ED recoverers: post your worst ED memory

Hey everybody, let's get motivated to keep on keepin' on with recovery!

I was just thinking today about how being anorexic for a year has interfered with my life and ruined so many occasions that could have been happy.  For example, I remember one time my family was going out to a buffet that I used to love, to celebrate a big accomplishment for my brother.  They called me at work and asked if I wanted to go.  I begrudgingly agreed to go along, but I was terrified the entire time.  As soon as I walked into the restaurant I practically had a panic attack looking at all the food.  I couldn't enjoy anything, I just got a little salad and a couple spears of steamed broccoli, and watched my family enjoy themselves.  I made my mom come with me to the buffet line to help me get some things I felt I could eat.  I was practically crying while I was with her, and (this is the worst and most embarrassing part of all) I actually had a measuring cup in my purse and I would spoon the items into it before I put them on my plate.  OMG, I was in so deep.  I can't believe I ever let it rule my life like that.  Needless to say I had a terrible time and felt very isolated the entire time.  My family obviously didn't have as much fun as they could have either.

But now I'm determined never to let things like that happen again!  I want to LIVE my life, because it's too short not to enjoy it!  And who knows how much longer my parents will be around?  I need to have FUN while we are all still together and a family.  I could easily have practiced moderation and portion control at that restaurant, but instead I let myself get paralyzed by fear.  Well, not anymore!  I'm recovering just like so many other wonderful people on this site!

So my point is, I thought it would be motivating if we all posted an experience like this, in which your ED kept you from doing something meaningful, fun, or enjoyable.  Then we can kick it on its ass and get on with our lives, living them to the fullest.  Sorry for the long post--what stories do you all have?

there were a lot of really horrible things but i think for ME, the two worst were

the incredible cold intolerance/poor circulation (i still deal with this even though i am otherwise healthy) and fatigue

but the WORST WORST thing was

being sooooo constipated that i like, literally would go a week and a half without taking a crap. and when i did, it would be like, nothing. this went on for SO long. i was taking laxatives all the time (not to purge, just to try and go to the bathroom because i was so uncomfortable!) cute huh?

Always being cold, my hands and lips were always purple in school and people would joke that i always look like im dead...

Also ive had some pretty big freak outs. I went to a japanese resturaunt with my aunt one time for our birthdays (same day) and i asked the cook guy for chicken without any sauce on it so the calories would be easier to calculate. He cooked right in front of us and i didnt see him put any sauce on and so we sat down and started eating. And i didnt notice there was sauce on the chicken because i had never had teryaki chicken before, until my aunt tryed mine and said "oh he did put the teryaki sauce on". I completley freaked out and started crying my eyes out. I was convinced i has just consumed thousands of extra calories, and refused to eat anymore. Needless to say i ruined the whole night.

Another time i was in the airport. This is just pathetic really. The day before my dad had forced me to eat a normal amount all day. I felt completley horrible, and thought i had already gained tons of weight. When we were walking in the airport i started getting really paranoid and thought my thighs were touching when i walked. (I know now i was just purposely walking differently so they did) And i thought they never touched like that before, so i started panicking. I started sweating, shaking, and crying right there in the airport. A complete meltdown over just eating normally the day before. This is not a way to live life!

And just planning every night how i was going to avoid food the next day. And having to refuse my birthday cake my mom took all day to make :(, i feel horrible about that one she was crushed. 

Oh god i have quite a few bad memories.

I remember the awfull feeling of guilt i felt if i sat down for even just a minute, my god i cant waste precious calorie burning time, now can i!!! 

And i used to hate school because everywhere i went i could here people saying "shes deffinately anorexic" and in the rare occasion i ate in school people would come up to me and be like, "oh my god your eating!!", i didnt even know them!!!!

When i was in early recovery for anorexia, after being discharged from hospital,  i started to binge and purge. well one morning after a **** load off food my dad was in the toilet and i was desperate to be sick, so i just did it in a bag. Well my mum found said bag (gross i know) and told my therapist. Back to the hospital for me :(

there are more but im not listing them, ill be here forever.

