Sitting in front of a room of 300 students, I have to smile to myself and take a deep breath.  Never in a million years would I have fathomed talking to such a large group about something that was so personal to me.   As I have done hundreds of time before, I stand up and welcome the class. “Thank you for letting me join you today.  My name is Johanna and I have struggled and recovered from Anorexia Nervosa, Exercise Bulimia, and Binge Eating Disorder.”   Here is my story…

      I was what you call a “text-book” case anorectic.  Almost all the signs and symptoms that appear under the definition of anorexia directly reflect back to me.  I grew up in a loving household and was always given everything I needed.  I was a straight-A student, a type-A personality, control freak, and a perfectionist to the fullest extent.  I was the type of child that never gave my parents a hard time and never gave them a reason to worry (well, most of the time).  I listened to what I was told and I always attempted to do things that would make my parents proud.  I started dancing at the age of three and was hooked by the age of five.  I knew that I was going to become a professional ballet dancer, no matter what the expense and sacrifice.  What I did not know, however, was the type of future that was waiting for me.

    I remember the day that my first diet began.  I had just gone back to my first ballet class after summer vacation.  I was twelve years old.  I went back to class with anticipation and hope, and could not wait to see my friends.  After class, our teacher pulled the class aside and told us that they were working on a new version of the Nutcracker.  They were looking at our class to fill some of the Company Corps positions.  She continued by saying that we would all have to lose weight before the auditions.  I thought to myself, “I am going to show them.  I am going to be the thinnest in the class and for sure they will want to cast me.”  That night, my mother picked me up from the studio and we went to a friend’s house for dinner.  I told them that I was officially going on a “healthy diet.”  I told my mom,“ I am going to watch my weight.  I will be careful though and not go overboard.”  Well those were famous last words. 
 
    As time passed, I became more and more conscious of the way I looked and what I was eating.  I remember buying a fat and calorie counter book and looking up everything I ate.  I was still eating meals, but avoided anything that any large traces of fat.  I develop a huge fear of fat.  My progression into anorexia was a slow process, and it was apparent to everyone around me the direction in which I was heading.  I really do not know if ended up losing a few pounds before the audition, but I  walked into the audition class excited to dance.  To my dismay, I was not cast in any of the corps parts.  They told me that my look was “too young,” but I took it personally and blamed my weight.  I felt like all the hard work that I had accomplished up to that point was gone, just like that.  The rejection helped me continue down a path of self-destruction.

    By the summer time, I was enrolled in a summer program that my ballet academy was holding.  At that time, my mother was still packing my lunches.  She supported the fact that I wanted to eat in a healthy-manner, so she would pack healthy, well-balanced meals.  As the summer progressed, I started to eat less and less.  I was dancing almost nine hours a day and I had also started waking up early in the morning.  I would go for a walk around my apartment building and do a series of exercises before going to sleep every night.  I remember, specifically, one of the last days of the summer program.  One of the company teachers, pulled me aside and said, “Wow, you look amazing!  You have lost so much weight.  You should be proud of yourself.  Your dancing has improved tremendously also.  Keep up the good work.  You are finally on the right track.”  Well, that was all the ammunition that I needed to continue.  I knew that I had finally found out the secret and now, I was hooked.  There was no turning back.

    By the time my freshman year of performing arts high school had started, people were beginning to take notice of my weight loss.  Mostly, I was getting compliments such as, “you look so great”, “you have lost so much weight”, or “I wish that I had your discipline.”  It felt great when people would tell me that.  This encouraged me to work harder at losing weight.   Since I did go to a special arts school, I spent half my day in academic classes and half my day in my dance classes.  My exercise schedule became pretty much outrageous.  I woke up every morning and went running.  I would go home, take a shower, and get driven to school.   When school let out, my friends and I would hop into the car and drive to our ballet studio, where we would take dance classes from 4:30 pm until 9 pm.   When I would get home, I would go for another walk/run or I would a series of exercised in my room.  I remember declining any invitations after dance class because I knew that I needed to get home to exercise.  Despite all this physical activity, my food intake became even more restricted.

    So, there I was exercising like mad and hardly eating.  I was hungry all the time.  You see, I thought that I was fighting a battle against myself and everyday that I fought off hunger, I was victorious.  In my mind, I had the ultimate control that I thought the others around me did not have, and it was something that, in a sick way, I became extremely proud of.  By the time Nutcracker auditions came up again, I had lost a significant amount of weight and knew that this year I was not going to be denied of the parts that I was working so diligently to acquire.  I had succeeded!  I was cast in every Corps role.  I was thrilled, and although I was convinced that my dramatic weight loss was the cause to my success, in reality, it was not.  My exercise schedule became even more hectic with all the additional rehearsal times.  All this movement and lack of food began to take a toll on me both mentally and physically.  I just blew it off and continued.

