the fun Nitty Gritty of Body Image, Purging and Tempting Anorexia.

Readers Note: I am not advocating eating disorders. I am not blaming eating disorders on people reading fashion magazines (because quite frankly, I believe that if you read the latest issue of Vogue or Allure and feel fat or ugly, you were feeling ugly and fat before you read it). Stop reading these magazines. If you are recovering from an eating disorder, I suggest you not read the following blog entry, for it is not likely to contribute to your recovery.

What's funny about what I am about to write is that the happenings I am about to try to work out; understand more clearly happened last night on June 16th. This morning, as I sit here trying to piece together this "oh-god, my-brain-has -been -taken -over -by- food" stuff- I began searching for a blog entry that I remembered writing about my history of eating problems as I understood them at the time. It turns out, this entry was written exactly a year before the happenings I am about to discuss. Funny, how that works, eh?

Last night, I celebrated my birthday with my adoptive family because on my actual birthday, they were out of town visiting other family members and I was here, celebrating with Ms.Hepburn, The Flague, A secret family, Sam, Jenny, Lloyd, Eve, and We the People. Anyway, this of course, is not the intended point. I was at dinner last night, a wonderful Asian cuisine, eating Sushi, talking about their Pennsylvania trip, and enjoying the company of my adoptive family and trying to remain as comfortable as possible with this whole-she's-gotten-another-year-older celebration. I was doing a really really good job. I loved the Sushi. It was so good. While I was eating it, I don't remember once thinking/hearing, YOU ARE A BAD PERSON FOR EATING THIS. and trust us, this is major progress. I was actually not worrying about my food at all, and I was actually enjoying the taste of it. Wow. Great. Good food. I didn't consider throwing it up. I didn't have that feeling in my stomach of ultimate and complete badness that 9.75 out of 10 time accompanies any meal I dare consume. I ENJOYED MY DINNER LAST NIGHT. I ENJOYED THE PEOPLE I WAS AROUND. I HAD FUN. I LAUGHED. WHEN THE USUAL FEARS DID ARISE, I COULD FIND A PAIR OF EYES TO LOCK WITH AND SOMEHOW IT MADE THE FEARS FALL APART INTO NON-LOGICAL NOTHINGNESS.
{even when we had a slice of the wonderful cake Ms. Dana brought I was not consumed by need-to-vomit-ness.}

and then, I had to come home. To a place where, it is evidently not understood that I DO NOT WANT TO TALK ABOUT MY WEIGHT OR THE FOOD I AM EATING with you, unless I ask you what you think about my weight or the food I am eating.

I walk through the living room, dressed in bare-nothing, shorts and a bra, headed for the laundry closet. The only person in the home who could see me strut almost-naked through the living room is my grandmother, a woman overweight, in her fifties, sitting in her nightgown, plopped pleasantly on the couch and she says to me, "OH, Honey, you're getting a little hippy aren't you?"

of course this comment started a whole series of thoughts, most of which my grandmother will never understand or know i was telepathically hoping to communicate as i stopped dead-middle of my journey to the laundry closet and starred at her, blankly, desperately trying to regain balance. The stare, however was not really blank it was a loaded stare, dead into her eyes that screamed, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME!? A LITTLE HIP-PY. IF YOU ARE GOING TO CALL ME FAT, SAY FAT SO THAT IT AT LEAST SOUNDS THE WAY IT IS MEANT TO AND NOT LIKE SO DISGUSTING LITTLE ADVICE TO LOSE WEIGHT BEFORE I GO BACK TO SCHOOL! YOU MUST LIKE THE IDEA OF ME HANGING MY HEAD OVER SOMETHING AND BARFING! YOU SICK DISGUSTING PIG! HOW DARE YOU ASK ME A QUESTION LIKE THAT- IT WASN'T A QUESTION, IT WAS A STATEMENT OF YOUR OPINION REGARDING MY HEALTHY WEIGHT THAT I HAPPEN TO BE COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY INSECURE ABOUT BECAUSE ON MOST OCCASIONS I FEEL THAT I WOULD BE A BETTER PERSON IF I WERE THINNER! WHICH IS ABOUT AS STUPID AND INSANE OF AN IDEA AS ME GETTING A LITTLE HIPPY. I'M NOT HIPPY YOU COW! I'M NORMAL. NORMAL. NORMAL PEOPLE DON'T THINK I AM FAT, AND YOU DON'T COUNT AS A PERSON BECAUSE YOU THINK OF YOURSELF AS A GOD AND I DON'T WORSHIP YOU FLUFFY!!!!"

of course the real excitement of this particular entire inner-monologue is the fact that she heard none of the above that was being shouted inside by an eight year old and decided to chuckle at my blank stare instead.

AND I WANTED TO DIE. THE END.

JUST WHEN WE ARE GETTING BETTER A LITTLE REMINDER COMES THAT WE SHOULD NEVER EAT AGAIN.

love, jessieh

The soon-to-be sleepless night.

We will not sleep tonight.

There are three essays to be written.

We must finish the play tonight.

The brain is throbbing. We must find a Martha before tomorrow at 3:00pm.

