As many of you know by now, I have struggled with an eating disorder on and off throughout the years. It's been a long and hard struggle I've had to learn to live with and nothing can prepare you for what it does to you.
The past couple of years I have started to share my own story to others and become more open about it. I've realized that people can never wrap their heads around how I could not believe in myself enough to the point where I felt like starvation was the answer. I just wanted to talk a little about it because it's something that has been on my mind a lot lately and keeps coming up.
There are a lot of factors when it comes to eating disorders and each person deals with it differently. I can't tell you what it's like for everyone but I can tell you what it's been like for me.
Growing up my sisters and I fought and often times words would be said that we later would regret, just like most families. I don't know why, but I would take those harsh words to heart and I held onto them more than I held onto the good things they would say. As I kept growing up, I started believing those words and I unconsciously started losing my self-esteem.
I can't trace it back to one single event but after years of hearing and believing the little "flaws," I started to notice things about myself that would show evidence that even though they might not mean to say it, what they were saying was true.
It got to the point where I couldn't see anything good about myself and I felt uncomfortable in my own skin. I knew inside I was worth something but I felt like my outside didn't match what was inside. I knew I had a good heart but I didn't think people could see that because of all my flaws and I wanted that to change.
After a while, my fixation on my flaws started to cover the things I actually did like in myself. It became harder and harder to see anything good about myself because I could only see my weaknesses and flaws. People always ask well why couldn't you just notice the good things other people saw? Like I've said, I fixated on the flaws that covered the good qualities. I think the best way to explain it is that I had a "tunnel vision."
I could only see one way and couldn't see any other way.
Even though I heard people point out good things about myself, I never held onto them like I did with the negative stuff. Why? I don't have the answer to that but if you look at the world we live in, we live in a very negative-oriented world. It's hard to know how to see good things when you are bombarded by negative things everywhere you look.
The way I have felt about myself has always been an issue in relationships. Whether it's with a friend, a family member, a teacher, a boyfriend, etc. it has always been something that I spend too much time on. Any little thing I would take it and spin it to fit my view about myself.
So when people ask me how I got to an eating disorder, I never have the same answer because 1. There really are a lot of factors that play into it and 2. I keep learning more and more of how I got there. There were years of unknowingly tearing myself down before I even thought of an eating disorder.
For me, the emotional side came way before the mental and physical side of it. And I've become very aware now how I deal with words other people say - even when it's good things. And obviously it's something I still deal with but it is something I've been working on become more aware of.
I know people compare themselves with other people often and it's sometimes things we all do unknowingly but it becomes unhealthy when that becomes our main focus.
Have you ever heard of that one game (it's not really a game) where you say 5 positive things for every negative thing you say? This is something I've been trying lately because I often do have negative thoughts about myself. I've found that I can do this in my head - and even though it takes some time, I can do it and it does help. But when I do it out loud for others it's harder and takes longer. It's another level to admit it to my friends that I might think some good things about myself. So that's something else I've been trying to work on.
But before I end this post, I do want to say for anyone who might feel the way I do about themselves that even though your vision may seem limited, it's not. I often still think my vision is very limited but there are moments that prove otherwise and you have to hold onto those moments. So even though it's hard and often times you want to give into the negative thoughts, please don't. Don't hurt yourself more. You deserve love especially from yourself. So keep reminding yourself that. Even if it means putting up a sign that you'll see everyday or putting a reminder on your phone. You need to know that you deserve to love yourself.
