Short storys

The "In" Crowd

All I ever wanted was to be popular. Have the coolest friends. Be in a hot rock band and date the best looking men- simple wishes for s young girl like me. Some of those dreams even came true. I started a rock band. And the cutest guy at Melbourne High School in Florida even asked me out.

I said yes of course, but within a week, he complained, "Your hips are too big. You need to loose weight to look thin like the other girls in your rock band and on the beach. "

Immediately, I tried several diets. On one, I ate grapefruit and vegetables only- and I felt giant and had to eat "real food. " The second week I tried skipping breakfast and lunch. When I did that, u became so hungry by the time dinner came, I splurged and eventually started gaining weight. I added ten pounds in a month trying to please my new boyfriend. And instead of praising my efforts, he cut me down even more. "You look like a whale, " he said, making me feel not as pretty as my other friends who wanted to date him. I felt self-conscious and didn't want to loose him as a boyfriend, so I desperately searched for new ways to loose the pounds that where keeping him at bay.

Other girls in my school where doing the same thing in the bathroom to loose weight, and they never sufferer any permanent damage. I wouldn't either. All I ever wanted was to be as pretty as a model. I wanted my boyfriend to look at me the same way he looks at all the other girls on the bikini posters.

Once a day turned into three force​d vomites. I was constantly hungry, I ate more- and threw up more. It wasn't until I started gaining water weight, and tried to quit that I realised I couldn't stop the Cycle. As soon as I got up from the table, my stomachs would start convulsing. My stomache somehow believed that it was suppose to do that now. I would constantly have to run from the table. I was throughing up without even sticking my finger down my throat or even wanting to! I wasn't in control anymore- of my weight or my life!

No one ever mentioned to me that if you forced yourself to vomit after you eat, you actually retrain water, lose hair, ruin the enamel on your teeth, get serious stomach aliments, and worse- have no power to halt the process.

I needed help, my boyfriend and my weight were the least of my problems now, and I knew it. At the age of fifteen, I didn't know what to do! Despite for a solution, I broke down into tears and confined in the only person whom I could trust.

"Mom, im sick. I forced myself to throw up to loose weight, and now im vomiting every day. I can't stop and Im afraid Im going to die!"

I looked myself in my room the entire night. The next morning my mom woke me up saying I had a doctors appointment. After the initial meeting, I was placed in a hospital. My blood work, indicated that I was dehydrated and starving. They wouldn't release me for months. I felt alone, I missed a year of school. I had to be tutored so I wouldn't be held back. I took several typed of medications and months counseling before my bulimia was under do control.

My boyfriend left me. He dumped me because dates at the hospital weren't much fun. Most of my friends didn't understand and stopped coming to see me. Even a family member made a joke saying I was making this all up just for attention. I can't tell you how much that hurt.

But, I'm okay, I'm at peace

It took one year of counseling and medication for me to realise that if people don't appreciate me for who I am, no matter what weight I am, then their not worth knowing in the first place.

I learned that the hard way, a lesson I'll never forget. Being popular is an artificial notion. Once I knew I was "enough, " It didn't matter shat people thought of me. If you love and believe in yourself, you are "in" the crowd.

~~~•~~~
Hey people,
Learning to except yourself is more important than making people except you. Its how you see yourself that really matters.

When people hurt you over and over, think of them as sand paper, they scratch and hurt you. But later you'll be shinning and polished, while they end up useless

Sincerely,
Jessie 👣❤