    Then, all of a sudden one-day, people’s tones changed.  On a dress rehearsal night in the middle of December, my ballet teacher pulled me aside and told me that she was concerned about my weight.  I had lost too much weight and she was extremely worried.  She told me that if I continued to lose more weight, I would no longer be able to dance until I started to gain some weight.  I was so anxious that I went home and binged for the first time in my life. It numbed my anxiety for that moment, but once that subsided the shame and guilt came rolling in.  My friends and family members were beginning to take notice as well.  My friends kept telling me that they were worried and that random people were approaching them with fear and concern.  In addition, some of my family members were approaching me as well.  However, both of my parents were still in denial.  All this confrontation made me angry and caused me to hate all the people that were talking to me about this “so-called problem that I had.”  I felt as if they were stealing this newfound control that I was embracing and rejoicing in.  I was convinced that the only reason they were warning me was because they were jealous of how thin I got and they just wanted me to be “fat.”  When in fact, they were trying to help me and save my life.

   I knew that something was not right in the back of my mind, but I had convinced myself that if I only lost a little more weight, I would be happy.  Unfortunately, that number was never low enough.  When I looked into a mirror, the reflection I saw was an image of a person that was still had weight to lose.  I was awarded a full scholarship to dance at a ballet academy in Texas.  I went away for 8 weeks and when I came back home, I had lost even more weight.  I started to notice that my hair was falling out in clumps, my skin was turning a weird shade of yellow, and I had begin growing a type of fur all over my body.  My family grew more and more concerned as the days passed.  Then one night mid-semester of my senior year, my reality became exposed. My mother finally saw what she had worked so hard to deny.

    I was changing in the bathroom out of my ballet clothes and had accidentally left the door cracked open.  My mother was passing in front of the bathroom and saw me changing.  She took one look at me, froze, and then let out a loud scream.  She grabbed a hold of me and began shaking me.  She was crying and yelling at the top of her lungs, “What is wrong with you?  You can see all of your bones and muscles.  You look like you have just walked out of a concentration camp.  What are doing to yourself?”  I felt empty and panicked.  I reassured my mother that I was okay and knew what I was doing. I was in control. I told her that I was not feeling good and had lost a few pounds.  I explained to her that I would gain the weight back and more as soon as I felt better.  To my dismay, that did not work this time.  She no longer bought my “act.”  Reality was staring me straight in the face, and I was scared.

    The first step my mother took was to bring me to the doctor.  Ironically, the first doctor I went told my mother that I was a little thin, but still ok.  I left that appointment relieved that I would be able to continue what I was doing.  About a month later, my mother still not happy with the diagnosis took me to another physician and boy did the diagnosis change.  After performing a battery of tests, my doctor told me that I had developed osteoporosis, I had low blood pressure and a slow heart rate.  He continued my physical by asking me the date of my last period.  I answered him by saying, “What period?  I have never gotten my period.”  He responded with a look of concern and told me that since I had delayed my reproductive maturation, there was a chance that I would not be able to have children in the future.  So, there I was, age seventeen with osteoporosis and an inability to have children.  She immediately put me on a set of hormone pills and therapy.  My diagnosis was anorexia.  Things were about to change, and change rapidly.

    The medicine that I was taking (steroids and hormones) made me gain some weight.  As the months went by the weight was slowly creeping back on and I had to ultimately surrender.  I felt numb, as if I had no more control over anything in my life.  My dreams appeared to be shattered, and I was miserable.  I began to binge eat because I thought to myself, “Hey I gain weight if I eat or don’t eat, I might as well eat, right?” At the time, it felt so good to numb my feelings with the food – or so I thought.  By the time my senior year was ending, I had put on quite a bit of weight.    I really thought that the world around me was closing.  The only thing that I had ever wanted from life (to be a ballet dancer) was falling through the cracks of my fingers.  I wanted my life to end, and I wanted that ending to come quickly.  I started to abuse diet drugs, laxatives, diuretics.  Anything I could get my hands on. As soon as I would read about a new diet drug, I would run out and try it.  Guess what?  It did not work.   None of it did.