Sharing a dressing room with my 13 year old sister, seeing our bodies side by side in the mirror and realizing how ugly, disproportionate and sad it was that a 20 year old's body looked less developed and smaller than her petite little sister's.  It was an eye opener because she's always been super thin and when I saw us together I realized I had no body fat, was skinnier than her and looked AWFUL while she looked healthy. 

Getting really cold and then getting stabbing chest pains from the effort that shivering took.

My friend's little 3 year old nephew walking in on me while I was purging, snot and food hanging from my face, and seeing how scared his eyes were and having to tell him I am sick.

Having a cute guy try to talk to me at a grocery store/bakery/take-out place and only being able to think about getting out of there with the food so I could get home, stuff it into me and then bring it back up.

Yeah, I'd say this thread is a big motivator to not repeat these experiences :(

So many stories that I can relate to.  I am still convinced that whatever is wrong with me is not anorexia, and I the "recovery process" as most like to call it, is off to a slow and painful start.  I read all of these severe stories and think to myself, well I'm not that bad, or this person was 20lbs underweight I’m only 8...  I have to keep reminding myself that if I continue to restrict my diet to 1000-1200 calories or less that I will only get worse...

Anyway to avoid retelling similar stories, the most shocking thing so far was talking to my younger brother on the phone, he is 16 5'6 and weight training... anyway he was asking me how much I weighed, in the younger brother mindset of competing with his older brother to get big (muscular).  I had just weighed myself early that day 118, the lowest I've been, so I knew my weight.  I told him that it doesn't matter, but he persisted "come on man, I’m 145 now I must be getting close to you...." I couldn't bring myself to lie to him, but I couldn't tell him the truth, that his 3 inch taller older brother weighed 27lbs less than him... So I comprised, I said "I don't know man, I weigh like 120-125 or somewhere in that area... it really hit home and since then I have joined this website and started my secret, self-recovery process.

But other than that all I can attest to is the truth in how f---ing cold it is all the time, I sit in front of my laptop all the time with a sweater and sweat pants with the space heater roasting my legs just to stay comfortable.  And the truth in bedsores/bruising of my butt when I sit for too long...  Man this really is turning out to be a long post... sorry, but it really does help to "vent" on here, I don't know why but it does.

Wish me luck on not counting my calories at dinner tomorrow, that’s my goal for the day.  God I’m pathetic, one of the .0005% of males worried about calories (just a joke, no need for sympathy).

 

My memories are particularly traumatizing because I remember them so well, and they started when I was so young. I remember in grade 6 being terrified that my children's size 8 jeans were getting too tight (I had been wearing children's size 10s the year before, but restricted to get myself down to an 8).

I remember going into grade 7, insisting on getting a pair of those checkered umbro shorts in the smallest size (that were probably intended to be worn by a 4-year old).

I remember refusing to wear jeans in fifth grade because they would make me look fat in my 65lb body.

I remember obsessing about the need to be able to wrap my thumbs and index fingers around the highest part of my thigh, and hating myself when I almost couldn't. I believe I was about 9 years old when this started.

I remember crying in the shower when I was 18, after I had been purging fruit salad. I was clutching the handle on the side of my shower and just thinking to myself how out of control I was. It was that realization that I couldn't stop starving myself. I couldn't deal with being full (aka having anything in my stomach), even if the food I was eating was healthy.

Feeling like a slave was one of the worst things, because I wanted to do better and I would try, but I was too far out of control to help myself. It is really hard to swallow this when everything you have done in your life, you have excelled at...but you can't do something as simple as eat.

omg! well sadly (well actually it's a good thing!) all my WORST memories are gone, these are the remains after recovery

- I went to school in 7 layers of clothes, we needed to be given a needle, so off came the layers, not only was i freezing my ass off but my stick thin arm was finally revealed to all my friends, all the girls at school, teachers (i'm like teachers-pet so that was pretty embarrasing). i was blue too, my friend would'n't leave it alone either...

