Anorexia Speech
By: Kimiko Carter
Length: 12 minutes
Word Count: 2,700 words
Self hatred is the least of your worries now, because you’ve likely just signed your own death
warrant and I’m guessing by the look on your face you really don’t care. However I can assure
you, that that will care and you’d give up anything and everything if you could take it all back.
Then you’ll realize that it’s too late, because by the time you do care, you in so deep that you’re
dying. And as much as you want to snap out of it, you can’t, but wait. I’m getting ahead of
myself. Perhaps I should go back to the beginning; back to when you thought you’d have it all.
Ms. V and fellow classmates, You may be wondering who I am to tell you this, so I’ll tell you. I
am the friend to an anorexia survivor. So I stand before you to day to share with you exactly what
anorexia is.
So, you think starving is a good way to lose weight, do you? I think you’ve been spending to
much time watching the modeling channel or reading tabloids on celebrities with eating disorders.
Anorexia is no walk in the park; its sheer and total heel and you have no idea what you are getting
yourself into. But since this is what you want, I’ll go ahead and give you the details of exactly
what is going to happen to you and your body.
I bet you didn’t know that half the time people starve to lose weight, it does not work. I bet you
thought you’d end up insanely thing and gorgeous didn’t you? I hate to be the one to break it to
you, but that’s not the way it works. You might actually gain weight and because of this you will
start to go insane; literally. Your mind won’t be yours anymore. It will be too consumed with
thinking about food to do anything else.
Your metabolism is what breaks down the food you eat and its not something you’re supposed to
play with. It’s like the hard drive in your computer. You shouldn’t go around deleting programs
and files or your computer just isn’t going to work. The less you eat, the lower your metabolism
goes, which isn’t good. You might starve and barely lose anything. As you metabolism starts to
fail, your body will just shut itself down and the weight will go nowhere and even though each
time you step on the scale, the number will not change you will still starve yourself. But don’t
even think for a minute that you won’t be sick if you aren’t losing the weight. Your mind will
convince your body that it will work soon. But tell me how long is soon anyway? It’s not that
simple to just say “Oh this isn’t working, so I think I’ll go and eat again.” It doesn’t work that
way. That thought will be so far from your mind you won’t even know what the word eat means.
I bet your thinking that you won’t be one of those girls; you won’t be a failure, you will be
successful. You’ll be thin, perfect and beautiful in your own eyes. But I have to ask you this.
What is thin, perfect and beautiful; at what weight will you look in the mirror and be happy with
what you look like? Most girls who are anorexic never truly know what they look at; they don’t
see the truth. They look in the mirror and believe they’ve gained at least four hundred pounds in
the last hour. This is true to whether you weight one hundred and fifty pounds or seventy pounds.
That mind you lost is telling your body that every weight is just too fat for you.
You’ll start consuming even smaller amounts of food and work out more and more. Did you
know that eventually you just won’t be able to work out because your muscles will just stop cooperating? They will be to sore to even hold your body up on some days. Naturally, you’ll panic
and start to eat even less to compensate for not being able to work out, which really isn’t a smart
idea. As it is you’re barely eating enough to stay alive. But you don’t care because you’ll still
want this. You’ll still want to starve yourself to lose weight.
Since you have no desire to stop why don’t I tell you about your “prize.” I’m sure you’ll find it
quite nice. You’re ribs will stand out and your hipbones will be sharp. You will be sickly thin, but
you won’t see it. You’ll take one look at yourself and see rolls and fat and wonder when you
turned into you obese Aunt Bernice. You’ll cry and look at girls who are fifty, sixty even one
hundred pounds heavier than you and wonder why you can’t be as tin as them. Other people will
see you get thinner and thinner with each passing day, but you’ll swear you’ve gained ten pounds
everyday.