    By some miracle, I made it through the really tough times and found some salvation in a “metabolic specialist” that was highly recommended to me.  I started going to this doctor who put me on a severely restricted – even though she knew my history of restricting.    Although I knew that the diet was anything but safe or healthy, it was working.  I was getting back into “top-form” and I was proud of it.  I felt as if I was slowly regaining control.  During that summer, I auditioned for a ballet company and to my uttermost happiness, I was accepted.  I was scared of the change and leaving home, but I knew that it is what I wanted.  The girl who I was going to live with in this new city was not going to move into our apartment for another two weeks, so that I meant that I was going to be living alone for the first time in my life.  I immediately started rehearsing for a performance, my first with this new company.  I very quickly fell back into my old habits – I stopped all medications and restricted my food intake.  My weight was coming off and coming off quickly.  By the time that my parents came to see the performance, I had lost a significant amount of weight.  My mother noticed it immediately and said, “That’s it.  You are going into treatment.”  I promised her, like many times in the past, that I was would be okay.  She warned me that if I lost any more weight, I was going.  A week later, in ballet class, I started to think.  Was putting my health in jeopardy and possibly causing myself a slow and painful death, worth it?  The next day I did the unthinkable. I quit ballet.

    At first, I felt lost and empty.  I thought that by quitting ballet, I had put myself on the road to recovery.   However, my eating disorder only grew worse.  The reason – for so long I had two identities:  Johanna the ballet dancer and Johanna the eating disordered individual.  When I gave up the ballet, the eating disorder was the only identity I thought I had left, and it became all encompassing.  I feel into a deep depression, started sleeping all day and never wanted to get out of bed.  My eating disorder morphed into Binge Eating Disorder.  I had become so afraid of binging that I would restrict during the day, which would make so hungry that I would home and binge at night.  It became an unhealthy cyclical pattern that caused to sink further and further into my eating disorder.  Then one night, while I was lying in bed, something suddenly became to me. The only thing I knew as well as ballet was my eating disorder.  I knew that I wanted to help others that were battling and help them avoid the path that I had struggled with.  I enrolled myself at the local University and decided that I was going to become an eating disorder therapist.  I was interested in becoming as involved as possible.  I was given a lead by a local therapist an eating disorder organization had just opened the week prior in my city.  I contacted the Executive Director and asked her if I would be able to do some volunteer work.  She was thrilled and told me to come to the office the following week.  I started volunteering at the association and eventually my volunteering turned into a paid position.  Although I would love to tell you that I was healthy during this time, the truth is…I wasn’t.  I was working all day at school and the organization, and I was going home at night to binge.  While I was preparing and panicking for Graduate Record Exams and Graduate school applications my last semester of college, I knew that I could not help anyone else until I helped myself.  I wanted to live and be healthy.  I wanted to stop this horrible eating pattern and put myself on the road to wellness.  I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.  I finally called my parents and asked for the help I desperately needed.  I started going to therapy and working towards this recovery – through the help of a treatment and outpatient program. 

     It was then that I realized that being a psychologist was not want I really wanted to do.  I  wanted to create my own organization and help make eating disorders understood by both the teenage population and for that matter, every other age, gender, class, and race group.  I knew that I was not the first person or the last that has ever struggled with an eating disorder.  I knew that given the fact that I was still very young, 21 years old, I would be up against some pretty difficult barriers, but at the same time I knew that it was something that I had to do.  I graduated from college December of 2000 with a Psychology Major and Women Studies Minor.  I decided to delay graduate school for a while and follow my dream.  I founded The Alliance for Eating Disorders Awareness. – a grassroots organization dedicated to the outreach and education of eating disorders.  It has been almost seven years since I founded The Alliance.  I have had the blessing of speaking to over 85,000 kids, as well as parents, professionals, and other recovered individuals about my story and the truth about eating disorders.  It has been a struggle to keep the organization afloat financially and I have had to take 2nd and 3rd jobs to have the money to continue.  The biggest reward of all is not monetary.  It is being able to continue down the path of recovery and to help make a difference in the lives of others.  I have acquired such strength and security in my recovery through the work that I do, and am so grateful I was given this chance.

   
     As I finish my presentation to the group of students, a young woman comes up to me with tears in her eyes.  “Thank you for being brave and making me feel like I am not alone,” she says to me.  As tears start to run down my face, I realize that there is no greater gift out there that the power to help another person.   You see, I chose to live and thrive.  With the support of my loving parents, my wonderful family, great role models, and my amazing friends, I am able to face the world with happiness and aspirations.  I hope that my story does not serve as a roadmap for someone that is in the grips of an eating disorder, but rather as proof that recovery is possible.  I was very lucky that I got off as easily as I did and I know that if I would have continued down the path, death probably would have taken me away from my friends and family.  If you think that you might have an eating disorder or someone you know might have one, please get some help.  Trust me, I know.  I am living proof that you can not only survive an eating disorder, but be victorious as well.