- Didn't have breakfast so i fainted in front of my favourite teacher in my favourite class, crying etc.

- i love this one clothing store, i hadn't been there in a while, so i visited i'm usually a size 12-14 - i walked out with a size 4 which i still have today, lol they make me look big now (recovered - bac to being a 12 :P )

- Being cold, 24/7

- Having my hip bones grabbed and being yelled at and told i would die by my 'loving' grandparents -who still do it now despite there being no hip-bone and me being recovered! *sigh*

- i like NEVER sat down it hurt and didnt burn as many calories...

- sleepness nights, thinking of the calories in the next day's meals and my hip bones digging into my mattress, so many crying fits.

- the long jogs i didnt have the energy for, i just cried and choked myself up in sobs

- Some kid at school spread i was bulimic, annoying as it was he had it wrong anyway

- health class my heart rate like 45

teacher: that's healthy, you do alot of excercise i see?!?!

me: umm yeah a bit, naturally low, just genetics

i did no excercise at that point and theres no gene in our family like that, now i sit here thinking 'idiot, don't i look underweight' 

- during recovery i had a HUGE (and i mean HUGE) bowl of lamb curry with ALOT of rice - i still fear rice to this day - this was when it suddenly clicked, im gaining calories don't mater, so that appetite i had regained that evening i used to my advantage;  bucket of cashews, banana, peanut butter sandwhich...list goes on....until my mouth was like cut and sore. then i lay on my bed for the next couple of hours feeling like throwing up, but never could, just physically couldn't! my first binge and i think my only proper one too

like i said the worst memories i have done well in wiping and i'm not bringing them back for you, not you, not anyone, ill never look back

Other peoples' comments about my appearance and eating were awful.

 

"Why aren't you eating any lasagna?"

"You're not trying to lose more weight, are you?"

"You need to gain a few pounds."

The worst were the friends who didn't even care, just accepted it as a fact of life:

"Hey, do you want a bite of--oh, that's right, you don't eat."

"Do you want to try some?" Me: "No, thank you." "Oh. Of course you don't."

What the hell, man.

And the low pulse rates! Even at the damn doctor's office, pulse of 46, they ask if I'm a runner. I say yeah, mumble something about ballet, genetics. Bull CRAP, and I weighed in on their scale as 112.5, I'm 5'7". Can't you SEE I'm underweight?! You're a medical professional!

UGH I can't WAIT to be normal again.

oh the excuses to get out of eating or to explain extra long bathroom visits, I could write a book just about the excuses

I ordered a sandwhich while we were down at the beach [while everyone was eating fish and chips] and I asked for 'no butter'. I took a massive bite and then realised that there was heaps of butter in it. I started freaking out and crying, it was so horrible.
And while we where there I had to wear a jacket; it was the middle of summer and I had to wear a jacket, I must have looked so stupid

while I was rehearsing in concert band I asked the conductor if we could turn the heaters on because it was cold and she was like "you know why you're so cold? because theres no fat on you, eat a sandwhich or something"
[oh thanks, and in front of everyone]



passing out while shopping with my mum, then going to the doctor and being told that I had some ridiculously low blood pressure [I think this was my first 'turning point'] 

oh and when my mum found me purging- I have never felt so much shame in my life

I'm slowly learning how eat normally and how to relate to normal people again, I feel like a small child :/


ziplock bags. need I say more?

- family members taking turns to call me and tell me to eat.

- trying SO HARD to eat when in front of my family, but my stomach being unable to handle it. getting physically ill and having to lay down after every meal with them.

- ruining dates. taking one bite of dinner or freaking out and getting upset if something is different than i was expecting (too oily, etc.). having to walk around the block and cry to calm down enough to have something. my poor boyfriend.

oh and now while in recovery I look like a melon with toothpicks, with another melon on top for a head.
its so horrible, my limbs are bony and my stomach is bloated and massive! [and that is not just my Ed talking, I tryed on my pre-anorexia jeans that are still a bit saggy around my butt and legs, but I COULDN'T EVEN ZIP IT UP!

