My thoughts this week...

An Ode to Bulimia

This is a disease that tells me that I can eat whatever I want. But after I’ve eaten, I better damn well get rid of it, come hell or high water, no matter how far I have to go to have a bathroom to myself to do that.

This is a disease that tells me I can cope. When I’m hurt, or angry, or upset, I can soothe myself with food without any danger of becoming fat. But at some point it changes and what I am coping with is no longer legitimate anger or sadness but complications from bulimia itself.

This is a disease that tells me to be silent. When I am in its grasp, my understanding is that no one will accept me, no one will love me if they know how I am. I went to extraordinary lengths to hide bulimia from those around me.

This is a disease that convinced me I was alone. It placed me in complete isolation. I was the most ###$ up person in the world, because I talked to no one about it and I had no perspective on it.

This is a disease that crept up on me. I remember reading a year ago about how some people felt trapped by the endless cycle, and I remember thinking that would never happen to me, that I would never let it get out of control.

This is a disease that tricked me. I felt liberated by bulimia, I lost a lot of weight using bulimia as a tool. I lost so much weight that I was underweight, and still I kept starving, eating, and purging and starving. I was caught in a lie and couldn’t see the truth.

This is disease that wormed its way into my identity. I became bulimic, I defined myself as bulimic and the shame was overwhelming. I never felt like I was equal to anyone, always somehow inferior, forever weaker than ‘normal’ people.

This is a disease that stole 6 whole months of my life. I chose bulimia over nights out with my friends, I chose bulimia over enjoying Christmas and other holidays with my family, I almost chose bulimia over one of my most important relationships. It became too hard to hide bulimia from my loved ones so I chose not to see them. Bulimia became my best friend and then my only friend.

This is disease that made food my enemy. Food became a crutch, a weapon to hurt myself with, a terror to me, something to avoid until I was so hungry that I couldn’t avoid it anymore. Bulimia caused me to hate the very thing that sustains me.

This is a disease that built thick barriers around me. Social outings with food involved became my personal nightmare, seeing friends after a morning with bulimia was impossible, smiling at a co-worker after half an hour with my head in the sink was too hard. And still I did it, still I pretended normalcy to keep bulimia in my life.

This is disease that wasted my money. How much did I spend on donuts and cookies and pies over the year and a half I was sick? Hundreds of dollars? Thousands?

This is a disease that ruined my health. My teeth became stained, my old ulcer came back, I suffered terrible toothaches. My body was starving, then full, then starving.

This is a disease that made me tired. More tired then I had ever been in my life. Lying awake at night with shame and hunger as my companion, every morning a blur.

This is disease that made me stupid. How could I concentrate on the edge of a binge? Sitting in work meetings, fantasizing about the food I would eat as soon as the meeting was over. Listening to my boyfriend tell me about his day while dreaming all the while of cakes, as the next day was my day off and I had the house to myself. I was in my own world, I couldn’t achieve, or concentrate, or even think half the time.

This is a disease that removed me from reality. I had no concept of how to go through a day normally. I thought my body should look like a supermodel’s and anything short of that was a failure. I abused my body to make it look a certain way, and I still thought I was healthy. I blocked out bulimia whenever I could, after a purge I would pretend to myself that it never happened, that I was as normal as everyone else. Except that my throat hurt, my stomach was upset, my breath stunk, but I ignored these things, anything to keep bulimia in my life.


This is disease that made me more compulsive, not less, every time I indulged it. My cravings got so fierce I couldn’t resist them anymore. I would eat and purge, eat again twenty minutes later.

This is a disease that made me into a pig. I ate 24 jumbo homemade chocolate cookies after dinner, I ate an entire box of sugary cereal along with cookies, and pie. I ate 21 full sized chocolate bars in one sitting. How painful is that?

This is a disease that taught me things I don’t want to know. I can tell you the caloric content of almost any food and I still have trouble looking at food without thinking of it that way. I know what food looks like partially digested. I know the best order to put food into my body if I am going to bring it up again. I know what food is easiest to bring up, what food is hardest and best to avoid during a binge.

This is a disease that made me untrustworthy. I had to lie for bulimia. When asked how my day was, or what I did during the day, I had to hide bulimia at all costs. I lied to everyone, my friends, my lover, my family, my boss. I had to lie to myself in order to continue to survive.

This is disease that made me ashamed. Ashamed of myself, ashamed of my greed, ashamed of my compulsion, ashamed of my need and my weakness. I lost my confidence in myself, I lost respect for myself.

This is a disease that sucked the life out of me. Bulimia hid my strength, my courageousness, my laughter, my light. Bulimia crept in slowly but surely and twisted my thinking until it was all I wanted, all I needed to survive.

Bulimia brought me to my knees.

But that is in the past. Today I’m standing up straight. Bulimia is no longer me and I am no longer it. It is separate, at arms length and for the first time in years, I feel the lightness of freedom. One day at a time, one normal meal after another, one healing conversation after another.

There has to be another way and I have become determined to find it.

Its my 8th day, no purging. I've done that long before but this time feels like a real change. Thanks fo listening.

Firstly, thankyou for writing this, I see so much of what you've written in me & I really hope soon I can stop..

and WELL DONE! 8 days without purging, keep going babe, be strong u can do it

Take care. Sasha x

*nods* This is a good read. There's also a lot there that I can identify with. Thank you for writing this my friend. I can feel a quiet build-up of confidence from within myself right now.


Thank you so much...You just laid it all out there. It was perfectly-simple.

*hug*
Kevster