Spread understanding about Anorexia, Bulimia and Compulsive Overeating

i never suffered the way others have suffered from these illnesses, but the experiences i did have, i am willing to talk about

for about 2 years i intermittently didn’t eat, and when i did, i would purge as a way of trying to bring some self-control into my life, which at that point i felt was spiraling out of control

i am VERY open about what i went through (and to some degree still go through today) so if anyone would like to talk, i am willing to open a dialogue

anorexia and bulimia ruin lives,not only of those who suffer these conditions but also those around them who very often do not have the resources or assistance to propoerly understand and help thier loved ones,if anyone out there is in a hard place over thisget help from groups like BEAT in the uk,don’t be alone….

This excerpt recalls a time when I had such strong cravings to binge but I was determined to fight those demons and see what happened. It was the start of a long road to recovery, but a very worthwhile one too…

Tonight I am going to hold my head up high and walk right through those fears and see what is really on the other side. I want to know exactly what will happen to me if I don’t binge. I need to know so that I can face it and come through it and be able to do it again and again. These fears of mine have built a huge wall inside of me which I come up against day after day, and it blocks so much light from my life. I can’t face the wall of fear for long before I turn around and run away once more. If I rush to the food every time the fear shows up, then how can I ever dig myself out of this dark hole I inhabit and live the life I really want to live?
I am still sitting here with my book and the chocolate is still in the kitchen. On the TV a lion is attacking a deer and Neil is engrossed. I am starting to shake now, imperceptibly at first, but it feels so much worse from the inside. The voices in my head are louder now and they say the word ‘chocolate’ over and over again, getting stronger and stronger every time. I can see those bars in my mind, I want them so badly.
Chocolate! CHOCOLATE!! CHOCOLATE!!!
It is like a manic mayday call from a pilot who is about to crash onto the rocks below. There is the same terror and intensity in the tone and the same absolute desperation. The voices fill my entire head now and my mind is buzzing with the noise. I need to drown them out. I need to eat. I need to somehow numb myself and calm myself down before it gets any worse, and I know that only the food will do that for me. There is no other way. Nothing else ever works.
But I make myself sit rigid on the settee with my book gripped tightly in my hands. I will not move…not this time.
I can visualise myself over and over again, walking into the kitchen, picking out the chocolate I want, unwrapping it carefully, and taking that first sublime bite. It would be the perfect answer to all the terror building up inside me right now. It would calm me down immediately; that very fist bite would push the fear far away and make everything okay again. The chocolate would be like a soothing warm blanket wrapped around my shoulders, it would feel like a giant hug which can make me feel safe again. I could face up to these fears another time, couldn’t I? This time I could just give in….
NO!! No way! I have to go through with this or else what is the point in even trying to get better. I can’t keep on stumbling at the first hurdle. I have to ask more of myself. Nothing worthwhile ever comes easy, does it, and surely my health and happiness and that of my family is more than worthwhile, isn’t it? I have to believe that it is and I need to stay very strong tonight.
I am visibly trembling now and I feel so very cold and clammy. My heart is starting to race and I am incredibly jumpy, as if I am steeling myself to be attacked from all sides. The adrenaline is pumping wildly through my body in waves and I am on full alert, senses primed and palms sweating. Something terrible is going to happen to me, I just know it is. I am going to topple over the edge, I am going to crash against those rocks below me and I will be lost. I can’t just sit here and let that happen. I need some help and I need the chocolate. One bar of chocolate won’t harm me and even if I end up having more, it’s not the end of the world, is it? I can just eat less tomorrow like I always do. I just know I can’t cope with this awful crescendo of fear and panic which is building up inside me. I can’t bear it any longer. I have to stop it somehow. Please make it stop!