You may think by starving yourself you’ll be pretty, but you won’t. You won’t be able to stop
your mind thinking about food long enough to catch a wink of sleep. You’ll have huge dark
circles under your eyes from the chronic insomnia. Your skin will be pasty, pale and have a gray
tint to it from lack of nutrition. The nutrition in your food keeps your skin looking healthy and
alive but you really don’t care about your skin do you? You just want to be THIN. I guess the
“pro side” to this is people probably won’t even notice your gray skin; they’ll be to busy staring
at the blue and purple blotches all over your arms. Every physical thing you do will result in a
bruise. I guess you could tell your friends you fell down the stairs a couple of hundred times and
that’s why your body is battered the way it is. While you’re at it, you should buy some hair dye
for you hair so you don’t have to explain to your friends why you hair is turning gray. Those
nutrients in your food keep your hail alive and undamaged and with out it, you’re hair is going to
feel like straw and be dry and dull. It will not shine anymore and conditioner will not help with
this.
While we are speaking about hair, what do you think about facial hair? I hope you like it because
you will become covered in it, everywhere. Oh and kiss your new gray hair goodbye now,
because its dying and falling out. You’ll probably end up having to rid the shower drain of your
hair six times for the water will actually go down. And those enviable natural nails that you take
so good care of might as well be cut while you still can hold a pair of nail clippers. If you leave
them they will just break and crack and it will hurt.
Girls, you’ll also lose your period. Despite the fact it happens to be probably one of the most
annoying things in the world, its something you don’t want to lose. It becomes a little sketchy to
your mom when you stop buying tampons once a month. On another note, I hope you’re not
having sex with your boyfriend because you’ll never know if you’re pregnant or not. Yes, you
can still get pregnant. I hope you don’t grow too attached to the baby because chances are you are
going to lose it. The nine months you carry a child you breathe, eat and live for that child. Since
you’re not eating you child is going to die from malnutrition. On the off chance your child does
somehow end up living it will suffer from lifelong and even terminal disabilities. A small price to
pay for being thin, even though you’re not the one paying for it. Who needs there full mental
capabilities anyway?
Your teeth are also slowly dying from vitamin deficiencies. You won’t be able to drink ice cold
drinks anymore or anything cold. You’re taking sensitive teeth to a whole new level here, and
those special toothpaste won’t work. You’re legs will also start to weaken and they will fall
asleep up to your hips, but its not that standard pins and needles tingling you are used to. This
hurts, and shaking your legs and hitting them will only cause more discomfort. You could rub
your legs, but that won’t get the knots out because there are no knots. This pain is permanent and
the rubbing only causes it to fade slightly. I’d also advise you to not stand up until the pain starts
to fade, unless you enjoy collapsing. You’re legs won’t be able to hold you up any longer and
falling out from underneath you will be their new favorite activity.
But you might not even notice the leg pain because you’re too focused on the constant migraines
and the pain in your bowels. You won’t be able to go to the bathroom anymore. You’ll be
extremely constipated that you will double over in pain if you try. By the time you produce this
waste, it feels like someone has grinded a rock of sandpaper against your intestines. But you still
want to be thin. Its worth it isn’t it everything is; your hair, our nails, bones, muscles, possible
children, your family’s heart and everything. Throw it all away because your thing now and that’s
what counts right?
You will be come so overly depressed more and more each day as you eat less and less. This is
partially from nutrition deficiencies, but mainly from your lovely eating disorder. You’re grades
will slip because your mind won’t function. How does repeating a grade sound to you? Teachers
and your peers will find out and they won’t understand. They’ll look at you and ask you why you
just can’t eat? Some will even call you fat just because they find it funny. They’ll force you to eat
and you’ll come to the conclusion that they just want you to be fat. Everyone in this world is
against you and they all want you to fall into a downward spiral of obesity. You’ll push away all
the people who love you because it’s the only way you’ll ever be thin.
