Living in the shadow of an anorexic teenager

Living in the shadow of an Anorexic teenager

Anything to do with anorexia shows the recipient as the victim, but what about me? I'm in the shadow, where no one seems to care. The atmosphere around her was always dull, and everything stopped for Meg. I guess i understand why she did it...

She used to have nothing, kinda like i have now. She was quite large, weight wise, and was always in the outsider's group, whilst i was in the popular group. She was always picked last for everything, and I didn't exactly help. It started getting to exams, and everyone in my family knows I don't give a damn, so it was up to her to give our family some sort of success. I didn't realise it at the time, but we were just piling everything on her, and I wasn't just partly to blame, I made her feel bad and stressed her out any chance I could. Now I have a huge amount of guilt lying on my shoulders. I used to put her self esteem down and never think about her feelings. She failed one exam, and everyone got so mad at her, especially me, because, if she didn't pass her exams I would have to do well, and that meant having to stop messing about and getting down to work. Revising instead of going out, study hours instead of romantic dates or clubbing endlessly. I couldn't do it, I wouldn't.

"You're such a loser Meg, why can't you just fit in. Just for once, why can't you stop being my dweeby little sister, and become something else, your own person. Now get out of my fucking way!"

"I'm sorry Katie, I don't mean to be such a disappointment to you. What do you want me to do? Become some skinny girl, who puts way too much makeup on to attract the lads, with no real friends but a bunch of idiots who don't give one about anything to do with my life. 'Cos i've got news for you sister, they 'ain't really friends...not really." With that she walked off, tears streaming from her eyes.

"Don't be such a drama queen!" I sneered, trying not to show my regret for trying to make her something she clearly wasn't.

She started losing weight, we all thought it was progress, she was getting on track. She retook her exams, and passed with flying colours. We thought everything was fine, the end to the problem, but really it was only the beginning to an even bigger problem. She started losing weight quickly, almost too quickly; something wasn't right. We didn't understand her obsession with her figure. Maybe it was just something she wanted to concentrate on. We all just shook it off, not really caring, as long as she got her grades and stayed away from bad crowds we were happy. I started to acknowledge her more, get to know her, actually talk to her without shouting, and I became more than her bitchy elder sister, I became her friend.

"Hey sis...thanks" I said, whilst she helped me with my homework.

"No probs, i'll always be there for you no matter what"

I felt a pang of guilt for not doing that before, for only starting to care because she was doing something for me. No matter what though, we were getting there, as sisters.

But the problem was always there, no matter what. We tried to cover it in bubble wrap and hide it, somewhere no one would see, at the back of our minds. However, we could never escape the niggling feeling, of that problem getting out, it was always there to tease us, all in a different way. We tried to shun it, but by doing that we were just fooling ourselves.

Soon though, no one could escape it. Mainly because it was everywhere. Megan started to lose too much weight and she would never eat at the dinner table, always making an excuse, like she was going out to eat etc. When we all knew she wouldn't eat at all. She went to the gym twice a day for long periods of time. It was too excessive and I wanted to do something about it.