My Smile

So, yesterday after having braces for 2 and a half years, I finally got them removed. "Big whoop" you might be thinking... But I have pictured this moment where I could confidently smile ever since the second I got them on. And now I can, my teeth are straight and yes I feel confident. But, I don't think that's down to getting my braces off.

It's not just straight teeth and carefully applied lipgloss - I think it's something more. When something small changes, you automatically shine from within, and that happiness makes you feel more beautiful, and look more beautiful to other people. I got lots of compliments from my friends as I flashed them toothy grins at a party last night, but I think it was the smile in my eyes and the smile about my whole persona that made them feel the need to say something.

My smile went missing, along with a huge part of me, when I was truly in the grip of anorexia. My friend J said something, which I will never forget. Ever.
"Maybe it is the weight loss, the gaunt face, the sunken eyes... but I don't think so. Something's changed. Your glow has gone, the glow you used to light up a room with... it's just not here anymore"
I think I still have the message saved on my phone, because in all seriousness that was one of the things I had never considered. On my quest for "beauty" and "control" I had managed to achieve ugliness through the sheer misery I was putting myself through.

A common misconception? Eating disorders are not glamorous or beautiful. For some reason, people seem to believe that anorexia has placed the vital chihuahua as the latest celebrity accessory. This thinspo shit pisses me off beyond belief, how somebody can promote a mental health illness as desirable is totally beyond me. Anybody who needs "thinspiration" or who relies on it for "motivation" does not have an eating disorder. They're following a fad, they're somebody with poor body image, but in my eyes that's not an eating disorder. Eating disorders are disgusting. Quite apart from the physical horrors your body goes through (google it, I won't go into detail), the light behind your eyes is dulled. You have no energy, no spark, no enthusiasm for anything but reducing the number on the scale.

So, treat yourself. Dye your hair, splash out on a new top, do your hair extra nice. Allow yourself to walk down the street with your shoulders back and your head held high with that eating-disorder-I'm-kickin'-some-serious-ass kinda attitude. Don't let that bullshit "once I'm thin I'll be beautiful and happy and successful and confident" fool ya. You'll feel sad and lost, look emaciated and unattractive, and life will all be in black and white.

The truth is, now I have my smile back, I feel almost happy. Something I haven't felt in a long time.

Smile chicas.

Letting People In

This has been and remains today the hardest part of the entire process for me. Innitially, I went through about a year and a half of bullemia, totally alone, not talking to anybody. Then, I chose to tell this one guy, let's call him G, which was a mistake. He was my boyfriend, and when he ended it, he used this knowledge to humiliate me. The progress I had made while our relationship lasted was well and truly reversed, and I plunged into anorexia with renewed vigour, reaching my lowest weight, passing out, my parents found out after a friend called the police as she worried I was suicidal, and I was put in psychiatric care. My psych threatened inpatient care if I lost anymore weight, which bumpstarted this struggle for recovery nearly a year ago now.

This time, I understood more about the pressures of coping alone, but also how a total reliance on one individual was, to be frank, stupid. I trusted a group of 4 or 5 friends, who I would talk to about how I was feeling, and would in turn be a shoulder for them to cry on. Trusting these  people did nothing short than transform my entire world. A new closeness was achieved with them, achieved by allowing myself to become vulnerable. My best friend, J, is who I particularly attribute my recovery weight gain and general more positive state of mind to. He was a huge help, indescribably amazing when I needed him most.

My biggest fear when I first considered telling people was "what if they don't believe me, because I'm too fat to have issues with eating?". I should also add that until December of last year, I denied ever having an  eating disorder, believing that to have an eating disorder, I needed to be skinny. My disfunctional mind wouldn't allow me to believe that being 'severely underweight' and quickly spiraling to a point where I needed hospital treatment because my BMI was so low was "skinny". In hindsight, I see that was just fucking stupid really.

So, if that's what's going through your mind? Put it in perspective. It is the eating disorder talking.

Letting people in has to be a two way thing though. I myself always have endeavoured to be there for my friends, one of which was severely depressed. She came to rely on me, to lean on me, to tell me all her problems. Which would have been fine, if she had let me talk to her once in a while. Whenever I tried, she would tell me she "couldn't cope with hearing my problems right now" because it "wasn't helping her". I always make sure I am never that person, and as much as people allow me to talk to them, I will always be there for my friends too. That has to be something you are prepared to do.

Although they won't read it or know who I am, thanks you guys. You saved me.

Start off this new year by doing something positive, and trusting in others as well as yourself.

New Years Resolution

First of all, hi, welcome to my blog.
I've been putting off starting a blog like this for a while now, it's always seemed pretty daunting to write totally honest blog posts, revealing my struggles and innermost feelings, all over the internet, with people reading them every day. Well, if people bother to come on the site in the first place of course! So, I made it a new years resolution, which is probably a bad idea since I never keep new years resolution. Last year, I decided I would keep my room tidy, and if I'm honest war zones probably look tidier.

However, this is a resolution I'm pretty determined to keep, and I'm a pretty determined kind of person. This blog is going to be an anonymous documentation of my struggles with anorexia, bullemia, self harm and depression, which have been demons I've been fighting since the age of 12. No, it isn't some kind of fucked up "pro-ana" thinspiration website, or some crazy self harm cult. I'm also not somebody who feels recoverED, I'm someone recoverING. I'll mess up, of course, but I also hope to inspire a few of you to fight the fight alongside me, because I know, don't ask how I just know, that there is something here worth fighting for.

If even one person takes some of this to heart, it'll have been worth it.
Speak soon :)