The Day My Life Began During My Struggle With Anorexia

Today is the day my life begins. Today is the day I make a conscious decision to start my recovery. Today is the day I fight to get my life back. And it all started with a supplement drink.

Rewind two hours to this morning. Pacing obsessively around my bedroom, I was trying to burn off the calories I’d cried over 10 minutes earlier about while holding a nurse’s hand. I’d thrown away the rest of the fruit salad because it was “too much.” I was walking round and round that tiny little bedroom, trying to rid my body of the nutrition it desperately needed. I was being taken for a blood test because the doctors were concerned about the levels of nutrients in my body. I fainted after said blood test because my poor body had been starved for three days prior. My hands were shaking over a glass of water, scared it would somehow bloom calories like a flower rotting in the dirt. I knew I had to change.

Fast forward to my visit with my mom. Having to leave the room because I was scared I was going to faint and didn’t want to in front of her, I sat on the floor of the corridor, gripping a support worker’s hand as she urged me to try my nutritional supplement drink. Something had to change. Suddenly I’d had enough.

I stood up and walked back into the visiting room, holding the drink in my hand like it was a grenade about to go off. I unscrewed the lid and handed the foil to the staff member with me.

I sat down on my mom’s knee (yes, this is the stage we have got to) and held the bottle to my lips. I could smell the sickly sweet vanilla and panic rose inside me like a tidal wave. I did not want this. My head did not want this. My body needed this. My mind needed this.

I took the first sip and it floated down my throat, warm and wet, finally giving my body the nourishment it desperately needed. Second sip. Third. Fourth. My head began screaming, the usual torment I receive whenever I eat or drink. “Fat.” “Stupid.” “Pathetic.” “Loser.” Hatred. Hurt, hurt, hurt. Stop, stop, stop.

But I didn’t stop. I sipped and sipped and sipped until every last drop had been drained from the bottle. Shakily, I set the empty bottle down on the table and chose to, instead of the voices, focus on the shine of pride in my mom’s eyes as she watched her daughter fight her demons.

It’s not going to be easy. Nobody ever said it would be. But I need this. I want to be better. I want to do better. I’m not letting anorexia (God, it’s been five years and I still find that word hard to say) take over my life anymore. I’m tired of fighting it half-heartedly, never really giving it my all. Because suspended animation isn’t much of a life. I deserve more.