I really need some help. -- LiveWire Teen Forums

I hide behind my smile. People seem to think that I am happy. Pshh...I dont even know what happiness is these days. My whole life revolves around the food that I eat and the image I want to give off to people. My thoughts are on the summer and what my fat butt is going to look like in my bikini. I see these girls around me. These stick thin girls. Girls who are naturally thin. And I want to be like them. I am constantly comparing myself to other people. "Am I thinner than her?" "How about her?" "Am I prettier?" I am obessed with image. It is my idol. And so is food. I have always had a food addiction. When I was a little kid, I was fat. My sister could eat 500 twinkes a day and she still looked like a twig. Not me. I came home from school and ate Zebra cakes everyday. I drank milk before I went to sleep. I wasn't obese...probably not that much overweight...just chubby. And I was sick of it. I guess in about 5th grade, I put myself on a diet. I knew what they were. I was tired of being the fat sister. I ate only three meals a day. I didnt even chew a piece of gum because it wasnt part of my meals. I remember once we were doing a project in school and we had to eat vanilla wafers. I lied and told the teacher that I absolutely hated them, just because I thought that by eating them, I'd stay fat. My diet worked and I really slimmed down. I lost all of my baby fat. I was stick thin. I then picked up running and I got smaller. At the beginning of 8th grade I think I weighed 85 pounds. I started running cross country, and I fell in love with the sport. I think I also fell in love with my appearance. I didn't diet anymore...and I didnt need to. I was running 6 miles a day, plenty of calories burned off. I guess in 8th grade I wasn't that obessed with weight. I kind of forgot about it.

Fast forward a little to 9th grade. As a freshman in a new big school I thought I had a lot of expectations to live up to. I met some new friends and it always seemed like the topic of our disscusions was body image. They always talked about how fat they were, how they needed to diet, to exercise. At first, I was just like whatever. Then I noticed that I had some cellulite on my lower butt. I am a perfectionist, and to me that was imperfection and not to be tolerated. I also had this skinny skinny friend that I was a little jealous of. So I decided to go on my three meals a day diet, just for a little while, to lose my cellulite before bikini season. (At this time, I was 14 and weighed about 92 pounds.) The problem was, I was so used to be being able to eat whatever I wanted. So I couldnt do it. I would eat bread and butter, and cookies, oh my gosh, I loved cookies. I wanted to get rid of the calories I had eaten. I figured out a solution. I could throw them up. Heck, no one would know, I would lose weight, and I could still eat whatever I wanted. So thats what I did. I became bulimic. Whenever I ate too much, you could find me leaning over the toliet with my finger down my throat. I thought I could stop. I thought I would stop. I thought wrong.

I guess I started throwing up food about November or December. In Feburary, I was starting to get really bad chest pains. So I told my mom. We went to the doctor and I had some heart tests. I did find out I had a heart condition, but that wasnt what was causing my pain. The doctor told me she now thinks its my eshopogas. I weighed 100 when I went to the doctor, which, for my height, 5'5', and my age, was underweight. I thought to myself... sitting in that doctors office, "She knows. She has to know." I still think she does because she said that acid in the espohogas is caused by vomiting. She told me to refrain from eating greasy foods, fast foods, and pizza; to eat tums; she gave me a prescription...and she told me to gain some weight. That was four days ago. That day, I ate a lot, and I didnt feel bad about it. The next day, I ate a lot, and I tired to throw it up, but I couldnt. The following day, I ate a ton, and the guilt I felt was enormous. I mean, I had eaten a lot for three days in a row... I WAS GONNA BE SO FAT! Then today, I ate a lot. But I threw it up, and I am making myself run 6 miles later.

I have a problem. I have a severe problem. I have an eating disorder. And I don't know what to do about it. I am a christian, and I have asked God to help me with this, but I just dont have any will power. I dont know how to change. I cannot love myself the way I am.

Everyday I wake up with a big question mark over my head. "Will I meet my three meals goal?" Every single fricken day. I made myself sick. I am destroying myself. I am destroying my body. I am always tired, always moody, so out of it. I am sick all the time. I had strep and the flu back to back. My immune system is weakening. I am destroying my relationship with Christ. I dont know what to do...I dont know who I can tell...I dont know where I can turn. All I know is that I want to be normal. I dont want to throw up anymore. I dont want to worry about food 24/7. I dont want to be constantly comparing myself to others. I want help. And I dont know where to get it from.

You look at me. You see a skinny, pretty girl. A christian. A girl who runs. A strait-a student. And you think I have it all together. But I am living proof theres a lot you dont know hiding behind that smile.

Post edited at 11:32 am on Feb. 24, 2008 by runCHELSrun93

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