Remember, an Eating Disorder doesn’t mean you wither and die, it is life threatening at any point. Sometimes the people who are more likely to die are not those who have a lower BMI than you. This got me to thinking, while it is important to not have a dangerously low BMI, the focus on weight and BMI is incorrect.
If you don’t have to wither and die for an eating disorder to be fatal, then an eating disorder is like a burning candle, a person can only take so much, and like a candle run out of wax and wick too quick and snuff out, however, like a candle a slight gust of wind can also snuff it out as well.
That slight gust of metaphorical wind could take the form of a health scare, an electrolyte imbalance and this could occur even when people say to you, ‘but you don’t look ill?’
Despite not supposedly looking ill, you could be deathly ill, an eating disorder can be fatal.
When you think of a candle, it looks different to different people, some might imagine different coloured ones, a partly melted one etc… everyones view is different, and everyone with an eating disorder is different. There is no look to a person with an eating disorder, no sticky note taped to their back, or sign above their head.
What makes one candle snuff out, and another one burn on to the end?
It is never too late to seek help and the earlier the better, there is no such thing as not ill enough, you deserve help, you deserve the correct treatment, don’t be the candle that snuffs out or burns too quickly to the end.