Ok, so my heart is pounding and I’m feeling really nervous about being honest about this, but I feel like I need to do this, not just because I need to get this off my chest but also because I feel like maybe I’m not the only one here on tumblr who struggles. So here it goes:
I don’t know how to love myself.
It’s been like this for a while now, 2 years actually, or even longer than that - when I was 9 I refused to show my legs because I thought I had hairs, when I was 12 I thought I was ugly and fat so I tried to lose weight - I lost 7-8kg in 2 months by secretly doing workouts every morning and night and eating less and less, but eventually I got back to where I was.
But then it started again, in 2012. I don’t remember why, but I didn’t feel comfortable with myself, I hated my personality and my body, so I thought that if maybe I lost some weight I’d start to become the person I wanted to be.
Long story short; I found the pro ana part of tumblr, I started to read up on everything I could find and I started to eat around 800 calories a day and working out around 4 hours a day. It worked, I lost 8kg again in less than 2 months. I noticed changes in my body and I looked at pictures of how I was before I started and I was horrified. I also believed that since I didn’t know how big I was then, maybe I didn’t know how big I was at the moment. So I started to develop this inner fear where I walk around with a delusion of me being smaller than I actually was - that when I wore some clothes, others would be whispering behind me “What does she think she is? Can’t she see she’s too big to wear that?”.
Eventually I found a fitblr and I started to realize that what I was doing to my body was horrible and not healthy - so I tried to change my ways. And I did, I became stronger, faster and much healthier.
But that all changed again last year in March when my old habits and thinking ways got back, but this time it was different. This time it wasn’t just about losing the weight, but it felt so familiar and so comfortable. It was a way for me to reduce my stress and just feel better. When I felt like I couldn’t control how my personality was or how my body looked - at least I could control how much food I should eat and how hungry I would be.
Last summer I also had a summer job where I mowed lawns for 8 hours a day in the burning sun and I took advantage of that. I told people I wasn’t hungry for lunch, that I was on IF, and I guess I burned around 3000 calories a day, but I hardly ate over 1000.And it might not have showed on my body much, at least I didn’t notice it, but it did show when I was at the blood bank.
I couldn’t give blood anymore, they literally could not get enough blood out of my body for me to donate.
And I pretended that I didn’t know why it was, ‘cause of course I ate and drank a lot, but I knew perfectly well why I couldn’t give blood - but I didn’t want to admit it.
During my last school year I’ve lied to so many people asking me about how I was doing. My P.E teacher used to want to talk to me after class to ask me how I was doing, and I told him I had lost my appetite but that I was seeing a doctor for it, I lied.
My school nurse called me in for a talk and asked me about how I was and why I was so sick in P.E because my teacher was still concerned, and I told her I had just had the flue and wasn’t feeling 100%, I lied.
My best friends asked me how I was doing and I told them about all the food I ate, all the junk food, bragged about it, but I lied to them too.
But I felt exhausted. It’s exhausting not to eat, but it’s more exhausting to eat and have to deal with the feelings and the voices and the screams and the thoughts.
I also lied to people who look up to me, my followers and tumblr. I preach about loving yourself and eating enough when in fact I was switching between eating 400 and 1800 calories a day every other day. Because I didn’t want anyone to feel what I was feeling, because it’s a lonely and evil place to be that will suck you in - until all you actually want to do is sit at home in your room and be sad and angry, but happy because you’re hungry and dizzy.
And I didn’t want to talk about it either, because I felt like I wasn’t sick, I wasn’t small enough, I was too big for anyone to feel sorry for me - people would laugh and point and call me a fake because of course I ate, look at me, there was no question that I ate.
But now, I’m doing better. Of course, I feel the same kind of guilt and screams when I do hit my 2000 calories a day, but it’s much fainter and I feel strong enough to push it away. Because I feel good and healthier. And I might not know how to love myself, but I try every day to be the best I can be for myself, the people I love and the people I want to help.
But please remember that there are people behind these health and fitness blogs, be kind to them and don’t tell them or ask them something you wouldn’t want to get yourself, because our of 100 positive words you’ll always remember that one negative word.
Phew, that’s all, and that was really long, I’m not even sure if someone is going to bother reading this or if I even want people to read this or to even posting it.
But here we go, I’m gonna post.
snowghoul
ellievsbear
pixelskylines
theartofmadeline
blakekathryn
origamiaround
