Like I said, years ago I thought that someone who was anorexic was emaciated and ate only an apple a day. I even thought they didn’t eat anything at all. Not really sure how I believed that because how did they still live? Anyway. We have this false belief of what eating disorders look like. It’s partly about the behaviors, but mostly about the mindset.
Oooooh, it made me SO mad sitting in my abnormal psychology class while I was going through recovery listening to my teacher explain what anorexia was. She was explaining how in anorexia sometimes you will have “binges” which technically means you eat more than you’re used to in an uncontrollable way. She said maybe someone with anorexia would usually eat half a piece of bread a day but if they had an uncontrollable binge, then they would eat the whole piece of bread. WHAT. Okay, that may be true for some anorexics, but not me. My binges were different. And I ate more than a slice of bread per day. If we are going to get a handle on this, we need to teach that anorexia, and all eating disorders for that matter, fall upon a range of severity. People aren’t gonna know they need help until we raise awareness of what it really is.
So what did my eating disorder look like? Probably like a lot of the diets that celebrities are on and the girls across the street.
I had three meals per day, probably the volume of my clenched fist. Nope, not anorexia according to what my teacher taught me because I was eating three meals!
I set goals to wait until certain times to eat again. I fought hunger by drinking a ton of water and distracting myself with tasks.
So many websites say 1200-1800 calories is enough. Celebrities swear that if you eat more all of the sudden you turn into Aunt Marge from Harry Potter. Noooooooo. False. You need double that, SAYWHAAA. Your body can’t function. I know. I got headaches. I remember feeling so lightheaded at school, I was lucky I didn’t faint. In fact, your body eventually stops burning fat and starts to take energy from your tissues. I’m convinced I really didn’t lose as much fat as I thought--my intestines were getting thinner and more fragile!
At the worst of it, I would go nearly a week without eating any type of grain. Fun fact: your body releases a signal every 2-3 hours for complex carbohydrates because it NEEDS IT. Your body knows what it needs, not celebrity diet experts. EAT THE BREAD IT’S SO GOOD.
I got anxiety thinking about making a big breakfast with my family and knowing it would be weird if I didn’t eat the cinnamon roll AND the scone AND the bacon. I got anxiety when we had two member meals in one day on my mission. I got anxiety when the number on the scale went up. I looked in any reflection as much as I could to check and make sure I still looked skinny--if not, I would chastise myself and vow to do better the next meal.
Just so you know, sometimes I STILL ate the fried chicken, the cake, the french toast, whatever, but I compensated the rest of the day by having smaller meals and eating mostly fruits and vegetables. I didn’t think that was anorexia. But it was.
Now, all these examples are not qualifiers for anorexia. Maybe you don’t get light headed. Fine. But if you find yourself thinking about food and how you are going to get around certain “unhealthy” foods at your next meal or party, or if you are weighing yourself several times a day or week, or even if you don’t like your body and are not being intuitive with your eating (which I will explain in the next post), I admonish you to really consider if you have a truly healthy relationship with food, ALL foods. And get the help if needed. And even if you do have an unhealthy relationships with food, maybe you don't have an eating disorder. BUT. You will be way happier with food and your body once you stop hating on yourself. Honestly, it’s still hard for me at times, but it helps even just to have a support system of friends and family that I can talk to when it gets difficult.
I kinda have this theory that some people have eating disorders without even knowing it. Hi, that was me.
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