Anyone out there….

Hey, Rachel. I’m a 9th grade teacher in my 20’s, and I have many female students who come to me with similar stories. I council my students and do my best to help them feel better, but what I can’t tell them is I have struggled with–and still struggle with–the same issues.

My eating disorder started at 13 when my mom made a comment about my weight. I had never had a good relationship with her, and I felt like she loved my brother more than me. My whole family was overweight except me. Being thin had become a point of pride until at that moment I felt I had lost even that. I started by simply cutting out junk food, but it got worse. At my most serious point I was eating around 200 calories a day, forcing myself to vomit, and working out 2-3 hours a day… And the sick thing is having that control and looking at the result in the mirror was the ONLY made me happy… not my athletic abilities, my intelligence (I had over a 4.0!!), or anything else that actually matters… just the body that I thought was pretty, the control I thought I had.

I started cutting myself at 16 as a private escape from my pain, but my boyfriend at the time eventually noticed and told my parents. I lied about the cuts and scars. I think my parents were too scared of what it would mean for their daughter to be cutting herself, so they forced themselves to believe my ridiculous story and the rest of the stories I made up from there on.

By college, it was a constant battle–I knew I shouldn’t be treating my body that way, and I felt guilty about doing so, yet I felt more guilty whenever I ate “too much” or didn’t “work out enough.” Cutting myself was still a private escape, and suicidal thoughts started to become more and more common.

I would like to tell you I realized it was stupid and everything is fine now, but that would be a lie. The truth is I still struggle with food and exercise, and I still battle the will to cut myself and suicidal thoughts. The last time I cut myself was 10 months ago, and I am proud of that, but it is still a constant battle, and tonight I sought support, because I am once again having suicidal thoughts.

My first love–the one who told my parents about my cutting–killed himself last year. (Perhaps we “messed up” people attract one another.) His suicide makes suicide a more common thought and yet pushes me away from it at the same time, because the pain I have felt because of his suicide is not a pain I would wish upon any of my friends….

I get the feeling that you (like me) struggle with your own perception of yourself and your own self worth. I feel like a hypocrite telling you to love yourself and that you are worth it and that the people around you believe you are worth it, but it is true. I go up and down with my self-worth, and suicide is a constant weight on my shoulders. I hang on for my students and for the people I care about and who care about me, and sometimes I hang on for myself. I am starting to learn how to feel strong from hanging on and how to reach out to others when I start feeling like I no longer want to be here… Thank you for your story. Tonight you have helped me hang on.