drinking, knowing the calories in alcohol, and purged after I would drink on the weekends. This dirty habit was addictive; I realized I could drink and not feel the guilt, so long as I was able to take a trip to the bathroom after a night out. Soon, I never went out without purging. Purging changed the game for my eating disorder, and I realized this rule could also be applied to food. since I was restricting so heavily, any time I broke my diet or rules, I would purge. At first it was only once every week or so, but it quickly became a secretive addiction that I was deeply ashamed of, but so deeply attached to. I remember one weekend not being able to keep any of my meals down. That low point was when I knew I needed help.

Terrified, I called my mom and hesitantly told her I wanted to maybe see a nutritionist over the summer, thinking I could just go back to my old ways. I had no idea the grasp my eating disorder had over my life. Towards the end of the year, my health was so bad that I barely even recognized myself; others told me I looked great and asked how I had lost so much weight, but the comments slowly turned to concern as I became a shell of my old self. My heart rate was so low that I couldn’t even sleep through the night; my days consisted of class, homework, exercise, and obsessing over meals, calories, and calculations. I ate the same thing every day, forcing myself to workout until I had burned off everything I ate. I wanted to recover, but mentally I couldn’t let go of the control I thought I had. Within a week of being home for the summer, my mom brought me in to a mental health clinic to be evaluated by a social worker. At the time, I thought I was going to speak to a therapist or nutritionist, but I was actually being evaluated by an eating disorder treatment team and told that I had no choice but to accept treatment in a partial hospitalization program, which consisted of intensive therapy from 8 AM to 4 PM every day.

I was devastated when I realized I had no choice but to enter treatment; I had already told myself I wanted to get help, but I didn’t realize the strength it would take like to choose recovery. I has to cancel a trip I had planned, I had to quit both my lifeguarding job and my dream nannying job. I felt like my life was being taken away from me all at once, and it was - my eating disorder had taken all of that away. I was embarrassed and ashamed to talk about treatment with friends, family, and even my mom - the one who was by my side the entire time. I was furious at her, at myself, and at God. Treatment terrified me. Every day felt like an uphill battle, and I cried as I watched my appearance change before my eyes as I moved towards health and gave up my. But I slowly became motivated to recover. I was honest with my therapists about my behavior, and slowly let go of my eating disorder behaviors that I had clung to for so long. As my recovery unfolded, I found freedom, and slowly became more room in my life for joy, love, friendships, faith, and peace in my mind, body and soul. However, recovery also created more room for fear, anxiety, and pain. I realized how much of a numbing tool my eating disorder had been all along: My eating disorder served as an unhealthy, destructive, deadly coping mechanism for a time in my life when I felt like nothing was in my control. Since leaving the treatment center last summer, my recovery has been an uphill battle - I am back at school, in a happy, loving relationship, and I have made huge leaps since my darkest days last spring. But I still have bad days and weeks, and my relationships have all struggled due to the stress my eating disorder placed on them. More and more, I am finding that recovery is not something you “go through” once and move on from. Maybe for some people it is, but for me, my eating disorder will forever be a part of my story, and recovery is a choice I will make every single day for the rest of my life, and I’m taking it one day and one meal at a time.

-Anonymous