What started your disorder?

Was there any one trigger you can point to or did it develop gradually? At what age did your disorder begin?

I started sticking a toothbrush down my throat to make myself vomit when I was about 13 or 14. It gradually developed. But the underlying cause was that I was overwhelmed with life due to undiagnosed OCD and ADHD and it was the only way I felt like i had some control.

My father, his second wife (not my mom), and his best friend suggested that I lose weight. I was about 18 and normal weight and nicely curvy - not looking like a teenage boy. My step-mother looked like a teenage boy, my father's best friend's wife looked like a teenage boy, my dad adored women who looked like teenage boys - all these people did something seriously wrong by giving me the direction to lose weight. I starved myself. A few bingeing and purging episodes, too. Recovered myself without professional intervention, which was unheard of back then anyway. Now I cannot shed excess weight and my endocrinologist says that one of the reasons is the history self-starvation - my body that has gone through starvation holds on to every single calorie and it is hard to lose weight.

I started when I was in the 6th grade. (I'm in my 30's now.)

My brother was one of those kids who could eat anything and never gain weight. He'd have dinner with Grandma, then dinner with the neighbors, then come home and eat dinner again and always was a bean pole.

My brother would eat everything in the house, chips, cookies, special things for dad's lunch, etc and when mom would get mad because the food was missing he would blame me. No one ever believed me when I said he was the one eating everything because he was so skinny.

Eventually, I resolved to stop eating altogether in hopes that they would believe me when I said I didn't eat whatever it was. Even when you could count my ribs, they never believed me. It's like no matter how much I weigh or how skinny I get I'll never be liked and always be the "bad kid."

My weight goes up and down now. I've lost 30 pounds since march, but I'm still the fat kid in my parents eyes.

I do remember being In the girl's changing rooms and everyone was comparing their gym skirt size. Mine was 24inches and one of the smaller ones. I remember thinking this was a good thing and it shouldn't get any bigger. I still do

Btw I don't think that one event triggered it but it sticks out in memory

There are a few incident(s) that stick out in my mind, some of which I don't really want to share but if you want to PM me you can...I will say that I think that things really went downhill when I was 13.

I am now "recovered/in recovery" whatever...but its a struggle every day, as we all know.

Great thread!

I think it I always suffered from poor body imagine from 5-8th grade. I remember noticing my legs were shorter and thicker than my peers. I was curvaceous and a little on the robust side (though not fat). I remember thinking about dieting a lot but I was a big eater (so was the rest of my family). Fast forward to 16 and my first real boyfriend and I wanted to look good. I dove straight into starving myself (and eventually purging). When I lost the first few pounds people were telling me how great I looked ( teachers even said, wow, have you lost weight?). It just fueled the fire. I never got dangerously low in high school but it set me on the path for a life-long struggle. Despite being many, many, years older, I think my anorexia has been a way for me to separate myself from the rest of my family who all eat with reckless abandon.

Mine began when I was 19. It was related to panic disorder, and manifested itself into being afraid of food. Also grew up with a parent who was into appearance, and worrying what others thought of us all (seems to be common among sufferers) and definitely feeling like I had control in a world of chaos (therapy has later taught me this).

I came out of it when I was about 21 or 22. in 2011, it popped back up after I went on a diet to lose weight, legitimately, I was quite heavy and unhealthy. I started out eating healthy, but ended up starving myself because I couldn't seem to lose enough. Eventually, I started ignoring hunger signals. I lost 50 pounds, which was my goal, but now deny myself food to the point of having little interest in eating. It's now just a way to keep me from passing out. Working on this though.

(hug) Thanks for starting this thread.

As I recall, my mother was constantly on a diet and was obsessed with her weight / appearance. I think I started taking diet pills when I was 14 or so, because I thought I was "fat". I could not see my true figure at all. My neverending quest to be stick-thin was top of mind...I was on a "diet" for 25+ years. Exhausting. *sigh*

Throughout my whole life, i have been underweight. I feel depressed ever since my weight hit 40 kg. I miss being 30+ man. Now i am 45 kg and still underweight. Haha but i binge often too which i feel guilty and then after i binge, i go on a diet.

mine slowly started when i was 14 and i got obsessed with exercise.
then the summer i was 15 there was a movie out calle Dirty Dancing. the girl in it had a perfect body, and i HAD to look like her. i just had to. i started starving myself then, by fall i was throwing up. i wish i had never seen that stupid movie.

