Happy Sunday! It’s a bit like Christmas Day here in the Anderson household: Christmas music plays (of course), red poinsettias line the dining table, twinkling lights illuminate the nativity, Santa’s elves spin merrily around the tree (they haven’t been real since I was six), and my future sister-in-law and my cousin’s three adorable tots are over for the afternoon, and they know to behave whilst I blog 😉

I left off on Friday with prayer. I cannot explain why I almost instantaneously recognized and admitted that I was sick after reading the article that day – at least not from a natural perspective. Looking through a supernatural lens, however, I can confidently attribute the momentous shift to my loved ones’ prayers.

As I wrote on Friday, my recovery didn’t manifest itself overnight as my sincere longing to get well had. I stubbornly held on to the notion that I, with what strength I had left, could will myself to eat more, work out less, and reach out to those I had shut out. And this pride presented a brand new problem…

Binge eating. This was my solution to the two-digit reading on my bathroom scale: eat as much ice cream, pizza, and pasta as possible. (College would be the perfect place to do this!) Using the rationale that I could most easily gain weight by consuming the “bad stuff” late at night, I would eat normally throughout the day, then go completely carb-crazy as I studied. After a couple of weeks, I did gain a few pounds…and a lot of guilt.

Abhor, detest, despise…choose your favorite synonym for hate, because all of those words accurately sum up how I felt about gaining weight. And the hatred led to over-exercising and overwhelming waves of guilt, anxiety, and depression. And each of those things led me to eat even more. I was caught up in a seemingly unstoppable cycle of compulsion, self-loathing, and the unyielding urge to purge.

When I saw my parents over Thanksgiving, they were noticably pleased by my more “girlish” appearance; I was getting my curves back, but I couldn’t divulge to them that my weight gain was the extent of my progress. Far to the contrary, I kept my late-night eating habits and next-day cardiovascular catharses on the DL the duration of my first semester.

As for my relationship with God, it was the same as it had been before I’d left home:  stuck, stagnant, suffocated by my secret sin. It may sound odd to categorize an eating disorder as “sin,” but there’s no doubt my preoccupation with my weight and working out had taken the place of God. It had become an idol (and I know my ten commandments 😉 ).  While I had admitted I needed a change in my life, I was yet to say it aloud to the One who could truly rescue me.

I still have some space, whoa! But I’m at a good stopping place, and these rugrats are getting rowdy :). Enjoy this day of rest!