I'm at a point in my life now - where I'm trying to understand. Trying to make sense. Trying to put together the pieces.
I've fallen in love with an industry, I've fallen in love with the desire to look and feel good - but I'm also learning, that the downfalls of this industry - the constant state of worry, the ego, the image, the pressure - do not sit well in my heart. I'm trapped in these, and I want to break free.
I'm a free-bird, a gypsy by nature. And in order for me to feel free, I feel I need to lay out my story. Let go of the chains, and learn to accept that what has happened, has just 'happened'. It is no more, and I have a lot more important things to be worrying about.
I'm going to wind you back, back to the very beginning, where it all began - thus, I gain a greater understanding of myself and what my journey encompasses.
At the age of 14y, I was diagnosed with Anorexia Nervosa and a severe case of depression.
Those words, they seep through my teeth. I speak of them not highly, but as dangerous and demonic. And also, desperate.
I had been brought up as a young girl that was taught to LOVE outdoor activity, being healthy and active - I had one of the best childhoods a girl could ever ask for.
Around the start of Year 10 at school, I fell into a spiral of lethargy - I would come home from school and just sleep. Unable to exercise, unable to do anything but sleep. The doctor's put it down to Glandular Fever - an auto-immune disease. Doctor's orders were, No more exercise or physical activity for 6 weeks.
Now, for any 'normal' human being - this would be no problem, just rest. But for me - my mind slipped into a state of panic. Little did I know, I had become addicted to the release exercise gave me, I became addicted to the feeling of 'toning up' - and a young mind like mine, knew very little.
So, naturally, an addictive personality like mine being told .. "No, you can't do this" - slipped into a cycle of desperation. I've NEVER felt so desperate for an answer and solution to a problem.
I was sitting in the car with my mother at the time, and I remember a slight voice piping up in the back of my mind,
"Sam, It's okay.. Just don't eat. You won't gain weight if you don't eat."
Okay, that's what I was going to do.
Not eat.
Starting, NOW.
I would refuse any piece of food put towards me, pick at my food, break it into pieces to make it look like I was eating, I would even start using glandular fever as an excuse that I couldn't eat.
"Oh mum, my throats to sore! I cant eat my dinner"
There were plenty of times I would pretend to be asleep, to have my mother or father come into my room to call me to dinner, and I would shamefully hide my head in the pillow to pretend I was asleep.
This voice, this voice was so quiet. I felt I had a friend who was ensuring that everything would be okay, if I just did what it said.
The voice had convinced me to exercise, but, I had to do it in secret. So, I learnt my mums timetable during the day. Whenever she went out, or wasn't home, I knew exactly how long I had to get as much intense exercise in as possible - this would range from situps, star jumps, lunges, jumping jacks or just running on the spot as intense as I possibly could. I used to pound my feet so hard, just to get the feeling that I was burning the "fat" off my legs.
This continued on for a couple of weeks, I could tell I was dropping weight. It felt good. I wasn't gaining weight, so I must be doing something right.
My next Doctors appointment was about 3 weeks after my first appointment, the doctor took one look at me and said, "Shivers, You've dropped weight - Go eat a burger or something" (Out of humor.)
I sneered.
My starting weight was 52kg, and I had dropped down to 48 by now. Which is a significant amount for someone of my tiny 160cm frame.
My obsession with cutting my food, restricting myself, and secretly exercising intensified over the next few weeks. I became addicted, it was all I had to focus on. My whole day literally circled around the fact I wasn't happy with how my legs looked. I became accustomed to routine.
My day would go something like this;
4-30am; Sneak out to the treadmill and run as fast as I could for 30mins (That's when Dad would begin to wake up)
5am; Pretend to go back to sleep
7-30am; Mum would be in the shower by now, So I would sneak off to the big lounge and exercise intensely for 25minutes until I knew she was out - it was too risky then, I may get caught.
8am; I would make some toast, crumble it up and then feed it to the dog to leave a plate full of crumbs to make it look like I had eaten my food. I would make a glass of chocolate milk and tip it out, claiming I had drunk that too.
8-45am; Mum would drop my brother off to school, I had 10 minutes to do situp's and leg raises.
Around 9-30 - 12pm; Mum would clean the neighbors house. I had the house to myself so I would complete around 3-4 Pilates DVD's before she got back.
.... etc, etc, etc.
As you can see, my day was an unhealthy cycle of secrets, hiding away, and starving myself.
