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Oh, hello, it’s NEDAwareness Week, which means it’s that time when I start oversharing again! This year’s theme is “Come As You Are,” and a lot of the posts I’ve seen have been dedicated to raising awareness that, despite what people might think, eating disorders come in all shapes and sizes. Here’s the deal: Eating disorders are mental disorders with physical side effects, and believe it or not, most people with eating disorders don’t look like they have them. For example, even when I was at my sickest, my weight never dropped below 155 pounds, and despite having clinically diagnosed bulimia, on most BMI charts, I was still considered overweight. It took me too damn long to get the help I knew I needed because I didn’t think anyone would believe that I had a problem. I was scared people would think I was overreacting, or worse, just seeking attention. I want to help create a space where people feel comfortable and validated coming forward with any issues they might have. I believe everyone is worthy of recovery. No matter what you look like, you deserve to feel at home in your body. You deserve to feed yourself. You deserve to think about things other than calories. You deserve LIFE. And, if you’re not in a place where you believe you deserve those things, I can promise that you DO deserve to know that you’re not alone, and there is a better life waiting for you. Come as You Are sends a message to individuals at all stages of body acceptance and eating disorders recovery that their stories are valid. I invite everyone, especially those whose stories have not been widely recognized, to speak out, share your experiences, and connect with others. Even if you’re not ready to speak out publicly, I would encourage you to talk to someone -- it can be me, but it doesn’t have to be.
If you take anything away from this post, let it be this: Your pain is valid, your story is important, you are not alone, and recovery is worth it because YOU are worth it, no matter your size.
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“No relationship is perfect, ever. There are always some ways you have to bend, to compromise, to give something up in order to gain something greater... The love we have for each other is bigger than these small differences. And that's the key. It's like a big pie chart, and the love in a relationship has to be the biggest piece. Love can make up for a lot.” Warning: This blog post is gross, gory, and more than a little TMI. It is mortifying, and it describes me at one of my worst moments.
However, I’m sharing it anyway because, yesterday being Valentine’s Day, I’ve had romance on my brain, and I’ve been trying to figure out what my definition of love is. I know there’s a girl out there who thinks love is in the grand gestures -- the huge bouquet of flowers, the surprise trip to Paris, the pulling up at your door in a horse and carriage. You know, your basic Hollywood teen movie ending. I know I used to think that. I thought love was constant butterflies, wild chemistry, a barrage of roses, and riding off into the sunset together. Don’t get me wrong, those things are nice, but I don’t think I knew what real, true love looked like until this summer. Backing up: As y’all know, Craig and I eloped in May 2017. I wanted to move to North Dakota, he was about to deploy, we had decided we wanted to be married, and neither of us wanted to throw together a wedding at the last minute. However, when he returned home from his deployment, we wanted to have a “We Still Do” party to celebrate our love with our family and friends. We chose to do this in Las Vegas, because it was an easy place for our guests to fly into, and we thought it would be a fun vacation where everyone would get to know one another. I spent almost a year planning this celebration, and I was so excited leading up to it. I’d finally be meeting most of Craig’s family, and I’d get to see my best friends for the first time in months. In my head, I thought this week would be filled with mornings hiking in Las Vegas’s overlooked nature scene, afternoons by the pool tanning and sipping margaritas, evenings indulging in the best buffets, and nights out on the strip dancing. I reserved a luxurious hotel suite for Craig and me. I tried to painstakingly choose every detail. I’m typically a very spontaneous person, so all this planning was a big deal for me, but I just knew this week was going to be perfect. Except it wasn’t. We got to Las Vegas on a Wednesday, and on Thursday afternoon, I got food poisoning. And not just a little case of food poisoning -- I have never been so sick in my entire life. I started throwing up during the dinner we planned for our immediate family, tried to put on a brave face and push through, but after the sixth time excusing myself from the table (and not even making it to the bathroom), I had to call it a night. Las Vegas parking is not the best, so we had a 20 minute walk through casinos, crosswalks, and parking garages to get back to