What in the world is an eating disorder? I mean this thing caused enough stir to be consider a psychological disorder, right? But what is it?

Often I’ve met with clueless parents, dumbfounded fathers and bewildered family members and friends that have a genuine desire to help someone plagued by this oddity of oppression.

Here’s the truth, there is no rational way to explain an “eating disorder” because it is irrational, it doesn’t make sense and it’s not okay.’

Now in all honesty. To meet with someone battling this is to actually meet with one in the throes of addiction a possible undercurrent of wanting to be free but also an unwillingness to change. There is a protectiveness, of “this is mine”, holding it close to the chest and refusal to surrender it, to let it go, to release it. As most addiction go, it becomes interwoven into what is perceived to personal identity. What would life apart from it look like? Life before without it a distant memory. The ugly truth is an eating disorder is actual a really fancy way to rename addiction. Eating disorders don’t materialize out of thin air and attach itself to an unwilling victim. It took root because the person came into agreement with a distortion.

Why?

To justify it, to hide it, to protect it, to sacrifice to it, to bow to it, to say that there is no control, that it serves while it destroys, to say that everything revolves around it, to sacrifice, to no matter the mounting consequences, to weaken the heart, to experience starvation, to only think of how to control, how to starve, how to overeat, when to purge. Is it really about starving? Is it really about food? Is it really about the number on the scale?

Eating disorders are a special kind of beast. For the bulimic its learning the tips of trade to become really “good” at throwing up, there are ways to do this so all the food comes up. The lie is that eating must happen but at the same time must not be allowed to stay. Cognitive dissonance will always cost more than anyone is willing to pay. If faced with the entirety of any addiction, that it could cost us our very lives, we would avoid it all costs. But there was something about it that drew that person in.

Why? Throwing up by all intents and purposes of the body is to get rid of foreign substances, stomach viruses.

Bulimia by it’s nature is malicious. It is a willful choice to rid the body of nutrients at all costs because….why?

There isn’t an explanation on the planet that makes any sense. That justifies what chronic vomiting does to the heart, to the throat, to the body. Even if the capillaries are busted in the eyes, the esophagus torn, thrown up blood. Why?

Anorexia…starvation. The desire to be skinny and skeletal? To starve to death is a slow way to go.

And to anyone battling an eating disorder of any kind, no matter what is said if you don’t want to hear it, it won’t land. If you want to continue down that path, you have free will.

But the truth is when a life is consumed by starvation, purging, bingeing and purging, overeating, when life revolves not just about control but about food? “Eating disorder” might sound some type of way but at the heart, it’s really addiction; “it serves while it destroys.”

There is a time and place for exploration, validation and real need. The truth is, it’s a distraction. It goes against the core of humanity. We were designed, to eat, to grow, to thrive.

Eating disorders are non sensical.

At the root of it is control. It is “I believed I was unacceptable and so I found what’s really a distortion, but a disappearance, that something is wrong, that life is wrong. That this is all wrong, that I’m not okay and in cognitive dissonance, I’m not okay. I am willfully choosing self destruction even though I feel victimized by it, like I must submit to it, that it controls me and that I am not in control of it. That I was victimized and so I became the victim at the mercy of this “thing”.

There is no sugar coating self destruction.

Nothing was ever “wrong” with you to begin with.

Even if we live in a world where “skinny” or “fit” is a thing, why do we care?

And honestly, is it worth your life?

There are those that look in the mirror and see a distortion, focusing every place that is considered flawed. Because being thin was the only way that they were going to be “perfect”, something internally has been marred and corrupted. On a spiritual level the mind, the soul, the body all recognize that something has happened that wasn’t natural. Sometimes the reason began from shame, from being betrayed in some way. The lie was that for this to have happened the fault lies within the person. That chasing being thin is even a means to “starve it out”.

Unfortunately in society today we have become saturated into the holy grail of self seeking validation and a want to be pampered and loved unconditionally, even at the cost of being accepted with self destruction. We went from burying everything not to becoming grave diggers and laying out the corpses from our past for all to see on social media platforms.

Validation from the masses will forever fall on deaf ears if you drown out the truth from within.

I recognize that any of these words might sound insensitive. I wasn’t born and called to be a counselor to pamper addictions. I am here for freedom, to see people set free. The truth is, no matter what you name it, it’s a thief. It’s taking years off your life for what?

No matter what has consumed you it doesn’t have to.

There is hope, there is healing.

If you’re ready to let it go, you can. If you feel discouraged, you can be encouraged. If you feel defeated, victory is still available.

Stay the same, remain the same, as they say. But seek the change, pursue the peace and you will find it.

Don’t give up.