But still I sit motionless on that settee and I will not move.
The fear is overwhelming now. I can sense it rising up through my body like a physical entity, and I feel as if I am about to lose myself in it completely. It is a nameless fear, a faceless fear, and all-encompassing fear, something which has no solid base, but is a mass of blackness surrounding and smothering my soul, and threatening to choke me. This is what I have been hiding from and for every good reason as well. I would give anything right now to be rid of this absolute dread and come safely back to the melting pot of emotions that I deal with daily. I would eat myself senseless if it meant I would never have to face this incredible terror again. Just what is it and where does it come from? Is it always there inside me and how do I deal with it now that I have set it free? How can I chase it away again? Will I have to turn to the food just to push it back down? What can I do? Help me, please…
But I have no answers at all, and it takes every last bit of strength and courage I possess to stay where I am with my book. The knuckles on my hands are white and my whole body shakes as my teeth chatter and my eyes stare straight ahead, seeing nothing.
Neil turns and sees my face and asks me what is wrong. Am I feeling ill? Can he get me anything? I just shake my head frantically and he leaves me alone, but he keeps watching me warily from across the room. I tell myself that this can’t possibly go on forever. The fear simply has to subside at some point, as I don’t feel my body can take much more. The voices in my head have stopped using coherent words now, and instead of a plea for chocolate there is an awful heart-rending scream that pierces through my skull and has me pressing my hands over my ears in an effort to block it out. But how can you block out something inside your head? It is pointless.
But I hold on tight, I raise my head, I take many deep breaths and I tell myself over and over that the fear will subside. I will beat it and it will never have the same immense power over me after tonight. I look it squarely in the eyes, and I tell it that I don’t really understand why it is such a huge part of my being today, but that I am determined to find out where it comes from so that I can learn how to let it go and live without it. I am more determined than I have ever been in my life that this fear will not remain an unknown terrifying mass living inside me, and I vow that from this day onwards I will do my very best to stop feeding it with excess food.The more I feed it, the stronger it becomes. One day I know I will be able to walk beside this fear and no longer let it block my path. One day I will grow into myself and live without it altogether.
Something strange is happening to me now. The voices are quietening a little and the shaking is lessening. I watch and I listen and I observe the changes within me, and very slowly the shaking stops completely, my heart rate slows back down to nearly normal, and I am able to move my tensed up body at last. The fear is gradually dying away now, and the cravings are easing off too. I don’t think I even want the chocolate any more and I certainly don’t need it as my safety net.
I cannot believe it! I didn’t eat! For once in my life I stood firm when faced with really strong cravings and I didn’t give in and I didn’t eat! I confronted whatever has driven me to damage myself for so many years and I am still here, still sitting on this settee with my book lying next to me. I am still here. I have survived. I have walked right through it, and now I know I can do it again when I need to. Maybe not every time, but at least some of the time, and that is far better than the never that it was before tonight.
I cannot believe I have actually been able to do it.
Yes, it was awful to go through. I felt sick and terrified and I so desperately wanted to give in but I didn’t! I have chased those demons back down into their dark hole without having to push them down there with food. I have used my own strength and power to face up to them and I have won.
Anyone who has ever been addicted to any substance or self-destructive behaviour will know that the first time you refuse to be hounded by your demons, the first time you stand up and say No, and the first time you find the strength to walk through that fear is worth more than all the gold in the world. It is a feeling of empowerment like nothing I have ever known. It is a lifeline and it gives me even more faith that I am going to recover. Just watch me…

