Anorexia

I am not the usual suspect when it comes to eating disorders. What are the characteristics you think of when you think of an anorexic? Of course she's terrified of what people think of her appearance. She cares about making herself more beautiful. About looking better than the people around her because the thinner the better. You know what? I hate those assumptions. I'm extremely self-assured, and I've never particularly cared about what other people think about me, especially my face and figure. Sometimes I'm flat-out arrogant. My anorexia came out of something completely different.

I remember the trigger. In the book Ender's Shadow, the main character Bean observes of the other children that they are fat-never missed a meal in their lives. At this time I was both fencing in every spare second of my time and running track. I looked at myself in the mirror and realized my soft features. I wasn't fat by any stretch of the imagination (this was the strongest point in my life, physically, anyway). Unless you compared me to say, children in Darfur. I've always been extremely sensitive, and I was struck by my very selfishness. Who am I to eat 2500 calories per day when these kids are lucky to eat a full meal?

I wish I could say that my self-inflicted starving was some noble form of asceticism, but I can't. That was the trigger, but my disease was ultimately a symptom of a deeper problem. I have obsessive-compulsive disorder. My obsession? Food. Restricting my intake, specifically. That's just my strongest one, but by no means the only. OCD haunts you at every moment of your life. Without my medication, I don't even sleep because my obsessions will keep me up at night.

So why am I telling you this? Because I am sick of people calling things anorexic when they're thin. It's a serious disease, and it drives me insane. People see eating disorders as something that happen to rich selfish celebrities. It's not, and it would be really nice if people would stop treating it with suck a lack of seriousness.

Also, I get incredibly frustrated when people claim that psychology-related drugs keep you from being who you truly are. Mine saved my life. I don't like taking them. I've tried to go off of them, but I can't. I am physically incapable of functioning properly without my meds. This is not a question of making me feel better; it's a matter of living.

So thats my random blog.