10. We're always cold. Always. Not just in October, or December, or January, or March, but always. When it's 87 degrees out and the rest of the world is lounging around in their shorts and tank tops, we will be the ones shivering and wondering when summer will finally arrive as we grab our favorite GFU hoodie and bury our heads and hands in its folds. Oh, and this would be in July or August, mind you... because here in Oregon, that's about the size of summer as we know it :-)
9. We have the dubious privilege of being able to shop in at least 3 different sections of any department store: Women's, Juniors, and Girls 7-16. It's very difficult to find work-appropriate clothing that doesn't require a shiny pink patent leather Hannah Montana belt to hold them onto us, and it's even more difficult to earn the respect of your fifth graders when you're wearing the same outfit as three of them. Just trust me on this one...
8. Every time we go to any grandmother's home-- whether it's our own grandmother or not-- for dinner, we always get clucked over and served double helpings under the mantle of "fattening us up". Which isn't so bad, for the most part... unless of course the grandmother's specialty involves pork, leftover goulash, or Spam and green beans. Or all of the above... together. Then things get scary...
7. Every time we go home to visit, our mothers shake their heads at us and mutter under their breaths about how "college cafeteria food just isn't what it used to be and if only we would just live at home things would be better..." Which is really sad when you're 35, married with several small children, and you can't even afford cafeteria food. Which then moves right into Reason #6...
6. People assume (especially if any of the aforementioned small children are as skinny as we are) that we simply CAN NOT COOK.
Okay, well, I guess in my case they would be right... I'm not a creative cook, or a particularly good cook. I don't really even LIKE to cook. But I can sure microwave stuff really well, and I LOVE to bake :-D Actually, I'm getting better at cooking stuff that everyone in my family can and will eat, and I do eat what I cook, so the implication that I'm incapable of cooking actually does chafe a bit, the more I think about it...
5. A lot of women automatically assume that their boyfriends/fiancees/husbands are looking at us and wishing that they (the girlfriends/fiancees/wives... not the guys doing the looking) were skinny like us. Given my personal dating history and that of the other skinny girls I know, I can most assuredly tell you that this is simply NOT the case... or if it is, those women do a really, really, REALLY good job of keeping their men-- and any others in about a 15 foot radius, for that matter-- from showing any interest in us whatsoever.
4. When we go out to lunch with a group, the first thing that the host or hostess at the restaurant does is point us to the salad bar. I really despise the salad bars at restaurants, because honestly, if I wanted to eat lettuce and veggies, I'd spend the 3 bucks for a bag of Fresh Express and a bottle of Catalina and pig out at home. When I go out to eat-- especially if someone else is paying-- I want REAL food and plenty of it... nom nom nom :-D
3. Women who look just fine to us feel that they're perfectly entitled to begin conversations that involve food with, "You're so skinny... I hate you." And then they smile and say they're just kidding... usually. But still, the damage is done. No one likes to be told that they're hated for something that they can't control, and it's especially damning when, if we were to turn the tables and say, "Wow, you're a bit chubby... I hate you...", it would end the friendship right then and there. It's also hard when all the while, we're looking at them and wishing that we had those kind of curves, and remembering all the times that our husbands or boyfriends have looked at women with curves and tried to gently suggest that "it would be OK if we had curves like that too..." Constructive criticism be damned, it hurts to be told you're not good enough.
2. Nothing ever quite looks right on us. Even when we think we look fine, we constantly have friends and relatives looking us over when we walk into a room, shaking their head at us, and suggesting that we just need to get more rest, we just need to eat more and eat better, or we just need to stop working so hard. They ask if we're feeling OK, compare our arms to toothpicks and wonder aloud if we really do disappear when we turn sideways. (The answer to that last one, BTW, is that no, we don't, but right then and there, we wish we could...) What they don't see is that the mirror at home points out the roundness of our cheeks and the way our chins get wider when we tilt our heads just so, and that it laughs at us when we suck it in to make ourselves look slenderer. What they don't know is that we are trying as hard as we can to eat, to rest, to look normal, act normal, be normal.
1. People always assume we have an eating disorder.
Which is sometimes-- not always, but far, far too often-- true.
For some of us, at some point in our lives, someone told us that we would be happy if we were just a little bit thinner, that we would then be pretty and that people would finally love us. Sometimes that person is a parent, or a boyfriend, or a so-called friend at school, but more often than not, it's an invisible voice that we can never quite trace, a voice that seems to come from all sides and always pops up when it's least wanted or needed. We see other girls who seem to have it all together, and whether they're skinny or not, we assume that, if we were only prettier like them, we would attain what they have naturally. What we don't see is that they are scrambling just like we are to pretend that everything's fine and that inside, they're often thinking that if only they were pretty like so-and-so, then they would be happy too.