MOMENTARY COMFORT.
It’s a momentary comfort, this chosen drug of mine.
It soothes for just a little while,
Placates a stormy mind.
But once the last bite’s disappeared
Leaving just a taste behind,
The pleasure turns to guilt and shame
And no peace can I find.

There is no logic to my vice,
No reason that seems clear.
It only aids the here and now –
A momentary cheer.
And in the middle of the night
When pleasure turns to pain
I always take a solemn vow
I won’t indulge again.

A vow which lasts for just one day
Then my mind seems to forget
That this comfort lasts for moments
But the pain continues yet…

And here is the next phase of my illness, the bulimia. I never made myself sick but I took so many laxatives that I was always pretty ill, and I ate so much that I am amazed my poor body has survived. This is what it was like for me after a binge…it was truly awful, and thankfully it is something that is no longer a part of my life.

To be full; what is it like to be full, more than full, bloated, overflowing with food? Just what is it really like?
Tonight I am so full of excess food that I feel as if I am going to explode. I have eaten and eaten in an attempt to dull the pain of the day, or at least try and turn the emotional pain into a physical pain, because that is always so much easier to deal with. Maybe if I could stop part way through a binge when I am comfortably full it would be okay, but I’m never able to, and this awful sensation of being full to the absolute limit is truly horrendous. I start off a binge searching for a brief release from the crazy thoughts which are constantly swirling around inside my head, but instead I merely invite even more fear and discomfort into my day.
No, being physically full never makes me want to stop eating, even when I have gone way past the point of comfort. I can only ever stop when I am emotionally full, or should I say emotionally numb. I allow myself to stop when I have finally reached the point where I can feel nothing at all emotionally. I am feeding my mind or my heart or my soul, but hardly ever my body.
My stomach suffers the most as I force so much food inside it, and my breathing is always far more laboured during a binge. There is precious little space for breathing after I have poured an extra ten thousand calories into my body. My churning stomach attempts to find more room to expand as I continue to send the food down to it, and my poor lungs struggle to find a breath at times. That never stops me eating though.
There is such a heaviness dragging its way throughout my entire body right now; not just a physical weight but a mental one too, and I am so very tired and sluggish. The food acts like some kind of drug, slowing me down and making me forget everything. It’s as if my limbs have concrete blocks attached to them and even my brain starts to function slower. I can’t think straight and I am physically incapable of much movement at all when I am having a binge. It takes far too much effort to move even a little bit and so all I can do is lie down on my bed and wait until some of the food gets digested and makes a little more space in my distended stomach.
I feel so very sick just now but I know that I will never actually be sick, however hard I try. It seems as if my body can consume an inordinate amount of food and never need to part with any of it. I have tried so many ways to make myself sick but nothing works at all and I have given up trying now. Well, almost. I still have the occasional attempt, just in case I can suddenly magically do it, but it doesn’t work. I should be grateful about that really, as it would only give me yet another problem to deal with, but despite that, I still wish that I could do it. It would be such an immediate release and would instantly deal with this terrible sensation of being fit to burst.
After eating so much I always get a burning bout of indigestion, which washes over me constantly in acidic waves. It can last for hours after a binge and I am lucky if it has finally eased off by the morning. I am uncomfortably hot and my face burns bright red, and my body sweats and I can’t cool down, no matter what I do. My poor ravaged heart beats faster and louder as it tries to cope with all the excess work it has to do, and I fear that one day I will have a massive heart attack from all the abuse I give my body. I know that I won’t get much sleep tonight as my body will be far too active with all the sugar it has to process. My heart will pound loudly in my ears, my nerves will be tingling, and my mind will once again be busy; the initial numbness never lasts for long.
I can’t wait for the time I can feel empty again and I yearn for the hours to pass quickly so that the food will have passed through me – aided by the laxatives, of course – and I can get back to normal. It hurts me even to yawn when I’m like this. There is no space, no room at all for me inside my own body.
Being full makes me simply want to stop; stop living a proper life, not that I ever really do, stop working, stop talking, stop socialising, stop facing new challenges, stop being completely. I don’t actually have the courage to stop myself existing completely and to take my own life. That is one small step too far for me, even though the thought of not being alive is more than inviting at times. But this constant overeating is a slow form of suicide, I know it is, and I don’t care about myself anywhere near enough to stop myself carrying on down this road.
Why do I do this to myself over and over again? What comfort do I really find in food? Why do I keep on doing it when I know exactly what the result will be? When I know just how bad I will feel? I never truly find the comfort or release I am looking for and yet I keep on using the same old methods of getting through the day. It is absolute madness.
The way I am acting, day after day, is my very own brand of childish tantrum.
My own way of screaming silently at a life which seems so alien to me.
This is how I pout my lips and stamp my feet, just like a stubborn two-year-old who is trying to find her way in the world.
Except nobody seems to notice but me.

The following was written by me and describes a little of how I felt about being anorexic. Maybe some people out there will be able to relate to this….thankfully I have recovered from anorexia a long time since and would love to help others who still suffer and also spread understanding to those who have friends and relatives with eating disorders.

