When I was wrapped up in Bulimia and Anorexia, nothing else ever mattered. Mirrors defined my existence and I only ever saw what my eating disorder allowed me to see. For the past few months, leading up to my recent realization that I am now recovered versus recovering, I have begun to notice things. All kinds of things. It is as though for the first time in my life, I am completely in control of how I perceive everything I come in contact with. Yes, there are occasions during which I find myself doubting my body and even some specific features, but for the most part, I not only see my body as it really is for the first time in my life, but I see the world around me free of eating disordered thoughts that tend to alter reality.
Seeing the world (and myself) free of an eating disorder is almost like seeing the world for the first time. I once was lost in my own world, a world defined by my warped sense of reality. Honestly, it wasn't until only recently that I managed to escape that world and join reality. I mean, of course I still live in my own variation of reality, as we all do, but today that variation is more accurate and only exists for the sake of protecting my sanity against the cruelness that has always existed in our world.
I came to this new place for many reasons: I wanted happiness, to love my body and personality, the ability to take my clothes off and share my body with man I love completely unreserved, and to prove to the people who have been by my side from the very first day I was in the hospital, and all throughout this battle, that I am not immedicable, but instead am invincible and resilient. All of these reasons factored into my desire to recover, but one reason, above all others, pushed me to where I am today.
I was fed up.
I was fed up with my eating disorder. I was fed up with hating myself, weighing myself, and most of all, killing myself, all in the name of Bulimia and Anorexia. I could no longer be sick, it was not an option. Not only had my eating disorder instructed my to cause unnecessary harm to my body in multiple ways for years, but it stole my soul. For years I had been living inside a cage, trapped deep within myself, no hope of getting out. For years I was convinced that there was no way I would ever ever ever recover.
I was sixteen when I attempted suicide. It was the twenty-second of October, I had only been sixteen for under a month. I had just had the most perfect sweet sixteen any girl could ever ask for. Thinking back to the day I overdosed, I cannot explain exactly what was going through my mind. I thought to myself, "This is too much. I'm doing everything right and I'm still not thin enough and I'm still not happy enough." I had convinced myself that if I did die from this overdose, I would finally be at peace. However, deep inside myself, I did not expect to die. I attempted suicide because I did not know how to ask for the help I needed. There was no way I could tell my mother and father about my eating disorder. I knew no other way so I did it, I tried to kill myself.
I blacked out and woke up vomiting and screaming. I somehow had the mind to change my clothing (probably led by my eating disorder) and was immediately rushed to the emergency room where my system had to be flushed. My levels were completely out of sorts, not only because I had just overdosed but because it had been weeks since I actually ate something without forcing it to leave my system immediately.
It took seven days for me to fully recover from my overdose. While I was still in the I.C.U., during morning rounds, the doctor overseeing my case would ask me if there was anything I needed to tell him, like if I had an eating disorder. I said no each time. Finally one night, I pulled a medical student into my room, broke down crying, and told her that I did in fact have an eating disorder. She was clueless, but the message was passed on.
The next day, I told everyone again, including my family, and it was decided that upon leaving the hospital I would enter treatment. That was a little over four years ago. Nothing worked, nothing stuck, I would just lie and pretend I was doing better for the sake of my family.
Finally last October, I found a new psychologist. He helped me talk through things and set small, achievable goals. It was the first time that things began to click. Of course it helped that I had decided to recover myself this time, instead of others deciding for me, but without those twice weekly sessions, I would have never made it here this fast.
I was fed up. I was fed up but now I am free. I am finally free after years of torment, years of self-loathing, years of destroying my beautiful body. I write this today as a survivor, and a very proud one at that. On my twentieth birthday I vowed that this decade, and every other decade of my life to follow, would be eating disorder free. I will not relapse. I will never go back to that cage deep within myself. My eating disorder is a part of my past and my present is my recovery and every day after that I promise to live free.
I will never be bound by the shackles that once held me, for they had no business being there in the first place.
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