Not eating enough: one man's compelling story

This links to a article written by a male suffering from anorexia.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2012/sep/09/secret-world-male-anorexia

It is well written. The turning point that allowed him to admit he had an eating problem seems to be meeting a person who was willing to a) challenge him on his eating, b) listen to him and make time for him over several weeks, and c) affirm that he was worth loving. I recommend reading the whole thing, as it might help some people here who come across anyone on this site potentially suffering from a disorder of this sort. Anyone here who is eating too little and is underweight might also find it helpful.

I have pasted a few paragraphs from it to give you a taster but it is worth reading the whole thing..

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... I started to work out more than ever. I found excuses to go to the gym in the middle of the day, as well as in the morning and evening. I told people I was running so much because I was training for a marathon. Every time I went to the bathroom I would lift my shirt to look at my ribs. I'd take the lift alone, so I could look in its mirror to see how concave my stomach was. I'd jump on every set of scales I saw: in friends' bathrooms, in hotels, and in Boots, on the machine that gives you a print-out of your height, weight in kilograms and BMI.

To begin with I was happy so long as that machine's prognosis was "below average weight", but I became addicted to seeing the numbers get lower. Each time they did, I shifted the parameters I set for myself. "I'll be happy when I'm 60kg, 55, 50," and so on. "If I have the discipline to drop another 2kg," I'd tell myself, "I'll have the discipline to make anything work." It was as sensible as saying, "If I can hold my breath underwater until I pass out, I'll have the discipline to never drown."

I knew I was being irresponsible, but, thanks to the giddy effect starving can have on brain chemistry, I didn't think I was sick. Truth is, being skinny again felt awesome. Newly single, I relished the chance to show off my body as much as possible. Being very thin makes your **** look enormous, which I felt quite good about. It also, eventually, makes it stop working. When that happened, I just told myself I was going through a phase where I didn't much want to have sex.

For months, I was dizzy every time I stood up. What was happening was that my heart was starting to pump blood less efficiently, but I told my doctor I thought I might have diabetes. She took a blood test and weighed me and said it must be stress, and that I was "slightly underweight". The fact that it was "slight" and not severe was terrible to me. I let my weight slide toward the 7st mark, then I did everything I could to hammer it down past it.

In my job, I rarely had to wear a suit, so I could layer shirts and sweaters up. For a trip to Sweden for a conference, though, I packed trousers that I hadn't worn for a while. When I put them on, I found that I had shrunk so far that they looked like a paper bag belted to my waist. I had to rush out and buy new ones, which were hard to find so small, but I was thrilled with myself.

On the penultimate night of that trip an older woman I worked with called me for a meeting in her room. "You tell everyone you're training all the time, and I think they believe you," she said. "I don't. Do you want to tell me about it?" She listened for most of the night, first while I lied to her and then, after some kind persistence on her part, when I told the truth.

I'd never spoken about it before and once I started I talked for hours. She told me a whole bunch of things she admired about me, reasons she thought I was worthy of being loved, and over the following weeks did everything she could to convince me she meant them, and wasn't just saying them for kindness' sake. Most of all, though, she told me I was a grown man now, and that the only person I had to be strong for was myself. She encouraged me to talk to friends and family back home, and did all she could to convince me they wouldn't abandon me if they saw I wasn't flawless and strong. She called me out on my crippling fear of being weak and unwell, then she promised me that she would never mention our conversation again. ...

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