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Hello,

My name is Melissa and I will be turning 29 years old this March. I live in Massachusetts, USA. I have had an eating disorder for about 15 years, started as anorexia in my early teens, turned into bulimia in my late teens and early 20s. Its been a mixture of both since then.

That's making a very long painful story short.

I am recovering now, i have been for some time. This took a few years of therapy and a concerned loving boyfriend (now husband) to help me get through some pretty dark self-destructive times. But I think I am in an ok place today. I have grown to know how my body responds to food, and what i need to do to maintain my weight, which i am ok with because my BMI is still on the lower side.

The process really is baby steps.

I log my calories on a daily basis. I have a minimum (to maintain) i try to hit, even if i have to fill the missing calories with fruit. Fruit and vegetables have become non-threatening foods to me now. I can consume them guilt free, and I enjoy the nutritional value they offer me. I purposely take vitamins. When i was a teen i use to slip them into my pajama pocket whenever my mother wasn't looking and flush them down the toilet at school. I avoided taking them even in my 20s as well. I have come realize that my body deserves and needs nutrients, especially if i intend on having a baby one day.

Logging my calories has been helpful in my recovery because i have made an agreement with myself to hit my minimum, and it helps me not to binge because i want to avoid the self-hatred and humiliation i would feel having to accurately log a binge.

Despite my healthier eating habits, i still relapse. On especially low days, i will not eat enough, or i will purge. I wonder if i will ever get to a point in my life where i won't relapse, where i can say i am totally void of my disorder. I worry this will never be the case, that this disorder is so engraved in my life it is an integrated part of who i am.

I go to the gym frequently. I started a gym membership a couple years ago, and it has helped me learn a better, less destructive way to maintain my weight, but it has also created another problem for me. Once i discovered what working out can do to my body, being thin was no longer enough. I must be thin AND fit.

I have also developed another body image issue that is new to me but equally as horrific as not being thin or fit enough.

As I am approaching 30 years old, I have come to the harsh realization that I am aging... and i am terrified about it. I still get mistaken for a teen very frequently, but i can't help but think about the future, and what i am going to look like at 35, or 40, or 50. I am hoping by then i will be well enough to handle my aging face and body, but as of right not, its a very real unhealthy concern of mine. I am constantly preoccupied by it. I scrutinize my body closely, looking for the typical signs of getting older. I look for grey hair. Wrinkles. Sun spots. Sagging loose skin. Stretch marks. Cellulite. I moisturize A LOT and use SPF on a daily basis. Part of the reason why i work out is to make sure my skin stays tight.

I feel ridiculous even formalizing these thoughts in written text.

I don't tell people about this... i don't tell anyone about how i feel about my body. Confessing these genuine feelings is usually looked upon as vain, or fishing for compliments, which really couldn't be more untrue. My quest on most days is just to look normal... average. So i keep these thoughts to myself and i find that doing this makes a once little flicker of a concern grow and fester into unhealthy, unrealistic, obsession. Dare i say, a delusion.

I am hoping this is a place i can come to to write about these thoughts.

I've never posted on an eating disorder related community before so i am not sure what to expect... i hope i didn't share too much. :/