Excerpts from Eating, Working out, & Feeling Anxious
“Time passed. Eating candy and other junk food started making me feel more and more guilty. I promised myself not to subject myself to it again, the best thing would be just never to touch candy again, that would make everything much better. I started making strict rules for myself. I forbid myself all junk food, and became addicted to every kind of food that had maximum zero calories. I found that I was getting stomach aches all the time after eating. With every day that passed, my anxiety mounted. It started at the end of the summer. I took every opportunity there was to exercise, run and jump, to burn off all the calories I'd eaten. At school I stopped eating lunch, and just had lettuce. My friends must have wondered, but nobody said much. If anybody asked why I was eating so little, I said I'd had a HUGE breakfast and was much too full to eat lunch. And personally I didn't think I was eating so little, I wasn't eating any less than anybody else. I even tried to avoid eating an afternoon snack, although I was often so tired my legs couldn't take a single step.”
“I can't go on like this. A strawberry smoothie, well then I might as well have a sandwich, too. And once I've had one sandwich, I might as well have a second. And if I've had two, well nobody ever died from three sandwiches, did they? And now that I've had stuffed myself so damn full, down go ten more sandwiches and then a whole package of Kit Kats, what difference can it make? Afterwards I realize it actually made quite a big difference. I'm nauseous, my stomach's all bloated and is sticking out much farther than usual. I run to the bathroom. Down on my knees and fingers in my throat. More, more, more. Up comes the bread, more, more, how could I get all that food into my stomach in the first place. I keep going, keep bringing up absolutely enormous amounts of food .. dough, sickening amounts. Then bile. I flush, clean up, wash my face and hands, cut myself, pass out.”
“Five kilometres was no workout for me, if I only ran 5 k I didn't think I'd gotten any exercise at all. Eight k was a light workout. If I ran more than 10, that was real exercise, but usually I didn't consider it a workout unless I pumped some iron as well. I loved standing in front of the mirror lifting weights. I often took off my T-shirt and stood there in my exercise top. In those days I had a macabre fascination with muscles. Watching them work. But to bring an exercise session to a good end, I really liked to include a walk, too. One problem with this kind of addiction is that no one notices. In our society, a person who gets a lot of exercise is admirable. People told me how good it was that I worked out often. The compulsion that would later eat me up from inside was encouraged by everyone around me.”
“I wake up in the morning thinking: Today's the last day ever I'm going to eat sugar and carbohydrates. I feel really motivated, take a quick look in my agenda because I want to know what the date was when I stopped, so I can talk about it later: that was the day I stopped eating junk. I go out to do a couple of errands. Once I'm in town, I take in the aroma of newly-baked cinnamon rolls. A thought is born and I try to resist it. NO, my ego shouts. But once the thought is there, I become obsessed with it. My self-control goes up in smoke, and my next thought is, well, one cinnamon roll never hurt. I go in. Oh, they're three for two dollars, so I take three, telling myself I can save them for the children. When I've done my errands I get into the car and eat my roll without even thinking I shouldn't. I've lost control, and by the time I'm home I've gobbled all three. When I get inside the house, it's started. Too late, I've already eaten badly so I might as well go on, the nasty thoughts run through my head. There's nothing bad for me in the house, I've gotten rid of it all. In the end I find myself standing eating hot chocolate powder right out of the tin with a spoon, the whole time pretending to myself that everything's all right. It's like I have no idea I'm a compulsive eater.”