Mirrors

People are rushing past. Frantic movement surrounds me but my vision is swimming and my head feels hazy. An incessant clicking cuts through the muffle of voices. One of the wheels is wonky; it reminds me of riding in a supermarket trolley as a child, but then, I didn’t feel the inexplicable fear I do now. Cool fingertips touch my cheek gently in a comforting gesture. I blink and my vision clears.

Fat bulges over my hips, my thighs touch and they are rippled with cellulite. My neck falls in rolls from my chin over my collar bone. On the other side of the glass, there I stand, hip bones protruding sharply, skin stretched taut over my ribs. My knees are wider than my thighs and blue veins show through my pallid skin. My eyes, encircled with dark shadows, are sunk deep into my skull. The harsh planes of my cheekbones jut out above my hollow, greyish cheeks. My nose wrinkles with disgust, and I hate myself for eating that slice of toast this morning.

“Her eyes are open. She’s coming around.” I try to move my head, but it feels as if a huge weight is pinning me down. The clinical smell tells me I’m in a hospital, and this time I’m not here visiting a relative. I am wheeled through a doorway and past several hospital beds, before stopping beside a window. A different pair of hands slides under me and I am lifted onto the bed. They speak to me, but I keep phasing out and my head is pounding relentlessly. Pain cuts through my stupor as I feel them injecting something into my arm.

I set daily goals for myself in regards to food. It’s all about balance – if I eat something for breakfast, I must forego lunch. I aim to eat twice a day, no more than a handful of food each time. Sometimes, temptation gets the better of me, and I eat more than I’m allowed, or I eat one of my forbidden foods, like chocolate or crisps. When I do so, I punish myself by not eating at all the following day. Yes, it’s all about balance.

I try to hide it from my mum, because I know what she’s like; she would try to make me eat more. It’s difficult, though. I tell her I ate a lot for lunch at school, so I’m not hungry, but she says I ‘need food to grow’. I don’t want to grow, because that means putting on weight, something I must avoid at all costs.

When I awake, my eyelids are heavy and my mouth tastes sour. I find I can move my head, and when I look down, I see a tube attached to my arm. Out of instinct, I reach to brush it away, but someone grips my wrist firmly and places it back at my side.
“Leave it alone, hun. We’re here to help you.” The woman smiled down at me with her kindly laughter lines. I don’t trust her.
“Who are you?” I demand rudely.
“I’m here to help you. Trust me.” She smiles again condescendingly.
They ask me if I know what happened. I don’t know anything had happened. They then tell me I collapsed on my way home from school, most likely caused by the complete lack of food in my system. That’s right, I recall, I didn’t eat anything this morning because I ate chocolate the night before. They say I’m dangerously underweight, and because of this, they will have to keep me in hospital until I’ve gained sufficient weight.
At this point, my mum bursts in, frantic, and runs over to me, enveloping me in a rib-crushing hug.
“How could I do this to you? My poor baby, why didn’t I notice? I thought this was just a dieting phase you were going through – I never suspected anorexia.”
Anorexia. I’d never associated myself with that diagnosis. I am anorexic? But I’m fat! I know they said I’m underweight, but... surely... The more I try to process it, the less it makes sense.
“Body dysmorphia,” the nurse says gravely. “You will see yourself as fat, no matter how much weight you lose.”

They give me small amounts of gruel-like food, bland but nutritious they say, and give me therapy sessions to help me come to terms with my illness. It seems ridiculous, but the concept of having anorexia was new to me, and it is hard to even begin to accept.

After ten days of treatment, and increasing quantities of food, I was placed in front of a mirror for the first time. I was thin, too thin, my hips were still visible and I could see the shadows of my ribs. This was a body I’d never seen, and I was horrified it was the one everyone else had been seeing for so long. I was shocked by what I saw, and knew I had such a long way to go before I was happy with how I looked, but at least now I can see the truth, and can begin the road to recovery.