"Oh God, Please help me, I can't take it anymore! I want to be anyone but me. I hate myself, I'm fat, ugly, dirty, and stupid and nothing good is ever going to happen to me. Why can't I be tall and slender while eating whatever I want and not 5'0 ft tall with a muscular build gaining weight by smelling something sweet, it's just not fair. What is wrong with me? I just wanted ONE cookie". This is my routine cry as once again, I'm on my hands and knees face down with my head in the toilet, I would rather die than be fat"

I was on my way to a miserable suicide, BULIMIA/FOOD ADDICTION. This has been the story of my life thus far. My name is Gina and I'm a 23 year old recovering food addict and bulimic. Today I know I have a disease. My eating disorder is a disease because it falls into the categories, which classify a disease as a disease; such as my bulimia, has symptoms ,is progressive, is fatal, and is treatable. I believe I was predisposed to have some sort of obsessive compulsive disorder or addiction of some sort. I've done some research within my family and there are some traces of alcoholism in my family. Alcohol never really turned me on because I was afraid of that substance, but food, well food is just food so that must be ok, right? Food allowed me to numb out my feelings before I even ever knew that's what I was doing. My relationship with food has been abnormal since I was a little girl.

"Come on Jackie, make me 5 pieces of french toast", I would beg my older sister during Saturday morning cartoons when I was 6 years old. I could already hold an unusual amount of food in my little belly. From then on, it only progressed. My life existence and happiness was based on a good dinner and rich goodies. However, there was a catch. I became a gymnast at the age of 7 which helped keep the physical consequences of my disease at bay for a while. My parents, coaches, and teammates thought I was an extremely hard worker when it came to my athletics. Although the truth was, I just learned how to use that as a way to over exercise in attempt to quiet my mind of the obsessive, crazy, and insane thoughts that ran through my mind constantly.

If I could only be thinner "If I could only be thinner" If I could only be thinner everything would be great! I would win first place, do well in school, get into the college I wanted, get a cute boyfriend, get married, have lots of money, and my family would be perfect. These are some of the lies my mind would tell me so I would continue to fuel my disease. My bulimia manifests itself in my mind, my thinking is where it all begins. When I give it power, it grows into this monster that has a complete mind of its own in which I can't control anymore. For a period of time through middle school and high school, my mind tricked me that I was in control. I was able to control when I binged and purged and I was accepting of my behavior. I enjoyed it for a while and looked forward to stuffing my face then getting rid of the food not having the guilt and shame for wearing it. Well, the honeymoon didn't last and I hit rock bottom real fast.

I've had numerous bottoms in this disease. Each time I decide to continue the cycle, the bottom gets lower, I hate myself more, and it's harder to recover physically, mentally and spiritually. I have an allergy to my binge food. My binge foods are mostly foods with flour and sugar in them. I also have no concept of the proper amount of food. Therefore, my solution, my way out looks like this, I use a digital scale to weigh and measure my food. I don't eat flour and sugar. I stay close to people who are recovering and doing the same thing I need to do with my food in their lives. I practice on abstaining from the foods and behaviors that cause me inner turmoil. Instead, I work on the inner me getting spiritually connected with my surroundings. Staying spiritually fit allows me to feel "full" in which I was seeking in the food but never received. In recovery, I have an opportunity to talk about and share light on the things I did and felt in the darkness of the closed doors of the bathroom when binging and purging. I don't have to live like that anymore. I just have to be willing to work on changing my old behaviors and thinking patterns. I have to go to meetings during the week and read a lot on positive thinking. When I keep up with this, I don't think about food and I get to live free from the bondage of my own mind"