It was the middle of my junior year at high school when things started back up. I am not really sure why these awful habits came back into my life. Maybe it was the fact that my favorite teacher had just been diagnosed with breast cancer, or maybe I was just stressed out from basketball. All I really know is that these habits have changed my life completely.

I have struggled with body image issues for as long as I can remember. I would constantly fight with the person staring back at me in the mirror. It was like I had a costume on that made me look gigantic. I have always wanted to change the way I look. I don’t really understand why, especially because I have never been overweight. I guess some people’s minds are wired differently.

I became obsessed with food all over again, only this time it was much different. Unlike in my past, where I would have just skipped a meal or two, I instead avoided food all together. My mom would give me twenty dollars for lunch every two weeks. Little did she know that I would pocket the money and waste it on diet pills rather than my lunch.

When the snow began to melt and the weather started to get warm, I took up running. At first I would run a mile every day. Then I began to increase that mile into two then three miles! To top that all off I also jumped rope for approximately fifteen minutes. My friends thought I was crazy and my parents just thought I was keeping in shape.

Over the next four months I had lost fourteen pounds. I felt amazing and beautiful on the outside, but on the inside I felt like complete shit. Every month I had to get bloodwork done. My doctor expressed great concerns about me and so did my therapist at the time.

This all continued until the middle of my senior year. Finally, my therapist was forced to tell my mom. She did not think it was appropriate for me to play basketball. She did not think it was appropriate for me to exercise at all! I was extremely pissed when she had told me she needed to talk to my mom. She recommended I go to this intensive outpatient program down in Albany or be hospitalized at four winds. Well at the time my mom did not want me to miss out on the rest of my last year at high school, so she made arrangements to meet someone down in Albany.

I was very nervous on the car ride down but at the same time I was really excited. I was ready to get rid of this nasty thing. I did not want to fight with myself anymore. Unfortunately, after talking to the lady my mom ended up denying that program. Her excuse was she did not want me to upset my dad and be forced to quit basketball, which I didn’t even like playing.

After that day, my parents both decided that I didn’t need to go see anyone, not even my therapist I’ve been seeing. They had this thought that all I needed was family support, and that this was just temporary. Well they were wrong.

The day I turned eighteen, I made an appointment with the therapist I had been seeing in the past. She had not known I did not go into a program. She was very disappointed. She had told me if she had known my parents denied sending me, then she would have reported it. I truly do wish she had. I was ready to get help but now that I was eighteen I couldn’t be forced into treatment. This set me back even more. I was too scared to get help. I also didn’t want to do it all by myself.

The thing with eating disorder thoughts is that your mind is constantly telling you, you have a problem but the other voice is saying you are fine. Basically, every day I would doubt myself on if I really had a problem or not.

Over this past summer is when I decided to get more intense help for the first time. I called the intensive outpatient program in Albany and told them I need to get in as soon as possible. Within the next couple of weeks I was down in Albany for 4 hours 3 days a week. The sad thing is, my parents never noticed that I was gone most the time. They never got suspicious. They just assumed I was working all the time. Even though they know I am going down there now, they still don’t show any concerns. In a way that makes me happy, but then again it makes me kind of feel alone and invisible.

Going through this struggle basically all alone has really impacted me. It has made me the person I am today. In all honesty, it has made me a lot stronger. I have learned that people won’t always have the support they want or envision but that doesn’t mean they cannot overcome the struggle they are facing. I hope to one day share my story and help those who do not have the support from family and friends. Even though someone may look like they are happy with life, it doesn’t mean everything's alright. It is very easy to hide demons from the outside world, but eventually those demons will come out and it’s better to get the help before it’s too late.