This is the first and only time I am going to be writing a blog post in response to the way in which certain individuals have been approaching me recently regarding my weight. I will also be writing about my experience with anorexia for the first and last time, as I feel it is important that people truly know both my opinion and personal perspective after my experiences as someone who has been overweight, underweight, and in recovery. I feel it is also necessary to make a note that the following material could be triggering to anyone still struggling with an eating disorder, so if you feel this is something that may affect you, I implore you not to read further.
When I was 17 years old, I did not know what a calorie was. I was unaware of the implications of diets, carbohydrates, the different types of fats in foods, etc. I was completely ignorant to what eating disorders were, or the world in which so many girls lived where they concerned themselves with their weight, diet and exercise on a daily basis. I was simply a normal girl, albeit overweight at the time, who enjoyed food and never even thought about what I was putting in my mouth or how it would affect my body. Blissfully ignorant, chubby and happy.
In the summer of 2007 I attended Reading Festival with friends. I was 5’6″ at the time, weighing around 160lbs. It was an incredibly hot weekend, typical of Britain’s finest summer weather, and the fields were full of young girls in bikini tops waltzing through tents, all different shapes and sizes. This was the first time I had ever become conscious about my weight, and I wondered whether I would look inadequate next to the sea of slender bodies and toned figures if I were to wear a bikini top myself. In the end, I decided against it, threw on a baggy shirt and continued about my day, not really considering the implications of that moment of heightened self awareness or the affect it would have on me in the near future. After returning home, a flood of photographs were uploaded to Facebook from our weekend at the festival, and I was excited to see what my friends had captured from our adventures, which is when I came across the image that turned my world upside down and completely changed my life for the worse.
Sat on my bed with my laptop confront of me, faced with the image that I could only see as a monstrosity, I burst into tears. I cried until my face was swollen, until I was salivating, until I couldn’t cry anymore, at which point I would lay down and rest for a few hours, only to wake up and repeat the process. 48 hours passed, and still I would cry and speak to no one, occasionally staring at my reflection and kneading at the flesh on my face and body with my fingers, distraught by what I saw and confused by who I was. Eventually I sent messages to all my friends on Facebook, asking them to untag me from the images or remove them completely, and I went into hiding.
Over the next year I cut my intake dramatically, sometimes going 2-3 days without food, and it felt empowering to finally be taking control of something that I blamed myself for not being in control of for so long. By 2008 I reached a healthy weight of 120lbs through unhealthy methods and disordered eating habits, which I strictly kept secret from my friends, family and partner. Everyone would tell me how wonderful my figure looked, yet I still felt inadequate and was confused by the compliments.
Realising how isolated I felt and still being in the beginning stages of an eating disorder, I decided to start an anonymous blog as a place to vent about my feelings, write about my experiences and seek some kind of self-validation. I would write about my future goals, how much weight I wanted to lose and how upset I was that I wasn’t small enough. I gained a small following of girls struggling with similar issues, and I connected with them. To read their diaries and experiences made me feel less alone, and sometimes, as if it was okay and ‘normal’ to be doing what I was doing to myself. I would see them post images of themselves to enable them to look back and see their progress, so eventually I decided to also keep an image diary, and I would occasionally upload photographs of my body anonymously where I would critisise myself and analyse what I didn’t like about my figure. I spent so much time hiding my body away in baggy clothing in the ‘real world’, that to be able to reveal myself in this way anonymously felt comforting.
By early 2009 I discovered that I had grown and was now 5’7, by which point my weight had also dropped to 107lbs and I would go through periods of 4-5 days without eating on a regular basis. I would spend all my time obsessively feeling my body and photographing myself at different angles in a desperate attempt to capture an image of myself that I didn’t despise, and whenever I managed to achieve this, (which was rare) it would be uploaded to my personal, anonymous journal. I was still unaware that I could be suffering from an eating disorder until I came across an article about it online later that year, and I was surprised by the similarities between my personal behavioral tendencies and that of a diagnosed sufferer.
Winter of 2009 approached, by which point my BMI had dropped to around 16, and I was now able to consume nothing besides water and diet carbonated drinks for 7-8 day periods. I became physically weak and uninterested in going outside or pursuing hobbies. Social situations were nerve-wracking and I would leave the house as little as possible due to the fact I was worried there would be food at the places I was invited to. I would begin collapsing on a regular basis and dreaded getting out of bed. My weight continued to drop and I continued to refuse to eat, until eventually my partner had to take me to the emergency room due to a period of irregular breathing where I struggled to stay conscious and was generally physically unwell.
I began to come to terms with the concept that I might have a problem, and eventually (with the encouragement and support of my partner) confessed to my doctor what I had been going through for the past 2-3 years. I was told that my BMI was now 15.4, I was malnourished, and that I was developing a serious case of atrophy, but that I was to go away and eat a minimum of 1,500 calories a day. Heartbroken, humiliated and feeling unworthy of help, I returned home, closed the curtains, crawled into bed and refused to eat for a period of 13 days. Eventually my partner, not knowing what else to do, called my father and told him everything. I was encouraged to return to my doctor, where they decided to put me on a waiting list for professional treatment, but I was told this could take anywhere between 5 and 9 months.
