Looking back, I think one of those pinnacle rock bottom moments (usually we have a few) was when I figured out how to open up the drain in the dorm shower so that I could purge the little food I had eaten while under the guise to my roommates that I was just taking a long shower. It still haunts me over 25 years later as I was so ashamed for being so desperate. I didn't want to live this way but I didn't know how to live without tormenting my body through starvation, binging and purging, and over exercising.
We are all capable of such obsessive compulsive behaviors and addiction. Some of us more than others. There are so many different vices but ultimately the desire for control and the lack there of control is a daily battle. For me between 19-22 years old, it was restricting food, starving, purging and exercising all the time (despite being a college athlete who already spent many hours in the gym).
To say it was my sport that caused it is the farthest thing from the truth. For me, it was a myriad of things that ended up snowballing. Yes, I definitely had a distorted body image. It did not help that at the time, there were not a lot of images for young female athletes to look up to. I worshipped Gabrielle Reece but even she was not someone I could identify with as she was 6'2 and quite thin herself. I also was in a relationship with an alcoholic so needless to say two sick people make for a disaster and further propelled me into my quest to find control. Throw in a cancer diagnosis of my mom, and you basically have the perfect recipe for illness.
My quest for control came in the form of creating what I felt was the perfect body. I remember thinking if I was just a little bit thinner with my muscles a little more defined, I would be fine with it. The problem was what I saw in the mirror and reality were worlds apart. I would never be able to see the truth and would always be chasing this image I created. The quest for "perfection" would never end causing an endless cycle putting my health in risk and tormenting me emotionally.
Fast forward to that pinnacle moment we usually have when we look around and finally feel like we had made it. For me, it was when I was pregnant with my first child, and I actually became more comfortable with myself than I probably had been in my entire life. For the first time, I actually felt beautiful, strong, and with a purpose that was worthy. I vowed to myself that I would be the example of strength and health so that none of my future children would ever go through the pain of what I went through.