She is nowhere to be found.

Because there is a throbbing happening in the brain, we have decided to make a list instead.

A list of books to be read:

1. Talking Dirty to the Gods by Yusef Komunyakaa
2. Living Out by Lisa Loomer
3. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
4. On the Road by Jack Kerouac
5. Prozac Nation Young and Depressed in America: a memoir by Elizabeth Wurtzel
6. White Oleander: a Novel by Janet Fitch
7. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
8. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
9. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathon Safran Foer
10. Safe by Susan Shaw

love, jessieh

Anorexia, Bulimia, The Food Situation

Readers Note: I am not advocating eating disorders. I am not blaming eating disorders on people reading fashion magazines. I am discussing my own history with eating disorders, and my personal opinions surrounding them. If you are recovering from an eating disorder, I suggest you not read the following blog entry, for it will more than likely not contribute to your recovery. This blog is for my venting interest and I feel like venting right now, so you've had your warning. Feel free to proceed...

The past two days I have had this strange desire to deny myself food. It has been a want. There is something wrong with that. I am still eating though, I refuse to allow myself to stop eating. I have never been declared anorexic. I have been miss-diagnosed with bulimia and then re-diagnosed as a bulimic with anorexic tendencies. The most recent diagnosis is recovering bulimic with anorexic tendencies, e.d.n.o.s. That diagnosis came from a quack shrink in purple polyester pants, whom I have little a certain sense of humor towards.

My metabolism is shot. I can't lose weight even in a healthy fashion. My body doesn't allow it anymore. I'm fat, and my self esteem is crap but getting better.

How I feel about food and eating and disorders and the media and the recovery process.

I started purging when I was ten, of course, at the time I didn't know that I was purging. I just knew that the food didn't belong in my stomach, that it was bad, and it needed to come out. What I didn't know at the time was that the real reasons for my purging have never had anything to do with the food I've consumed. I've never really been a binge eater, that's why the diagnosis of bulimia was so off. I've typically speaking, just eaten normal amounts of food and then gone into a bathroom, or somewhere else, and puked. I have binged on several occasions, but I didn't do it alone and I didn't purge alone. I found it gross. It didn't make me feel light and in control when I binged. I only feel light and in control when I control how much I eat and I make it all come out of me.

To be honest, I haven't found anything that has made me feel the same way that purging did. I no longer purge because it has already caused me some serious health problems, and I want to be healthy. I want to live my life without feeling like a fraud. Throwing up your food, is a big secret to keep and I'm frankly just tired of secrets. Plus, I know now that it's not the food I've been trying to get rid of, it's a place of pain, and I know that that place of pain is not going away by me hurting myself. It just isn't. I could justify the act of purging in a way that would make the average person want to puke but it wouldn't make purging right. I am learning to do things and develop a passion for them so I can avoid seeking that drive from an eating disorder. My eating disorder has always 'fed' me. I say all of this to conclude, that I am learning to seek other things and I still have a daily battle with food, I'm just not acting on my desire to purge, and it's hasn't been acting on me. I want everyone who reads this to know that I want to purge every single time I eat, but I am making a conscious choice not to.

I'm not organized in my thinking, forgive me.

1. I'm a total hypocrite sometimes because A.) I hate that the movies about eating disorders are all lifetime movies. B.) I hate that they all portray ALL bulimics as freak animals raiding kitchen cabinets and locking themselves in closets with their incapable-of-actually-holding-all-that-food
amount of food in their arms. C.) In these lifetime movies, the bulimic never drinks anything in the midst of her binge. I have never met a bulimic who has consumed the amount of food presented in these movies without drinking plenty of water. It is dangerous to purge as a general statement, it is more dangerous to not binge before purging, it is certainly most dangerous to not drink anything with the food. A serious choking hazard. No one wants to die from their own puke. D.) Despite the fact that these lifetime movie specials really irritate me, I enjoy watching them, they make me feel stronger for some reason. I know, it's pretty pathetic.

2. This heavy amount of blame placed on the media for eating disorders is wrong. We are placing the blame in the wrong places. The media encourages people to be dangerously thin yes, but eating disorders are not REALLY about being thin. Eating disorders are an unhealthy venue for control (among other things) masqueraded by the desire to be thin. If I feel worthless and ugly after reading a beauty magazine, I was feeling that way before I read it. Seeing someone skinny in a magazine doesn't automatically develop a low self esteem, it just helps in the process. I think we need to focus on the other contributing factors to eating disorders. These other factors most often include childhood trauma (i.e. sexual or physical abuse), they include emotional and personality disorders, family pressures, and some believe genetics are involved. I'm not saying that we ignore the fact that the media does play a role, I am just suggesting we address the other issues at hand. I know that a magazine model had nothing to do with me puking up my Ramen noodles in a bag underneath my bed at ten years old. It just didn't.

3. There was initially something meant for three, but for now I'm going to give myself a rest and go grab a diet coke. I hope someone will comment.

4. If you or someone you know is battling an eating disorder and needs assistance I suggest you refer to the resource list provided by the National Eating Disorders Association at http://www.edap.org/p.asp?WebPage_ID=384.


love, jessieh