Anorexia and Me
Jun 17th, 2008 by zania
When I was 14 years old, I was a little overweight; not an enormous amount, but enough to make me envious of the ’skinny girls’ who could wear tiny cut off tops without breathing in, and who didn’t have to struggle to button up their 501’s.
At the age of 14, you often have an unrealistic view of your body’s capacity to change shape. I had a ‘boyish’ figure - long legs, strong arms, small bust and hardly any waist. It made me the sports star when I wanted to be the cheerleader.
I wanted to change my body’s structure and be a ‘dainty butterfly ‘, not the strong and capable carthorse I saw myself as. So I went on a diet…
When your whole being is set on losing weight it isn’t that hard. I read all the diet mags I could find and developed my own calorie controlled diet. I gave myself an exercise regime which an army phys ed instructor would have found hard to keep up with. And the excess weight fell off.
It was only 10 pounds or so anyway (my granny called it ‘puppy fat’). But somehow losing those pounds was not enough. I was nowhere near being a ‘butterfly’. So I kept right on going…
I soon felt in control of my body for the first time in years. I was on a high with the excitement of it all. With a new slimmer me I felt I could conquer the world. And I kept right on dieting.
The skinny tops and 501’s were not my aim anymore. Hell, they were so loose I couldn’t keep them up!
I became a new, confident person. I felt pretty and popular and the admiring looks from the boys in my class confirmed this for me. But I still couldn’t stop dieting. Not only was I afraid that I could pile the weight back on, but I still had to change my body’s shape. I still had the build of the sports star not the cheerleader… although now my body was beginning to lose strength as well.
My mother was beside herself with worry. She thought I was eating ok, so she wondered whether I had some terrible disease. She begged me to see a doctor, but I told her I felt fine; that I was doing a lot of sports at the moment and that was making me lose all the weight. She didn’t know that the ‘good meals’ I was making myself contained hardly any calories (just vegetables mainly), or that I was hiding away doing my gruelling exercises every spare moment I could.
This went on for some time. It was only when I passed out a couple of times at school that the alarm bells really rang. You see, I had realized for a while that I was much thinnner than the average girl and that the sight of my emaciated body would worry people. It didn’t worry me; I felt great about it, but I felt I had to be careful. So I wore bulky jumpers and baggy jeans most of the time and few people noticed. I was cold most of the time anyhow.
Of course the irony is that I could no longer wear the skinny cut off tops I had set my heart on, because the sight of my almost fleshless ribs would have put some people off. But I didn’t care. In my mind I was beautiful; a fragile, feminine little thing. And I still had to do something about not having a waist…
I guess I knew I was ill and was putting my body under immense stress. I even guessed that I had Anorexia, but I felt that if Anorexia could change the shape of my body, then so be it!
Eventually my mother called a ‘family meeting’ and I was almost dragged along to see the doctor. The doctor took one look at me and knew. But she insisted on weighing me anyhow.
I weighed 64 pounds; only a little over half of what I should have weighed for my height.
The doctor asked me what I saw when I looked in the mirror. I said I saw a slim person I was quite happy with… I just wished I was a slightly different shape…
Of course, what everyone else saw in that mirror was an emaciated waif; gaunt and changed almost beyond all recognition and someone who looked like she was seriously ill.
I know that now. I can’t see what I looked like then - I tore up the pictures - but I can guess.
To cut a long story short, because I was considered to be dangerously ill, I was sectioned under the Mental Health Act and put in a special unit in the local hospital, designed for patients with eating disorders. I would not be allowed out until I had put on some weight.
Maybe I’ll write some time about ‘life’ in that mental hospital; the anger I felt about being there and the constant struggles I made not to put on weight. But for now, this entry is long enough.
Needless to say, I did eventually put on weight; enough to get me out of that place and to get my badly treated body back functioning normally again. Nevertheless, even today, years later, I still have a tendency to Anorexia.
Today, I still look in the mirror and see someone who needs to lose weight, even when in actual fact I maintain my weight at a few pounds under the ‘ideal’ (just in case…).
I think that Anorexia, like alcoholism, is something you have to deal with for life, or else it will sneak right back upon you again.
But of course, I am no expert…
[...] a recent post I spoke about my Anorexia. I still say ‘my’, because I consider Anorexia to be one of those illnesses that never [...]