My Story
I fell down into a very dark and lonely place in my life – a place where I would discover the defect that hid in the depths of my very brain. Then, it swallowed me whole.
Iwas the “perfect” child – the child my parents could depend on from a young age. My “baby” life was short – walking at seven months, potty-trained at ten months, and talking soon after. My parents didn’t have to worry much about me, and therefore used all their energy to help my little sister with eosinophilic[i]disease and my older brother with autism. I liked being the child my parents saw as “perfect,” the child who didn’t really need help.
Elementary School
Eating disorders can begin as young as the age of five or six.[ii]
I remember, when I was just six years old, I was so excited to put on one of my dance “performances” for my parents. As I leapt across the dining room floor, I heard them commenting on how my thighs were getting “thick.” Little did they know, that comment would make me rethink my bathing suit choices, exchanging my classic bikini style bottoms for ones that resemble boy shorts to cover as much of my thighs as possible. Their seemingly meaningless remark introduced such an uncomfortable feeling to me as I took off my shorts to go in the water, making me not want to go in as I’d be forced to take them off. But my parents never even knew I heard them, and certainly wouldn’t have imagined that that moment would follow me through the next twelve years of my life. It is my memory of it that explains the feelings I would later face, those that cannot be changed by anyone, not even myself.
Sixth Grade
One in five ballet dancers have eating disorders.[iii]
At dance, everyone had always fought for the barre spot behind the “skinny mirrors” (mirrors that were angled slightly downward, making everyone appear skinnier than they truly were). But those mirrors scared me. They made me believe I would never be able to see myself through anything but the mirrors’ deceptions. Knowing my reflection depended on the mirror I would use fed an obsession I had with my body image. My fixation on my body and my distrust in mirrors would then cause my disordered mind to take over my vision. And that is when my fear turned into a disease.[iv]Consumed by the body my mind created, I transformed from a fool of mirrors to a fool of my own self.
At the costume shop, I would nervously wait to get measured in a line full of leotarded ballerinas I assumed to have had thirty-two-inch hips and twenty-three inch waists. I dreaded it, trying on other dancers’ costumes from previous years just to find out they needed to be modified to fit my much-larger hips. The place I had once seen as a “wonderland” of beautifully embellished tutus became a place where I felt trapped in a room full of perfect dancers whose bones were so visible it looked as if they had transparent skin.
At P.E., while everyone else changed in the actual “changing” portion of the locker room, I’d change in the bathroom because I didn’t want anyone to see my imperfect body. I hated going to P.E. where they not only would measure us, but would also take our weights. They’d record our body measurements on this small index-looking card, which everyone would leave around and exchange with others like they didn’t care what they said. But I didcare. My measurements defined me. They made me vulnerable.
In the middle of all my insecurities, my grandmother had passed away due to Parkinson’s disease. My mom cried for months. She would try to hold in her tears when she was around me, not knowing I could recognize her sadness as her eyes sparkled and her nose turned pink. I knew I needed to appear strong for her, so I buried my pain underneath a smile, hiding behind a collection of sorrows that devoured my mind. My life then turned my into an infinite loop of misery.
I cried until I was tired of crying, pushing me through four years of what everyone else saw as “perfection” when, little did they know, my unconfronted griefs and insecurities consumed me. It became harder for me to keep up my façade of perfection as my ability to “empty” my tears gradually vanished. So I found another way to cope with my untamable emotions – a way that would lead me into the very dark abyss of my life.
Seventh and Eighth Grade
Eating disorders are not merely a product of vanity; they likely stem from a fear of losing control.[v]
I needed control. So, I turned to the one thing I thought could give me it, my greatest insecurity – my body. My thoughts became my destruction, my flawed perception of “perfect” became an illness, and my body was just collateral damage. I felt like I finally had a purpose, which skewed my perception of the damage I was doing to myself: throbbing headaches due to dehydration, constant fatigue that could never be fixed despite the amount of sleep I’d get, and diminishing electrolyte levels that would be the ultimate cause of the two.[vi]But I could finally control something, measuring my progress by the proximity of my thumb and index finger as they wrap around my arm.
