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Eating disorders

Living with someone with an eating disorder

By Zamir HanifPublished 3 years ago 6 min read
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Me and my beautiful wife

Before I met my wife she was hiding away from the world, locked up in her bedroom. If she went out she would wait till is pitch dark so no one will be able to see her. She was very emotional a lot of the time, she had no job nothing going for her in her life. The worst part of it all was that no one understood her illness.

After getting to know her she was someone who was just looking for someone to understand her illness. Someone she can share how she is feeling about her eating disorder. What a lot of people do not understand is that an eating disorder is a mental illness.

No one wakes up one day to say I am going to restrict what I am going to eat, or that I am going to eat so much that I am going to make myself sick. Imagine having a voice in your head 24/7 telling you that you are eating too much, you are getting fat, do not eat that because it is too late.

After meeting and getting to know my wife I had to learn about her illness. So I started reading articles online about anorexia, reading books about eating disorders and specifically anorexia and listening to audiobooks while on the go. Before meeting my wife I never even thought or had any idea/experience of eating disorders.

La’ilah and Zamir

My wife has a voice in her head 24/7 telling her not to eat, telling her you are getting fat, it is not the right time to eat. The worst part of it all is that some people do not even believe that there is such a thing as an eating disorder. Imagine trying to tell them how you are feeling on a day to day basis when they do not even believe in your illness.

It took me over 2 years of chatting and talking on the phone to La’ilah (now my wife) before she decided to meet me in person. Our first meeting in person felt awkward because we had grown to know each other so well by talking and chatting over the phone but had never met in person.

Our first meeting was the start of something special, La’ilah was stunning, with a beautiful personality. The thing I loved about her was her teeth they were so white they were blinding me every time she smiled. After meeting me she was thinking to herself why did I wait so long to meet Zamir, but she did have a reason she was not happy with her teeth yet.

Eating disorder is not something that starts out the blue when you wake up one day. It is a mental illness that is caused by an awful experience in your life which in return you want to punish yourself because that is the only thing you can control. This awful experience happened to her at a young age, as she was growing up this awful experience made her start hating her body and herself.

She thought if I do not eat then I will start looking like this horrible malnourished skeleton and look unattractive so why would any guy want to be with me. She has punished herself with the only thing that she has ever had control over which was her eating. With ED (eating disorder) taking over her life and make her lose so much weight.

At beginning of her illness, she was in denial that she had an issue her weight from a healthy teenager of 60 kilograms down to 38 kilograms, but this weight was still ok compared to when she was at her worst when her weight had fallen to 20 kilograms. This is when her body started to fail and she ended up in the hospital.

My wife has had an eating disorder for over 25 years now, this all started when she was only 15. ED was La’ilah’s best friend for so many years up to a point where she was so malnourished that she died in hospital 3 times and had to be resuscitated. Luckily enough she survived, she lost all her hair, she could not walk for 3 months. She was in the hospital for over 4 months.

Zamir and La'ilah

So next time someone tells you they have an eating disorder please do not try to think you know what it is because unless you learn about it you do not have a clue about what an eating disorder actually is and what are effects. No two people can be compared who have eating disorders so you should never say I know because my sister has an eating disorder. First of all, there are many forms of eating disorders, second everyone with an eating disorder is different and finally depends on how long they have been suffering from this awful illness.

Imagine someone walking into your life after ED being your best friend for so many years and trying to help you with your eating disorder. It was never going to be easy but I had decided that I was going to try my best to understand La’ilah and help her with her eating disorder. So from taking small steps of learning about her illness and just listening to the struggle she was going through on a daily bases with ED controlling her eating.

So here we are a year later and she is my wife now. Life is never easy and we will always have the struggles just like everyone. We both have our ups and downs and it can be a struggle at times but I am determined to be the husband that my wife La’ilah deserves. Every day is a battle but our love for each other is what keeps us going and in my heart, I do believe she will get better.

La'ilah is working now as a Trainee Dental Nurse, she loves her job but because of her personality her boss, work colleagues, and her patients love to her bits. She will be learning to drive a car soon, she goes out during the day, she is proud of herself. We are planning to start our own family for which we cannot wait but this has challenges of its won due to her illness and her weight.

I love La’ilah with all my heart and as I am writing this vocal story she is in the hospital due to an erupted kidney and is going in for operation this morning. Her malnourishment has caused her to keep getting kidney stones she has had several operations to have them removed over the last 12 years but this time it has erupted her kidney.

I am praying everything goes well during this operation and that I have my wife back in my arms very soon. Everyone in this world deserves to be happy, it does not matter if they have a disability or mental illness. I hope by sharing my story helps others who might be living with someone who has an eating disorder, I just want to say it will not be easy by any means but you can really change someone's future and life.

Thank you for reading my story about living with someone with an eating disorder.

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About the Creator

Zamir Hanif

I have been a fitness fanatic most of my life. It all started at the age of 12 when I bought my first dumbbells and I have been into health, fitness and wellbeing ever since. I want to write about my life, health, fitness, and wellbeing.

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