Each and Every Day

I don’t really remember when it happened, I just know it did. One day, food became the enemy.

I had spent the last 4 years working as a chef, had opened my own small business doing personal cheffing and catering. I loved food, ate everything I could get my hands on, and my body showed it. I felt the weight in my knees, my ankles swelling as the days wore on. My clothes no longer fit quite right, and I felt as though my face had become very round. I avoided it though, my boisterous personality outweighing any feelings I had about being heavy. Then one day it all came crashing down.

It started slowly at first, I couldn’t eat as much, got full quickly. Alcohol made me sick, not drunk sick, but nauseous. Meals I loved became meals I avoided for fear of spending hours miserable. I started losing weight, not a lot, but 5 or 6 pounds here and there. As time wore on, the sickness got worse. I couldn’t eat anything without feeling the urge to vomit, or proceed to spend hours fighting back waves of nausea. I consumed less and less, avoiding red meat, fearing the intense pain it caused me, my stomach cramping to the point where I couldn’t stand up. I avoided restaurants for fear of getting sick, or feeling wasteful not eating more than 2 or three bites of a meal. The worst part was that even though I was sick, my body was hungry. I would become ravenous, hunger taking over, and I would eat and drink quickly, attempting to quash the hunger before I got sick. Doctors looked on in confusion, no test revealing any key to the root of this problem.

My husband became my life-line. He saw the misery I felt, and held me while I got sick. In 13 months I’d lost 140 pounds. I ate 10-12 ounces of food a day, my mouth always dry, my body always dehydrated. I spent hours in the emergency room, having fluids IV’d into me, to keep me on my feet. I remember my mother taking me to the doctor. I was sick, body hurting, organs swelling, him sending me to the ER. I vividly see myself standing in the parking lot, screaming at my mother, wondering why no one cared, why no one was as shocked and lost as we were. Doctors seem so outside the situation, keeping a distance, when all I needed was to see that someone, anyone cared. These visits were filled with random answers, too much avoidance, a surety that this was not a neurological problem, not a hormone problem, it was gastro, just that my gastrologist couldn’t find anything YET. He never did find anything. I tried natural supplements that cost hundreds of dollars, saw every doctor in my area, even ventured to the Cleveland Clinic. Here I found a doctor who seemed to care but was as lost as everyone else.

My final straw was laying in the Emergency Room, pain and fatigue racking my insides, my body shaking, the pain meds, and anti-nausea medicine pouring into my veins. I laid there, looking at my husband, realizing I was dying, realizing 25 was the furthest my life would go. I remember not crying or getting depressed, just being very calm with the reality of this.

It’s an odd feeling, knowing life is over. Knowing life had come to a bittersweet end. I looked at my husband, my mother, my father. I knew I’d never see children, or see my 5th wedding anniversary. At this moment in the beginning of summer, I knew I’d never see another winter, another spring. And strangely enough, I was ok with it. Life had become a miserable existence, that wasn’t worth living anymore.

I was sent to an eating disorder specialist, a psychologist who dealt with patients with chronic eating problems. Everyone felt she may be able to help the mental issues I was dealing with, and maybe get me to come to some even ground with all of this mess.

The first 2 weeks we discussed life history, did I have a bad childhood, did I abuse myself in any way, the usual questions. Week 3, we had been talking about a book I had flipped through at the local bookstore. It had discussed simple eating disorders. She looked at me, asking me random questions, and finally said it.

“Do you think you could be anorexic?”

Stunned, I was amazed as the tears came to my eyes. Pouring down my face, she explained that not all eating disorders are conscious efforts; many times they start out as an interest in weight loss, and roll rapidly downhill, out of control. She said it might have started as me telling myself I need to lose a few pounds, get in better shape. When that happened, I got to the point where I liked it. The weight started to come off so fast, people couldn’t help but notice, and the attention fed the disorder. I lost so much weight in such a short time, my body couldn’t adapt. It fed off itself, doing damage to my body and my brain.

Now I was still a curvy girl, and the idea of anorexia seemed hard to accept. She explained that anorexia isn’t about being skinny, it’s about not eating. And now, many of the things she talked about made sense.

Another thing I had a hard time with was the idea that there was no pill or surgery that could solve this problem. It was going to be life long, a constant uphill struggle. I had always adhered to the adage that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. This was no different.

I am now looking forward to the future. While I still have some stigma, I am doing well. I eat more, and finally have cravings, urges for certain foods. I still eat small portions, but I am eating and that is all that matters. When I’m under stress, the disorder gets worse, and I have to focus on my treatment, which includes journaling, and documenting my food intake. My body has been damaged, in ways that can never be fixed. My eye sight is poor, due to the anti-nausea medicine I took for 11 months. My rib cage is brittle, the muscles that form between the skin and the ribs having broken down with the lack of protein in my diet. I can’t eat red meat, because my system isn’t strong enough to break down the harsh protein. Alcohol sits in my system, concentrating, and can easily create alcohol poisoning from only 2-3 sips of a drink. My immune system, while improving, is still below average, and when I get colds, they last days, usually only going away after a few days of constant sleep and fluids.

While I can’t have children for the next few years, if ever, I am enjoying the lush carpet of snow on the ground outside, and have enjoyed the bitter cold of a winter hike. I look forward to spring, the wedding of my best friend, and my own wedding anniversary in 9 months. I look at my life now with a new found grasp on the way the world turns. Life isn’t so scary now, and neither is death. I’m no longer scared of the future, for I know now, that we live life one day at a time, and living it to the fullest is the only way to go. Enjoy each and every day like there is no tomorrow, because someday, there won’t be.