Starving For Help

Chapter Two

              Every day I started feeling more and more fragile; like I was just going to snap in half and shatter if I had to get dressed one more time. Looking at myself in the mirror is a lot like torture. Trying on every article of clothing in my closet, only to find that none of them can make me feel any better about my body. But all of them had the ability to make me feel even worse. I couldn't stop replaying those numbers flash up at me on the scale. 1-6-8. I'm starting to hate myself. I'm starting to hate life.

I was so desperate to feel happy with myself. I started snorting cocaine to curb my hunger. I've done it throughout my teenage years. So, why not? Maybe I won't hate myself anymore if i'm not hungry anymore. These thoughts came to me consistently. When the coke wasn't strong enough to affect my appetite anymore, I attempted to dance with an even bigger devil. A life changing monster. Crystal meth. I never expected to get addicted. At least not in the way that I did. I've done drugs since I was 13. I grew up in a household where access to drugs was easier to get to then access to food in the kitchen. My mom did coke my whole life. My brother did it, too. All of my mom's boyfriends were either drug addicts or alcoholics. So I guess to me, drugs always seemed to be less dangerous than they were made out to be. That was what I naively thought before I met the monster. Before I watched relationships and lives fall apart and even end. I had no idea what I was getting myself in to and to be honest- I didn't care.

I was able to do it once in a while and not want it again unless it was offered to me. Once I began to notice my jeans getting looser, I started doing it more frequently. I started losing a pound a day at first. After a few months of going 2, 3, and sometimes even 4 days without eating or sleeping I started losing weight a lot faster. I would lose 3 pounds in 1 day sometimes.
After about 5 months of this, people started asking a lot of questions that I didn't want to answer. But of course, I had a plan! I have tumors on my liver. They've been growing and multiplying. They're benign and not harmful but they started becoming very painful with eating. (This was true!) The largest one sits right on top of my gallbladder. So that explains the pain with food. I started telling everyone that my weight loss was due to my pain. I made them all believe that I just wasn't able to eat much anymore because I can't handle the pain when I do. It was valid. Not exactly a lie. However, not exactly the full truth either. But what was I supposed to say? I rarely ever leave my house because I stay home and take care of my children and my household. I also work from home so it's not like I get out to go jogging much. Although I would LOVE to exercise. I knew how dangerous that could get for me and at that point I wasn't in deep enough with my eating disorder (so I thought) to attempt obsessing even further. 

One day, I was introduced to smoking meth. I had only ever snorted it before then. I didn't really like it at first. Then I quickly realized that if I smoked it instead, I was usually able to get a couple hours of sleep at night. I already have to take sleeping pills at night because of my anxiety and PTSD. I've always had trouble sleeping. Going days without sleep was taking a toll on my body. I started hallucinating really bad. Seeing people walking in the street while I was driving, that weren't actually there. Hearing voices while alone. Objects would randomly start moving on their own. I needed to sleep! I had no idea the depth of the effects that sleep deprivation could have on your body. Smoking meth seemed like it was my answer to at least get a couple of hours of sleep in. I always felt the same when I was on it. Although I was a little more energetic and creative. I actually enjoyed doing things I would normally dread doing. I even noticed that I would play with my kids a lot more. I wanted to engage with them because I wasn't spending all morning worrying about how to lose weight and hating myself. I was just happier. I thought this was some kind of medication to my eating disorder because I wasn't making myself puke anymore so that's gotta be a plus, right?
Little did I know- the "positive" parts didn't last long.