When I don’t eat enough, I get low blood sugar and I find it hard to concentrate and function enough to do anything. And that’s just from skipping a meal, let alone if I hadn’t eaten for days or was subsisting for years on a very small amount of calories. When I see anorexic people in movies or books, they seem to have enough energy to exercise compulsively, go to school or work, and other things. Is it that their eating disorder gives them anxiety and that makes them more energetic? Or does your body just get used to not eating and functions fine after a while?
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I’m not anorexic, I just don’t have much of an appetite. I regularly wake up feeling like shit and realize I didn’t eat the day before. I don’t know, the feeling of hunger doesn’t really register for me like it seems like it does for other people and, combined with a hair trigger gag reflex, I just don’t find it uncomfortable not to wat. I typically work very hard to schedule meals sort of like how I schedule workouts, it’s something that’s good for my body that I don’t have a strong intrinsic drive to do. To answer the question, I just don’t really mind the side effects until it’s been enough that I get light headed or shaky when I stand up.
Supporting a loved one through anorexia recovery right now. She’s been feeling fine and full on ridiculously low amounts of food throughout. All of a sudden she started feeling hungry all the time and overall shittier. Her team explained that her body basically took all those signals offline because it didn’t have the energy to maintain them. Now that shes giving it more fuel, it’s turned everything back on and is throwing up every signal it can to get her to address problems.
You sleep a lot. At least, I did. And a tiny bit of caffeine and sugar will keep you going for quite a while.
Many people confuse hunger with low blood sugar. True hypoglycemia is dangerous but hunger is just uncomfortable. Eating will make you feel better, but unless you are diabetic it is unlikely you will suffer any negative consequences from hunger alone. In fact, you will probably benefit from fasting and the hunger will subside from the feeling you get when you skip a meal.
you just kinda get used to it. before that even it feels like a high. like success. i always told myself it was a sign i was “on the right track”. glad i’m not that bad anymore. i nearly fainted at work several times but felt so “superhuman” when i would push through. absolutely crazy and delusional.
ex (?) anorexic here- you get used to it or learn how to deal with it. we all seem to have coffee or energy drink addictions. some of us live(d) off of things like electrolyte packets or gatorade zero. i used to go >!2 days!< without eating at times, and the worst symptoms i would get were brain fog and just general tiredness
Threads like this make me grateful that I don’t have any addictions, compulsions, or other things in my brain trying to make me do things I don’t want to do
I feel like having a moderately healthy brain is something we shouldn’t take for granted
Atypical anorexic here, in recovery but currently fighting a relapse. I’ll try to be as vague as possible about the specifics to help the folks who are trying to recover not relapse
The very short answer is: badly.
You can accomplish a lot of things with self-loathing and willpower. The hunger cues go away after a few days, and caffeine is an appetite suppressant.
At my worst, I was walking a lot and eating in the low triple-figures of kcal daily. My nails were splintering and my joints hurt constantly. I was getting through by focusing on making the number on the scale drop, and just taking it day by day.
The brain fog is atrocious and your reflexes and judgement screw up too. It’s also very upsetting to watch yourself do something that’s hurting you and not be able to stop.
You convince yourself that it’s worth it, but there will never be a number that you’re happy with.
I had it for years and still struggle with this. So your “I’m hungry, I should eat” function stop working. Hunger become something you ignore and you get no signals to your brain that you need food. Food is disgusting.
Then you just go zombie mode, completely on auto pilot. One piece of food give you enough to continue. You learn how to handle the symptoms, like sit up slowly or you will faint. You just kinda adjust to it.
Then years later. You realize your “you are hungry, you should eat” signal never really turned back on. So its so easy to fall back to that habit of ignoring the hunger. Its just background noise
The aggressive almost determination feeds your willpower or ability to maintain control is almost robotic. It’s about being the absolute divine master over yourself, using force, pain, anger, shame, pride, and if you focus on it in small weight steps it actually isn’t as hard horrible or slow to work. U focus on a number just under ur current, exercise a wee bit more, eat a few bites less, and hit it in few days. As you get more trained into the needs of the pattern you can bump it to 1 kilo more, or a final target weight. U never stop at that weight. It’s a game u get good at winning, and completed kills u. I loved what others thought was gross. All my ribs, collarbones, spine vertibre were defined and viewable, it was amazing feeling so pretty and accomplished. Then u get weak n tired if ur eyes are open u feel like u could sleep , summer becomes less but still winter, your muscles get sore from light strain, a single grocery or handbag or bottle of coke lift ability each arm. U get fuzzy hair like hairless dog, everyone is insufferable, everything is not as interesting or fun, you get stares from everyone everywhere and u start wearing baggy coats to avoid them being over ten seconds of farrowing eyes, everyone only talks about food to you, that doesn’t improve your mood because it’s all nagging, suggesting, offering. Nobody believes any illness you get is caused by viruses or bacteria anymore, it all has to be from lack of eating. Getting a stomach bug everyone automatically Wil not believe you aren’t also bulimic. You look like you’re on crack, your skin acts like ur willpower is trying to kill you in rash or pimple eruptions as ur guts lose their ability to remove toxins and absorb nutrients, your airways puffed, even from sitting. It takes at least 18hrs of your 24 hr day as ur single most focused thought. It is worse than heroin. I haven’t had an episode for over 12 years. Now I hate how I look, can’t ever ever ever get on scales for anything even one time, though I want to just so I can buy clothes properly. I avoid going out because I feel hideous, I hate eating, I hate not eating, I don’t trust doctors for anything ever they’re all liars, even the good ones. I was miserable anorexic. But I was also proud and felt pretty. Now I just exist, can’t do anything that could trigger playing my game against the scales, and I just am waiting like in bus stop to die. Not happy, not really sad, just waiting, thinking I’d love to just feel that pretty again for 5 minutes.
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