A WEEK FROM HELL
Updated: Mar 3
Every week, every day, every minute, I suffer from anorexia. I am lucky enough, that alongside my suffering, an abundance of love, freedom and connection exists. However, there are many days when that isn't enough to compensate for the loneliness anorexia entails. To best depict the hellish nature of living a life with an eating disorder, I'm documenting an anorexic thought, feeling or response I had for every day of this week.
MONDAY
My low self-worth inclines me to immediately jump to the conclusion that I am the cause of tribulation. When I don't have any will to eat or live for myself, I draw the strength I cannot muster from my family. I know that, more than anything, they wish for me to get better. But on those days when the thought of eating is a thought that consumes me like a dark, cumulonimbus cloud, hearing 'I am proud of you' acts as an answer to my call that takes the form of me trying for them. Today, before a meal, Mum saw the reluctance in my face. She didn't need to ask me what was wrong. Like an angel, she wrapped me in her arms and said: 'I am proud of you'. Often, these things get lost in translation as I battle to communicate my needs surrounding anorexia recovery with those I love. But that moment turned everything that wasn't okay into a moment made of magic.
TUESDAY
One of my greatest fears is eating in front of anyone: Family, friends or strangers. It's a double-edged sword because when I'm left unsupervised, I don't feed mysel properly. My parents are the only two people in the world that I feel truly comfortable eating in front of. It's because I trust that they, close to always, have all of the patience and understanding in the world. They know to be careful of their topics of conversation, they know what to do and say when I can't bring myself to take a mouthful and they know how complex an eating disorder is. After years of developing this unique bond with my parents, I've managed to obtain the bravery that's allowed me to eat in front of people whom I don't know if my parents are there aswell. My parents know I won't manage food if they leave me alone, yet they also want to experience a normality of life with me that involves their shared love of food. So once a week, my parents eat out at a new cafe or restaurant and I bring something to take with me. Truthfully, I quite like feeling included in society, when I otherwise feel very estranged.
Anorexia turns simple situations into fabrications of reality.
What was simple was beautiful. It was the fact that the entire cafe ended up communicating with each other over the common joy of watching my tiny dog chasing away Ibises bigger than him. A room full of strangers found themselves smiling, laughing and talking with each other. I wanted to look around too, to witness all of the faces become illuminated over my funny, happy, silly Archie. But I found myself trapped in a fabrication of everyone else's reality... My reality. I felt fearful that in my parents engaging with everyone, customers' eyes would be increasingly aware of our table, and then perhaps me, judging what I brought, its size and its nutritional value. I have a saying etched deep into the hearts of my Dad and I: 'I want to sing like the birds, not worrying about who hears or what they say.' During that moment, I wish I could've sung like a bird.
WEDNESDAY
Today my family and I went to the beach. It was such a warm, sunny, beautiful day and I wanted to swim in the ocean. But after I lay down in the shade, I knew I couldn't. My blood pressure gets so low sometimes that the world becomes glaringly white, blinding me, and disabling me from seeing anything in front of me. When I'm in the sun, it only worsens because the added light, makes everything even whiter. There was no shade covering the walk from the grass to the water which would leave me fully exposed to the sun. I was fearful of an accident occuring if I walked to the water in that state. This often happens, when the desires of my heart run faster than what my physical body can. Anorexia made me miss out on a moment of delight on a perfect day with my loving family.
THURSDAY
No two eating disorders are exactly the same. More often than not, there will be a vast difference from one person's to the next. However, I do know that many people with eating disorders equate their intake to their worth, menaing that if, like me, someone has a low self-worth, they don't believe they deserve to eat. Hopefully this background information makes it easier to understand that one of my greatest difficulties is expressing to my parents that I need to go grocery shopping or that I would like them to get me certain ingredients if they'll be in close proximity to a grocery store.
It's one thing for me to eat for or by myself, but it's a different ballgame when there is none of my usual food left to use to face my hardest task of all... Eating.
Dolls, considering this truth is such a complex and personal adversity, sharing the exact recount of what unfolded this day is a strength I cannot muster. What I can share is that when I am low on groceries and my family don't notice or when my family does a grocery shop for themselves without asksing if I want anything, anorexia lies to me and tells me that all of it is just evidence to support my inherent belief: That I am worthless, underserving, unimportant and unloveable.
FRIDAY
I long for the day I do not face the fear that today will be the day that my loved ones leave me.
I grew up with so much love around me. I think that's an important thing for everyone to know because it only takes one person, one determined person, to anialate that love with a knife of their words and actions. Out the other side of tormenting years of suffering from this lived experience is the truth that I am a girl who always assumes my presence is an incovenience, over the assumption that I hold a place in the world. It is painful to hate myself so much. It is painful to be totally reliant on other's opinion of me, because I have no positive opinion of myself to act as a foundationof support. I am definitely an empath, so I quickly recognise fluctuations in people's moods. When I feel this change, I feel I've caused it. It's difficult to always believe I'm the person who ruins everybody's day because even when it gets clarified later on that their upset had nothing to do with me, what I experience for many moments, often hours, sometimes days, is the torment of thinking I'm a horrible person who is the tainter of the hearts of those I care about.
SATURDAY
My parents support me with more empathy, understanding and giving than most people with an eating disorder will receive in a lifetime. They've always listened to me and my desires above the advice of professionals. They see me as Luka, their daughter, not Luka, the anorexic. But that doesn't mean we don't all still suffer because we do, all the time. My Dad is the only person who I can allow to make me rice. He does it with so much love and somehow, that genuinely makes its outcome different. But this day, my dad prepared the rice for me whilst he also prepared his and mum's dinner. And because of my fear of contamination stemming from my OCD and anorexia, I knew I wouldn't be able to have any. I did want it. I did try overcoming the rigidity in my mind. I did feel dissapointed in myself for wasting his time, efforts and love. Although it was also a frustrating situation for my Dad, as always, he proceeded with kindness and understanding because like I know it's hell for him, he knows it's hell for me.
SUNDAY
I met a healer and she asked me what I wanted. I told her I wanted freedom. She asked me to visualise how my life would look like if the freedom I so desperately crave became intergrated into my day-to-day. When I imagine living a free life, I imagine that my actions will cease being an outcome of anorexia's words. Today, I went grocery and liquor shopping and I felt tired. I felt tired from the mundaneness of picking the exact same safe foods. I felt tired of every item being a number and not a word. I felt tired of being jealous of all the free people in the store who get to shop according to their taste, their souls and their inner child. I felt tired of the nutritional pannel having the final say. At the liquor store, I just wanted to reach for what I wanted, put it in the basket, pay for it, drink it, hopefully love it and then for that to be that. But anorexia doesn't grant me this freedom in my life. Being anorexia's full-time slave grants me a sliver of satisfaction from a whole cake filled with nightmares, problems and pain. In fact, I cannot recall a day or even a moment in a day that I last felt freedom.
I've labelled this blog post as 'A WEEK FROM HELL' but it isn't too disimilar from what all my days look like. Even people who see me in public or meet me in person most likely do not know how much suffering I experience every day. I think it's an important reminder for all of us to have the compassion and empathy for others that they would hope for if they were suffering at the hands of an adversity, like, for example the mental illness called Anorexia. Though the cases I've listed are particularly harrowing, often, it's the little setbacks causing me the most turmoil. Because the longer you've been drowning, the harder it is to reach your hand up.
Kisses,
COS x
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