TELLING THE TRUTH

I have come-out to my doctor about my eating disorder; my habitual restricting not only of food, but also of medications, possessions, hair length and activity. I endeavour to make EVERY aspect of my life smaller. Although a new realization for me, this is not news to her. She has been gently encouraging me for years. Statements like:

"I think you aren't eating enough."

"I'm afraid you don't listen to your body."

"You are gaining weight because your body is starving."

However, admitting to my doctor that I am now facing the truth of what I have been doing to my body is terrifying in the physical sense. I come home with my mind whirling and my stomach churning. I eat some asparagus spears and half an avocado. The food sticks in my throat, and then heaves in my belly. Only the security of having an empty bowl nearby quells the urge to rid myself of the food I have eaten.

"What insanity has brought me to this place at sixty-three years of age?"

I am pathologically afraid of gaining weight. I am so tormented that the fear leaves a copper taste in my mouth. Being fat shames me so much that I torture my body in ways that I would not inflict on my worst enemy.

I have taken a vow.
"Just once in my life, I want to be a stick person."

I look in the mirror only to judge the face, hair, body and clothing of the person I see reflected there. I jeer at myself and call myself names.

I strive for a model of perfection that I can't even verbalize, but which is an unmercifal task master, driving me on to a goal which will snuff out my life.

This demon that possesses me is sneaky. Until just recently when my friends and husband began saying that I needed to eat something, I saw my constant restricting of food intake as healthy and pro-active. I look in the mirror and see an overweight woman, and the thought that I am under-eating doesn't seem reasonable. It goes against everything I have been taught about managing a healthy weight. Calories in must equal calories out in order to maintain your weight.

This is the reality: the body systems affected by my lifelong under-eating:

2016
Emotionally frozen in place

2014
Heart
- QT interval prolongation
- left upper quadrant chest pain
- elevated troponins
- blood bressure 117/82
- heartrate 40-60bpm resting,
60-80 bpm active
- basal body temperature 95.6 - 97.4F
- oxygen sats 88-92%

2014
Exteme fatigue
- post-prandial syncope
- shaking after brief exertion
- cold sweating within 15 minutes of standing up
- perpetually cold
- fever and chills

2013
Spinal stenosis
- falling when walking or standing from sitting
- severe debilitating back pain
- mechanical trochanteric bursitis

2012
Endocrine
- Hashimoto's thyroiditis

2011
Skeletal
- seven broken bones in four months
- osteopenia

2010
Cognitive decline w/o dementia
- br ain fog
- difficulty remember things
- loss of train of thought
- can't think or speak the right word

1998
Neuropathies
- peripheral nerves of legs
- pudendal nerve
- right trigeminal nerve