Until The Secrets Became Routines...

Until the secrets became rountines and my eating disorder took over my life. There was never a moment where I decided to let my eating disorder take over my life, it just happened quietly.

It started with little things nobody else noticed, thoughts I kept to myself and rules that made sense in my head. Promises that felt harmless because they were only meant to last for a day.

The problem was that eating disorders never stay small, the things that begin as choices slowly become obligations. What once felt optional starts feeling impossible to ignore. The rules multiply, the fear gets louder and guilt becomes constant. Before you realise it, your entire life is built around keeping the eating disorder comfortable.

I stopped making decisions based on what I wanted, I made them based on what would keep the guilt away... what would stop the anxiety and what would silence the voice for a couple of hours.

Food was never just food anymore, every meal became a negotiation, every invitation became a calculation and every mirror became disgusting. I became so consumed by thoughts about food, my body and what I had or hadn't eaten that there was barely room for anything else.

The strangest part is that from the outside life often looked normal, I still showed up, I still smiled, I still answered messages... but inside I was exhausted. There is a loneliness that comes with living a double life, the version of yourself that everybody else sees and the version of yourself constantly fighting a battle nobody knows exists.

All the secrets become normal, the behaviours become routine, the panic becomes familiar and eventually you stop questioning whether any of it is okay because it has become your everyday reality.

I lost years without noticing they were disappearing, not because I wasn't living but because I wasn't fully there. My body was present, my mind was somewhere else entirely, counting, planning, avoiding, obsessing, repeating, over and over again.

The hardest thing to explain to somebody who has never experienced an eating disorder is how something that hurts you deeply can become something you rely on.

How something that makes you miserable can still feel impossible to let go of because by the time the secrets become routines and the routines become your life, the eating disorder no longer feels like something you do... it feels like who you are.

This is what makes it so difficult to imagine life without it, not the food, not the weight, not the rules... the fear of meeting yourself underneath it all.

With Love, Niomi 🤎