Life With ED.

Who is ED, you may ask?
ED is my best friend, but also my worst enemy.
My eating disorder, or "ED" is a bastard, simply put. He came into my life unexpectedly, and no one even knew he was there. Not even me.
I noticed him first when I was about 11. I was in dance class, and completely loved it. I was very comfortable with myself and never had a problem with the twig-thin girls in my class.  My dance teacher once asked us to all go around and say what we had for lunch. She then criticized every 12 year old's lunch and warned us how much weight we would gain if we kept eating this way. I suddenly felt uncomfortable in my body. I was ashamed that I wasn't tiny like the rest of the girls in my class. I constantly was aware of my stomach and the way it felt against the waist band of my jeans or the way my thighs would spread out when I sat on a chair. I was miserable.
I began to be very paranoid about what I ate, but didn't think this was a big deal. I was just eating
healthier than anyone else my age, that's all.
WRONG.
I was then diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at age 14. Before this, I had lost a significant amount of weight from the undiagnosed diabetes, and quickly gained it back when I was finally healthy again.
Naturally, I lost my mind.
I became obsessed with calories, carbs, and exercise. I was so angry at the world. Why did this have to happen to me? I did everything I could to make sure something like this wouldn't happen to me. I envied the girls in my school that seemed to have perfectly sculpted legs and a tight stomach to match. I never saw myself as necessarily fat, but I always wanted more.
Eventually, I learned to mask my anxiety about food and my body.
Even though I was maintaining my grades, doing well in softball, and keeping my friends, I knew things were just getting worse.
When I got to college, my eating disorder was in full force. I was absolutely TERRIFIED of the "Freshman 15" and was bound and determined to not let it happen to me.  At first, I did not want to purge because of the fact that, 1. It was messy, and 2. Having a whole group of girls hear me puke my guts out multiple times a day was not the most appealing thing to me.
Quite the image, right?
I felt out of control. I completely shut myself off from everyone around me. I wanted to be like a normal college student and go out with friends to dinner or dancing, but I knew that I would obsess over my meal or worried what my body would look like.
Staying in my room and pretending I didn't have any issues was easier for me than anything else.
That's when the purging began.
Since I felt alone, I turned to my eating disorder for comfort. Hell, I turned to my eating disorder for EVERYTHING. My inner demon, the thing that was taking my life away from me, was my best friend, and my greatest source of comfort.
I started purging only a couple times a week, maybe more if I was stressed. I thought "this will be easy to stop, no one will ever find out"
And I was right. Until I came home for the summer.
Being home broke me apart, stripped me of every piece of self confidence I had left.
I needed my eating disorder to cope. Or so I thought.
I remember purging 10-20 times a day, not thinking twice about how extreme this was getting. Some days, it was a struggle to even keep water in my body.  I rarely ever left my room, or my house for that matter.
I felt numb. And in my mind at the time, there was no point in even feeling anything, because it would just cause me anxiety.
I didn't become really aware of what this was doing to my body.
My kidneys hurt like crazy every second of the day. My hair was falling out and breaking off. My teeth were becoming sensitive and thing. My heart was beating irregularly, and I could never seem to catch my breath. As for my diabetes? I did not care. At all. I was not managing it well and my body was SCREAMING at me for help.
My mind was also being affected. I couldn't retain information for more than a couple minutes. I couldn't seem to connect myself to any conversation, or anyone at all.
Why would anyone want to do this to themselves?
I needed help. But for a couple months, I wasn't sure if I even wanted it.
I was comfortable. Isolating myself and purging insane amounts during the day is what I was good at.
I knew I couldn't go back to school like this. My body was not in shape to play softball, and I was in emotional turmoil.
Deciding to stay home really hurt me. I felt like a failure, and that I had let myself and everyone close to me down.
I wanted help at this point. I had goals. I was going places. And I was not about to lose that.
As soon as I entered treatment, I knew this is what I stayed home for. This was my path for this certain time in my life.
After reflecting on my story and going through treatment, I've learned many things. Things that I think people that don't have an eating disorder should know.
I want to bring awareness to this seemingly 'taboo' subject.
I am in no way, shape, or form ashamed to talk about this. In fact, talking about it helps me.
Eating disorders suck.
Recovery is hard, and makes me want to throw my hands up and walk away sometimes.
But life is too precious and too short to waste on something so dangerous.


Thanks for reading, and expect many posts in the future.
:)


-Lela