Body Image

Chapter 68, The Body Politic in Readings for Diversity and Social Justice is very interesting to me personally.  In spite of the fact I am now very much overweight, I once struggled with an eating disorder.  I really struggled with writing about this time in my life because I think people who see me as I am know will never believe me. 

With that said, I will attempt to allow you guys a small glimpse into my personal battle with a combination of anorexia and bulimia.  It actually started with a bleeding peptic ulcer.  Due to the blood in my stomach I vomited frequently and lost a little weight before my physicians were able to diagnosis the ulcer and treat it.  I gained the weight back, which made me think I could get really skinny by vomiting.  So I started purging everything I ate or drank.  After a few months, I would go for several days without eating or drinking at all.  My senior year of high school, I missed over forty-five days of school because I was so frequently hospitalized due to dehydration.  Because I missed so many days, I had to go before the school board and convinced them to allow me to graduate.  The only reason I was not forced to repeat my senior year was that I was an honor student with a very high GPA. I continued my pattern of starving and purging until I was in my early twenties.  I was sent to Scott & White hospital in Temple, TX at the age of twenty and spent several weeks attempting to get better.  The physician told my family, I would probably not live; they could not help me because I was unwilling to be helped. 

Shortly after that I was involved in a severe car wreck. I suffered a closed head injury, which caused me to develop severe migraines and other medical issues. I spent months in physical and cognitive rehab, which made it very difficult for me to keep up my eating disorder routine.  I would love to say, I learned to eat health and quite purging and starving myself because of some inspirational insight.  However the truth is, I quite because it was too difficult to keep up with my routine and deal with constant severe neck and back pain and atypical migraines.

My family and I are fully aware; I have the potential to develop an eating disorder at any given moment.  I attempt to keep myself from that temptation by remembering the excruciating hunger pains and how weak I felt.  My fear of developing another eating disorder is what has kept me from dieting at all in the past.  I recently started weight watchers in hopes to get back down to a health weight.  Thankfully I have a few friends that know my eating disorder history that help me not get too carried away with my dieting attempt.

We as social workers must keep in mind; things are not always as they appear.  No one in our social class would ever be able to guess I struggled with an eating disorder just by looking at current physical appearance.

 I decided to include a few pictures of myself when I was much smaller.  At the time of both of the pictures, I was already beginning to gain weight.  At the height of my eating disorder I weighed ninety-six pounds and was five foot seven inches tall.

Jennifer Bliss age 19

Jennifer Bliss age 21