tw: ed | venting

dear void, I'm going to talk into you now. take the words from my mind and set them free

love, me

___

I had a long talk tonight with my mom about my disordered eating. I don’t think she fully gets it yet, and she might not ever. But she’s trying. She didn’t say much, just listened a lot. That helped more than I thought it would, but usually she's so responsive. Maybe it's hard for her to listen to. Or maybe she just doesn't know what to say. However, my biggest fear is that she simply doesn't believe me when I tell her about how truly bad it has become. 

I weighed myself today and I’ve gained so much weight, I hate it. For two days in a row I’ve eaten a meal. Like an actual dinner meal. Which is insane. But I know I’m not doing it because I want to. I’m doing it because I make myself so hungry that I can’t hold off any longer. I wanted to skip tonight, i don’t know why I didn’t.

And when she asked me if I was hungry, I wanted to SCREAM "NO!"

But I whispered “I’m starving” 

And I ate a meal. A real meal. 

She asked me if I felt better and I said “mentally no, physically yes” 

Then I explained that starving is mentally better than after eating. starving physically hurts and eating physically feels better. There is no middle ground. I starve? Mentally great, physically sick. I eat? Mentally shit, physically fine. She got that. We talked about genetics and body types and how I would have to fight like hell on a daily basis to beat the genetics. I told her maybe it’s a good thing I can’t physically because I would if I could.

I know that if I physically could, I would turn to obsession and it would only worsen everything. I think sometimes being disabled creates a barrier between me and things that are bad for me, which I’m kinda grateful for. at least on the logical side of my brain, I am. Part of me wonders about breaking past that barrier. If I just pushed through. Pushed through the hives and eventual anaphylactic reaction that comes when I overheat and sweat. Push through the lack of muscle tone and coordination that comes with my brain disease. If I forced myself to do the things I can’t? If I just dealt with it?

She and I talked a lot about how neither of us have that structure with food that most have. In this house, we eat when hungry, never at set times. Never together as a family anymore. So we end up eating like one meal a day (if that). Which is probably a huge factor in this. Part of me wants structure, part of me wants to run from it. I feel this incredible battle going on in my mind between logic and emotion. I don't want to tell her that she has a tendency to perpetuate my habits. Not consciously, but through her own actions. I see her eating habits and I think sometimes I get lost in them.

I told my therapist twice about my disordered eating, and my psych twice. I got ignored 4 times. So when I left therapy and realized I was doing much better without therapy, one of the only things i didn’t have was the ability to cope with this. I learned so much, but not about this. Sometimes I wonder if they dismissed me because I don't look like I have an eating disorder. Which is insane given that they are mental health doctors who know that eating disorders aren't diagnosed based on appearance, but rather habit.

For the past four years, I've been battling with extreme agoraphobia. It wasn't until recently that I started fighting it. I take a calendar of the month and write down on it all the days I've gone out and where I've gone. I like to share it publicly because I've had a lot of people reach out and tell me it's helped them or inspired them. But sometimes I wonder, when I post my agoraphobia calendar, do people think I eat a lot? McD is on there a lot - when in reality, it’s me eating a few fries to hold me over for the next two days. or sometimes just a bottle of water. maybe nuggets on a rare day. I don't know why I feel judged. I feel watched. But I don't want to stifle my agoraphobia progress based on my fears with food.

I keep asking myself “What do I want? Do I wanna get better? Do I wanna get worse?" I guess what I want is for my mind to get better, but for my body to look the way I want it to. but in all of this, it’s just my mind getting worse. For the longest time, it wasn't even about my body. It was about control. It was about seeing how long I could go without eating. It was about my mind telling me I didn't deserve food.

Truth be told, I want the guilt to go away when I eat. I want that voice out of my head telling me to just wait a little longer. I want the fear to go away. The fear that I’m gonna gain weight and spend my 20’s looking the way I do. I want my clothes to fit again. I want to not eat and not be hungry.

I know I need to go back to healthier food. I know because I’m showing the same symptoms i was when I was pre-diabetic. Except back then I had so much to cut out of my diet. Now, I don’t. I don’t know what to cut or change because eating at all is HARD. Back then it was so easy to cut out junk food and just eat a balanced diet. Now? Now, I don't even have much to cut out of my diet! Back then it was picking a home-cooked meal instead of pizza. What now? Deciding not to get cheese on my salad?

I don't know. I feel like I failed? But I'm not sure what I failed at? Like how the fuck do you gain weight when you don’t eat? that doesn’t make sense to me and it’s just… I don't know.  I’m just scared. And I know it’s getting worse and I don't know what to do.

I wish she would look me in the eye when I talk about this. When I have a moment of clarity and beg for help. She tells me she's afraid I'm going to develop an eating disorder... I already have. I go days without eating. I can't remember the last time I had breakfast lunch and dinner all in one day. God, it must've been years by now.  

Then, on top of it, there is this sense of crippling imposter syndrome. Here I am, beginning my career. I land a cover piece for a magazine with an article for their self-love edition. Literally, my first magazine and my article graphics are the cover. I talked about how being yourself is of the utmost importance. Hell, I have a framed 24x36 print of the magazine cover coming in the mail and all I can think is that I lied. I lied and I'm going to frame that lie and hang it on the wall. Well, maybe I didn't lie, per se. I think I'm just not applying what I wrote to myself. So, if I'm not a liar, I'm a huge hypocrite. 

My friends tell me I'm being way too hard on myself. Maybe I am. But if I'm not hard on myself, who will be? The pressure I put myself under is like a hydraulic press, but it's only because I know what I want! If I don't beat the living shit out of myself, how am I going to get further? Maybe I do it because i know that nobody can hurt me as much as I can hurt myself... as if it's some sort of preparation. 

Sometimes I wonder if that's where the ED voice comes from. The pressure. Pushing myself so hard to the point where I tell myself I don't deserve food. Not until I look perfect, perform perfect, act perfect, and thrive perfectly in my career. I know perfection is overrated, I know that. But why shouldn't I fight for it anyway? To get as close as possible? It's hilarious because the entirety of my magazine article talks about how people who display perfection are undoubtedly faking it in one way or another and that you shouldn't fall for it. Here I am... hypocrite. 

In some strange way, I think my ED is me trying to compensate. Even though beauty isn't my top priority, it's definitely the top priority of society. It's the basis for rejection: and it's human nature to hate rejection. So I try so hard to be the picture of beauty even though I don't give a damn because somehow, it'll make me more valuable even if it's the last thing I care about. The world is a cruel and unfair place where sometimes, it doesn't matter what you can do or how good you are at it. It matters how pretty you are. And even though I put 110% of myself into my work, I become afraid that it isn't enough. That it won't be enough until they would choose me despite my work.

I want to be known for the work I do and how hard I work at doing it, but the world just doesn't work that way.

Holy hell, I'm trying to use beauty as insurance for my career. Gross.

I've faced rejection in every corner of my life. My family, my friends, my relationships, my health, my career. This journey with ED feels like one big battle to fight off more rejection. 

I won't be free from any of this until I get what I'm fighting for. And I always get what I'm fighting for. If I don't, I wasn't fighting hard enough. I won't rest. I will fight tooth and fucking nail until the death to get to my dreams. It just so happens that I've picked up a bad habit or three along the way.

I want back what I had to sacrifice. I want the body that spent the first 22 years of its life being chronically sick to instead become beautiful. I want the career that people would die for. I want my family to see what they missed out on. And I will get it. I don't care who I have to push out of the way to get it...

even if the person I'm pushing out of the way is myself.

God damnit I am so hungry.

_____

dear void, thanks for listening

love, me