Stupid number

I started doing exercise tapes every day and writing down everything I ate. I remember looking in the mirror after I had lost some weight and thinking, “I look good.”


But quickly my weight loss spiraled out of control. Soon I was down to 79 pounds. I was sent to a three-month inpatient facility in Pennsylvania, where I was discharged at 125 pounds. With no aftercare, I was thrown back into the world on my own. A girl I knew asked if she could live with me for a while to save money, so I said yes. But she was depressed and talked all the time about how she was so fat. She also got drunk a lot and cried about the abortion she had. Two years after coming out of treatment, I relapsed. I weighed only 92 pounds.


I used to weigh myself everyday, several times a day. I don’t own a scale now, because my mom used to throw away the ones I had. When I get weighed at the eating disorders clinic I go to, they make me turn around on the scale so I don’t see the number. It all has to do with a stupid number. Whatever that number is, it controls how I feel.