I was 8 years old when I became vegan but quickly turned into anorexia. I blame it on having ham when the head of the pig was "staring" at me. I became bulimic at 12 when I had to gain weight for basketball. Also 12-16 I spent 8hrs / 7days swimming.

Pictures of me in grade school were not fat, but they weren't thin either. I didn't want to end up looking like my mother....& that's what I felt like I looked like. However later on in school, I was so active that I ended up staying fairly thin.......college the same thing. Midterm's & finals caused so much stress, I could eat a lot of food & end up loosing weight.....didn't realize how much stress controlled my weight.....but looking back, any time I got stressed about something, I would loose a whole LOT of weight.....but the stress situations never lasted long enough for the weight loss to be dangerous.

When I got married & ended up pregnant (had my daughter 10 months before graduating with my BS), I wouldn't allow ANY junk food in the house....never had morning sickness.....but kept my weight gain down compared to my other friends who were pregnant at the same time just by eating good healthy food & exercising & swimming every day.....even into the winter. The last month was bad because I found out my baby was too big & I was too small to have her naturally.....obgyn said I had to have a c-section. I had never even been in the hospital before let alone having to have a surgery to have a baby.....I was not very happy about that & the stress caused me to loose so much that I only ended up gaining 10 pounds for an 8lb 2oz baby. I was so determined to be active that I even went down hill skiing the week before I had my baby. Got out of the hospital looking like I never had a baby......others in my college classes asked if I had lost a bit of weight over the spring break...lol. Most didn't even know I was pregnant.

The stress of finishing my degree & taking care of a baby.....keep my weight down. I had my job offer before graduation & started at a wonderful company that provided a health club as part of the benefits.....so I played hard games of racquettball every day at lunch.....which was something I kept up doing at every company I worked for.....& it was great at keeping the weight under control.....so I really had no issues with anorexia or anything.....I was just healthy & at a healthy weight.....but there were definitely times when I didn't eat breakfast or lunch....but one meal a day was good enough for me....I would eat when I was hungry.

The anorexia hit however when I was 43/44. I ended up loosing my career as an firmware design engineer.....I defined myself by my career & it was my escape from 20+ years of a BAD MARRIAGE.....so it really messed me up & the aerospace industry was so bad, I couldn't find another job & we had a huge earthquake that destroyed the roads & my life was a complete mess.....my daughter was then a senior in high school. My anxiety turned into major depression & suicide attempts & I ended up on permanent disability. The pdoc that I had at the time was giving me prozac......& I lost more & more weight & then even more.......I didn't say anything about it because at that point, I was thinking it would be easier for my daughter if I died from anorexia than from an OD......so I continued to say nothing until one day, my husband commented to my pdoc about my excessive weight loss. Pdoc immediately said it was anorexia & jumped to the conclusion it was body image because of what I had thought about my past & wanting to not gain weight & stay thin. He got the Radar institute at Washington Memorial to take me for almost 8 weeks with them covering the cost of the hospitalization....just not all the Dr's I ended up having to see (which all ended up going to collection). Obviously that treatment did NO GOOD & the T there was a moron & I was about ready to douse everyone that came close with the ensure. Needless to say, I did gain some weight that they had basically forced me to gain by forcing me to eat.....but for about the next 2 years, I was in & out of the medical hospital with Central line & IV nutrition.....along with OD's because I really didn't want to be alive........& the weight loss stayed dangerously low which was why my GP kept doing the central line.....I would pass out, husband would take me to my GP....vicious circle.

I don't have a good memory for all those years between 1994 & 2003.....but remember being in & out of the mental hospitals......had horrible migraines that ended up not going away....still have then 24/7....not sure the cause since I never even had a headache when I was growing up. During that time, I had a hard time even getting out of my dark, quiet, non-smelly room......& during that time, had a parkinson's like reaction to several of my drugs, & with the migraines. I just layed there & did nothing....couldn't even ride my horse because of the migraines......started to gain weight.....& gain & gain.....swinging my weight to the other side of too thin.

