But after years of enduring a very intense, very private battle with food and exercise, and knowing I was on the road to recovery, I felt I had something meaningful to say. I had traveled to places few people have gone and I had seen things few people have seen. I was convinced I might write the next New York Times bestseller, if only I could get a single sentence onto paper.
It’s been nine years since that day, and in that time, I’ve felt an ongoing urgency to “figure myself out.” That is, to peel back the complicated layers and understand what led me to struggle with this addiction in the first place. Was it a cry for help? If so, what kind of help was I seeking? Was it an experiment? If so, what was I hoping to gain by challenging my physical limits? Was it a spiritual quest? If yes, then what inspired me to want to expand beyond the physical world and connect with something greater? Sure, I’ve always felt “different.” But I come from a good family and a good home. In the eyes of any onlooker, I have not suffered any real hardships in my life. Yet what hijacked my reality was something so dark and so powerful, something all-encompassing that swallowed me whole.
The interesting thing I’ve come to realize in the process of reflecting and writing about my eating disorder is that what appeared to be a food disorder really had nothing to do with food at all. My addiction was the thing I used to distract me from my pain. It was a coping mechanism that enabled me to avoid dealing with my real issues—an undeveloped sense of self, social anxiety, and confusion around my sexuality, among other identity roadblocks. I was not yet equipped with the tools to nurture myself, or the courage to make my needs known to others, and so I clung to very deliberate behaviors that had predictable outcomes…like starving myself.
As more and more of this developed in my awareness, I began to consider the relationship between my eating disorder and the reoccurring feelings of my adolescence—feeling like I didn’t fit in, feeling like I couldn’t stand up for myself, and feeling like I didn’t always deserve to take up space in the world. All the while I was dodging calories, purging, and compulsively exercising, I was actually just trying to protect myself from a reality that felt dangerous and unsafe.
This was a pretty big realization for me, in that it prompted me to think more openly about addiction and mental illness as a whole. I began to wonder: to what extent are disorders actually “disorders,” and to what extent are they doorways to helping us understand the truth about our lives? Many people engage in self-deprecating or even masochistic behaviors to help them cope with an underlying challenge at some point in their existence. Are all of these people sick? Or can we empower them instead and say they simply haven’t yet accessed the parts of themselves that hold the key to their healing? Perhaps at the root of all addiction is the refusal to acknowledge or permit certain feelings—feelings that, if witnessed, have the power to free their sufferers. Perhaps the suffering is even part of the journey to healing.
Then there’s society and the rest of the world to consider. While it’s definitely not my prerogative to defend eating disorders or other acts of self-harm, I do believe their prevalence in our modern world is an epidemic that must be compassionately examined. Though commonly experienced in isolation, such “disorders” represent a collective yearning for connection, acceptance, and emotional nourishment among generations that are starving for many things. Simply organizing sufferers of anorexia, bulimia, and other issues into their respective boxes based on an exhibited list of symptoms and treating them accordingly is not enough to heal them. We need to dig deeper. We need to ask, “Who are the human beings beneath these labels? And what are they really hungry for?”
The experience of writing this book has been both therapeutic and agonizing. In trying to untangle what began as a heavy, abstract knot of thoughts and emotions, I’ve learned quite a few things about myself—things that have given me a clearer direction not only in writing this book, but in living my life. In addition to having some meaningful things to share with others, it turns out that I also had a lot to uncover for myself and a lot of growing to do. I appreciate you taking the time to witness the parts of this journey I’ve managed to transcribe.
At thirty-one years old, I’m happy to say I no longer struggle with an eating disorder of any kind. While I admit I’m a work in progress like anyone else, I’ve developed a sense of awareness, compassion, and appreciation for myself that makes it feel impossible now for me to disparage myself in any way. In discovering who I am and what I need to feel sane in the world, I’ve opened myself up to a reality where I’m able to be more trusting and forgiving toward myself and others. I recognize now that it’s my own responsibility to take care of myself, and with the realization of this responsibility comes a great deal of power.
In the following pages, I’ll share with you everything I’ve come to understand about my hunger and all of its implications. While this book might be most relevant to those who have experienced or are currently experiencing an eating disorder, I think it will make a good companion for anyone who’s struggled with identity, sexuality, or an addiction of any kind. Regardless of who you are and where you’re coming from, I am thankful for the opportunity to reach you.
Marissa
PART 1: WHAT’S EATING THE WALLFLOWER
Chapter 1 WHY ARE YOU SO QUIET?
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In this first section, I’ll share with you my personal story with as much gritty emotional truth as I can. I’ll tell you about how I felt like an outcast throughout my school years due to being painfully introverted, how I related to my family, how I felt plagued with fear and confusion around my sexuality beginning around puberty, and how I struggled to transition from adolescence into adulthood with only a frighteningly subtle sense of who I was and what I needed to be happy.
Early Struggles with Social Anxiety and Fitting In
To this day, I’m not sure there’s anything more terrifying than entering the cafeteria alone on the first day of school. For an eternal moment, you hover in the entranceway, watching everyone take a seat as if choreographed, as if summer was just another day gone by and no one’s kinships have skipped a beat. Then the bell rings with a frantic shrill, and soon enough you’re the only one left standing. What do you do? Your backpack weighs on your adolescent shoulders, heavy with too many textbooks. It’s too late to be inconspicuous. You have to make a decision. Now really, what do you do?
Both literally and metaphorically, I’ve never really known where to sit. So I spent many of my elementary and high school lunch periods hiding out in a stall in the girls’ bathroom, discreetly peeling the aluminum foil off my peanut butter and jelly sandwich, hoping to God no one would notice my feet under the door.
From the time I was very young, I sensed there was something different about me. I was first exposed to people my age at a Catholic elementary school, and it didn’t come naturally to me to reach out of my comfort zone and make friends. I was highly observant, perceptive, and painfully shy. While the other kids goofed off during recess and competed for attention during gym class, I sat watching them, harboring this feeling that there were infinite universes between me and other human beings. A wallflower by nature, I did the best I could to conceal my nerves and blend in. But I very quickly learned that keeping to myself was a widely unacceptable manner of existing.
“Why are you so quiet?” my classmates would ask me, interrupting the concentrated effort I put into trying to make myself invisible.
“I don’t know,” I’d reply with a bashful grin and eyes that begged them to leave me alone. Then I’d return to my default personality—well behaved and petrified. Eventually, through the years, my classmates stopped asking questions, and I was just the quiet girl in class who did all her homework and rarely raised her hand.
I remember getting on the school bus, always choosing the third or fourth seat. The middle of the bus, slightly favoring the front, felt safest to me. Of course, the back of the bus