But one day this whole ordeal will be over; you’ll either die or recover. Recovery sounds like a
much better option, but death is proven to be easier. First you’ll have to admit that you need help
and that is one of the hardest things you’ll ever have to do. Do you think you really have the
courage to look your mom in the face and tell her that for the past year you’ve been slowly killing
yourself by depriving you body of basic fuel for life? But even if you are able to do that, things
are still hard. Eating disorder treatments are expensive; you can end up paying seven thousand
dollars per week. So even if you do find a doctor who can help you, you may not be able to afford
treatment. Insurance only pays so much on mental health problems. If you are lucky, if you can
afford this you’ll have to say goodbye to school and everyone there. Some students may even
admire what you did and try to become anorexic too, but you have no right to judge them. You
used to be them once; you wanted to be anorexic once and you never realized how stupid you
were.
Only sixty percent of people with eating disorders survive. You may fight this for years but it will
never go away. Once an anorexic always an anorexic. Each morning will be a constant struggle to
not starve yourself. You’ll see an article on someone with an eating disorder and you will start to
cry as you remember that terrible pain. I’m not talking about the physical pain at this point. I’m
talking about the emotional pain which can’t be described at all. There are no words for the
mental anguish. The pain is unimaginable. You will never feel another pain so filled with self
loathing, vulnerability, terror, rage, desolation...
Living with anorexia is no walk in the park. After you’ve recovered you will realize how much
you wasted. You threw away your chance of a normal education. You tossed prom, homecoming,
parties, friends and teachers out the window all because you wanted to be thin. Those times are
gone and you can never get them back. You have lost those wasted years forever and the saddest
part is you probably don’t even remember what occurred during those years. Your memory will
have started to fail you as well.
Why, why do you want this? I know even after hearing me say this to you that you’re still sitting
here wanting this. What do you think you are going to gain by doing this? Do you honestly think
that you won’t be like this; that malnutrition won’t steal you looks? Do you think it’s going to
give you more control in your life? Let me tell you, you’ll never be more out of control than you
are when you are anorexic. Do you think you’ll be the one person who’ll do this and then be able
to stop when you like the reflection in the mirror starring back at you? Are you doing this for the
attention because there are so much better ways to do it. Go streaking down the streets or dye
your hair a different colour. Needing attention is a natural thing but anorexia isn’t the way to go
about it. You won’t be the only one suffering either. Think about your family. Can you get out of
bed each morning and look into their faces knowing that you are slowly killing them as well. Put
yourself in their shoes for a moment. Imagine watching your child self-destructing and knowing
there was absolutely nothing you could do to help them. How would you feel to come home one
morning to find you’re child dead from this disease? You won’t ever see this pain though because
you’ll be to busy starving yourself. You will see this when you recover and you’ll hate yourself
for ever hurting your family the way you did. You’ll wish there was something you could do to
erase it but there is nothing. Living with the consequences is hard, especially when you think of
how many times your anger came out of them; how many times you got nasty when there only
motive was to save your life, not make you fat.
You probably want this because you want to be thin. You probably hate yourself and think this is
the fastest way to fix it, but its not. Do you know about self-hate? You think you might but go
ahead and start starving yourself. I can guarantee you that however much you hate yourself now,
its nothing, NOTHING, compared to what you will feel once you get into this.
But do you know what? Self-hatred is the least of your worries now. Because you've likely just
signed your own death warrant...& you likely don't even care...yet. But you will. You will care.
You will care & you will cry & rage & swear you'd give anything to take it all back. But it’s too
late, because by the time you're in deep enough to care, you're already dying. It’s too late to snap
out of it now, no matter how much you want to.
This is the reality of living with an eating disorder; of living with anorexia. Anorexia is nothing
like those powerful articles you read splashed on tabloids about how the famous celebrities over
came this vicious disease. It is nothing like the beauty you see when you look at a thin model
walking down the runway in the latest Marc Jacob’s dress. It is nothing like that beautiful popular
girl at school who naturally weighs eighty pounds. Anorexia is nothing like you have ever lived
before and you will never be the same.