our car. I had my head in a plastic bag, puking my guts out, during the entire walk, making those 20 minutes seem like an endless parade of humiliation. Once we got back to the hotel, I spent the entire night and next morning in the bathroom with nastiness coming out of me from both ends. I was miserable and so weak I could barely stand up. Our rehearsal and wedding party dinner were that afternoon, and our wedding was the next day (Saturday). My dad made a not-very-funny-at-the-time joke about one of my sisters standing in for me during the ceremony. I was panicking -- what was I going to do? Thankfully, at around 11 a.m. on Friday, I began to be able to keep things down. So Craig, my sweet groom, force fed me nausea medicine, saltine crackers, and pedialyte. I still did not feel good, but my guests had flown thousands of miles to be with us, so I’d be damned if I was going to let them down. Long story short, I made it through rehearsal and only almost passed out once. I didn’t eat anything, but I made it through dinner without any major incidents. I thought maybe things would be ok. The day of our celebration dawned, and I still felt weak, but more like myself. Craig and I said our farewells because, after the morning, we wouldn’t see each other until our “wedding.” I was well enough to run some last minute errands, while unbeknownst to me, Craig was cleaning our hotel room (my food poisoning did a number on our fancy suite). My bridal party was meeting me there so we could all get ready together, and Craig was going to hang out and get ready with his best man. Again, to make a long story story short, our wedding day went according to schedule, and it was a blast. I was too exhausted to go out afterward like I had originally planned, but other than that, I really could not have asked for a more perfect day. And here’s the deal -- that would not have been possible without my husband. He let me have that perfect day while he dealt with the mess. (FYI, here comes the grossest, most embarrassing part of this story). I don’t remember how he told me, but the day after our wedding, he said when he was picking up the room, he noticed what he thought was a bit of makeup on my robe. But then when he looked closer, he saw that it wasn’t makeup. Nope, it was feces. Apparently, at some point during those awful 24 hours where I thought about dying more than once, at 26 years old, I had shit myself and not even noticed it. And instead of dropping it in disgust and running for the hills, my man calmly cleaned it and the rest of the room for my bridesmaids and me. Furthermore, he didn’t even tell me about what he had done so I could enjoy our day without being embarrassed. You guys. Your wedding day is supposed to be the most romantic, most beautiful day of your life. You want your groom to look at you like you’re the sexiest, most gorgeous woman he has ever seen. My groom literally picked up my shit the morning of our wedding. And I think that’s what true love is. Yes, Craig is my dreamy prince charming who brings me flowers for no reason, writes me love notes, and tells me I’m beautiful. But he’s also my partner who is strong when I’m weak, who takes care of me even when I stubbornly refuse help, and who holds my hand when I have anxiety and/or panic attacks. He is the only person I’ve ever been able to picture forever with. Obviously, I would have preferred our wedding week to go the way I had originally planned. But, being a silver linings kind of gal, I think Jesus used what I thought was catastrophe to show me what “in sickness and in health” really means. Is it humiliating? Absolutely. But it also absolutely shows how much Craig really does love me. Social media on Valentine’s Day is a highlight reel of the big stuff. It can really distort our view of what a relationship looks like day by day, and let me tell ya -- it’s not always roses and chocolates and teddy bears. Roses wilt, chocolates get eaten, and your dogs will chew up teddy bears (I may or may not know this from experience), so if a relationship is going to last, it has to go through the times where love can seem more like sacrifice than romance. Craig and I are only two years into our marriage, but I think we’re off to a good start because we’re realistic about what love looks like. Love is doing the dishes because you know that’s the chore your partner hates. Love is forgiving your partner when they’ve hurt you. Love is sitting in comfortable silence. Love is having the hard conversations. Love is seeing each other at your worst. Love isn't just accepting the other person's baggage, it's carrying it every now and then. Love is also in the grand gestures, sure, but in my experience, I think true love is in dealing with people’s shit (both literally and figuratively). You find someone who does that, and you’ve got a keeper. |
About the AuthorConfessions of a failed southern lady. I've got messy hair and a thirsty heart. Writer, photographer, career wanderer. Archives
May 2023
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