I was just surfing around this site and I read a lot of post about eating disorders. I would like to take this time now and talk about some of the things that were missing from those post. They first thing I would like to talk about is me. I myself am facing being anorexic. I started when I entered high school to ffit in and get the attention of a certain boy. Well I was a perfect 118 pounds and in one week of starving my self I droped 13 pounds. I was feeling good about my self. None of my clothes fit and I was now able to wear the perfect size 0 jeans. I was ready to just stop eating all together, but the morning of six day I was to not eat my mother and I had to go get worm medicine for one of our sick dogs. We stopped at this McDonalds and ordered some food. I was completly disgusted my it. I ate it and I could literaly feel my body expand with each bite. So when we got home I grabbed my dog and took her for a walk. I thought "Damn it. Now that one sandwich ruined my whole week of not eating!" When I got back inside the house and went to my room, trying to avoid the kitchen. I was just 14 at that time and the only thing I knew was that not eating made you lose weight, but I had no idea of what came next. I just had the sudden urge to eat every thing. All the food I had denied myself through out the course of the week could no longer be ignored. So over the weekend I just ate and ate and ate. When Monday came I felt so disgusted I didn't eat for three days to get back down to 105. People were saying things like, "Oh, have you lost weight.?" "You are looking so much better." Which only encouraged me not to eat. Though on Thursday I just lost it and I would binge for four days and not eat for three. It became a regular thing for me. I had noticed that not eating for three days would bring me back down to 105 and so I was feeling good. Number two, I have not seen anyone talk about what happens when you stop being anorexic. One word: Excessive weight gain. When I looked in the mirror and saw how good I was looking I still thought I need to lose more weight. I never looked good enough. Though one day I got so light headed and dizzy I could barley stand. I hurt like hell. I made my way to the kitchen and grabbed what ever I wanted. I had realised that I had gone to far. I suddenly realized what I was doing to my body. Sure I what to be skinny, but I did not want to die. I just decided that a that point I would try to regain myself and no longer starve mybody of its nutrients. It was heard at first. I started to eat maybe less than half a cup a sherbert icecream and work my way up from there. I was disgusted every time I would put food in my body. Always counting calories never wanting to go over 300. I started to gain weight, though. I gained weight at a rapid pace. I did no know that when I did not eat my metabolism slowed down. I was screwed. With a slow metabolism my body stored fat more than it burned it. Once the body has no nutrients given to it the metabolism slows down to conserve the fuel in your body. And finally 3: Once you start it doesn't stop. When I started not eating I thought I wuold do it for a few days and look better. Wrong! Four years later I still don't eat every day of the week. Some times I don't eat for one or two weeks. That is just how my life is now. Every time I eat I gain weight. I can eat one day and gain as much as four pounds. I now constantly worry about going to bed and wondering if my pants will fit the next day. So every so ofter I go without food for a good long while and look at myself in the mirror to make sure I can see my rib bones. I have not tried to get help for this, nor do I want any. I just wanted to say that for the people who start to stop eating, you will have to continue this for your life. Every bite of food you eat, you gain that and a whole cake. The only way you can stop is with help. You can not just say "Oh well I will just start to eat regulary tomorrow" because it doesn't work that way. My last words of this blog is this: Just don't start be happy with your self or you will just end up making it worse.
A word of advice.
By Corlea - Posted on July 16th, 2007
It's great that you've brought this up. Not enough people are happy with themselves. I'm ok with myself, at 5'4" and 235 lbs, but I'd like to get under 200 because I was healthier then. I am very curvy and could therefore never be skinny, and I accept it. Other people should, too - loving yourself is much healthier and more satisfying than hating yourself.
I can't remember when I weighed 118. I think by 8th grade, I was up to 135, and I just skyrocketed up to 175 after that. Now I'm back down to a healthier 150, and I'm happy with it. At any rate...
You say you don't want to seek help, but I'm going to give you advice anyway. The only way to kick start your metabolism back up is to eat. If you get depressed over gaining 4 lbs in a day, you need to keep eating. Eat things like fruits and vegetables, several times a day, small portions. Also, go out for walks so your body will still be burning calories. I'm assuming you're a girl, by your picture, so keep in mind that if you ever have children, you could put yourself in extreme danger from your eating habits by now. Just another thing to think about.
And please, you might want to break up your post a little bit, to make it easier for the rest of us to read. One long paragraph makes it easy to get lost going from line to line.
~C
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Your story is heart breaking, though the eating disorder you described is called binge eating. It's when you starve yourself, then suddenly eat very large quantities of food. Anorexia is characterized by a total decrease in eating. It's usually associated with OCD behaviours (IE: an anorexic will obsessively count calories, exercise, will usually eat their food quite slowly and cut it into small pieces). Obviously, I can't say EVERY anorexic does this, or EVERY binger does that, but your disorder sounds more like binge eating. Also, I strongly urge you to seek help, even if you just go to therapy, or a school councellor. You're doing much better, but a vast majority of people who suffer from eating disorders can't heal by themselves. You still have a long way to go, and I really hope that you get there.