In 2003, I was finally prescribed pain meds that controlled my migraines so I could function again. Went back to take interior design classes at the junior college, my mother had been dx'ed with cancer that previous summer, a friend from college died of cancer & my mare was pregnant & she had lost every foal she tried to give birth to before that. While on foal watch, a forest fire got started & the smoke covered the valley I lived in....ended up with asthma & bronchitis & landed in the medical hospital for 10 days. Up to that point, with my new ability to be active I had started loosing weight again at a very healthy rate....& I was rather happy with myself.....but the smoke....made everything taste & smell horrible....couldn't eat, weight started coming off faster.....but I thought that was good. Ended up with heat stroke after getting out of the hospital & still on foal watch. My mother had her cancer surgery that summer, my mare had her healthy baby "Itssabout Tyme" (Izzy), & my stress was going higher & higher because my mother wasn't healing well from the surgery & I was having to take her to my pain specialist to get pain help for her on top of my foal at 3 weeks cut her leg down to the bone & I was caring for her several times a day at the ranch (which was about 10 minutes away from my house). The amount of weight I was loosing was still ok, but it was coming off like it had before...but this time from stress, not prozac....this was more like when I was younger from stressful situations....& my stress got worse.....ended up going through a trauma with the home care person who ended up manipulating her way into caring for my mother......within less than 6 months after my weight loss started from my overweight place, I was low enough to end up landing in the medical hospital again right before my mother got to the point when I didn't know how much longer she would be alive. The trauma I went through made my weight loss even worse & worse & worse.....I couldn't eat or drink because my nausea was so bad.

It took several years after that to gain my weight back up to a safe place. GP & Pdoc wanted me to go to a treatment center again....but all I called didn't treat anorexia because of trauma....all they would treat was body image issues

My mother died that January......the night right after I went back into the medical hospital.......excaped the hospital AMA to go to my mother's funeral.....then went back after that for the central line & IV nutrition.......several years went by trying to process the trauma I went through & the anger I was feeling toward my mother as none of that would have happened if she had been a tiny bit smart.....I was a complete wreck & I know that if I didn't have Izzy, I never would have survived.....because I was still in the bad marriage that I couldn't escape for all those years.

Stress is honestly the key to my anorexia......however is talking with my psychologist, I realize that I really do have the not eating behaviors.......I still go days without eating some times.....& more so if I have gained a few pounds.......even after leaving my husband 5 years ago......all the financially stupid things he has done to hurt me over these last 5 years has brought unending stress continually to me & I am still dealing with stress from him in the foreclosure of the house that we still both own together because there was no way of getting out of it.....I issues with the IRS........& now I am finally able to get the divorce......but there have been many other issues that have caused major stress here.

I know that the only reason I keep at a safe weight now is because I live alone & I have 5 american eskie dogs that depend on me for their care......& hopefully I will be getting my mare (Izzy) here in the near future.....after I get the divorce settled.

Was talking with my psychologist the other day about not eating when I feel stressed & she said that even though the weight loss isn't about body image, the behavior is still the same.....& I like to go through recipes & find things that sound good, but I never make them, My sense of feeling hungry is not normal most of the time.......but at times it is. I also keep a healthy weight because of the pain medication I'm on & even though it didn't bother me the last time with my anorexia, I don't want to take the chance that my new pain specialist might have an issue with low weight & the high dose of medication I'm on.....he could definitely see it as a serious problem....& I just don't need to go there.

It's going to be hard enough eating after I have all my teeth pulled & go ahead with getting the dentures in the near future......I am sure there will definitely be some weight loss involved with that even though eating with broken off teeth has been very difficult in the first place.

There are so many other things that are the cause of anorexia than just body image.......but I also know that the need to feel some level of control about something does seem to kick in wanting the control over loosing more than the control over eating healthy.

For some of us there is not just one thing that is the cause......or even the trigger to start the weight loss all over again.

Wish it wasn't so complicated......but it it weren't, it would be easier to treat.

