Originally recovery was forced upon me, but now I am choosing it.
For so long I lived in denial about my eating disorder. I couldn’t see the damage I was doing to my body, my health, to the people around me and my life. It took everything away from me yet I still couldn’t stop. I wasn’t able to go to school and finish year 12, I couldn’t go out with my friends or be at parties or gatherings because the phobia of food that my eating disorder gave me, was so unbelievably overwhelming. I felt as if that was the only thing that mattered, my anorexia was all consuming, it was my number one priority. The only thing I cared about.
At the beginning of this year I was diagnosed and admitted into outpatient treatment, and I fought against it. I did everything in my power so the anorexia could win. I lost myself, I was terrified of the sheer power these voices had in controlling me. I couldn’t fight against it. It got to a point where my parents had to supervise me eating every meal, I was put on a meal plan and restricted from doing all the things that made me happy because that was what had to happen for me to get better. My life had completely fallen apart, and so had my mental state. Being underweight made me anxious, depressed and angry. I couldn’t maintain relationships and I knew then that I couldn’t continue living like this.
There was always that lingering voice in the back of my head, that stuck at around, even after getting help, saying “you’re not sick enough, you’re not sick enough”. I longed for validation of my underweight body, what I ate, or more so what I didn’t eat.
All consuming and unbelievably destructive.
After a long period of restrictive, compensatory and purging behaviours and eventually an inpatient stay, I slowly began to realise there is more to me than what my body looks like. I don’t have to love my body or even be happy with it, but I can accept it for what it is and all the amazing things it does for me. Recovery is a long process and the hardest thing you will ever do in your life, but keep reminding yourself, as do I, still on the journey to recovery, it is possible and it is the best decision you will ever make. Take your life back.
Originally recovery was forced upon me, but now I am choosing it. I choose to nourish my body and look after it in the right way, I want to be able to go to picnics and not be afraid, to have a piece of cake just because I want to and most of all to be healthy and happy and not have the rest of my life consumed by fear and unnecessary and dangerous discipline.
There is a whole life waiting for you. I believe in you.
the skinny elephant 