I struggled with anorexia from the time I was 13 until I was 19; it took me another 3 years and placing my unborn daughter at risk to finally break its hold over me. I honestly believed that, if I could just stick with 3 pieces of bread and a couple of glasses of milk each day, I would finally be slender enough that my face wouldn't resemble a potato and my thighs wouldn't wobble like beached whales when I walked. Of course, I always ended up eating more than that and cursing myself for being such a failure... everything in my life always seemed to come back to my inability to control myself and the inescapable fact that I was, and would always be, a failure. The most ironic thing? At my heaviest, I weighed only 131 pounds, which is completely normal for a 5-foot-6 teenager. More often, my weight hovered around 114... nowhere near overweight.
When I was 19, I finally admitted that my not eating was a problem and resolved to make myself eat more. Funny thing, though... suddenly, my appetite all but disappeared. Even after Jesus Christ saved me at the age of 20 (which is yet another long story that I may or may not go into at another time), it just didn't seem like my eating was all that important in the big scheme of things-- I mean, after all, aren't Christians supposed to force their bodies into submission and show self-control in all things and avoid gluttony and all that "be holy as I the LORD am holy" good stuff? (Yes, I'm being sarcastic here... please don't start posting comments about how I'm misinterpreting the Scriptures and making Christianity into some sort of ascetic self-mutilation cult. Thank you... o_O)
What finally gave my the wake-up call to start actually doing something about my anorexia was when the doctor who was to deliver our first child became concerned because, at 8 months of pregnancy, I had stopped gaining weight; she feared that my inability to eat enough had caused the baby to stop growing entirely. Two additional ultrasounds were inconclusive; there wasn't enough detail to tell anything other than that our soon-to-be born daughter was alive, but not moving as much as she had been before. For the first time, my eating disorder was endangering someone other than myself, someone I had been charged by God to take care of and to protect-- not to starve and cripple. Our daughter was born nearly 2 weeks past her due date weighing 8 lbs, 2 oz and (after spending a few additional days in the hospital for unrelated issues) perfectly healthy, so it turned out to be just a scare for all of us. BUT... I guess I needed something like that to shake me out of my stupidity and motivate me to actually conquer my eating issues. To this day, though, I have trouble gaining weight and keeping it on, and even though I eat and eat and eat, I never quite make it to the point where people actually believe me when I say that I'm fine. So I guess I will always be one of the "skinny girls"... and at this point, I'm OK with that :-)
There is a song I've always loved that helps me to put an image to this struggle with myself; maybe I like it so much because I have no innate musical talent of my own BUT if I did, I wish I would have written and sung this song myself :-) Anyway, here is a video that someone else made for the song, followed by the lyrics...
"Piece of Glass"Can’t believe that I did it againWake me up from this nightmare‘Cause this monster’s wasting me awayTaking my daysEvery day, I live a bit lessOne night leads to anotherEven if I went backWould they recognize me?Or criticize me?Who are you that lies when you stare at my face?Telling me that I’m just a traceOf the person I once was‘Cause I just can’t tell if you’re telling the truthOr a lieOn you I just can’t relyAfter all, you’re just a piece of glassStill I control this nightmareWhen I call, it answersBut I can’t tell it when to come orWhen to stayWho are you that lies when you stare at my face?Telling me that I’m just a traceOf the person I once was‘Cause I just can’t tell if you’re telling the truthOr a lieOn you I just can’t relyAfter all, you’re just a piece of glass“Don’t talk… listen.Hold Me tighterStay with Me just for a whileUntil the sun shinesStay with MeJust give Me one more day…”Who are you that lies when you stare at my face?Telling me that I’m just a traceOf the person I once was‘Cause we’re not the sameYou’re just a picture of meYou’re gone as soon as I leaveYou’ve lived my life for meAnd you’re no more than just a piece of glassYou’re no more than just a piece of glass-- Danielle Young & Derek Webb
Anorexia is something that never completely goes away; it's always at the back of your mind, whispering in your ear and calling you names like "fat", "ugly", and "cow". It laughs along with the jokes about ugly people and pokes you in the ribs to tell you that, hey, they're laughing at you too. It tells you that no matter how hard you work or how far you go, you will never be pretty enough, attractive enough, special enough, or good enough for anyone to love you. And when someone finally does tell you that you are enough, you are special, and that they do love you, it calls them a liar. Anorexia is the enemy within; its weapons are the mirror and the scale, and it seeks to destroy us from the inside out. We are not strong enough to battle it on our own and win because it is us; this is why we need God's love and His strength to fight it on our behalf. And now, well into the second decade of this war against myself, I can at least say that I'm not losing nearly as often anymore... and that gives me hope for tomorrow :-D
And now that it's almost 12:30 in the morning, I think I'll be signing off for now... until later :-)
