Eating Disorders: Monster In My Head

As if one day I could wake up and live normal again. Live without this monster that infiltrates my mind 24/7. Every action I make is around this monster. Every plan, meal, thought has this monster in it. From the time I wake up in the morning to the time my head hits my pillow at night, this monster poisons my thoughts. Somehow he has made this cozy home in my mind, no one can explain it, and I cannot control it. But my mind has convinced me it is the only thing I can control in my mind, so when I start to freak out or lose control of everything, I always run back to this monster. He is called an eating disorder. It’s the nasty little monster that sticks like glue. 

Most eating disorders come as a pair or morph into one another. As for me, I met my first monster in 2008. Anorexia nervosa. He is the reason I lost 65 pounds in two months, the reason I developed horrible eating habits and became depressed and one of the reasons why my friends worried constantly about me. It didn’t just put a strain on my life but theirs also. I spent hours at my boyfriend’s sleeping because I was too tired and anemic to be awake and he spend his time trying to force feed me because he didn’t understand. My friends started talking about me behind my back and I wanted nothing to do with them. I felt alone, just me and my monster. It became my best friend. 

I reached my lowest weight of 108 pounds which is small for a tall girl like me. That’s when I admitted to myself that I needed to get help. I just wasn’t happy that I had no control of my life anymore. Telling my family wasn’t easy, but what made it worse was they didn’t believe me. I wasn’t home much and when I was, they thought I was losing the weight by eating healthy and working out. WRONG. After I talked to a couple people and made some changes, things got better you could say. It still seemed like every little pound I gained, my mind lost control. I developed Body Dimorphic Disorder. Something to this day I am never convinced will go away. It’s the monster that tells me I am fat, ugly, out of shape, unattractive, etc. I hate it the most; it is what triggers the rest.

Shortly after I started to binge eat. I “didn’t care” anymore and ate everything in sight. I still do and it is so hard to control. Eating this way can pack pounds quick, which triggered one more monster in my head. Over time my friend who is a student in psych noticed the amount and routine of my workout schedule. I had for sure developed exercise bulimia. This is the part of my brain that justifies binge eating because I can work off anything right? WRONG. 

Now since I have had no help I fall back into all of this in 2010. It’s not easy, and my life is so far from perfect. But I love God and I know he put this challenge in my life for a reason.  So one day, I will get over it. It may be hard now, and I may want to just cry myself to sleep because no one but me understands what goes through my head every day. But this will not defeat me. God doesn’t give people challenges they cannot handle. So let this be a learning experience by reading my life story. Don’t give up. Mark 5:36; Don’t be afraid, just believe.

By: Carolyn King

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Inspirational Recovery Quotes: Letting Go

Don't let your mind bully your body into believing it must carry the burden of its worries.

Astrid Alauda

Stand up and walk out of your history.
Phil McGraw

Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?
Mary M.Morrissey

All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.
Havelock Ellis

There's an important difference between giving up and letting go.
Jessica Hatchigan

Every breath is an opportunity to receive and let go. I receive love and I let go of pain.
Brenda MacIntyre

Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.
Oprah Winfrey

Absorb what is useful. Discard what is not. Add what is uniquely your own.
Bruce Lee

 I am responsible for what I see. I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt. I could see peace instead of THIS. The past is over - it can touch me not. This instant is the only time there is. Today I will judge nothing that occurs. I am not the victim of the world I see. I can escape from the world  I see by giving up attack thoughts. I am determined to see things differently. I am never upset for the reason I think. Forgiveness is the key to happiness. All that I give I give to myself.
Hugh Prather

Creativity can be described as letting go of certainties
Gail Sheehy

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.
 Lao Tzu

Knowledge is learning something every day. Wisdom is letting go of something every day.
Zen Proverb

You don't need strength to let go of something. What you really need is understanding.
Guy Finley

Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.
Unknown

You cannot let go of anything if you cannot notice that you are holding it. Admit your weaknesses and watch them morph into your greatest strengths.
Neale Donald Walsch

Change is never easy, you fight to hold on, and you fight to let go.
The Wonder Years

The key to change... is to let go of fear.
Rosanne Cash

Some think it's holding on that makes one strong; sometimes it's letting go.
Sylvia Robinson

Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass...It's about learning how to dance in the rain.
Vivian Green

Let go. Why do you cling to pain? There is nothing you can do about the wrongs of yesterday. It is not yours to judge. Why hold on to the very thing which keeps you from hope and love?
Leo Buscaglia

Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.
Chinese Proverb

Letting go doesn’t mean giving up, but rather accepting that there are things that cannot be.
Unknown

There are things that we never want to let go of, people we never want to leave behind. But keep in mind that letting go isn’t the end of the world, it’s the beginning of a new life.
Unknown

As I started to picture the trees in the storm, the answer began to dawn on me. The trees in the storm don't try to stand up straight and tall and erect. They allow themselves to bend and be blown with the wind. They understand the power of letting go. Those trees and those branches that try too hard to stand up strong and straight are the ones that break.
Julia Butterfly Hill

Think about any attachments that are depleting your emotional reserves. Consider letting them go.
Oprah Winfrey

Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.
Raymond Lindquist

Complaining is silly. Either act or forget.
Stefan Sagmeister

 Sometimes you have to let go to see if there was anything worth holding on to.
Unknown

In deep self-acceptance grows a compassionate understanding. As one Zen master said when I asked if he ever gets angry, 'Of course I get angry, but then a few minutes later I say to myself, 'What's the use of this,' and I let it go.'
Jack Kornfield

Hanging onto resentment is letting someone you despise live rent-free in your head.
Ann Landers

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.
Thich Nhat Hanh

The harder you fight to hold on to specific assumptions, the more likely there's gold in letting go of them.
John Seely Brown

It's not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential.
Bruce Lee

In the end these things matter most: How well did you love? How fully did you love? How deeply did you learn to let go?
The Buddha

What's done is done.
William Shakespeare

It is so conceited and timid to be ashamed of one's mistakes. Of course they are mistakes. Go on to the next.
Brenda Ueland

The greatness of a man's power is the measure of his surrender.
William Booth

We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.
Joseph Campbell

Inner peace can be reached only when we practice forgiveness. Forgiveness is letting go of the past, and is therefore the means for correcting our misperceptions.
Gerald Jampolsky

We need in love to practice only this: letting each other go. For holding on comes easily--we do not need to learn it.
Rainer Maria Rilke

When you become good at the art of letting sufferings go, then you'll come to realize what you were dragging around with you. And for that, no one else other than you was responsible.
Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

Laugh when you can, apologize when you should, and let go of what you can't change. Life's too short to be anything .... but happy
Unknown


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