Warning: This story discusses disordered eating.
I stand frozen in my kitchen. The source of my terror: a humble slice of buttered bread, waiting on a white plate. Nearly four years of living with anorexia nervosa meant the same amount of time on strike from bread and butter, from all sorts of simple pleasures.
I was not officially diagnosed until April 2024, but my eating disorder began in August 2021, coinciding with the start of my MFA program.
Graduate school meant moving states when the farthest I’d ever lived from home was a 15-minute drive. It meant starting over socially, leaving behind my aging grandmother and childhood pets, and plunging myself into a thesis about sexual assault. Lost in a scary, unfamiliar world and reliving the memory of my body completely under someone else’s control left me unmoored.
I looked for the first thing Icould completely control and found food.
Overwhelmed in a West Virginia Walmart, my first solo grocery shopping trip, I tried to remember what brand of bread my family had always bought. I tried to think about what constituted a “good” lunch and how best to stretch my limited funds. I wondered if I would eat alone every day. My eyes darted between Sara Lee and Pepperidge Farms, impatient huffs of other shoppers behind me, air-conditioning blasting. I decided to buy no bread, no ingredients for a “good” lunch, no lunch at all.
What started as a way to channel my fear of the unknown mutated into an obsession with making myself small. The less space I took up in the world, the better. Over the course of grad school, I cut back to 1,000 calories a day, then 800, 500 and 350. I lost 165 pounds and had withered down to a BMI of 14 by my official diagnosis.
That very same month, I finished my MFA. By then, I had lost more than weight to anorexia — no friends, no period, no personality, no stamina. Walking more than a few feet exhausted me. My skin cracked and bled. I ate rice cakes, salsa, celery, miso soup, pickles and Splenda packets. My life stretched into a flavorless slog. Every second dragged until I could collapse into bed. Then, I’d fall asleep fearful that a heart attack might keep me from waking again.
I was unable to see a way out of the gray, bland world I’d built in West Virginia. Fortunately, my parents are fighters. They whisked me back home the second I graduated. They knew recovery was a life-saving intervention, not an option, and began the slow work of helping someone hellbent on sticking to her destructive ways.
Those first months home, I made concessions only if I could nutritionally justify them. My blood work revealed dire deficiencies, so I started eating foods rich in potassium and magnesium.
The simple act of pressing down a knife to cut through the starchy flesh of a sweet potato required my body’s maximum strength. I sliced half-moons, doused them in zero-calorie cooking spray and paced in front of the air fryer. I googled “calories in sweet potato” every single day, concerned scientists might unearth secret nutritional caveats. I slipped Ziploc bags of singular dried apricots into my purse. I considered three almonds a filling snack.
My physical fear of food did not translate mentally. One of the most common misconceptions about anorexics is that we hate eating. In reality, I obsessed over food throughout my disorder. Not just the scant calories and shrinking number of items I actually ate, but the world beyond and its rich possibilities.
I scrolled TikTok for hours, watching moms stir together easy slow-cooker meals of rotisserie chicken, blocks of cream cheese and cans of broccoli-cheddar soup. I watched Ina Garten toss fresh pasta in sautéed garlic and olive oil. I read “Cook’s Desserts” cover-to-cover, all 600 pages.
In recovery at home, my parents encouraged me to bake. I started taking small bites of treats fresh from the oven. On my 25th birthday, Mom taught me her perfect Crisco crust recipe, and we made a miniature pumpkin pie. I stared down at the small pink candle.
Another year I’d survived, despite anorexia’s best efforts. I blew out the flame and wished to be brave.
In the fall of 2024, I moved into a period of recovery marked by bargaining. I could eat pretzels, exactly 21, the recommended serving size. I could order a kids’ ice cream cone. I could bake potato wedges for lunch but only hot sauce for dipping. I could buy açai bowls — no high-calorie add-ons like peanut butter, though. I could eat bread. The 40-calorie-per-slice kind, coated in butter-flavored cooking spray.
My life became tastier but more stressful. I fell asleep at night looping through every single meal plan for the foreseeable future. I never went to restaurants that didn’t post nutrition info. I always ordered the lowest-calorie option. Other humiliating moments in my recovery: fainting, crying over popcorn and convincing myself that a whole-wheat wrap covered in tomato slices was as good as real pizza.
In December 2024, I ordered peanut butter with my açai bowl for the first time. I drove home crying. I arrived home crying. I measured out an exact tablespoon and threw the rest away. I cried more about being wasteful. I walked several loops around the kitchen, my cat rubbing against my legs. I stuck my spoon into the peanut butter and made myself eat.
Twenty minutes later, I stared down at an empty bowl. I licked the last remnants of peanut butter from its edge. How had I convinced myself that something so simple could ruin my life? How had I forgotten the years of childhood where I ate PB&J every single day? Was that little version of me some out-of-control, greedy, black hole of a girl for liking Jif? Of course not. She was just hungry, so she ate.
Over Christmas, I tried a bite of every cookie we baked. I drank a peppermint mocha while window-shopping: 440 empty calories. I tasted soups to see what seasonings they needed and did not berate myself.
But staring down at that piece of bread and butter, I know my recovery is really progressing. Nearly four years from that Walmart trip, I am urging myself to be brave. The 40-calorie loaf and cooking spray sit in the pantry. I could reach for those safe options guaranteed to keep me in my sick body.
But I don’t want a life governed by anorexia. I don’t want to wake up every day exhausted. I don’t want to plan a future around the same dozen foods I’ve eaten for years.
I want to taste all 600 recipes in “Cook’s Desserts.” I want to run without getting dizzy. I want to buy Ina Garten’s really good olive oil. I want my period back. I want an honest-to-God pizza from the parlor downtown, greasy with cheese and pepperoni. I want to tell friends, “I don’t care where we eat, surprise me.” I want a hunk of double-chocolate cake for my 26th birthday.
Most of my days are still spent in the “Iwant”phase. Recovery is hard and slow. I am still significantly underweight. I still fight the belief that controlling food is the only way to control anything. I still resist the urge to take up less space in the world.
But I haven’t lost any more weight, and I have never had a long-term relapse. I eat cheese fries and peanut butter. My blood work is much better, and I can sleep without fear of death. I have incredible parents with me for every moment.