Coming to Terms with Anorexia
by elaina whittenhall
Painting by shalanah backus
I was seventeen years old, and at 5’9”, I’d whittled myself down to 97 pounds. My school nurse called me down to her office. She wanted to take my vitals, to make sure I wasn’t going to drop dead. The dean of my high school said goodbye to me for Christmas break, urging me to get help. I reassured him that I had a counseling appointment at the beginning of the new year. “I hope you can wait that long,” he sighed. My English teacher, Mr. Noverini, gave a mini-lecture on how we should all be safe over the holidays. He pulled me aside after class, “That especially applies to you, Elaina. I want to see you back after the New Year—alive.” The Cycle of Sickness ?By this point, I’d been struggling with an eating disorder for four years. Kids had been telling me I was ugly since I was seven. The torture was constant. It intensified especially in fifth and sixth grade, and by seventh grade I was extremely depressed—not knowing, at that age, what depression was. I started writing poetry, using ink to beg for help when screaming for the ridicule to stop, when joining in with them, when even crying didn’t work. I showed the poetry to a couple teachers; they thought it was good, but didn’t hear my pleas through the rhymes. Finally, I wrote, “I begin to think of starving myself / so you will see my fractured emotional health.” The ridicule finally caught up with me. I quit eating a month later. ?I had bought into the cultural message that physical appearance was the ultimate indicator of worth. I concluded that, if I was ugly as the kids said, I was worth nothing. This message only grew louder as I grew older and started listening to the advice of fashion magazines. ?After a few years of cycling between starving, then binging and purging, I finally perfected my technique and dropped thirty pounds during summer camp. The leaders sent me home, not wanting to be responsible if I had a heart attack. My parents pursued an aggressive approach to treatment with a respected area doctor, nutritionist and counselor. None of it worked. I wanted to be better, but I didn’t want to have to get better. ?Less than six months later, I quit going to all the doctors. However, I continued doing a Bible study called Freedom from Eating Disorders with a woman from church. I threw myself into recovery for three months, but soon relapsed. I was using the Bible merely to overpower my feelings instead of to help me face them. As the next nine months passed, I quit the Bible study and lost all the weight I had gained back. Pastorly Advice ?At my mom’s request, I went in to talk to my pastor. I tried to explain to him my fears about giving up anorexia. I journaled, “I’m scared. I’m terrified. I’m afraid of losing who I am. This [anorexia] is part of me. It’s part of my personality, part of my identity. [It makes me special and distinct.] With it, I have a goal and a purpose. I don’t feel so lost, so alone.” ?My pastor tried to explain my worth in light of the gift of salvation, “Jesus still came just for you. The gift is universal yet personal. If the size and value of the gift is in proportion to the amount of love, then you must be worth a heck of a lot.” ?I was moved, but not convinced. “If I give up anorexia, what if I miss out on something? On happiness or contentment once I reach my next goal weight? What if I just miss being thin?” ?He reassured me, “You’re not missing out. That’s Satan’s lie. Like in the Garden of Eden, Satan said, ‘God is keeping something good from you.’ ” That made sense. God was only keeping me from pain, misery and heartache—which I was certainly experiencing. I left his office with newfound resolve. I think I even ate a donut. See-Saw in Motion ?But my pastor’s one-time inspiration wasn’t enough to help me fight the constant battle in my mind, the battle I had to fight every time I put food in my mouth. A few weeks later, I wrote: I hate having to constantly remind myself that I’m no less special because I eat . . . I hate having to say, “Okay, Elaina, food hasn’t changed you or your personality. You’re still thin. People still love you; they still care. You’re not failing.” But . . . I’ve always equated thinness with worth, and now it’s difficult to separate. I know I have to explain reality to my emotions. But they’re kicking and screaming that reality is wrong! They’re so overpowering that I forget everything everyone has told me that is right and true. These deceptions are screaming, “All of your uniqueness and specialness was lost when you gained pounds.” Yet only a few days later, in a moment of hope, I wrote: I won’t succumb to the grave. I will fight to live. Fight for significance, worth and love. I don’t have to be perfect. . . . My