Eating disorders, psychological illnesses that cause a person to experience abnormal eating behaviors, are some of the deadliest psychiatric disorders. The three main types of eating disorders are anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder. Having an ED can consume your life in almost every possible way that you could imagine; I know because I had one, and from time to time I would relapse. Eating disorders are not like fad diets. They could start that way, but they’re a lot more than that. For me, it was an obsession with a number on a scale, with an image in a mirror. When I restricted calories more and more, I felt in control of things I wished that I could change about myself and that’s why it was so hard to stop.
I started dieting in 6th grade, but it was one of those things I never really committed to. I started restricting calories early in high school; this was around the time I also discovered laxatives. I went from restriction to over-exercising to laxative abuse. Once, I even got a really bad sore throat and fever for a week from just exploiting them all. I remembered breaking down over and over again when I would binge from the starvation, then do the same thing the next day. My parents would tell me that I didn’t look healthy, that I was thinner and thinner, but to me those kinds of comments just made me want to keep going, to not stop.
Growing up, I wasn’t a very skinny kid; I was chubby with baby fat and when you realize that sometimes your body doesn’t look like somebody else’s, it’s heartbreaking. You feel out of place. You avoid certain types of clothes. You avoid your favorite foods. You avoid your friends. Every single time that you would put something in your mouth, you counted those calories. Maybe you would write them down or download 3 different apps to get the most precise number of what you were eating. To me, it was better to eat less than to eat more.
There were times when I felt like purging and no matter how much I knew that it was a horrible idea, the thought would pop into my mind once or twice. It was difficult to not give in, despite the guilt I would feel after eating something that I wanted. I used to make lists of my trigger foods and when my parents brought me some home, I would offer them to my brother or sister in hopes that I would not give in to eating because I knew that those thoughts would start again. My best friend would say that I could have the most perfect body and still want something better. She would say that I was never going to win against myself if I didn’t stop thinking about the things I hated. I remember one day going out to eat with my parents and the smile on their faces as they watched me eat a cup of vanilla ice cream. It wasn’t much but I knew why they smiled: I was eating and, although it was difficult, I stopped restricting.
Self-worth shouldn’t be defined by a number. Change takes time and low self-esteem can be difficult to overcome, but it is important to acknowledge that the road to recovery is filled with struggles. There will be moments when we may go back to our old bad habits, and that’s okay; because, at the end of the day we are just human (but you shouldn’t be crying over eating a piece of cake- trust me, I’ve been there). A lot of the time we forget about how much hurting ourselves can also hurt the people around us. If we aren’t willing to change for us then I think we should at least do it for them, for the ones who care and see the damage before we do.
National Eating Disorders Association Helpline (call or text): (800) 931-2237