What is it like to have bulimia?

Quora, 

Lynn Cynette, Just a girl playing the Game of Life

Answered Jan 19, 2018

Bulimia isn’t just throwing up or wanting to be skinny.

It’s craving the feeling of control, the feeling of false perfection and success. But beneath it all, it’s the self-loathing that threatens to overwhelm you.

Sometimes bulimia is violent and messy.

It’s refusing to eat for days, watching your stomach constrict, checking the scale five times a day, looking, waiting, begging for that pound to drop off. Then, out of nowhere, it hits you. You’re STARVING. You tear open the freezer. In the darkness of your room, you devour an entire gallon of Moose Tracks, never once stopping to think through what you’re doing, relishing in the taste of temporary happiness, that is, until the realization hits.

Your spoon hits the bottom of the container and only then do you comprehend what you’ve done. Terrified, you throw down the empty tub, pinching the little pieces of fat that refuse to leave your sides. You dash into the bathroom, but your parents are watching, telling you to leave the door open, hovering outside the door. You scream at yourself, furious, upset, depressed. How could you? You disgusting, fat pig, you’ll never be skinny! Look what you’ve done you worthless- you shove a hand in your mouth and vomit in the cold water of the shower, tears collecting in your eyes, acid burning in your throat, stomach shaking until your head spins. You scrub the tub with soap, washing away any evidence of your sins against your body. Then you get out, shaking, trembling, forced to look at your fat body and you throw yourself on the floor, puffing out sit-ups, Russian twists, anything, anything, to reverse the horrors you’ve inflicted on yourself until you’re drenched in sweat.

Then you get up, wash your stinking hands a million times, brush your teeth until they sting, wipe away your tears, and close the bathroom door behind you with a smile.

Other times, Bulimia is quiet and deadly.

You eat meals, you munch snacks, you share an ice-cream cone with your best friend. You sit at the restaurant with your family, rolling your eyes at the dad jokes, at your little sister’s dumb drawings. The dinner comes, and you eat it slowly, drinking glass after glass of water until you can hardly take another sip. Then you excuse yourself with a laugh, walk to the bathroom and lock the door. Within moments, you are bent over the unfamiliar toilet, your teeth hurt and your throat stings but you keep purging until, finally you run out of food to throw up. Then you sit back, wipe down the seat, wash your hands, and take a look at your yellow teeth. The dentist told you to brush more, that if you did you wouldn’t have six cavities and such bad breath. You wish that was the reason as you slide back into the booth and see your happy family finishing up.

Regardless of how it’s shown, Bulimia is a real and actual mental illness and should be addressed as one, not as a ‘grab for attention’ or the punchline of some sick joke.