I tried to find a photo on Google for Binge Eating Disorder and it was HORRIFYING. Their images are the forefront of shaming. They were all these ugly, ugly enormous food portions, people comically stuffing their faces, and adverts for books on how to stop in 10 easy steps.
Fuckers.
Do it. Google Binge Eating Disorders. Click Images. If you see nothing wrong with these photos, you need some serious educating right now.
Let me re-think this, though. Is it even possible to create an image for this most secret of conditions? What would it look like? What does a person look like when they are in the midst of a fugue state beyond their control? It might be a pretty boring photo.
Hmm. I know.
Here’s an image for Binge Eating Disorder:
That’s me. Living my life in the sunlight. Doing things I enjoy. Sometimes having experiences I don’t enjoy. Thinking fun things. Taking my meds. Hiking. Posting on Facebook. Dreaming of running. Writing. Loving my dog, my husband, myself, and my friends. Even having friends. Going to a movie. Going out to eat.
Oh! That last one! That’s the image you want! The one that shows how ashamed I am to be eating. How ugly it looks for me to be consuming food. Except, it’s not.
Secrecy
There are times when BED sufferers do not want you to see them. It’s the same with me. We needn’t obsess about it though (except, we can’t NOT obsess…) because it’s usually impossible for you to tell when it’s happening. We’re very, very good at hiding it.
There are those stereotypical hidden episodes with a torn-open box that used to hold a dozen donuts sitting in front of a sufferer and there’s frosted sugar smeared all over our faces and tears and snot are dribbling down our noses. Our eyes are also glazed over and the noise in our heads is a constant scream. You’ll never see that. Not on Google images, for sure.
For a photo of a typical binge, perhaps time-lapsed photography could do it. Or a Go-Pro attached to my head. You would see me having a bowl of chips in front of Netflix. Later the same night, you’d see a serving of ice cream. Earlier, it was half a pizza. After the ice cream, it’s the other half of the pizza because I couldn’t leave it on the counter for my husband to consume when he gets home later from having a life while I hide in front of Netflix all alone in the evening no matter how much I’d love to also be out living a life but don’t because it’s so much easier to eat that much alone. Especially that whole pizza. I rarely plan to do it. It happens. It’s habit. It’s 52 years of abuse that won’t let go.
Okay, so the Google images might have been close.
What you won’t see
You won’t see me up in the middle of the night with acid reflux vomit coating my throat because I’ve eaten myself sick. You won’t connect the dots to the disaster in my stomach lining, diverticulitis, shingles, hives, sciatica, and the embarrassing gymnastics I have to do to fit into a theater seat.
You won’t see the numbness that eating so much creates and the terror of my inner 5-year old little girl who had to turn to food to survive.
What you will see
More like, what you THINK you’ll see… Now that you know, you will see that every morsel that goes into my mouth is tinged with binge – EXCEPT it’s not. You’ll wonder – Is Susan enjoying her food or is she stuffing it into her mouth because she’s sick? You won’t be able to help it. I’m sorry. I can’t stuff the genie back in the bottle.
Don’t worry about it. Just see me. I’ll smile at you and we’ll have a pleasant conversation. I’ll welcome you to a show. I’ll banter with you on your thread. I’ll do all the things that make me basically a neat person. We’ll even share a meal.
And, I’ll suffer from binge eating disorder.
Up soon… What’s Next?
Susan Scot Fry is the author of “A Year of Significance” which morphed into “A Life of Significance: Adventures in Oversharing” when it turned out she wasn’t done living after that first year but had developed a taste for saying too much.
Hello Susan. This is awful. This is so awful. It’s such a waste of a person, of quality of life, of feelings of self-control/self-respect/self-esteem. It’s so incredibly unfair. And yet it’s the way that your very clever and sensitive brain have chosen to help you to cope with life and living.
Well done to your clever mind for finding a way to help you (and also to mine for helping me). For had we not perhaps that suicide option would have been pushed forward with a little more urgency than it has for either of us.
Mind a bit of my soul dies after ever large binge – as measured my Will To Live. Whilst I take responsibility for each and every binge (i.e. no gun was put to my head) I still don’t feel that it is me that is behind the attrition of my soul. It’s the bingeing. I can’t reconcile that whilst I’m responsible for each binge I can’t seem to control it. How does that even make sense??
Good luck to both of us.
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Hello Ava,
This makes PERFECT sense. Thank you for all your great thoughts and for actually sharing them. It helps so much to hear from people who get it and are doing our best to deal with it.
We got dished out a pretty rotten helping of coping skills but we keep plugging away. Funny how I seem to be using more and more ‘food’ analogies. 😉 Dished. Helping. Well, that’s me. Survival by humor. And total honesty.
Solidarity, Ava. Good luck to both of us.
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