"I am so jealous of you, everything always looks so good on you." It's what friends often say to
me. But do you know what I've been through to get this body? Follow me, and I'll tell you my story.
I used to be the girl in school that nobody noticed. All of the boys would just look pass me. I
wasn't even popular in my own group of friends. I was invisible. I used to feel a little down
about that, but it was my goal to get into the best university possible. And when I set my mind
to something, I do everything in my power to achieve it. My priority was to first get into my
dream college, and then I could worry about my appearance. I asked my parents for their permission
to get cosmetic surgery if I was accepted into the university. And they agreed and gave me their
blessing. So from that moment on, I focused all of my time and all of my energy into studying to
pass the entrance exams. And once I was accepted, they were so proud as they knew how much work
I had put into getting there. But I was still a long ways away from achieving my dream. There were
two more obstacles I still had to overcome. First was my face. So I had the surgery to add an extr
a layer onto my eyes, to raise the bridge of my nose, and to make my face into the V-shape. All
the things that seem to be what people consider beautiful. When I was done, I looked like a
completely different person. But then I was left with the part that stressed me out that most:
losing the weight. Because even though my face was beautiful, if I'm still fat, no one will consider
me beautiful. This is the social convention, you have to be skinny to be beautiful. It didn't help
that most of the boys in the university liked to tease me. Chubby, they call me. Piggy, they tease.
They even joked around about my big arms and big legs. My friends said they were just joking and
not to take it seriously, but as time went on, I had no more confidence and no more self-esteem.
So I had to be skinny. I watched clips online to teach me how to exercise, and used the entire
summer break to lose the weight. At first, I was so exhausted and everything hurt. I almost gave
up. But I kept myself inspired by constantly looking at all the beautiful and fit girls on
Instagram. I figured if I could look like them, people would notice me, I could wear anything I
wanted. But most importantly, I could finally show the people that tease me about my body that
they were wrong.
Once university started , I was the center of attention. Girls looked at me with jealousy, and so
many boys kept asking me for my phone number. Even my clothes were getting smaller. But it wasn't
enough. When I was nominated as the Queen for the Summer Ball, I started to worry even more that I
wouldn't win. I still believed my body wasn't perfect yet. And exercising just wasn't enough
anymore. So I started to control my diet. I ate less and was more picky about what I was eating.
I ended up losing weight even faster than I did from exercising. People were telling me I was too
skinny, but I didn't believe them. "I'm not skinny, what are you talking about?" Of course I won
the Queen of the Summer Ball. I worked so hard for it. Everyone was congratulating me, but all I
could think about was that I had to work even harder. That I'm still fat and if I'm not careful,
I would go back to being invisible again. I had to exercise more and control my diet more. So I
started to work out not just in the evening, but also in the morning. I didn't eat anything that
had carbohydrates or fat, and then, for lunch I would only eat fruit or a box of milk, and for
dinner I had just a glass of water.
I was so obsessed with how I looked. I really believed that if I missed a work
out or ate more than I was supposed to, I would go back to being fat again. While I was obsessing
about my weight, I was just ignoring all these other strange symptoms that were occurring. My
period had stopped coming for months. I was losing so much hair. I was cold, I was always cold.
My skin was started to peel. And I was struggling in every single class to focus. My grade had
dropped so far and so fast, that nobody could believe it.
A lot of people noticed the change. I kept hearing that I was too skinny, I wasn't the same, I
wasn't as pretty as I used to be. I couldn't accept it and would just tell them that they didn't
know what they were talking about. I lost a lot of friends that time. I cried almost everyday. I
really didn't know what they were talking about, I couldn't see what was so skinny about me. When
I looked in the mirror, I still looked fat! So I thought they must have been just jealous. "Hi
honey." I woke up to see my mother standing next to me. She looked sad and concerned. Then I looked
around. Why do I have so many tubes in my arms? What's happening? Last thing I remembered, I was
exercising.
I was diagnosed with Anorexia. I couldn't
believe it. But I knew my condition must have been serious, when I could no longer feed myself and
I had to be fed through tubes. I was in the hospital for weeks. I even had to drop out of school,
and my mom even had to quit her job just to take care of me. But, it's been a year now, and I'm
fully recovered and finally back in university. I really learned how little value other peoples
opinions have. The most important things are the love you have from friends and family, but what's
even more important, is the love that you have for yourself. I am me. And I am beautiful in my own
way, and I don't feel the need to have to follow the society or trends about being skinny. Why do
I need people who only love me for how I look anyway? It's been a long journey getting here, I
really hope that my story can help to warn people that are about to fall into the same trap.