Ex-Anorexic Lament
(Trigger warning: I discuss eating disorders in this, in more detail than other triggering topics on my blog)
Food is exhausting. Feeding myself is exhausting. I recovered from anorexia only to fall into ARFID. I don't enjoy eating anymore. I used to. I think a common misconception about anorexics is that they hate food, but the opposite is often true. I loved food and eating so much that I decided the only appropriate way to punish myself (for the crime of existing) was to deprive myself of it. And yes it was also about weight and being skinny and preserving youth, but mostly it was about harming myself.
The misconception probably comes from the way that anorexics eat- bland, unseasoned, overcooked foods. Diet food does not taste good. This is by design. The anorexic conditions themself to see food as numbers, as a way to fuel their body just past empty. If you only have 600 calories a day, you spend hours researching how to maximize your protein and vitamins and fiber. Most anorexics will try and maximize the amount of food they can eat. I would agonize over how I could create crude imitations of my favorite foods.
I don't mean to give the impression that I was some 88lb waif. I was, and have always been, fat. I won't say my numbers, but my lowest weight still planted me firmly in the "overweight" BMI category. I'm grateful that my therapist knew that eating disorders reside mostly in the mind. Despite actually being fat, I still have and had body dysmorphia. I'm not really sure what I actually look like. To me, my face looks grotesque and engorged. I can't look into mirrors or at photos of myself. I've actually lost some weight recently from the ARFID thing, but I swear my mirror image has gained some.
The main issue that I have right now with regards to food is that I am not eating enough. Unlike during my anorexia, I am eating high calorie and high fat foods. I just can't eat enough of them. I'm not hungry ever, and when I am, it's for a specific food. Right now I only want frosted flakes and almond milk. I know that if I prepare this for myself, I will take one bite and spit it out. It will taste off and wrong because of some reason or another. I eat a lot of takeout, fast food, and frozen prepared foods because they are the same every time. I love to cook. I cannot cook for myself, too many things change every time I make something.
I do not know how to fix this. I don't want food to feel like a punishment again. I almost wish I could be tube fed. I have cried over burritos being made "wrong." (In quotations because it was just not made the way I would have liked it to be made. The restaurant did nothing actually wrong.) I sat for 20 minutes trying to eat an apple. I look at the massive amount of food in my house and cannot find anything to eat because of some arbitrary reason or another. I overeat my safe foods until they become unsafe.
I miss being able to eat my favorite foods. I miss when my dad's gumbo tasted better than anything to me. Everything I eat is soulless.