Mental illness is something I’ve always kept closeted away, something I never wanted anyone to know about, even close friends. In fact, I think there will be several people I’ve been extremely close with for years who will be shocked by this post. But the bravery recently exhibited by one of my dearest friends in opening up publicly about her own mental illness has given me the courage to talk about mine.

I have the disorder known as anorexia nervosa.

This will come seemingly out of nowhere to the people who have seen me; I am nowhere near a person you would look at and think ‘she’s anorexic’. Anorexia is not always about starving yourself to skin and bones, although it can end up that way.

Anorexia is the relentless obsession over how many calories are in each bite of your food, and how many you eat in a day.

Anorexia is weighing yourself multiple times a day, and berating yourself over every little fluctuation.

Anorexia is looking at yourself in the mirror, poking all the parts of your body that are just too big and you hate, wanting to be able to take scissors and just cut off parts.

Anorexia is wanting to throw up every time you think about eating, even if you’re starving.

Anorexia is reading every food label, disgusted over the numbers on the container, and cutting portions down just to shave off a few calories.

Anorexia is being so hungry, but only letting yourself drink more water.

I’ve done all these things, and more, and struggled with it since I was twelve. Body image is hard, especially for women, and even more so for a woman that dances. Dance culture is especially hard on people, with the obsession with the lines of a dancer. “Dancers must be thin and graceful to dance”. Well, I’m not thin by any stretch, and I still dance. But it’s horrible, walking into a master class when you’re the heaviest in the room, when all the other girls have the thin, coveted dancer’s body. Even if they’ve never danced before, they still have the body for it. This obsession with thinness takes a toll, and often girls who have trouble losing weight (like me), end up developing this disorder.

I’ve improved somewhat from my early days in struggling with anorexia; in previous years, I would stick to things such as the ABC diet, or other diets similar, eating less than 500 calories a day. Every time I ate something that pushed me over that minuscule limit, I’d be horrified and disgusted with myself. All my thoughts centred around “don’t eat that, do you know how many calories that is??”. Weight fluctuation made it worse. Something as simple as drinking water will shift your weight, and I would relentlessly weigh myself, usually around 5 times a day. Every time it fluctuated, I’d be disgusted and horrified.

Looking in the mirror is still hard for me. I tend to avoid them, and won’t let people take pictures or videos of me, because I despise my body. And as much as I’ve tried to overcome that, it still exists. I’ve managed to approach the issue in a healthier way; I limit myself to getting on the scale to every other day (which I know is still a lot, but it’s better than before), and I’m trying to limit how much I obsess over calories and the numbers on the box.

But it’s still there, no matter how hard I try to get it to go away.

Even while exercising, when I’m getting tired, all I can think is the repeating chant in my head of ‘just keep going, think of how thin you’ll get. You’re doing this for the thin.” Not for being healthy, for being thin.

Anorexia is a difficult disorder to deal with. Because while the physical symptoms of it are easily treated, the mental part of it is not. There’s no magic pill that will erase the mental symptoms.

I am beginning to overcome anorexia. But it’s an uphill struggle, and one I fear will take decades. But I will get there, no matter how long it takes.

Ballet circuit workout for legs and an arm workout with 5lb weights today. I am so going to regret that in the morning. 

Dinner!

My parents took me to Cracker Barrel tonight as kind of a goodbye dinner as I'm flying to Nevada in the morning, and I think this is the first time I've ever ordered off the "Healthy/Low Cal" section of the menu. I got Buttermilk Oven-Baked Chicken, steamed Broccoli, and mixed fruit, which consisted of pineapple, blackberries, and blueberries. It was about 350 calories, and the chicken was so. good. Ah-may-zing. I'm a happy and very full camper now. 

I'm a poor college student and I have no food. So for lunch today, I had toast, MorningStar Farms vegetarian sausage, Yoplait strawberry whipped Greek yogurt, and Silk vanilla almond milk. I'm so poor *cries* But hey, at least I can still eat healthy even when I have no food. 

~ Michelle 

New shoes!

I wanted new shoes, since the only ones I have are regular Nike running shoes, and they're rather big. Not size wise, they're just-- big. And since I intend to use them for trail running, which has lots of lovely obstacles for me to trip over and land on my face (been there, done that), I need shoes that I don't catch the toes on just walking down the hallway. So, Sports Authority it is. I found this pair of slim Nike trainers for $70. They're super comfy and I don't feel like I'm clomping around in them. FTW

Commissary

One of the biggest benefits of being a military brat is having a dependent ID, so now that I'm living in Utah, I can still go onto a base to shop at the Commissary, (the base's grocery store)

My boyfriend and I went to check out Hill AFB the other day. Neither of us had been there before and we got really lost, but we finally found the Commissary, and it was the best deal on healthy food I've gotten so far. 

Pro #1: everything there is sold at a discounted price, lower than what you'd find in your everyday grocery store. 

Pro #2: no sales tax.

Therefore, my list consisted of;

- a bottle of lemonade

- 2 bags of chocolate chips to make cookies with my roommates

- Dole peach cups

- bag of celery

- two boxes of strawberries

- three kiwis

- loaf of bread

For $16. The most expensive thing was the chocolate chips and nothing individually cost more than $3. #MilitaryLyfe 

Shopping!

I woke up early today so I went in to Sprouts. I ended up with:

- 2 lemons
- A cucumber
- 2 cartons of organic strawberries
- 2 1/2 lbs of red seedless grapes
- 2 3/4 lbs of sweet cherries
- 2 nectarines
- A bottle of blood orange Italian soda

The grand total? $18.12. Whoever says that you can't eat healthy for cheap is a liar.