I Said NO to My Mother in Law- Bulimia Recovery Marriage

 

Dear Readers,

A reader from Pakistan, now living in Dubai would like to share her story of saying No to society’s demands of Size Zero with us. I am very grateful to her for sharing such a fabulous story with us.

 Dear Maha,

I read your post on Love Marriage and Anorexia and it made me realize how right I was not to give into demands of my family and mother in law to lose weight to fit into society’s ideal image of body size. I am sorry for the sufferer and it made me so tearful to read her story. I thought perhaps you would like to share on your blog my struggle with nearly 11 years of Bulimia.

Love Marriage and Anorexia

Every Girl has a dream that one day she’ll get married. In Pakistan, it doesn’t matter what class you belong to, you know your future and destiny, It’s Marriage. It’s inevitable, you can’t escape it. I was 15, when I planned my perfect marriage to a perfect man. I remember standing in front of mirror and thinking, ‘I have to lose weight if I want to have a wedding of my dream’.

I come from a family that is bit too perfect. My father is in army and my mother is a therapist. She charges astronomically high amount for her sessions. Right from the age of five, I was taught, what to eat, how to speak and what clothes to wear. We had a full-time governess from Philippines, She was a sweet and nice lady but very much under my mother’s instructions and rules. My mother is a control freak. She studied Psychology in Washington DC and just wanted all her three children to be perfect, to look perfect and be high achievers.

I had a good child-hood, the only problem was that I developed a secret life when I was 12. I would never spend my money on clothes or toys but on food items, anything from crisps, chocolates to drinks to pop corns. I loved stashing food in my room. At night time, I would binge on all this food. By the time, I was 15, I weighed nearly 70kilos. My mother put me on cabbage soup diet. It was a horrible time. She took me to nutritionist in Washington DC and in Pakistan we visited many doctors for my weight problem.

It wasn’t till we moved to DC in 2000 that I learned how to binge safely and not gain excess weight. I became bulimic. I somehow managed to get down to an ideal weight with lots of exercise and behaviors, but this completely destroyed my mental health. My mother could not have been more prouder of my new weight and new way of life. Do you know what’s strange? She was so focused on showing everyone what a perfect family we were that she simply overlooked all my behaviors and destructive methods.

What happens after 10 years of bulimia? You become suicidal. Your body begins to give up on you and you notice the damage you’ve done to your body.

The pressure of perfectionism led to high achievement for all three of us. I went to University and Studied Engineering and I also worked as a case worker for a local charity. I had a good working environment. At work, I would not binge or purge. At University, I began to procrastinate and I would feel fearful at a simple thought of not meeting my parents high standards. I always experienced stomachaches and headaches. If my average was below 95%, the depression would settle in. The only relief from all this pressure was food and more food and bulimic behaviors.

It wasn’t till 2010 that everything started to fall apart. I had  a complete break down during my mid-term exams. At hospital series of tests revealed surprising amount of deficiencies in my body.  My body was simply emaciated from years of bulimic behaviors.

How Did I Change?

My mother’s comment, “How can you do this to your family”, “Don’t you have any shame”? “How am I going to face the society now”? “It would have been better if you had anorexia, how do I tell people my daughter eats and eats like a greedy ***”. Those words stung, they stung more than Doctor’s medical report. I thought you counsel people and you deliver seminars on mental health and when it comes to your own daughter, you refuse to acknowledge her illness. She thought it was all deliberate and I was doing this to seek some kind of revenge.

Why is there so much shame surrounding Bulimia? I thought to myself after I left the treatment center.  It doesn’t matter how many times my therapist told me Bulimia is a disease, and no matter how many times you hear it, the stigma surrounding Bulimia persists. Stigma, shame begets relapse—so I did one thing and the only thing I could have done to protect my fragile dignity, I left DC.  Why? As soon as I returned home, my mother did a very wise thing, she locked our kitchen and pantry. According to her my uncontrollable binges were attributed to a failure of will and weak character. Psychology 101: People who feel bad about themselves, the logic goes, have greater incentive for self-destructive behavior.

In 2011 I left DC.  I went back to Islamabad to deal with the stigma.  From February 2011 till August 2011, I simply locked myself away in my own world. I did not switch on TV once. I read books and focused on eating and eating without purging. It wasn’t easy. I incorporated Yoga in my regime and did breathing exercises. I also went for short walks in the foothills of Himalaya Mountains. In that period, I did not speak to my family once. I was living with my Grandmother. In 2012, I completed 8 months of being bulimic free. I also learned how to forgive myself and my mother. I did not go back to DC, there were just too many demons living there. It was then that my father’s friend asked for my proposal for his son who is a doctor.

After series of meetings, I agreed. I became engaged and a wedding date was set for October 2013.

My weight by that time had stabilized but it wasn’t good enough for the society that had developed obsession with girls who looked like matchsticks. After my engagement, every body refrained from passing comments on my weight but I could tell that my future Mother in Law had a fascination with girls who were thin.

I still remember June 2013, when my mother came up to me with a diet plan. Your mother in law thinks if you lose few more kilos, you’ll be a perfect bride. My weight at that time was 60 kilos, and this was my set- weight for my height.

It triggered something in me and ED was back, “Yes why don’t you follow this detox plan and this no-carb diet for few months, you’ll look perfect.” Three days on detox diet, I relapsed and binged on anything and everything I could get my hands on.

I remember being horribly sick in 45degrees of heat. It was horrible. I had an acid reflux and my chest hurt. it was then that I looked at myself in the mirror and made up my mind that NO, enough is enough. I took off my engagement ring and sent it back to my in-laws home.

The End

I got married on 10th October 2013. I was a perfect healthy bride without a single thought of bulimia. It changed many things.

 

 

You just have to stand up for yourself and believe in yourself and love yourself. I knew that instance when I binged and tried to purge that fast food that if I give into ED now, there will be no going back. Those painful 10 years of bulimic life flashed before my eyes. I remembered all those trips to public lavatories and food stores. I remembered hiding in closet so I could binge on Ex-large Pizza and I remembered the accusations of my family and no-support when I was in treatment center for my Bulimia.

I have pride and I have dignity and I thought “never ever am I going to let anyone make me feel so low about myself”.

 

What I said to my future husband? I suffered from Bulimia, if you want to marry me, then marry me for who I am and not my outer appearance.  When I left treatment center, I vowed never to go on fad diets and I vowed never to go below my healthy weight.