Being little means feeling safe.
It means that someone can easily wrap their arms right around me and love me with all their heart and protect me at all times.
It means that I can hide away from the world more easily and nobody will stare at me as I walk down the street. I am so very small that people hardly notice me and so they won’t bother me at all.
Being little means that I can curl up into a tiny ball and no-one will be able to reach me or hurt me ever. I am little, I am anonymous and I am safe.
They keep asking me why…why am I doing this? Why don’t I eat? Why am I starving myself? Why won’t I accept any help or do as they want me to do? Can’t they see? It is all perfectly crystal clear to me, but I can’t even begin to explain it to them because they would never understand and they would only try to make me bigger again. It is simple though, and they should be able to see it if they only looked hard enough.
I want to be little again. No, it is far more than that…I need to be little, and so if I don’t eat I will get smaller. It all makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? And if I am smaller they will love me more, the way people are supposed to love and protect little children. Little equals love, but big equals ridicule and loneliness.
I can remember being little in such detail and I really yearn for those days, even though they weren’t very happy days. I just loved being able to sit in a big grown-up chair and swing my feet back and forth, revelling in how far they were from the ground. It felt as if I were a princess up in a high tower, looking down to the ground and feeling so very safe. No one could possibly reach me up here. I hated it when I grew taller and my feet began to slowly touch the ground. I would push myself as far back in my chair as possible to try and make my feet swing as they had done before, but there came a time when I was so big that there was no space further back to push myself.
I hate this new connection I have with the world. It makes me feel that I now have certain responsibilities, and people have so many expectations of me. I have to perform. I am no longer the little princess sitting high up in her tower, safe and sound, oblivious to the adult conversations around her. Now they expect me to join in and be one of them, all sensible and grown-up. I feel ordinary somehow, like I no longer have a chance to be special to anyone ever again.
I loved being little and standing beside Granpa and not even being tall enough to reach up to his shoulders. He seemed so big and solid to me, and just being next to his obvious strength and seeing him tower above me made me feel as if nothing in this world would ever hurt me, ever. Nobody in my family is as tall as Granpa used to be and of course I am getting bigger too, so when I stand next to Nanna or Mum I am just about the same as them. I don’t want to be the same size as an adult; I want to be small like a child.
As my height has gradually crept up, it has felt as if the balance of power has shifted somehow. For every inch I grow I feel like I should take on an inch more responsibility for caring for myself, protecting myself, standing on my own two feet, and making my own decisions. But nobody has ever shown me how to do that and I am scared.
The fear of being bigger and being older engulfs me completely some days and it is far too much to deal with. I can never imagine myself standing alone in this world. I couldn’t possibly take care of myself without any help. I would never be safe enough. I don’t want to be an adult. I don’t want to grow up. I want to be little and stay that way for always.
And now, as I start to shrink physically, I feel as if I am shrinking in actual height as well, although I know that isn’t actually possible. I know I have lost some weight, not that I can see it much – I rely on the scales tell me so – but I know I have to lose a lot more weight before I will be little enough. The numbers on the scale don’t even mean too much to me right now. I will know inside me when I have reached my magic goal of being little enough. I am still far too big as I am. I can feel the fat on my bones and I can see it in the mirror. I repulse myself because I’m not yet the person I want to be. I need above all else in the world to be little.
I think of nothing else these days – just losing weight, getting smaller, and making my world perfect and safe. It’s all I want in this world. If I can’t be little, then there really isn’t much point, is there?

one that I work out in a dozen different ways. I’ve decided to “finish” this goal, click “I want to do this again” and move it to “ongoing” status.

So it isn’t done, it will never be finished, it’s just… not on the list anymore.

I was recently contacted by a journalist who wants to write a few articles about my story and is interested in helping me get my book about eating disorders published too. That is my absolute dream. I really want to see my book on the shelves as I remember when I was in the midst of anorexia I was searching the bookshelves for something which had been written by someone who had actually been through it – not some expert who thought they knew about it. I really want to travel round giving talks about eating disorders and trying to help as many people as I can. Hopefully the articles that the journalist writes will open up doors for me so that I can achieve this dream….

I AM YOUR DISEASE

To all who come in contact with me, I wish you death and I wish you suffering.

Allow me to introduce myself; I am the disease of addiction Alcoholism, Drugs and Eating Disorders. Cunning, Baffling, and Powerful! That’s me. I have killed millions, and I am pleased. I love to catch you with the element of surprise. I love pretending I am your friend and lover. I have given you comfort, have I not? Wasn’t I there when you were lonely? When you wanted to die, didn’t you call me? I was there. I love to make you hurt, I love to make you cry. And better yet, I love it when I make you so numb, that you can neither hurt nor cry. You feel nothing at all.

This for me is true glory. I will give you instant gratification and all I ask of you is long suffering. I’ve been there for you always. When things were going right in your life, you invited me. You said you didn’t deserve these good things, and I was the only one who agreed with you. Together, we were able to destroy all things good in your life.

People don’t take me seriously. They take Strokes seriously, Heart Attacks seriously, even Diabetes they take seriously. Fools that you are, you don’t know that without my help, these things would not be made possible.

I am such a hated disease, and yet I do not come uninvited. You choose to have me, so many have chosen me over reality and peace.

More than you hate me. I hate all of you who have a twelve step program. Your programs, your meetings, your Higher Power; all weaken me and I cannot function in the manner I am accustomed to.

Now I must lie quietly. You don’t see me, but I am here, growing bigger and stronger than ever. When you only exist, I can live. When you live, I can only exist. But I am here.and until we meet again, if we meet again, I wish you death and suffering.

Sincerely, Your Disease of Addiction

(Author Unknown)

I have had them all – starting at the age of 16 I have had 30 years of all the above-mentioned disorders and have lived to tell the tale. I still think that these diseases are marginalised and not understood as much as they could be. They are as dangerous as Alcoholism and Drug addiction, and yet many people still treat eating disorders as something trivial.
Eating disorders cause much pain, can rob people of years of their lives, and end in death. I want to tell as many people as I can what it is really like to be on the inside of an eating disorder. Look at as many websites as you can for more information, and most of all, try to have compassion for those who are in the grip of a terrible illness. Thank you for listening and please get in touch with me if you have any questions. Anne Beattie