Being as weak as I was and and not having any outside help available, it was decided that I was to go and stay at my fathers house under his care, where I would try and take control of my spiraling health with support from my family, but I was surprised by how I felt when food was placed in front of me and I tried to eat again for the first time in what felt like a millennium. I can only describe it as the same feeling you would get if you were standing on the side of a road preparing to throw yourself in front of a bus. The idea of eating a spoonful of food to me felt like the equivalent of someone asking you to kill yourself when you’re not ready to die. Anxiety plagued me, and I just wasn’t ready to recover.
Despite now living at my fathers, my weight still managed to drop further, and by the time I received my first invitation to speak with a specialist psychiatrist, my BMI was 14.3 and I was encouraged to accept inpatient treatment as I was simply too afraid to eat more than a few teaspoons of condiments a day to keep me standing, and they were concerned about the deterioration of my physical health. My feet went yellow, heart palpitations became frequent, my hair began falling out in mass, I would collapse daily and laguno began growing over my back and arms. Summer of 2010 was a blur of unfamiliar faces, hospital walls and tension between myself and my family. Eventually I began eating solid food again and went through an agonising period of refeeding syndrome, which only brought me to the irrational conclusion that food was bad and my body just didn’t want me to eat because of the affects it was having on me.
By late summer I was vaguely physically stable and had enough courage to go for a meal for the first time, in public, and after being encouraged by my psychiatrist and the girls in my group therapy sessions not to hide myself away, I went out wearing a strap top and shorts on a hot summers day, instead of baggy jeans and a jumper. Men would shout crude comments at me in the street, “You’d be a painful fuck, I’d snap you in half, eat something” whilst girls would just look at me strangely and stare.
This is the first time since I was diagnosed with Anorexia Nervosa that I actually felt small instead of big, and it didn’t feel good. I felt embarrassed and ashamed, but somehow this translated into a new determination to recover and pursue health.
2011 was a better year and the beginning of my first major steps to recovery. I slowly began to gain weight and was able to attend restaurant meals with my father and family, battling the anxiety and distorted perception of reality that I once submitted to freely. I no longer accepted the inability to live and inevitability of death as my fate, but rather fought it, and embraced my determination to enjoy life.
I am now at a point in my life and my recovery where I am able to eat and enjoy it. I am able to look at my reflection in the mirror and not only accept how I look, but embrace how I look. I am able to model and feel beautiful in my photographs instead of ugly, and accept my flaws when I notice them instead of over-analysing them and turning them into something hideous. No matter what anyone says about me or my appearance, I know in my heart that beauty is subjective, and that as a woman, no matter what my shape, size or struggles, I am beautiful.
On a regular basis I am blamed for being an advocate of thinspiration and pro-anorexia simply because I am comfortable enough to reveal my body to the public despite still being underweight, because I am comfortable with people seeing me in my underwear, because I am happy to share photographs of myself when I have a moment in which I truly feel attractive. The images which I posted of my body to my anonymous journals when I was at the pit of my anorexia were never intended to be found, and unfortunately they were discovered and leaked by other people with malice, not by myself. (Which at the time was absolutely mortifying, but thankfully I have come to terms with it.) The images of myself posted on thinspiration websites are posted by other people without my permission or knowledge, not by myself.
If, when I was at the stage in my disorder where I was still triggered by images of other girls, I took it upon myself to message each and every one of them and ask them to not reveal themselves, to not bear too much flesh in photographs or even in public because it is triggering to me personally, it would be absolutely ludicrous. It would be completely wrong of me to actually expect every female who happens to be underweight, struggling with an eating disorder or recovering from an eating disorder to hide themselves and cater to my disorder and my distorted perception of both myself and reality. I will not hide my body away from the world and refrain from taking advantage of my right as a woman to bear my flesh ‘just incase’ it triggers someone, and I would never expect all the girls who ever triggered me to do the same. (I would never blame anyone for triggering me – it is the fault of my illness and my psychological state alone, no one elses.)
If people weren’t posting pictures of me as thinspiration, they would be posting pictures of someone else. There will always be women who are underweight on this earth, whether it be natural or not, and none of them should be expected to hide themselves away. Whether 300lbs or 60lbs, healthy or struggling with an eating disorder, we all have the right to wear what we like and show as much skin as we like, not just as women, but as human beings.
I have come too far to allow negative comments, lies or accussations to affect me. I have come too far to allow anyone to make me feel ashamed. I allowed anorexia to control what I thought of myself, what I wore and how I felt for far too long. I allowed it to dictate what I could and couldn’t do for far too long. I will not allow anyone else to do the same.
Disclaimer: I will not be reading or responding to any critiques or conflicting opinions. My stance is as it stands.
Links:
www.something-fishy.org
www.b-eat.co.uk
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