 

grrrr

• my first hospital admission, I was in 7th grade, and my parents picked my up from school and told me they were taking me to my therapist.  So I got in the car.  I realized we weren't going in the direction of the therapist, and my parents locked the car doors, and I FREAKED OUT.  I was punching, kicking, screaming, crying, banging my head against the car windows, grabbing the steering wheel, anything to turn the car around.  So finally we arrived at Hopkins and it took 3-4 male nurses to get a 75 pound girl 12 year old girl out of the damn car.  That was not a good day.
• I had just gotten discharged from a residential stay at Laureate, and it was out of state.  So my mom and I (I was 14) were in the airport and it was time for lunch.  And I was like hell no.  So my mom called Laureate and she re-admitted me about an hour after my discharge.
• My parents were trying to get me to eat breakfast one morning, but I REALLY didn't want to.  So I jumped out my 2nd story window because they wanted me to eat a banana.  So I walked to the bus stop.  Once my parents realized what I had done, an ambulence picked me up in front of all my friends.  That was embarrassing.
• During lunch at school I would throw out my lunch and do jumping jacks in the bathroom during out 30 minute lunch period
• Eventually my parents caught on to my lunch time shenanigans, and I had to eat lunch (during school) in the car with my mom, and if I didn't eat I couldn't go back to school.

And these are just a few...

i was never diagnosed with an ED, but if i would have lost anymore weight (i dropped from 125 to 105 in like 3 months) on my 5'8" frame, i would have probably been put in the hospital.

i just wanted to say that reading all of your stories made me pretty much cry, and NO ONE should have to go through any of that.

here are some of the worst things i remember when i was dropping so much weight...

• ditching my bestfriend's birthday party because we were going to the movies...and i knew theyd think something was up if i didnt order popcorn.. i wouldnt tho, because i knew the butter was "unhealthy"
• one of my best friends emailing me saying she knew i was losing too much weight too fast and that she was rly worried about me
• when my cross country coach watched my lunch table one day..and i guess she called my mom because i didnt eat...i sat there drinking flavored water..
• when i went to my granparents house in florida over xmas break, and my grandpa telling me i was going to end up in the hospital
• freezing my butt of when i had to wear shorts and a teeshirt in gym class

january was when i hit 105...now im at 120 and maintaining/gaining =).

except one thing that upset me was monday night. i was outside with a few of my guy friends, and one kid i hadnt seen in a while says to me "wow you are really anorexic now, arent u?"  im like wow no. that was really rude.

being perpetually freezing, the shower was just about my favourite place to be. i was too weak to stand under the water pressure without feeling faint, and sitting would cause bruising from my bones, so i would have to lay down on a little bath cushion. my boyfriend would have to convince me to come out after an hour or so, and a few times he teared up while wrapping me up in towels. i still don't stand in the shower :(

the countless times people who cared for me would try to cook me something with disguised calories (margarine, oil, seeds, anything...) and i would deny their lovingly cooked meals to eat plain fruit or veg.

Hi, just wanted to say this is an AWESOME, really healing idea, so thanks. 

My worst anorexia memories are when I was in this lifeguard class, and I kept shivering and I was so skinny I couldn't keep warm.  My skin was like literally blue and everyone kept asking me if i was ok or if I was anemic. 

Also, the month after my grandma died was when my ED really started going strong.  I remember being in her house after the funeral and there were tons of family memebers around.  everyone was cooking and making a big dinner and I got so overwhelmed.  i ate some salad and tried to eat a little swordfish.  but i freaked out and ran away to the back bedroom where I was shaking for like 30 minutes and sobbing silently before anyone found me.

I just remembered something.

At the begginning of the year, I told this girl about my ED (because I thought she was my friend). Turned out she was just a b****.

