Unhealthy Habits – The Fireman Weight Law

Nicholas Sparks planted the seeds…
I fulfilled a dream – a fantasy, really, planted into my brain by a combination of my overly romantic personality and a decade long addiction to romantic comedies and Nora Roberts novels.

That is to say, my boyfriend carried me up the stairs.
We then, pressed against my bedroom door, hurridly shed our clothing and had sex on my sister’s twin bed.

The fantasy part, is of course, being carried up the stairs.
And Hollywood is, of course, to blame.
The seeds of desire to be 1) light enough and 2) to be carried by a man were surely planted by the previously stated personality and addiction. Which came first, the personality or the addiction, the chicken or the egg?

I fear the infamous stereotype of Man Carries Woman (across threshold, to bed, to safety, to the car in the rain) is another subtle worm in the female subconscious self esteem. Perhaps I’m looking for someone to blame other than myself for this eating disorder.

Eating disorder. Two words that can’t possibly be associated with me, a well adjusted, well educated in sex ed, self esteem, and freshmen wellness classes, feminist minded young woman.

And yet, I was 125 pounds in October.
It is April and I am 110.

I’ve always had shitty eating habits. For one I’m the queen of picky eating. I also don’t eat much, but when I do you can bet it’s not healthy. Meals might be crunchy peanut butter, chocolate chips, and Ritz crackers. Or Top Ramen noodles and 6 hard boiled eggs. Or pudding cups, Tombstone pizza, bagel bites. Maybe 3 root beers.

Granted most of that is the diet of a typical college or high school student.

Now that I’m out – er, dropped out – and moved to a new town and new job, I’ve picked up new eating habits.
Eating as little as possible.

I like to blame this on the job. I get a ten minute and a 45 minute break. Not much time to eat in the 9 hour shift. So I take an Orange and buy a hot chocolate. I don’t eat breakfast (too early) and on a 1-11pm shift or 3-1am shift, when I get home tired wins out over hungry, so I go to bed and sleep the hunger away. Which, I’ve discovered, is a good way to get hunger to go away. Hunger (empty stomach) + ZZZ = full stomach.

I can last full days on just a hot chocolate and a small chocolate yogurt cup.
The more days I go with so little food, the smaller my stomach gets. So when I do have time to eat, like on Thanksgiving this year when my stepmother and father made steak and potatoes, my favorite foods, I was hungry but had no space for anything.

The pants I bought in November for my work uniform (size 9 and 11) now slide off my hips easily. I went to Target to buy a replacement size 7 pair. To my surprise, much of this weight has disappeared from my boobs. The bra fitting sales woman looked at my bra and tsked " much too big ". My eyebrows shot up in shock. I’d just gotten a new bra over the summer and made sure it was properly fit. "Oh, um, I’m getting over a sickness where I lost a lot of weight. That’s why i need new bras." I told her.

Sarah Jane sent me my bridesmaid skirt / shirt in December to choose sizes. In January, at her wedding, I could’ve pulled the skirt up over my breasts.

Firemen only save the skinny ones.

I’m not deathly skinny. My ribs aren’t showing. I’m not pale or tired all the time. (well tired all the time, yes, but that’s my life).

People keep saying how skinny I am, though. How much weight you’ve lost!

Which only, irrationally, makes me think I must have been heavy before.  And perpetuates a weigh-myself-every-morning cycle, trying to get that optimal weight whose only restriction is above 100 lbs (because, even my de-tracked mind knows that 99 is unhealthy) and always liftable by potential boyfriends or firemen.

And I can’t tell whether this is just bad eating habits or an eating disorder. Or is this me asking for attention and wrapping it up in a big word "eating disorder", because I don’t throw up or binge or pretend to eat and throw away my lunch in secret, which are the typical ways I’ve seen EDs described.

So I’m finally confronting myself here. And I said the words. Eating Disorder.
Bad habit or psychological unrest? Bad spiritual health?

And if this is a psychological thing, who could I possibly be crying out to? What do I want to happen? To be the center of attention? To be told to eat more? To be told to reach a healthy weight? To be hospitalized? To be told I’m beautiful when I’m heavier?