The Day I Realised Anorexia Was Never Going To Be Happy...

For a long time, I believed there would be a point where anorexia would finally be satisfied, a point where I would feel good enough... thin enough, disciplined enough, in control enough. I kept believing that if I could just reach one more goal, lose a little more weight or push myself a little harder, everything would finally feel okay. But shocker, it never did because the truth about anorexia is that it is NEVER happy.

It isn't happy when you're struggling, exhausted, missing out on life and definitely not when you've sacrificed everything for it. Every time I reached a goal, anorexia just wanted more from me. Every time I thought "this will be enough," it whispered that I could do better. Be smaller, more control, more rules, more punishment and for years I listened.

I would listen while my world got smaller, I listened while food become frightening, I listened while my relationships suffered, I listened while my body begged me to stop. Somehow despite everything I was giving up, anorexia still convinced me it wasn't enough.

That's the thing nobody tells you, an eating disorder doesn't have an end goal for you. There is no magical moment where it turns around and says "well done, you've done enough now you can be happy now." Happiness was never what an eating disorder wanted for you, it doesn't care about your happiness, your memories, your relationships or future.

The day I realised that was the day something shifted inside of me because I finally understood that I wasn't failing my eating disorder, my eating disorder was failing me. I had spent years trying to satisfy a voice that was designed to keep me trapped, years believing that if I sacrificed enough of myself, I would finally feel worthy. But no amount of weight loss was ever going to make that voice go away, no number on that scale was going to give me peace. My eating disorder was never going to give me the life it kept promising me.

Recovery became possible when I stopped asking myself how to make my eating disorder happy and started asking myself what would make ME happy?

My eating disorder spent years convincing me that happiness existed on the other side of being smaller but recovery taught me, happiness existed on the other side of letting it go.

With Love, Niomi 🤎

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