How to talk to an Anorexic...

YOU LOOK SO HEALTHY

What? Why? You look great! What’s your secret?! What do you eat? What diet are you on? Like no carbs, sugar, bread or anything?   

How did it start? Did you just…stop eating? JUST EAT! Go eat a cheeseburger! Or five…

I’m surprised you don’t smoke pot or anything…you know…to give you a heartier appetite!

You look like an Auschwitz survivor…

Do you have cancer?

You don’t pray enough…If you were a better Christian…just give this up.

 

These are all comments I have heard throughout the progression of my battle with an eating disorder. The stigma that taints those with anorexia, bulimia, compulsive eating, or EDNOS is like an awkward purple elephant sitting in the middle of a room full of people.

What, do you just not LIKE food?

The funny thing is…an eating disorder has nothing to do with food. Weight. The scale. Yet that is how it cleverly disguises itself~ cloaked in labels and numbers, endlessly obsessing over calories in, calories out. But if people only knew. This is no diet. No ‘fast’. I sure as hell did not wake up one day and just decide to contract anorexia, despite the notions of others. It is not fun shit. Anorexia is but a symptom of a much deeper issue. Trauma, self hatred, loathing, shame, control, competition. FEAR. These are but a few of the signature events that sprinkle a fellow ED sufferer’s life. I’ve been around the block a few times. I have seen people walk through the doors of Inpatient treatment centers suffering immensely, but rest within a normal weight range. Yet still, the misconception is that in order to be “sick” with an eating disorder, you have to exhibit physical ramifications.  You have to be diminished to skin and bone. However, some of the sickest people I have met are above a “normal” BMI, their mental well-being in a horrific space. They are then ejected prematurely from the intensive care they desperately need because their weight is deemed “stable”, according to the standards of Insurance companies.       

F insurance companies. Because the scale cannot measure the internal suffering this insidious disease produces. My job as an insider to these people’s life stories, their pain, their shame, their incredible courage in opening up and accepting help, seeking life outside of the misery, is to educate others. Not only for myself, but for those who have trudged the path with me. Warriors.

Remember, you know my name, you don’t know my story. Everyone struggles with something. Not one of us is perfect. But there is beauty in the breakdown.