PrettyThin

Hello,

I would like to share my story:
As a young girl I was very confident my mother made sure that I knew that I was intelligent, beautiful and comfortable with myself…when I hit the 5th grade and went to a new school…kids started to pick on me. Turns out by the end of the year ¾ of the 5th grade had formed a hate group against me. I was completely alone, I began to think that I was useless and that I deserved the hate group meanwhile I had never done anything to deserve it.

A year later my parents decided to move to Toronto I was more than thank full, a new start is what I needed, I made friends really easily but then again a particular group of girls decided they did not like me…for no apparent reason. Thankfully I had made a solid group of friends, therefore had more of a support group.

Years went passed and I was happy had friends, was doing well in school. My mother had become more protective and controlling over my life I guess because I was getting older. One morning I woke up to my mother shaking me and telling me there had been an accident. My sister had been driving and crashed her car…she was brain dead at the scene, was in a coma for about a year and is now paralyzed neck down. My life took a spin and apparently I was not able to handle it…the day I told my “friends”, they laughed and said whatever and walked away from me (these are the girls that had not liked me at the beginning of my middle school life) I quickly learned that I did not want to be friends with them even though they were part of the “popular” group (btw they are all still friends and going nowhere in life, are just as superficial and have no substance as they were in grade school).

High school came around and I had learned that drugs and alcohol were a way out I dabbled in a lot for a few years and then got clean at 17. After I got clean I changed dramatically - my new addiction became PERFECTION. My hair, my makeup, my clothing, my body…my everything had to be perfect. To me I was happy and everything was great. Then I tore my ACL and lost some control again but in this case I was given pain killers, I quickly learned that pain killers suppress eating…I pretty much stopped eating entirely. I was 5’2 115 pounds(HEALTHY) and dropped to about 93 pounds in a matter of weeks. I did not see how thin I was…I kept pushing and pushing to be much thinner. My boyfriend broke up with me, my mother was beyond disappointed, I stopped talking to most of my friends because I wanted to be alone in my own misery and not see the disappoint of the people who cared for me. I was the most depressed I had ever been in my life, every day I wished that I would just disappear little did I know. I was.

It got to a point that my mother told me if you did not get treatment I would be told to leave and find somewhere else to wither away (I was 19 so it was allowed) This gave me a good push, that I desperately needed. I finally went to CAMH…I received treatment even though I didn’t think that I had a problem. One day on my way home from the facility I broke down on the subway, it occurred to me how sick I was and how I didn’t want to be sick anymore. The next session I opened up I spoke about how deep the wounds went from as far back as elementary school and how it still hurt me, how my controlling mother made me feel unimportant and how I wish she was how she was when I was younger more supportive and loving…especially when I needed it most. I ended up gaining most of the weight back. I struggled a lot at the beginning of my recovery…skipping meals here and there because I was scared to give up the control.

I can now say that I am a “recovered anorexic” (text book terms)…however I still have my good days and bad days. I don’t believe in recovered  EDs I believe that in contrary to what apparently is the opinion of a lot of people on this website, it is a life long disease. People who have EDs are unfortunately mentally ill when they are going through a phase of the disorder being full blown. I now, everyday stand in front of my mirror look at myself and tell myself “ I am beautiful, I am strong, I am worth it” It is so much easier to hate yourself than to love yourself…however I am learning that is so much more thrilling and lovely to love yourself. I now have an amazing boyfriend who loves all of me and tells me everyday…he makes a point to make me feel awesome and I do the same. We feed off each other in the most amazing, motivating and healthy way.  

I used to think it was so vain and such a BAD thing to think as myself as beautiful, but now I find it is empowering to feel beautiful inside and out I feel like I can really love and be loved now… My boyfriend tells me confidence is so sexy…I too now believe this  

I would like for some of you to read this and realize yes you are not alone…none of you are. There are so many women that are slowly diminishing because of these diseases and you should seek support whether it is from forums, friends, family, treatment facilities, councilors..etc but don’t listen to ways to cover up your eating disorder and lie to your doctor. I am not judging but posting ways for a girl to trick her doctor into not finding out she has missed her period is dangerous…I learned in treatment the reason why your body does this is because it literally protects you from getting pregnant because it can not support that natural process. You and or the baby could and probably would die.

I remember not wanting to listen to anyone because “No One Understands Me” was my outlook….But I do understand I do understand not wanting to get out of bed because you feel so god damn ashamed, sad, uncomfortable and just deep seeded hatred. But if you are reading this and you are LOOKING for support. Then take it by the reigns and tell yourself to screw off.

No one is going to make you better…you can really only make you better but having support is number one.  Someone mentioned in the “hate” area that she is curvy and gets men all the time…I am going to counter that and say I got guys too, plenty of them and always had good looking boyfriends…NONE of them could make me feel beautiful because I felt ugly. It has nothing to do with being thin or curvy, I am sure there are beautiful curvy women and beautiful thin women like myself…It is not fair for thicker women to look down upon the thin either, some of us are naturally small built and some of us have a larger build. But most of the world is not sick…this disease is painful. It is the day that you crack and you don’t want to be sick anymore that it will help. I only use the word sick because that is a proper term…you are not well when you are starving your self for all your own reasons. You will get better and it will be hard and you will falter all the time. But it gets easier…if I could say it a million times I would, it just gets so much easier.

The minute you begin to love yourself the most amazing things happen…I know this cause I am there, I have control of my life, I am happy and full of life…I chose happiness and damn does it feel good. I will not lie I still have bad days…but so does everyone. The disease will break you down, but you have the inner strength to break it down and kick it in the butt!

J

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