She told a lot of people. If they bring out the subject I just denied it, that I ''got over with it''. But it's all lies. In class, when she had the opportunity, she would make mean remarks about anorexics and laugh, just to get me. 

At the end of the year, we had to make an ''Tortilla Espanol'' (basically an omelet with lots oil/potatoes) for lunch at school. 'She came and said, in front of my friends:

Her- ''You actually ate the omelet?''

Me-''...Yeah''

Her- ''Oh, I thought you had an ED! Isn't what you said at the beggining of the year?''

My friends (who didn't know about my ED): ''What?! She has an ED?''

I had no words. I tried very hard to not cry in front of the class. Hello?! It's not because you have an ED that you don't eat! Is it so hard to understand?? And eating this omelet was such a challenge...this girl ruined everything.

Of course, I bursted into tears when my friends brought up the subject later.

 

Once, about 4 years ago, in the midst of a relapse I had just binged on a pb&j sandwich, and I couldn't purge no matter how hard I tried. I ended up crying and hitting my thighs and having a panic attack. I carved the word "fat" into my inner thigh. The scar is still there and very readable to this day. I can't wear shorts around most people. =/

So many to choose from.

One that is most distinct in my head is when I was at my lowest weight,going to bed hungry and being scared i was going to die and not wake up,pretty grim

Or throwing  a pan of scrambled egg at the wall out of fury with my dad, fighting over the lunch i was having.

hope this times reduce and dissapear

Ohh boy, there a quite a few to choose from..

I would always feel freezing cold, and would never be found without several layers of clothes on.

The constant comments from people. People would come up to me during my workouts and tell me to stop because I was getting too thin. Or my friends grabbing my shoulders and wrists and exclaiming how bony they were.

Having to pass up every party/social gathering that involved food. Gradually, my friends just stopped inviting me altogether. :-(

The pain from sitting or laying down too long.

The extremely long and painful workouts that I had no energy to do. And occasionally even passing out in the bathrooms from the workouts. Thank goodness it was only for an hour or two..

Freaking out in restaurants or in front of my friends about eating or the calorie content in foods.

Chugging down large amounts of red pepper and black coffee, because I thought they would speed up my metabolism.

One time, when I had "binged" on a single tiny cookie, and I tried to purge it for several hours, but to no avail. I then proceeded to burn off the cookie by running for 2 hours at 10 pm in the pouring rain..

I'm sooooo glad I'm not nearly as bad now as I was then.

I am currently writing a memoir about my experiences for my senior independent writing project (I'm a creative writing major in college) and so many of these stories are eerily similar to my own.

i remember coming home one weekend to visit my cousin at her apartment. i told my parents i was eating dinner at her house, and i told my cousin i was eating dinner at my parents' house, but really i didn't eat at all.

i almost passed out walking to the 3rd floor for my psych class. then i went into the bathroom and did jumping jacks anyway to "perk up".

i used to feel guilty for having a piece of gum or even crystal light. or coffee. because it has, like, 3 calories.

not drinking with my friends at college because of the calories.

cutting my apple in half and not even eating the half i "allowed" myself.

stupid, **** light & fit yogurts, 100 calorie packs, and 60 calorie sugar-free pudding. i will never (pretend to) eat those again.

going to the caf @ school and getting salad w/ no dressing. every. single. day.

running on the treadmill until one day when i physically COULDN'T do it anymore and started crying and had a breakdown and everyone was staring at me.

walking around campus FREEZING COLD and wearing billions of layers and having EVERYONE stare at me and whisper and point.

giving my presentation for my research class, in April, on a warm spring day, wearing a huge puffy winter jacket because I was so cold.

Constantly having a red, runny nose. 

baking my best friend cupcakes for her birthday and then refusing to eat one with her. even though i had replaced the oil w/ applesauce and the sugar w/ sweetener in the recipe.

not joining my friends for gatherings and meals and parties to the point where i never got invited anymore and i'd sit on the computer for hours alone in my room.

needing 8 cups of coffee a day just to function. and at least an hour or 2 nap.

the list goes on and on and on...