tyn (esmé)

I'm thankful that my passport, issued in 2006, has expired and I now have this picture to send in for my new one. 

I'm thankful that my old photo, taken when I was wrestling with an intense and debilitating eating disorder, exudes nothing but pain and sadness and literally looks nothing except the worst part of myself. 

I'm thankful that I thought I was fooling everybody but when I look back on the old passport photo (there aren't a lot others because I either avoided cameras or destroyed physical copies of them) I don't know how I could have thought this. 

What I see is a pallid complexion, slightly blotchy, with eyes that seem to not see the camera or care. My hair is pulled back, kind-of, with pieces dry, wavy, escaping. The most striking thing is how swollen my throat and neck is. One of the doctors said (and I've never tried to verify this) that my body started adapting to how often I was throwing up- by trying to absorb calories in my throat. 

I'm thankful that there are foods I cannot even begin to eat now because how much they were associated with my rules and were in high rotation on my list of ""Allowed Foods""- things like fat-free wheat thins, campbell's vegetarian vegetable soup, microwave caramel apple popcorn, and any of those zero-calorie hazelnut creamers you add to coffee. (Bad coffee/ the smell of burnt coffee reminds me of the worst mornings.) Whole wheat pasta angel hair spaghetti and jarred pasta sauce- usually barilla, fat-free kraft american cheese singles, cold stone creamery birthday cake batter ice cream...I'm thankful that J can't believe that I used to eat these things and ritually, if I ate at all. 

I'm thankful that it took a few months after I realized I had a problem to really feel like I was out of control. I'm thankful that because of the appetite suppression drugs I had illegally bought on the internet that I started having waking terrors. 

I'm thankful for the one I had where someone was breaking into the one bedroom apartment I was watching for a friend that summer. I'm thankful that when I opened my eyes and saw a man standing in the doorway, I put on my glasses. I'm thankful that when he was still there, I ran at him with all my might, and my pillow, screaming ""Get the fuck out of my apartment!"". I'm thankful that I actually woke up when I ran, full-speed, into the closed door of the room, bending my glasses, bruising my cheek. I'm thankful that I felt utterly insane. I'm thankful that I felt utterly out of control. 

I'm thankful for remembering sitting on the floor of the bedroom, my heart beating in a million tiny explosions out of my chest, lungs gasping against the combination of laughs and deep belly sobs that I knew I had to stop. 

I'm thankful that the sun was rising, that I stayed up until it was surely up. 

I'm thankful that recovery didn't happen immediately or in any sort of fairy-tale process. I'm thankful that finding help was actually a more long and involved process than I imagined it could possibly be.

I'm thankful for the Specialist who told me, point blank, that without drugs I would never recover. I'm thankful for his deep emphasis on NEVER. I'm thankful for my brother going through the painful process of discovery that his chemistry/genetics/whatever is not suited to typical prescribed SSRIs. I'm thankful that he went through the pain of the psych ward. I'm thankful that because of chemistry/genetics/whatever that I should never take SSRIs. I'm thankful that I had to recover without the aid of prescriptions they normally use as a go-to. I'm thankful that mostly they didn't really know what to do with me because I was neither anorexic nor bulimic. 

I'm thankful that there is far more information today for people who need help with ED-NOS diagnoses. I'm thankful that they aren't looked upon strangely, like I felt I was, and are taken more seriously. I'm thankful that there are far more options today. I'm thankful that after about 12 different psychiatrists and psychologists, I found a woman who didn't wear shoes in her office and had a lot of plants in her windows who listened to me and said, ""It will be harder but it's possible...of course it's possible.""

I'm thankful that 10 years later that I'm not there anymore. That I'm here. 

I'm thankful that that girl sitting in that office didn't really think she'd be around to see 2016 at all. 

I'm thankful to remember that and I'm so thankful that I'm here - I'm so fucking thankful for that.

- esmé (5/18/16). esmeawright most places on the internet.

previously: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5