Have you ever stopped to think about the compliments you give? Do your compliments vary depending on whether the recipient is male or female? Do your compliments sound something like this: "Have you lost weight? You look so skinny!" "Did you do something different to your hair? It looks great!" "Wow, I really love when you wear makeup; it makes you look gorgeous."
If your compliments resemble these, I urge you to continue reading.
I am on the long and arduous road of eating disorder recovery. This shocks many people, as I have never looked underweight or sick. In fact, the first doctor I went to for help said, "Oh, is binge eating your problem?" Talk about a punch to the gut. I mean, I'm going to the guy for help, and all I hear him say is, "Yep, you're fat." Anyway, eating disorders are mental not physical. The physical "looking too skinny" or "too fat" is the result, not the problem. I began my eating disorder journey at the ripe old age of ten. I began comparing. "Comparison is the thief of joy." I have already written about my journey in detail in "smaller me". Today, I only want to focus on a small part. I want to focus on the high school years and how compliments, like the ones mentioned above, became triggers for my eating disorder. Around the age of 15, I began restricting my daily caloric intake to 400-600 calories per day. The two pictures below were taken before I began restricting calories (to give a reference to the size I was when I believed I was too fat to be of worth).
I refused to eat more than 600 calories in a given day. I constantly went to bed with a growling tummy, and actually began thriving on that hungry sensation. I knew if I denied my body food when it was begging for it, I would lose more weight. I saw results rapidly. I went down several pants sizes within just a couple of months, and the compliments began flooding in. Everywhere I went, people would mention how skinny I was getting and they "wished they could do the same". I LOVED the compliments. In fact, I only felt good about myself if someone complimented me. If I went a whole day without someone telling me I looked skinny, I wouldn't eat anything except ice from my water the next few days. If someone complimented me one day and then didn't the next day, I convinced myself it was because I looked fat. As a result, I wouldn't touch food for days. I lived for compliments. I was killing myself to receive them. The pictures below were taken sometime during the midst of my caloric restrictions.
As you can see, I never "looked sick". My bones were not poking out all over my body, my eyes were not sunk into my head, and I was fairly muscular. I say all this to help show that a person does not have to look sick to be struggling with an eating disorder.
As I have grown older and begun taking steps to battle my self loathing thoughts, I have noticed my communication with other people has changed as well. I put forth my best effort to never compliment a person on the vessel they were given upon arrival into their physical being. We do not have a say in the body we are placed with. We don't get to choose the color, size, or shape. So, instead of seeing only the shell, I look for passion in the way someone talks about what excites them, and I tell them how beautiful it is. I look for encouragement in the speech of each man and woman and tell them I am so grateful for what they have to say. I watch for the sparkle in the eyes of people helping others and tell them how it excites me and helps spur me on in the work of the Lord. I look for the very soul of who a person is and tell them why I ardently admire who they are. You see, I refuse to aid any person in believing self worth comes from the vessel that carries him/her.
I urge you to examine how you talk to others. Are you complimenting something they have no control over? I beg you to consider taking a deeper look at the indivuals you know and compliment them on who they are as a person, not the "taxi" they were given during their time on earth.
Sincerely,
Miss
