To eat or not to eat – that is the question.
And it’s a question that I have asked myself on the daily since I was 12 years old.
There have been multiple times when I’ve tried to break my disorder on my own. I would last a month here and there, but then I’d fall right back into my old tricks. I was good at hiding it. No, scratch that – I am good at hiding it. I can always find an excuse to eat the smallest amount possible or not at all. With family, I can always say, “I’ll buy or order something later” or “I already ate.” At work, I always say that there’s too much to get done to stop and eat.
I know it’s not healthy to live this way. I know that this needs to change, but how to do you break a habit that’s you’ve gone 15 years of your life doing?
I’ve started seeing therapists for my disorder back in December and they were able to diagnose me. Anorexia Nervosa – that’s what it is. They told me that there was a study conducted that found that there is something in a person’s genetics that can make them more inclined to develop Anorexia Nervosa. I don’t know if that makes me feel better or worse knowing this information. On the one hand, it’s like saying you were born with this “defect” so it’s not your fault. On the other, it feels like I was doomed from the start.
My therapists are helping me find ways to overcome my disorder and I’m trying my best to follow their advice and tips.
One of the biggest things they want me to try to work on is not weighing myself daily. Every morning and night I would – and sometimes still do – weigh myself. The number that shows up determines how much I eat. I can gain a single pound and it’s like I can immediately see it, which is ridiculous. Dr. J says that I need to train myself to understand that logically speaking, we can’t actually see ourselves gain or lose a few pounds – we need to gain or lose a lot to see the difference. The day to day fluctuations I see in my body are a result of the number I see on the scale.
At the beginning of every session Dr. A weighs me to see if there has been a dramatic shift in my weight. Since I’ve started seeing her and Dr. J, I feel like I’ve improved. I’ve gone from weighing myself twice a day to just once a day in the morning. I know it’s not much and that they would prefer I stopped weighing myself on a daily basis, but baby steps ya know? Or at least, that’s what I’ve been telling myself. The thing is, after my last session, I realized I wasn’t actually getting better like I thought I was.
When I first saw Dr. A, in December I was 110 lbs. At my second session in January she weighed me at 108 lbs. During my most recent session I weighed in at 103 lbs. The disorder in me instantly thought two things: 1. Awesome! I lost 5 lbs and 2. That’s still too heavy.
Dr. A only thought one thing: You lost 5 lbs in one month – this isn’t healthy.
She had me talk through it to see what may have caused me to lose so much weight in such a short amount of time. Was I stressed at work? Yes. Was I weighing myself twice a day still? No. Was I weighing myself in the morning? Yes. Was I still working out 5 times a week? Yes. Was I eating regularly? Sometimes. And that’s when I realized, I wasn’t getting better like I thought because I’m still letting the number on the scale dictate my life.
Since that session I've found myself falling back into my old habits. I’m skipping meals and making the same old excuses. There’s too much work to get done. It’s too late to eat a meal. I ate a big meal earlier so I shouldn’t eat again. I’ll just eat a mint or drink some tea or water to satisfy my hunger cravings. It feels like all the effort that I’ve spent trying to overcome my disorder the past 2-3 months have been for nothing.
I know that Dr. A and J told me that my disorder is never going to completely go away, but I thought that I was at least making some improvements. After that last session though, it doesn’t feel like I’m ever going to get better – not even in the slightest. And honestly, I’ve never felt more discouraged than I do right now.
I can’t let that stop me though. I need to remember that there are going to be good days and there are going to be bad days. How I react is going to determine my will to recover. I can be upset at my progress and give up. Or I can use that disappointment to fuel my desire to heal. I choose the latter.
