When people asked me;

“You’re so thin, why don’t you just eat that piece of chocolate?”

“You’re so lucky that you’re so skinny, you can eat anything.”

“Why can’t you just eat it? It’s not that hard.”

Let me explain to you why I couldn’t "just eat.”

Think of your worst fear. Maybe that fear is of heights, spiders, clowns or boats. Imagine facing that fear every day, and imagine having that fear control every aspect of your life. My fear controlled my life. My fear controlled every decision I made, every person I chose to trust and consistently fed me lies. My fear was of food.

Therefore…

I couldn’t “just eat” because I religiously stepped on the scale 5-7 times a day and I couldn’t bear seeing a higher number.

I couldn’t “just eat” because I tracked every single calorie; I had a daily budget of 500.

I couldn’t “just eat” because I considered every food “bad” or “unhealthy.”

I couldn’t “just eat” because I planned every meal. I precisely tracked every calorie so I knew exactly how long I needed to run to burn it off.

I couldn’t “just eat” because after every bite I immediately had to body check. I had to make sure no new fat had deposited along my waist or thighs.

I couldn’t just eat because food was not “just food.” Food was dangerous. Food would make me fat. Food would make the scale go up. Food was simply just off limits.

When people continued to ask me, my response was always the same; “I ate at home, I’m not hungry” or “I’ll have something to eat later.” But I was hungry. I was starving physically and mentally. I felt as if no one understood how desperately I wanted to eat but I just couldn’t. No one understood I was brainwashed into believing that food was the enemy.

I was a prisoner to my eating disorder. I had no control over my eating disorder. I obeyed his commands. I believed his misconceptions about food. When he told me to hide my food I did, when he told me to exercise for 4 hours I did. When he told me I had to be 70 pounds I revolved my entire life around reaching that goal. I feared that if I didn’t listen to him I would fail.

I became terrified of food. But most of all, I was terrified of my eating disorder.

So to answer your question,

No I couldn’t “just eat.”