For me it started because ppl called me anorexic and picked on me even though I was just normal. Then I started getting confused because I wasnt THAT thin. But felt so fat to be anorexic. So then I started restricting food because I felt like I had to. Idk. Thats one of the more easie r to explain.... there was other reasons like needing to take control and stuff.


...Blue

There were a few influencing factors in my ED but the biggest one was that i started gymnastics at 4 years old was was competing by 7. By 7 they were already telling us that we had to stay inb shape and keep certain weight restricitons. By nine I was fuly restriction and stealing diet pills....Im now 39 and still struggle quite a lot. if you want to know more im happy to share PM me....

serenity24

I'm not sure if there was a specific trigger for me. When I was little I was sick a lot because my mom was drinking, using, and smoking a lot and not eating healthy--plus my dad was beating the s**t out of her all the time. I didn't eat a whole lot because I was so sick, and when I started getting better, I was so used to not eating that I had to be forced to eat. My dad really went overboard on trying to get me to eat that he would actually shove food down my throat, give me way more than I could eat on my plate and forced me to eat all of it end I would end up getting sick over it--he forced me to do pie contests and I would get in trouble if I didn't eat the whole pie. Well, I eventually got used to that, and when I ended up living with my mom (they were divorced when I was pretty little), I kept up those eating patterns. Plus, we lived off of junk food and fast foods. My mom complely ignored me so I had to raise myself basically. I started puberty early, which was ruff 'cuz I ended up getting beat up a lot by other girls and I ended being molested and sexually abused quite a bit. Stuffing my face was a way to deal with it.

I can distinctly say that the ED behavior started at 12. I was a fat kid, a really fat kid, and I come from a really fat family but for some reason I was the only one who got crap for it (because I'm the only girl maybe? I have no idea). Probably around age 8 or 9 it started to bother me, and by 12 I just decided I'd rather die than spend another day being fat. And that was that. Anorexia at first, then bulimia. I'm the bulimic always trying to be anorexic and failing miserably. So it goes.

I can't think of any triggers that caused me to become bulimic. I remember where I first learned about it and it was in my high school class. It all started when I was 16 years old and from that moment on I struggle with it from time to time. I am 30 years old now.

I have a history of abuse in my childhood and I was always the child that was over weight. I worked on coping with that when I am in therapy but still the issue of how people with this disorder is only looking for a way to get control back in their life never really fit well with me. I don't think thats why I go back to the eating disorder. I am still not sure.

I think I was about 9 when it started. It started with binge eating. I would eat half a box of cookies and then eat more. Then when I was 13 I started bingeing and purging. I never purged the meals or small snacks I ate, I only purged when I ate A LOT. I haven't purged in about a year. When I was 17 I started starving. I always try to "recover" and I do well and gain back what I lost but then I go back to starving again and lose it. It's an endless cycle.

I was 15. It was because my life was out of control. My mind was consumed day and night with OCD thoughts, and when I wasn't obsessing, I was all over the place with ADHD... The only thing I could control was what went into my mouth

I always had overeating tendencies, but when I was told I was possibly allergic to gluten, dairy & sugar, I started to go nuts. Then my friend told me she was anorexic, and while I was trying to help her, I developed my own version of it. So I started the binge-starve cycle. Along the way I developed holding my breath, cutting and working out like a nut. Then I started trying to purge. Right now I have pretty much stopped purging, but still binging a little and starving. Overall, I am trying to get better now!

I first saw a therapist for anorexia when i was 5. My father had a ruptured brain aneurysm when I was 4, he nearly died. My home life was a bit chaotic, unstable and some abuse by that age. So I started restricting heavily when I was 4. As this continued through the years I developed body dysmorphia which was just fuel to the fire.

I was always depressed from a young age and later dx'd with bipolar. I am sure that they play a role together for myself. My eating disorder developed out of a need to control something in my life, and it seemed to be the only thing a 4 year old can control to me anyways.

My ed stated when I was 10 or 11. Will be 42 ext month. 30 yrs with an ED

I've had mine for about 22 years now. Just curious, have you tried therapy and did any particular type seem to help?