{"id":373,"date":"2015-03-29T13:43:40","date_gmt":"2015-03-29T20:43:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amberbird.com\/blog\/?p=373"},"modified":"2016-05-17T18:32:35","modified_gmt":"2016-05-18T01:32:35","slug":"not-ashamed-anorexic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amberbird.com\/blog\/2015\/03\/29\/not-ashamed-anorexic\/","title":{"rendered":"Not Ashamed: Anorexic"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you haven’t already, please read the introduction post<\/a>. That will give you context for this page.<\/p>\n

\n

(Trigger warning: eating disorder)<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, once again, I want to stress that my parents have no blame in this or any other of the things in this series of essays. And I want to send out gratitude to my friends who saw what was going on and made diligent efforts to get more calories into me.<\/p>\n

I remember sitting in health classes and trying not to snort with laughter when the instructor would say that anorexics and bulimics didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t realise what they were doing. Because I knew exactly what I was doing. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d made a choice. I hated my body and I was mired in depression, and I had made an assessment that anorexia was more effective than bulimia (and knew that I preferred practising some discipline to vomiting).<\/p>\n

I was going to carefully starve myself as much as possible (didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to get caught not eating). I was going to get very thin. My period was going to stop. And then my organs were going to fail. When I actually started, I also found that I was going to feel clean and tight during the process. Yes, I knew exactly what I was doing.<\/p>\n

If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re reading this and thinking that sounds good, I want to tell you how very not-good a choice it was. Or if, like me, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve done this and find that you get a little hungry for it when you read about others doing it, I want to tell you not to give in to that.<\/p>\n

Because what it really did was make sure that, once I started eating again, there was weight put on that was unlikely to ever go away (which also happens to those of you who think you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re just eating a calorie-restricted diet). And it crippled my metabolism so that, even years after I was eating regularly, it took a seriously calorie-dense diet (I ate so much, and foods that I was horrified to eat, and I wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t allowed to exercise) to get it back in order. Until I discovered the issue and fixed my metabolism, I had low body temperature (years of wearing socks to bed every night, among other things), more painful periods, fatigue, and apparently it stunted my growth. (No joke. This last year, I suddenly grew an inch\u00e2\u20ac\u201das measured by my doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand started to have breasts large enough to need a bra a few days a month. Fortunately, puberty was less stupid this time around. Ha!)<\/p>\n

The saddest thing is that I was never overweight. Not even a little. And I knew that once I started to work on getting healthy. But it wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t until recently that I realised I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m skinny. Like many people, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see myself clearly; I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see my reflection in the mirror clearly. When I look in the mirror, I see an average-sized body. I just got lucky and saw one photo of myself that jarred me and made me realise the truth. Realise the truth, but not be able to see it…At least, these days, I see \u00e2\u20ac\u0153average\u00e2\u20ac\u009d instead of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153cow.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (And, since people often ask, I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see others through the same lens. Whilst I was hating on me, I might find someone else\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s actual curves lovely. Yeah, this is a mental health issue.)<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s years later (I got sorted in my late teens), and my body is just now \u00e2\u20ac\u0153normal.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But that demon sits in the back of my head and takes any chance to try to convince me do it again. Thank goodness I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve learnt that food is awesome. That I took the time to get the physical and mental issues of this sorted. Because all the things I meant to fix by starving myself were better handled by eating well and working on the real issues in my life.<\/p>\n

You don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to tiptoe around me or worry. I eat quite a lot. I calmly handle it when good friends point out that something I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m wearing doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t flatter my bum. (I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m grateful for those honest friends!) I keep meals on my daily schedule and keep a food journal so that I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t accidentally slip. Now, if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll excuse me, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve just baked some bread and I expect I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m going to eat quite a chunk of that loaf, slathered with butter and jam. Yum!<\/p>\n

(If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re struggling, please get help. At the very least, use an online calculator to find out the shockingly large number of calories you should be eating. Stop over-exercising. It is insane how much joy I can find in guiltlessly savouring a chocolate bar. It is insane how much more fulfilling life is when I put less time towards exercise and more towards all the other stuff. I want you to have the same.)<\/p>\n

Cross-posted<\/a> to the Not Ashamed section of my site (so that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all tidy).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you haven’t already, please read the introduction post. That will give you context for this page. (Trigger warning: eating disorder) First, once again, I want to stress that my parents have no blame in this or any other of the things in this series of essays. And I want to send out gratitude to my friends who saw what was going on and made diligent efforts to get more calories into me. I remember sitting in health classes and trying not to snort with laughter when the instructor would say that anorexics and bulimics didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t realise what they were doing. Because I knew exactly what I was doing. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d made a choice. I hated my body and I was mired in depression, and I had made an assessment that anorexia was more effective than bulimia (and knew that I preferred practising some discipline to vomiting). I was going to carefully starve myself as much as possible (didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to get caught not eating). I was going to get very thin. My period was going to stop. And then my organs were going to fail. When I actually started, I also found that I was going to feel clean and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food","category-not-ashamed"],"yoast_head":"\nNot Ashamed: Anorexic - Amber Bird | Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.amberbird.com\/blog\/2015\/03\/29\/not-ashamed-anorexic\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Not Ashamed: Anorexic - Amber Bird | Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"If you haven’t already, please read the introduction post. 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