Ninth Grade
1.5% of American women struggle with bulimia.[vii]
I assumed that being disgusted by your own body was “normal.” But was it “normal” to measure yourself daily, pinching the fat on your hips to see how much better you’d look if you could only get rid of it?[viii]Was it “normal” to think of excuses to get out of social events that revolved around food because you despised eating in front of people?[ix]Was it “normal” to be so driven by perfection to the point where you give in to self-destruction?
Tenth Grade, First Semester
People with bulimia share similar dopamine abnormalities as people with cocaine addictions.[x]
My illness became my religion where I worshipped measuring tape under the direction of a priest – the toothbrush that would purge me of all my sins – food. My red and yellow polka-dotted journal where I would record my daily measurements became my bible, evolving into a place where I’d list my sins and goals in the form of numbers and drawings of the bodies I had longed to live in, but could never achieve. I had become obsessed with my body and possessed by my disorder. I was scared that, without my daily rituals, my emotions would overwhelm me to the point where my parents would see the pain I was in. I tried so hard to hide my illness, running the water in the shower to muffle the sounds and locking myself in my room where I’d claim to be doing homework, but actually couldn’t as my bottled-up sorrows wouldn’t allow me to.[xi]My throat always hurt, my cheeks swelled, and my grades plummeted.[xii]I felt like a failure, which made hiding the pain harder. It became more and more visible. And that’s when they found out.
My parents noticed I was distancing myself. Then they saw the drastic drop in my grades. So they started watching me closely, not realizing what I was going through until they found my “bible” hidden in under my bed. I was speechless. The pressure point in between my thumb and index finger I had relied on to stop my tears from shedding no longer worked. I had kept my secret from them for four years. I was never sickly skinny and I hid my eating habits – furtively eating in my closet and purging my “sins” in the bathroom – so there were no obvious physical indications that I had a disorder. And that’s when I realized just how confusing my disorder was – it was my greatest accomplishment that I felt too ashamed to tell anyone about.
Tenth Grade, Second Semester
10% of people with eating disorders receive treatment.[xiii]
The year my parents found out was the longest, most difficult year of my life that would eventually become my first step toward recovery. I would look at my old pictures, reminding myself of who I used to be: the girl confident enough to use the preschool lunch tables as a stage for her “dance recitals” and a runway for her “fashion shows;” the tiniest seven-month-old girl who refused to sit in her stroller and, instead, walked around lifting her chin with every step, thinking she’s as tall as a skyscraper; the girl who didn’t have to tryto wear a smile on her face as she was unaware of all the pains she’d later have to face. I’d wonder why I could no longer be that girl just to realize that my illness – what I had used to gain control – had actually taken control of me. My unconfronted distresses fed my disorder, and my disorder only amplified them. It kept me from not only happiness, but the dream I have had since the age of five, to become a doctor. So I forced myself out of my loop of misery. I received treatment.
Today
The relapse rate for bulimia is between 35% to 36%.[xiv]
I did not instantly overcome my eating disorder. In fact, I still haven’t, and never will. It is a process that is able to quiet my urgencies, but will never fully silence them. I have accepted that I will not be able to kill my disorder, I can only put it to sleep. I have accepted that it will always long to infect my mind. It will awaken during the times I am weakest – the times when I feel alone and unable to reveal the agonizing thoughts that vex my mind. It will know that that is when I am most vulnerable because it knows everything about me. It has been through the deaths, the breakups, the drama, and every other obstacle, which is why I’m still learning how to take control of it. I’m learning that confrontation and acceptance is the anecdote for taming the wild emotions that lurk in my head. I’m learning that I doneed help. I’m learning to feed my vulnerabilities to others before my disorder feeds off of them itself. I’m learning I cancontrol the way I cope with my inevitable pains by doing these things, but that doesn’t mean I won’t struggle. And that is why I am still afraid.
[i]"Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis." National Association for Rare Disorders, rarediseases.org/rare-diseases/eosinophilic-gastroenteritis/.
[ii]"Eating Disorder Myths." NEDA, www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/toolkit/parent-toolkit/eating-disorder-myths.
[iii]Carbine, Melanie. "The Ballerina: A Starving Artist." KSNN, 3 Jan. 2017, ksnn.net/the-ballerina-a-starving-artist/.
