Testimony of Healing June 30, 2003 Issue

A healing of anorexia

Laura Lapointe

"It's not fair!" said one of the girls at my table in the cafeteria as I pulled out the Hostess cupcake my mother had packed in my lunch bag. "You get to eat whatever you want and stay so skinny." She grimaced at her bag of rice cakes and turned toward me with a face that conveyed deep resentment.

After hearing such comments repeatedly in middle school, I began to be concerned about my weight and body image in a way I never had been before. I had always been taught to eat what tasted good when I was hungry for it and to stop eating when I felt satisfied. Sweets had never been off-limits in our house. Now all of a sudden my eating habits, along with what apparently were other quirks, were turning me into an outcast. I felt that I had no real friends. I was sure I would always be that geeky girl no one wanted to talk to. As I read over the journals I kept during those years, I see passages where I questioned whether it was worth it for me to continue living.

In an effort to fit in, I began to eat less of the coveted sweets my mother used to pack. I had always been called skinny, but I started to feel that I was not thin enough. I severely cut my food intake except on holidays, when I would ravenously devour large amounts of my mother's delicious cooking after weeks of "saving up." Years later, I saw a photograph of myself during this time, and in it I look positively emaciated. I was about 5 feet 4 inches and weighed only 83 pounds. (My normal weight at that height should have been about 115-120 pounds.) My teachers and parents were very concerned, but I denied that there was any problem. Clearly I had all the symptoms of anorexia.

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