A week later I went back to the doctor, He looked at me in despair - my weight was 45kg.
I wasn't eating or drinking fluids, so I had to be admitted into hospital to get fluids pumped into my body. I was also then referred onto a specialist - who would then later, diagnose me with Anorexia Nervosa.
As soon as those words were spoken, the voice that compelled me to do everything I had been following through with, piped up. It was strong now, it had gained strength, this 'monkey on my shoulder' as I now call it, had me attached to strings and was playing me like a puppeteer.
I was too weak now to have any control.
My first visit to Princess Margaret Hospital as an Eating Disorder Outpatient was the start of the journey. I remember the day so clearly. It was a cold, rainy Monday morning. My parents drove us all into town at 8am. All I remember on that drive was solemnly sitting in silence in the back, staring at my reflection in the window - looking back at me were scared, hollow, huge eyes.
It was a long morning;
Doctor tests, ECG Heart readings, Psychiatric help and Family counseling.
I hated, HATED, every single second.
Mind you - I am now led to believe it was Anorexia, who hated every second. Not Sam, deep down, I just wanted to be saved.
My weight at this point was 42kg.
As soon as I saw that number on the scales, the monkey piped up and clapped.
It was good, but not good enough. It might go up, and the immense fear of ever seeing that number go up - led me to continuously and viciously embark on this spiral downwards.
My heart readings were all over the place, and the medical stats definately started to show my body was struggling to keep up with the daily demands of life. That didn't phase the monkey.
"Keep going, we've got a lot of work to do here"
When people think of Anorexia, It seems to be an automatic assumption that, "Oh, she just doesn't eat". There is SO much more than that - And I like to view it on an intensity scale. Each thought process, each addiction and each habit - starts of very minute. I mean, we all LOVE exercising and being healthy, right?! But that's on a minute end of the scale, when it reaches the opposite end, and becomes a consuming and deteriorating lifestyle - that's when it becomes dangerous.
Now that everyone KNEW the Monkey was here, I had to be a little more clever when it came to hiding my food and exercise.
Well, first seems first, I needed new hiding places for my food. My parents had ratted me out of most of them, But I got clever - Slipping my dates and nuts into the back of the carseat, crushing up biscuits and putting them in my pencil case when I'd 'pretend to go get a pencil out'. Under couches, in my pockets, anywhere, anytime.
It got to the most desperate time - when I'd get up at 2am every night, proceed to the fridge and remove all my meal replacement drinks. I would poke a hole in the bottom of each carton, and empty them - carefully ensuring they didn't lose their box shape.
I'd gently stack them all back in the fridge, as they were.
So when, in the morning - I was forced to sit at the table and eat my Jam on toast laden with butter, It would have 'looked like' I was consuming my drink - Dad would shake them at the end, to check it was finished.
It was only when Dad actually went to grab one out of the fridge FOR me, did he realize they were all empty.
Woopsies.
The extremes I surrounded myself with food were ridiculous - I would spend my whole day researching food labels, calories, researching low calorie baking ideas and I even made a whole cookbook of "fat free" baking, I drew the pictures and everything.
It was madness, I was completely and utterly obsessed with food - I just didn't want to go near the stuff.
This cycle, spiraled down for months - until I noticed I was getting extremely painful at night time, my joints were aching. I became obsessed with lying on my side and making sure my thighs weren't touching, that way I knew I was thin enough. If they touched even the slightest, I would be forced out of bed by the monkey to secretly exercise in my room.
I remember getting on the scales one day, to nearly pass out as I saw my weight had plummeted to 37kg.
37kg, of nothingness.
This was the point, where I was told by doctors I would lose my life. My own organs had began to munch away at themselves, as a source of fuel. Walking down the hallway, could have forced me into a heart-attack. The cartilage in my neck had broken down, as I was too weak to even hold my own head up.. and lastly, I had grown a down of fur over my body, as a survival technique to keep warm.
The ends my body went to try survive, absolutely still astounds me to this day. And I owe my life - to my body.
I am so frequently asked, "How did you recover" or "What made you want to get better"
I don't have a set answer, yet I am going to share with you the series of events and how I grew to be a survivor, how I grew to build back a relationship with food - but not only that, also where the relationship has negatively had an affect in my life ever since I was sick.
To come, in my next blog.
Thank-you for taking your time to read this.
x Sam.
Thank YOU for sharing your journey.
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