For anyone with the goal of college right after high school, the beginning of senior year is the time of college applications, scholarship applications, and building a resume so great any college would be lucky to have you. I needed the perfect college application so I did everything to be the perfect applicant. But during those months, I struggled to receive gender affirming care with my parents fighting me every step of the way; my grandmother, the only family member that fully accepted me, passed away; my father started frequently abandoning my family, leaving me to financially support people that told me I was a mistake. Every new obstacle was a new boulder being added to my chest, the pressure leaving me unable to breathe and unable to think in a time I needed to most. In a desperate attempt to cope and gain any bit of control I could possibly grasp, I retained a habit that almost cost me my future and my life.

At first it started with skipping a few meals, which was horrifyingly easy to do. When I wasn’t at school, I was attending countless extracurriculars to enhance my application. When I was at school, I was doing homework, or studying, or I was practicing one of my instruments during my lunch break. I was rapidly losing weight, and I wasn’t trying to until I was repeatedly complimented on my new physique. My dance teacher was proud I was “getting in shape” and offered me a solo. I was told I was passing better, and started naturally looking like a man instead of a woman pretending to be a man, after losing my curves. I always put in so much effort in everything I do, never receiving any credit or any praise, that I thrived on how I was now treated. My eating habits became clinical. I could only eat every other day, but I had to stay under 500 calories. I weighed myself every day when I woke up and before I went to bed, delighting at the steadily decreasing numbers. No one tells you that when your body is starving, it goes into a state of survival where everything you eat is conserved causing you to gain weight for everything that goes into your body. As the numbers started going up again, I sobbed. And I was determined to get those numbers down again.
The only reason I am still here is because of my friends. They saw me fainting, freezing, and not able to stay awake for more than 6 hours at a time. I was told repeatedly I could tell them anything and they wanted to help, but I refused. I was ashamed. And then I found myself in Subway’s employee’s bathroom, forcing myself to throw up the cookie I just ate. I drove to my best friend’s house when my shift finished and cried in her arms.

I agreed to get help. I talked to people online about my experiences, stopped calorie counting, and assigned people to check in on what I ate, starting with small amounts and working up to multiple meals a day overtime. I learned balance, cutting some responsibilities and scheduling time to relax. I was terrified it would cost me the college education I had dreamed about, but I was more scared of how I was a slave to my disorder. There are still times that I stop eating when I get stressed, but I learned how to recognize it and I know how to help myself.