I wrote this as the beginning of a non-existant story about someone with bulimia.
Let me know what you think! Am I being accurate? Does it sound awful?
The tightness in my head and
stomach is reaching an unbearable climax- I feel like there’s a child inside of
me that’s trying to push its way up out of my throat.
Quickly I close the bathroom door
and lock it. Turn on the fan. Run the water like I’m going to take a shower.
For good measure I strip my clothes, because things can splatter pretty easily
and I don’t want to smell like vomit the rest of the day.
I wet the tips of my index
and middle fingers with my tongue, and a moment later I can feel my stomach
heaving.
The ice cream’s all coming up,
still somewhat cold and sweet. I can see the swirls of vanilla coagulate in the
toilet, forming bubbly clouds and floating a few centimeters beneath the
surface of the water. Then there’s clumps of bread that get stuck in my
throat-I have to make myself throw up twice for each of those. And the smell of
rotten cheese next, as pieces of yellow string exit my mouth along with more
salty brown sludge.
Acid burns my throat- my cue to
stop.
As usual, my hand is covered in
vomit boogers and I have to use two pieces of toilet paper to get it all off.
Lid closed- flush.
My eyes are stinging from the
purge and as I look in the mirror I can see hints of red where veins
(arteries?) are furiously pumping blood.
Everything will go away when I
step in the shower- the involuntary tears, the pink flush in my cheeks, the
dribble of who knows what on my chin. Only my dry throat will remain, and maybe
a headache- yes I can feel one coming now.
I’m too tired to look at myself
and see if it’s paid off. I feel thinner, but they say you can only get rid of
half the calories you eat by throwing them up.
To be safe, I lift the toilet lid,
and sure enough, a few pieces of cheese are still floating there. That’s why
you always flush twice.
“And that is the last time,” I
croak to myself. Tomorrow will be better.
Its hard to even read this. I've been purge free for 3 weeks now, but this doesn't trigger anything it just reminds me how awful it is. Every detail is so familiar to me. The hardest thing for me is, that purging was so easy to me. I would finish in 2-3 minutes, red eyes and tears only last for a minute and then my face goes back to normal. No noise, nothing. No one would ever notice. So I had no reason to stop (except a million reason I didn't want to think about) But there were some foods hard to flush in the toilet like marshmallows, I usually would throw in a lot of toilet paper on top after I finish, so when I flush the paper sucks everything in and flushes it away.
ReplyDeleteYou are more then accurate..I like it, it describes everything, so whoever reads it will have a feeling how hard and awful it is..
I also found this quite hard to read, hard because it is so real and so raw, it's a very realistic picture of what bulimia is really like.
ReplyDeleteThere is a myth that eating disorders are somewhat glamorous but you show here how truly ugly bulimia is.
I have a kind of ritual when I purge, usually I start walking to the bathroom with a mouthful of food, I tie my hair back, roll up my sleeves purge, I am quick and quiet and it's all over pretty soon.
Take care x
That sounds so familiar. What I say to myself every time tomorrow will be a better day.
ReplyDeleteHI,
I've just found your blog, am liking it so far! If you ever want any help or support you can find me on mine.
http://toofatforwords.blogspot.co.uk/