Hi,

I came across these boards tonight and decided to join because I feel like I really need to simply unleash some of the stuff going around my head.

I'm a 22 yr old sufferer of anorexia, and I'm a guy, which makes it tougher to find ppl to share my problems with. I suffered a lot in high school -- too much working out, not enough eating, which led to a huge drop in weight. I went off to college and turned to drinking to help curb my obsession with my self image. It helped, I gained a normal amount of weight back and, in fact, I gained a little extra. The entire time that ppl were telling me that I was finally looking good, I couldn't stop thinking about how 'fat' I had become.

My real problem now is that I've graduated college, and since quit drinking because I really need to pursue good health. But now I can't follow healthy habits, because without the drinking, all I do is obsess all day about my weight, how much I eat, if I've run enough(5-10 miles a day) and lifted enough weights.

I can't get away from this problem. I'm terrified right now, I've lost 25 pounds in two months, and although I'm still in healthy shape, I cannot afford to lose any more weight. It's like a runaway train though.. I wanted to lose a little weight and get healthy, and I've found myself back in the quagmire of full-blown anorexia. I've had professional help in the past, and found that it just doesn't help with the obsessive-ness of it all. I know that this affliction is, in a way, OCD, but do ppl actually recover from this.. or do I live with my problems the rest of my life, just keeping my weight in check, never being satisfied with my physical or mental self?

no, you DO and CAN and WILL recover from this! i feel a lot of similarities to you -- not in actual experiences, but more in the OCD/obsessiveness of it all. but i really believe (and want you to also!) that i CAN beat this thing down and live/eat normally and healthily. will i ever be able to sit down with a big bag of m&m's and just eat away? maybe not. but i'll be able to eat a handful or two. will i still hesitate when someone suggests cheesecake after a steak dinner? maybe. but the difference will be that i will have that momentary hesitation and then i'll remember "oh yeah, it doesn't matter" and i'll be able to go along and just do it!

i KNOW that you can do this, but i think a big part of the battle is believing that yourself, you know? i know you've tried therapy before and it didn't seem to work, but i strongly urge you to try it again. first of all cuz you've gotta find the "right" therapist and secondly, because you're a different person now than you were then. so what didn't quite "click" before may REALLY help you now. good luck and keep posting, you'll find a lot of support here.

I'm a girl, but I have motivations that are similiar to yours. It's not about getting pretty/popular/attention, but all about how my physique appears and what that says about my strength/self-control. It's tough because exercise can be healthy or disordered - as with food, you have to find the balance. Therapy didn't do jack for me either. Every time I've relapsed, I've needed to go on anti-depressants to pull me out. That's me; I think it's highly individual.

Exercise can really help you get healthy, and proper nutrition helps you perform so much better. One thing that helped me start getting better was learning much more about muscle-building nutrition and then starting to measure myself by how much I could lift, NOT how much I weighed :)

Thanks.

The toughest part of the past couple months, and my current relapse, is that I got a job about 4 hours from where my longtime girlfriend got her job. She'd been my built in support for the past 4 years, and now that's gone. Of course, she wasn't my only support. I developed a troublesome drinking habit in college that I thankfully have quit since leaving, but without the every-few-nights of drinking with my pals, I've returned to my obsessive self. I had started taking anxiety medication at about the time that this whole turn around happened.

Hey, i can relate (i think) to what you're talking about and i might have some good advice. Anorexia makes us all withdraw into ourselves and essentially "leave" the outside world, so i think it's VERY natural to fall into the trap of spending ALL your time alone, at home, counting calories, exercising, obsessing over food, etc. the thought of going out seems daunting and relatively impossible, right? cuz all "Ed" wants you to do is sit around thinking about ed-related issues and worrying and controlling every morsel, every 4 steps of exercise, etc.

it's great that you had some built-in support before with your girlfriend and your friends, and i can totally understand that feeling of loss/aloneness now that they're "gone" (so to speak, i know they're really not gone for real). I go through/went through the same thing and what i've found that has helped me was forcing myself to get busy with things that are NOT ed-related. so i'm not filling my time with things like exercise class or baking cookies to bring into work, you know?

basically, since you've lost the everyday support of your girlfriend and the built-in going out with friends, you've gotta fill that time! everybody's got different interests, but here's some things i've done that have helped me stay busier and hence, helped me not feel so "alone" with my ed. I started taking a once a week guitar class cuz i always wanted to learn to play. There's a bonus to that cuz i've gotta practice everyday, so it keeps me even busier, you know? i've started reading more (i LOVE to read). I've started more "projects," like sewing and fixing up stuff around the house (i'm sort of crafty, so these exact things might not work for you, but you get the picture.) you just gotta get out and DO stuff, it doesn't matter so much what the "stuff" is! go to a coffee shop and read (just having other people around, even if you don't know them, helps i think). pack a picnic and eat in a park one night.

and with your friends, you can still hang out with them frequently, just don't drink, you know? see a movie, go bowling, go to a play, go to a concert, whatever. i know that at our age it seems like all people do is go to the bars, but i think that's just out of boredom/lack of creativity sometimes, you know? if you can suggest other things to do, i'll betcha they jump right on the bandwagon. anyway, hope this helps somewhat. and just remember, that loneliness/aloneless is a BIG part of anorexia and part of recovery is fighting against that and forcing yourself to "re-enter" society. good luck!