worth is innate; I don’t have to earn it. I don’t have to meet everyone’s standards. My flaws and vulnerability make me “perfect.” Still, only a few days after that, I reverted: I don’t have the will and determination to stubbornly decide that I will fix [anorexia]. So . . . why wear myself out? Why try fixing it when I’m floundering in indecision and wavering between health and destruction? Fighting on multiple sides takes more strength and energy than fighting one battle. I don’t have room to spare. So . . . here’s my towel, I’m throwing it in. This seesaw went on for a month. All the pressure to eat, gain weight, get rid of anorexia was still present, but there was so little support. After my mom had found out I had an eating disorder, she pulled me aside one day before dinner, coercing me to eat. I stubbornly pronounced, “I’m not going to eat and pretend to be fixed outside until I’m fixed inside!” ?She stammered, “What do you mean ‘fixed inside?’” ?I honestly didn’t know what I meant. I just knew I didn’t feel good inside, and until I did, I didn’t want to give up the one thing that sometimes did make me feel okay about myself. On the Road ?One day Mr. Noverini asked how I was doing. I complained that I was eating more. He observed, “So you are doing better.” ?Frustrated, I replied, “No, I’m eating more, but I’m not happy.” Another teacher overheard and challenged, “So what? That’s still good.” ?I tried to explain, “Mentally, I’m not doing well.” ?Mr. Noverini defended me. “What she’s saying is that she’s eating more, but she still doesn’t feel right or good about it, which is what’s important.” My feelings mattered. Someone actually cared about what was going on inside of me. I no longer had to make my pain physically visible for it to be taken seriously. ?Slowly, interactions like the one with Mr. Noverini helped me start recovering. I realized that people would listen to me and care about me even if I started getting unsick. So I took small steps toward health. I started eating toast and jam for breakfast, a bag of mini-carrots for lunch. I talked a lot about how that made me feel, how I felt like I was fading into normalcy, to a place where I wouldn’t be special or important and no one would care. ?And people listened. They reassured me that I looked good, that I deserved to eat. They helped me understand that all bodies are different. And they let me know they cared. By doing these things, they proved wrong my distorted thoughts. I learned to deal with these thoughts by challenging them, and coping with my feelings by talking about them, rather than numbing them with starvation. By leaving the eating disorder behind, I’m able to have authentic relationships with people, and I’ve found that they help me when I hurt and make life fun and worthwhile the rest of the time. And by communicating to other people, I have people around me who can wait with me while I’m struggling with difficult feelings that don’t immediately go away. Staying Healthy ?For me, the work of recovery is ongoing. I graduated from high school just four months after I committed to recovery, and the change and loss of a support network shook my commitment. Since I believed I was “recovered,” I stopped taking care of myself. ?Still dealing with trying to find a way to prove my worth, I transferred my obsession with weight to an obsession with getting good grades. Instead of allowing a scale to tell me what I was worth, I let the letters of the alphabet dictate my value. I absorbed myself in the intellectual pursuit of academics, further distancing myself from my feelings. But the feelings made their way to the surface, and I became depressed and needed to seek additional help. But I trudged on, suffering occasional relapses (restricting food for a week or so) before deciding that wasn’t the way I wanted to live. ?In the process of all this, I’ve learned that I can’t hide from people or my feelings. They’re both integral parts of staying healthy. So now, I take medication to regulate my moods, I talk to a counselor once a week, and I talk to my coworkers and my pastor when I encounter something in life that’s hard to deal with (ie., the war in Iraq, a conflict with a friend, my jeans fitting tighter). ?Though I still have some anger toward God for creating a world he likely knew would end up in this kind of chaos and pain, I try to remember that God sees the whole picture. He knows whether all this pain is moving us toward a greater existence we would not have been able to enjoy and understand without the anguish. And I believe that he is in the process of redeeming my pain, drawing me closer to the love that I sometimes doubt—and ultimately proving it through the love of other people.
Published May 7, 2007. All rights reserved.