Nobody wants to be made fun of and not only do we have to argue with ourselves if we are skinny enough or pretty enough, we have our classmates and peers to tell us what we might miss.
Like all young girls I went through a 'chubby' phase, and it was the worst year and a half of my life. The names and the teasing, the exclusion and the hurt. I would cry myself to sleep, I would fake sick just to not have to deal with the torture on the school bus.
Soon because I took to long to get ready to go to school I would run out of time for breakfast...and I found that I didn't miss it. Soon I eat less and less of my lunches, either giving them away or throwing them away...I began to notice some of my clothes fit better and better.
Soon I was only eating dinner at home and then I ate smaller and smaller portions, telling my mom I got snacks later at school. Or I'd stay at friends houses so I didn't have to eat at all.
When summer came none of my clothes fit any more and I was considering a bikini...I wore it to the first pool party of the summer.
I was still teased...after 9 months of starving myself I was still getting teased, when I looked in the mirror I saw the fat girl again. I couldn't understand why my plan had backfired. So I kept up the diet over the summer, but the fat girl in the mirror never went away. The first day of school I got stares, I thought I had finally done it after a year of strict diet and control.
It was my favorite teacher that enlightened me about the stares, she asked if my family was having any money troubles, or if I was on any drugs. I was shocked and surprised by her questions. She showed me a picture of Marilyn Monroe.
She asked me if I thought her beautiful, and thin. I said of course, everybody thinks she was. She then asked if I knew what dress size she wore. She said a 4, but if she were to buy a dress in today's fashion industry she would wear a 10.
I couldn't believe it. So I went home and looked it up myself, and its true.
The fashion industry has managed to shrink our wiasts smaller and smaller to be 'beautiful and thin' according to their standards and not by health standards. In fact if you back further still in history you would learn that a curvy woman with large hips and 'meat on her bones' was a sign of health and wealth.
So I went back to my teacher and asked her what she thought I should do. She asked me which disease I had, whether I felt the need to eat and binge or if I just denied my body completely. She also asked me if my mother had been worried. I never though about it before, but she was and I was hurting her too. My teacher arranged a meeting at my house with my mom so we wouldn't have to worry about any of my classmates hearing our conversation.
when my teach showed up she had all sorts of information on the treatment of binge eating disorder, or Bulimia and treatment programs for anorexia, which had been my disease. The 3 of us talked for several hours about what I had been doing to myself and to my mother, I had no idea she had been so scared for me. She worried that I might have died, but she didn't know how to help me.
Finally we decided on a treatment plan for [my] anorexia but they made it very clear that it would be up to me to see it through. 'Eating disorders are something that you cannot overcome by yourself. You will require guidance from professionals that can help you through the entire process.' (quote taken from www.sunsetmalibu.com)Well that was 2 years ago, I am a senior in high school, I haven't gain all my weight back but my mom says it's ok to want to be fit under the right circumstances. Now my role models aren't the fashion magazines, but my mom, my teacher and Marilyn Monroe.
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