[iv]"Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD)." Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 2013, adaa.org/understanding-anxiety/related-illnesses/other-related-conditions/body-dysmorphic-disorder-bdd.
[v]"Self-Control and its Connection to Disordered Eating." Eating Disorders Review, 2016, eatingdisordersreview.com/self-control-and-its-connection-to-disordered-eating/.
[vi]Bell, Leigh. "Electrolytes and Bulimia: Why Is This a Big Deal?" Eating Disorder Hope, 19 June 2015, www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/bulimia/electrolytes-and-bulimia-why-is-this-a-big-deal.
[vii]"Eating Disorder Statistics." National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, anad.org/education-and-awareness/about-eating-disorders/eating-disorders-statistics/.
[viii]Birch, Jenna. "10 Subtle Signs Someone You Love Might Have An Eating Disorder." Self, 16 Mar. 2017, www.self.com/story/10-subtle-signs-someone-you-love-might-have-an-eating-disorder.
[ix]"Find the Best Bulimia Treatment Programs and Dual Diagnosis Rehabs." Bulimia.com, 4 July 2018, www.bulimia.com/topics/bulimia/.
[x]"How Bulimia is Like Drug Addiction." Montecatinini Eating Disorders, www.montecatinieatingdisorder.com/bulimia/articles/like-drug-addiction/.
[xi]"Warning Signs that Your Child Has an Eating Disorder." Adolescent Growth, adolescentgrowth.com/treatment-programs/eating-disorders/warning-signs-that-your-child-has-an-eating-disorder/.
[xii]"What Are the Symptoms of Bulimia?" WebMD, www.webmd.com/mental-health/
eating-disorders/bulimia-nervosa/understanding-bulimia-symptoms#1.
[xiii]Ouellette, JD. "Statistics on Bulimia." Mirror Mirror Eating Disorder Help, 2015, www.mirror-mirror.org/bulimia/statistics-on-bulimia.htm.
[xiv]Derrick, Dr. Angela. "Eating Disorder Relapse is Common; How to Help Your Loved One Through it." Eating Recovery Center, 3 Oct. 2018, www.eatingrecoverycenter.com/blog/october-2018/eating-disorder-relapse-is-common;-how-to-help-your-loved-one-through-it-dr-angela-derrick.
Iwas the “perfect” child – the child my parents could depend on from a young age. My “baby” life was short – walking at seven months, potty-trained at ten months, and talking soon after. My parents didn’t have to worry much about me, and therefore used all their energy to help my little sister with eosinophilic[i]disease and my older brother with autism. I liked being the child my parents saw as “perfect,” the child who didn’t really need help.
Elementary School
Eating disorders can begin as young as the age of five or six.[ii]
I remember, when I was just six years old, I was so excited to put on one of my dance “performances” for my parents. As I leapt across the dining room floor, I heard them commenting on how my thighs were getting “thick.” Little did they know, that comment would make me rethink my bathing suit choices, exchanging my classic bikini style bottoms for ones that resemble boy shorts to cover as much of my thighs as possible. Their seemingly meaningless remark introduced such an uncomfortable feeling to me as I took off my shorts to go in the water, making me not want to go in as I’d be forced to take them off. But my parents never even knew I heard them, and certainly wouldn’t have imagined that that moment would follow me through the next twelve years of my life. It is my memory of it that explains the feelings I would later face, those that cannot be changed by anyone, not even myself.
Sixth Grade
One in five ballet dancers have eating disorders.[iii]
At dance, everyone had always fought for the barre spot behind the “skinny mirrors” (mirrors that were angled slightly downward, making everyone appear skinnier than they truly were). But those mirrors scared me. They made me believe I would never be able to see myself through anything but the mirrors’ deceptions. Knowing my reflection depended on the mirror I would use fed an obsession I had with my body image. My fixation on my body and my distrust in mirrors would then cause my disordered mind to take over my vision. And that is when my fear turned into a disease.[iv]Consumed by the body my mind created, I transformed from a fool of mirrors to a fool of my own self.
At the costume shop, I would nervously wait to get measured in a line full of leotarded ballerinas I assumed to have had thirty-two-inch hips and twenty-three inch waists. I dreaded it, trying on other dancers’ costumes from previous years just to find out they needed to be modified to fit my much-larger hips. The place I had once seen as a “wonderland” of beautifully embellished tutus became a place where I felt trapped in a room full of perfect dancers whose bones were so visible it looked as if they had transparent skin.
