The Thin Daily: August 2009

I've been thinking a lot lately. But before I tell you what exactly, I'll fill you in on a little of my history. I started purging when my dysfunctional family moved across states in the middle of high school. I was alone and depressed. As time went on, it got worse, but never to the point of severe bulimia. One day I purged up blood and scared myself so badly I vowed to never purge again. So as an ex not-quite-bulimic, I started working out intensely. Then, after a while, I started to fast, eat smaller and smaller portions, and continue working out. I lost more weight than I ever had, which wasn't much by many standards but it was some. My body couldn't take my flirting with anorexia and I starting passing out more frequently. One day I fainted in my shower and woke up five minutes later with a cut on my hand that I must've sliced on the shower metal as I fell. I was completely horrified. So I lightened up on my strict rules and slowly got myself back to a fairly normal eating pattern.

Until recently those two episodes of irregular eating had been my only. I have been dancing between "almost-bulmia" and "almost-anorexia" for the past 6 months. More recently even, I made it half way through the ABC diet and lost 19.3 lbs. I was so, so tired. And this is what I have been thinking about. I was miserable, though it was purely divine to lose all that weight. I had dark circles, bags under my eyes. My hands shook and turned blue. This is not living. I was not living. I have decided, now, as I have gained over half of that weight back, that I will eat healthily. I will not starve myself, I will not binge, I will not purge. I will simply eat very, very healthily. I am vegetarian so meat does not appeal to me. I will not eat sweets, breads, fatty foods, no junk food, no empty carbs. But I will eat. And I will continue to work out and exercise, just not to the point of exhaustion. I do not want to be miserable. I do not want to scare myself as I drop the lbs. I do not want to continue this chain of strange, horrible eating patterns. I do not want to develop something more severe.

I have realized it is all in the mind. It is all in how we perceive things, isn't it? I am just lucky enough that I have gotten myself to this stage where I can say, I want to be thin, yes, I want to be thin so badly, but I want to be healthy while I do it. As obvious as this sounds, health is actually more important than thinness.

I hope at least some of you are closer to understanding and achieving a similar, healthier mindset now that I have shared my thoughts with you. Or, of course, the Super Skinny Me documentary may be able to shed a little more light than any of my chaotic, boring ramblings were able to.

So here's to my new goal. Healthy and happy, lean and fit, and in control.