My thoughts on B.E.D.

I don't think other people truly understand what it feels like to have binge eating disorder.

It's feeling overwhelming compulsion to eat...not just sweets, but anything and everything. It's when stress and anxiety hit you so hard that you find yourself scrounging for food, stealing snacks from your co workers office like a crack head, and it's not until you've finished binging that you even comprehend what you just did. So you learn to throw wrappers away in multiple garbage cans so no-one knows just how much you eat. You learn to hide your food stashes so know one else will know. You eat in private so no one sees how fast or how much you eat. And when all is said and done, you are so disgusted with yourself that you just cry.

Moments of motivation come when you can no longer fit in your clothes and the number on the scale keeps climbing. So you try...you eat healthy foods, you plan healthy meals, you plan workouts and join a gym. You vow to yourself that you will not let yourself binge again. So every meal you eat is prefaced with fear. Fear that as soon as you allow yourself to eat one thing, no matter how healthy, that it will trigger you to want more. Fear continues through the day as every encounter with food brings with it stress and anxiety and the compulsion to eat it. The stress builds when you have to pretend to everyone around you that everything's fine, you have to act normal, you have to hide. Every day, every hour, every minute is a constant internal battle.

Eventually, you get tired...tired of battling, tired of hating yourself, tired of restricting yourself. You become literally physically and mentally exhausted with all of it. So you take a break and stop fighting. You allow yourself to stop hating yourself, to say that it's not worth it and you allow yourself to be normal...to go out with your friends and family and to not stress about what you eat or drink or wear. You allow yourself to feel happy for a while.

Once again, you find yourself not able to button your pants, you check the scale, and you realize how far out of control you've let things get again. This is the cycle. Over and over. This is my life.

After years, you seek help from doctors and psychiatrists that you quickly find have no clue how to help. Antidepressants, seizure meds, cognitive behavioral therapy, higher doses, and the advice to just "use smaller plates" and "eat more apples" all lead to them saying, "I don't know what to do for you, let me give you a referral to see someone else." However, the referral is to one more person who doesn't know how to help or to a center that tells you you're too old for their programs.

Every doctors appointment brings with it hope that this time, this day could be a new beginning, a chance for a new start, a new treatment. At the same time, the end of every appointment leads to frustration and disappointment.

More cycling.

This is what I feel like. Every single day.