At P.E., while everyone else changed in the actual “changing” portion of the locker room, I’d change in the bathroom because I didn’t want anyone to see my imperfect body. I hated going to P.E. where they not only would measure us, but would also take our weights. They’d record our body measurements on this small index-looking card, which everyone would leave around and exchange with others like they didn’t care what they said. But I didcare. My measurements defined me. They made me vulnerable.
In the middle of all my insecurities, my grandmother had passed away due to Parkinson’s disease. My mom cried for months. She would try to hold in her tears when she was around me, not knowing I could recognize her sadness as her eyes sparkled and her nose turned pink. I knew I needed to appear strong for her, so I buried my pain underneath a smile, hiding behind a collection of sorrows that devoured my mind. My life then turned my into an infinite loop of misery.
I cried until I was tired of crying, pushing me through four years of what everyone else saw as “perfection” when, little did they know, my unconfronted griefs and insecurities consumed me. It became harder for me to keep up my façade of perfection as my ability to “empty” my tears gradually vanished. So I found another way to cope with my untamable emotions – a way that would lead me into the very dark abyss of my life.
Seventh and Eighth Grade
Eating disorders are not merely a product of vanity; they likely stem from a fear of losing control.[v]
I needed control. So, I turned to the one thing I thought could give me it, my greatest insecurity – my body. My thoughts became my destruction, my flawed perception of “perfect” became an illness, and my body was just collateral damage. I felt like I finally had a purpose, which skewed my perception of the damage I was doing to myself: throbbing headaches due to dehydration, constant fatigue that could never be fixed despite the amount of sleep I’d get, and diminishing electrolyte levels that would be the ultimate cause of the two.[vi]But I could finally control something, measuring my progress by the proximity of my thumb and index finger as they wrap around my arm.
Ninth Grade
1.5% of American women struggle with bulimia.[vii]
I assumed that being disgusted by your own body was “normal.” But was it “normal” to measure yourself daily, pinching the fat on your hips to see how much better you’d look if you could only get rid of it?[viii]Was it “normal” to think of excuses to get out of social events that revolved around food because you despised eating in front of people?[ix]Was it “normal” to be so driven by perfection to the point where you give in to self-destruction?
Tenth Grade, First Semester
People with bulimia share similar dopamine abnormalities as people with cocaine addictions.[x]
My illness became my religion where I worshipped measuring tape under the direction of a priest – the toothbrush that would purge me of all my sins – food. My red and yellow polka-dotted journal where I would record my daily measurements became my bible, evolving into a place where I’d list my sins and goals in the form of numbers and drawings of the bodies I had longed to live in, but could never achieve. I had become obsessed with my body and possessed by my disorder. I was scared that, without my daily rituals, my emotions would overwhelm me to the point where my parents would see the pain I was in. I tried so hard to hide my illness, running the water in the shower to muffle the sounds and locking myself in my room where I’d claim to be doing homework, but actually couldn’t as my bottled-up sorrows wouldn’t allow me to.[xi]My throat always hurt, my cheeks swelled, and my grades plummeted.[xii]I felt like a failure, which made hiding the pain harder. It became more and more visible. And that’s when they found out.
My parents noticed I was distancing myself. Then they saw the drastic drop in my grades. So they started watching me closely, not realizing what I was going through until they found my “bible” hidden in under my bed. I was speechless. The pressure point in between my thumb and index finger I had relied on to stop my tears from shedding no longer worked. I had kept my secret from them for four years. I was never sickly skinny and I hid my eating habits – furtively eating in my closet and purging my “sins” in the bathroom – so there were no obvious physical indications that I had a disorder. And that’s when I realized just how confusing my disorder was – it was my greatest accomplishment that I felt too ashamed to tell anyone about.
