Sue

There is no easy way to share this or way to sugar coat it, my story is one of a young woman who struggled with self esteem and body image issues since about the age of 12. I developed an eating disorder at the age of 11-12 and continued to set myself down a road of self destruction until about 8 years ago when I finally went into treatment. Much of this might sound foreign or slightly crazy to those of you who live a normal, balanced life, BUT anyone who has with diets, restricting, over exercising, body image, or self esteem, I am sure you will identify with many pieces of my story. I always felt very alone in my struggles and part of the reason I am so willing to be open and share my story is I truly don’t want anyone else to feel so alone with these issues. The hard thing about eating disorders is that you don’t know this is happening until you are locked into the behaviors enough that it becomes scary to let go. Its very easy for an outsider looking in to say…I can’t believe you would do that…or why would you…yet there are millions of woman and men around the world who find themselves struggling with these issues and behaviors. My story started at the young age of 11, when I had experienced some personal trauma that I couldn’t understand. I began to struggle with self esteem and body image at the time when my body and my peer group were changing. It was the perfect storm…all I can remember is that I wanted to feel better, for the first time in my life I no longer liked myself. There was a voice inside of me that told me if I would lose weight I would feel better and everything would be OK again. To this day I am still not sure where this voice came from (probably the society I lived in) but I decided I needed to lose weight. By the way, I was never overweight….it was all about my perception. So I started to restrict… I didn’t know anything about eating disorders, this was back in 1973. I started by skipping lunch….to make a long story short, and not trigger any behaviors in any one else…I restricted food. My eating disorder quickly took me from a normal weight,normal adolescent to a quietly obsessed under-eating, overexercising, insecure girl. One of my biggest mistakes at that time was keeping everything a secret. I didn’t tell anyone how I was feeling, not my friends or my parents. My thoughts and eating disorder behaviors quickly become my hidden identity. This is not a proud story that I am sharing, yet it quickly became my norm….and before I knew it, it became who I was. Everyday life and social activities became increasingly difficult. Yes, I lost weight but I never felt better about myself. That is the ugly truth about an eating disorder…there is no win. You will never feel good about yourself, no matter how much weight you lose. At some point you lose your dignity and your self respect and in the end you sacrifice your integrity. My story is anything but pretty, in fact it is about as real as you will find. I lied, cheated, stole… I hurt the people who cared the most about me. Yet I couldn’t see it…I was too locked into my behaviors. This carried me from junior high, thru high school and into college. At college I ended up rooming with a girl who also had an eating disorder. Her disorder was different than mine. I was anorexic, she was bulimic. She was this blond haired, blue eyed bomb shell from southern Indiana who was so full of life. I helped her with her studies and she introduced me to every football player at Valporaiso. We were a perfect match, until I discovered she was bulimic. At first glance you would have thought that I might have been disgusted at that behaviors, yet for me who was truly in a starvation mode…I understood this as an opportunity to eat yet not gain weight. Desperate people do desperate things is truly the story of this time in my life. I thought I could just pick and choose this behavior…..I could binge and purge once a week to control my urges. It quickly became apparent that once a week, becomes twice a week and before you know it is everyday and then 3-4 times a day. Bulimia is one of the most addictive behaviors I have ever taken part in and if hating yourself and your body when you are anorexic isn’t enough, just imagine how isolating and humbling it is to now become bulimic. My isolation and secrets grew bigger as the eating disorder became my existence. I experienced so may losses during this time….there are too many too list. Yet I just couldn’t see a way out. I write this just shaking my head at how could I not see the light….yet I say to you, eating disorders are so debilitating. So how did I get through and past this…..sad but true my son who was 13 years old at the time, learned about eating disorders in his health class and recognized something in me. He came home and confronted me….my whole world changed in that moment. I never wanted to hurt anyone, particularly my children. At that point I knew things had to change and I went into treatment. Treatment was by far the hardest and most beneficial thing I have ever done!!! I was so scared, afraid of failing because I would lose my family. But just as afraid of succeeding. Would I still like myself after gaining the necessary weight. I hadn’t had a normal relationship with food for 35 years. So here I sit, now at the age of 54. Yes, much older than you, yet not so far! What I can tell you is that recovery is possible and worth it!! I am now healthy, centered and have peace in my life and with myself. I wish I could have accomplished this at a much earlier age but I am ecstatic to have it at this point. I want anyone and all of you out there to know that recovery is possible…if I can do it, believe me when I say you can too!