for anyone with a restrictive type eating disorder, anyone who is overexercising, counting calories or skipping meals:
the physical harm of malnutrition and starvation doesn't have a weight limit. There isn't a safe amount of this behaviour. It is all doing you possibly irreparable harm.
Being a 'medically' healthy weight or overweight doesn't guarantee your organs won't start failing. Doesn't protect your heart from stopping from the stress.
Culturally we think of these things as happening to only skeletal war victims or people experiencing profound famine. But they can happen to anyone who puts their body through the stress of starvation.
I've been what I personally consider (mentally and physically) safely 'in recovery' for several years now but I still have a heart arrhythmia. I'm collecting a new chronic illness or collection of symptoms every few months. I don't know if these things are from my more than half a decade with an eating disorder but I can't say that they're not. It surely didn't help.
This isn't needless panic. This is mostly just my own life. Please, please be kind to yourself. You are not the exception. You do not have control over this disease. It will hurt you and take from you and never give anything back. I love you all. Be safe out there.
