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Continuing our series, “An Examined Life,” comes Katie’s story about her reluctant foray into recovery from anorexia and learning to reshape herself as someone other than the “sick, anorexic kid in the baggy clothes.”

Katie writes:

My eating disorder was not a conscious decision on my part. They hardly ever are, but I wanted to make that clear from the onset. Instead, it was like sitting in a bath while the temperature is slowly raised. Hardly noticeable at first, until you are being boiled alive.

It started in high school, when I was 14. I was a runner, mainly cross country, but also track. I wanted to be fast. I decided to eat right. I wasn’t trying to lose weight at first. Honest. We didn’t even have a scale in my house. But I started cutting down on what I ate and started running more and more.

My parents first saw the problem that spring, at the first track meet of the year. I had hid all winter in my uniform, my baggy running pants, my clothes from the 7th grade that still fit. But when I took off my sweats to run the first race of the season, my parents saw a problem.

That started a series of counseling sessions with many different therapists, appointments with the family doctor (whose advice was to eat more cheese), appointments with a nutritionist and finally, a stay at an eating disorder treatment center where they tube-feed me and I was told that God wanted me to eat.

I was not consulted on any of the above treatment.

I managed to get a few therapists to give up by completely shutting down during sessions or insulting their intelligence. The treatment center was against my will and I made it my personal mission to be a pain in the butt. I’m on the smart side and know my bible. So I revenged myself on them by teaching the other girls about the less savory aspect of the bible (Hosea married a prostitute) and arguing for evolution. You see, I wasn’t invested in getting better. And the more people tried to cram it down my throat, figuratively and literally, I rebelled and dug in my heels. I’m good at that.

It wasn’t until I went to college and was lonely, having anxiety attacks and hiding in my room that I decided I needed help. My parents wanted to try another treatment center, but that was again a disaster. This one, though not Christian, had an interesting understanding of treatment, considering I had only one session with a therapist in the 2 weeks I was there. So, I went back home.

By this point, it had been five years. Five years of starving myself, rebelling, being forced into treatment, rebelling against the treatment, all while maintaining decent grades and appearing, in baggy clothes at least, to be in every way ‘normal.’ I was tired. I was sick of being sick, sick of being tired, sick of treatments, but I knew I needed help. But it had to be on my terms. My parents, at the end of their rope, agreed.

The plan was this: I would see a therapist, the only one of the dozen or so I’d seen that I even remotely liked. I’d see a nutritionist weekly and a doctor to insure that I was still medically sound. My parents wouldn’t talk about my weight or my treatment unless I brought it up. They had to cede control of me to me. This was hard on them.

I decided, with the input of my therapist, that this wasn’t a time for college. But, everyone needs something to do. So I enrolled in art school. That, plus the therapy, turned out to be healing. I found myself projecting my emotions on to my art work. The art was reflecting my work in therapy. It was an amateur form of art therapy, but my therapist encouraged the process and it began to help me. I re-formed my identity, which for too long had been the identity of a patient, of the sick, anorexic kid in the baggy clothes. This was not an overnight process; it took about a year and half. But because my recovery was under my control, I worked the process and recovered. Gaining the weight back was incidental to recovery; the real change was in the way I saw myself and my future.

I eventually went back to college, studied psychology and studio arts. I’ve devoured a dozen books on eating disorders. I know the theory behind the causes and different modalities of treatment. I now want to put that to use.

I’m 23 and I am eating disorder free. I am a senior in college and am applying to graduate school in art therapy. With any luck, in three years, I will be an art therapist, helping others. I believe that my discovery and use of art was crucial to my recovery. I hope to share that with others and help adolescents who are struggling with eating disorders, anxiety and depression. I’m also working on a series of sculptures about my journey through the mental health system. I want to show, as well as tell, my story. I am no longer KJ, the anorexic patient, but KJ, the artist and future art therapist.

Inspired to write your own recovery story?  Submit your stories to me at Rachel (at) the-f-word (dot) org.