Tenth Grade, Second Semester
10% of people with eating disorders receive treatment.[xiii]
The year my parents found out was the longest, most difficult year of my life that would eventually become my first step toward recovery. I would look at my old pictures, reminding myself of who I used to be: the girl confident enough to use the preschool lunch tables as a stage for her “dance recitals” and a runway for her “fashion shows;” the tiniest seven-month-old girl who refused to sit in her stroller and, instead, walked around lifting her chin with every step, thinking she’s as tall as a skyscraper; the girl who didn’t have to tryto wear a smile on her face as she was unaware of all the pains she’d later have to face. I’d wonder why I could no longer be that girl just to realize that my illness – what I had used to gain control – had actually taken control of me. My unconfronted distresses fed my disorder, and my disorder only amplified them. It kept me from not only happiness, but the dream I have had since the age of five, to become a doctor. So I forced myself out of my loop of misery. I received treatment.
Today
The relapse rate for bulimia is between 35% to 36%.[xiv]
I did not instantly overcome my eating disorder. In fact, I still haven’t, and never will. It is a process that is able to quiet my urgencies, but will never fully silence them. I have accepted that I will not be able to kill my disorder, I can only put it to sleep. I have accepted that it will always long to infect my mind. It will awaken during the times I am weakest – the times when I feel alone and unable to reveal the agonizing thoughts that vex my mind. It will know that that is when I am most vulnerable because it knows everything about me. It has been through the deaths, the breakups, the drama, and every other obstacle, which is why I’m still learning how to take control of it. I’m learning that confrontation and acceptance is the anecdote for taming the wild emotions that lurk in my head. I’m learning that I doneed help. I’m learning to feed my vulnerabilities to others before my disorder feeds off of them itself. I’m learning I cancontrol the way I cope with my inevitable pains by doing these things, but that doesn’t mean I won’t struggle. And that is why I am still afraid.
[i]"Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis." National Association for Rare Disorders, rarediseases.org/rare-diseases/eosinophilic-gastroenteritis/.
[ii]"Eating Disorder Myths." NEDA, www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/toolkit/parent-toolkit/eating-disorder-myths.
[iii]Carbine, Melanie. "The Ballerina: A Starving Artist." KSNN, 3 Jan. 2017, ksnn.net/the-ballerina-a-starving-artist/.
[iv]"Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD)." Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 2013, adaa.org/understanding-anxiety/related-illnesses/other-related-conditions/body-dysmorphic-disorder-bdd.
[v]"Self-Control and its Connection to Disordered Eating." Eating Disorders Review, 2016, eatingdisordersreview.com/self-control-and-its-connection-to-disordered-eating/.
[vi]Bell, Leigh. "Electrolytes and Bulimia: Why Is This a Big Deal?" Eating Disorder Hope, 19 June 2015, www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/bulimia/electrolytes-and-bulimia-why-is-this-a-big-deal.
[vii]"Eating Disorder Statistics." National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, anad.org/education-and-awareness/about-eating-disorders/eating-disorders-statistics/.
[viii]Birch, Jenna. "10 Subtle Signs Someone You Love Might Have An Eating Disorder." Self, 16 Mar. 2017, www.self.com/story/10-subtle-signs-someone-you-love-might-have-an-eating-disorder.
[ix]"Find the Best Bulimia Treatment Programs and Dual Diagnosis Rehabs." Bulimia.com, 4 July 2018, www.bulimia.com/topics/bulimia/.
[x]"How Bulimia is Like Drug Addiction." Montecatinini Eating Disorders, www.montecatinieatingdisorder.com/bulimia/articles/like-drug-addiction/.
[xi]"Warning Signs that Your Child Has an Eating Disorder." Adolescent Growth, adolescentgrowth.com/treatment-programs/eating-disorders/warning-signs-that-your-child-has-an-eating-disorder/.
[xii]"What Are the Symptoms of Bulimia?" WebMD, www.webmd.com/mental-health/
eating-disorders/bulimia-nervosa/understanding-bulimia-symptoms#1.
[xiii]Ouellette, JD. "Statistics on Bulimia." Mirror Mirror Eating Disorder Help, 2015, www.mirror-mirror.org/bulimia/statistics-on-bulimia.htm.
[xiv]Derrick, Dr. Angela. "Eating Disorder Relapse is Common; How to Help Your Loved One Through it." Eating Recovery Center, 3 Oct. 2018, www.eatingrecoverycenter.com/blog/october-2018/eating-disorder-relapse-is-common;-how-to-help-your-loved-one-through-it-dr-angela-derrick.