My story started way back in 2016 when I was about twelve years old. It started with a small diet to lose a few pounds so that - I thought - I could fit in at ‘big school’ and be more popular. Of course, this was never the case. Throughout years 7-8 I started eating less and less and, although I lost weight, it was never enough. I couldn’t even see the change myself and so I started changing my diet drastically.
My rapid weight loss caused concern from my friends but my family praised my new appearance and so I continued these behaviours and increased my restriction. Soon it became my form of control. I relied on it and couldn’t see life any other way. Fuelled by compliments, I continued. ‘Well, it wasn’t that bad anyway?’ I thought.
How wrong could I have been.
This constant cycle never ended and there I was at 17 years old stuck in the same pattern that I created 5 years ago. In fact, things got worse, I was no longer able to restrict so heavily and began to purge instead. My friends concerns grew and my family were still totally unaware. After all, I was so scared myself that I didn’t feel able to talk to them. My boyfriend at the time advised me to seek help and so with his support I decided to reach out to a teacher at my sixth form, so that I could take accountability and attempt to recover from my ED.
Due to school policy, this had to be reported and although I have no regrets about making the decision now, at the time I did. I felt that I had lost all control and so spiralled further. I decided it ‘hadn’t worked’, when in reflection I was self-sabotaging to maintain my eating disorder and what I thought was control. I started running excessively and this caused me to become continually tired and faint. This continued for about a year and my half-hearted attempt at recovery caused me to feel like there was no way out. With a lot of support from my school, however, I was able to discuss issues that were the causes of my eating disorder. They also introduced me to Beat which helped me manage my thoughts by using the one-to-one chat. For this reason, I am so pleased that I did decide to talk about it back then.
It was only when I started university in 2023 that things truly got better, I realised how much of my family home centred around diet culture and how this was affecting things. I jumped fully into recovery and started pushing myself more than I ever had before. I also joined societies and socials that made things a lot easier as I found I was enjoying my life far more than I ever had before. After a while, I stopped thinking about food so much and it became far less of a problem. Of course, there are still occasions where the thoughts flare up, but Beat has been so useful in managing them as it made me realise that I was not alone.
I don’t remember exactly when it happened but at some point, I realised that control is not restriction. An eating disorder is not a method for control. It takes your control away, and although initially can feel helpful, is never worth it. The freedom that I have felt since letting it go outweighs any positives I could have seen from it, and I am so pleased of what I have managed to achieve since. My only regret is letting it consume my life for so long as I lost my teenage years to an eating disorder. But if anything, this regret has fuelled my recovery as I am determined not to allow it to take anymore time away from me.
Please don’t let an eating disorder take away your life, its not worth it. Don’t let a lack of diagnosis prevent you from seeking help for so long like I did. As much as you believe you’re in control, the truth of an eating disorder is that it is controlling you.
Contributed by Isla
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