potential health issues from eating disorders hindering recovery

Mental health
1

Begining with a brief history. I'm nearly 33 I've had some form of eating disorder since I was 11. I've never been diagnoised, but I have diagnoised myself with EDNOS.

At the age of 11 I began to abuse laxatives. For the most part until I was 18 this was mostly what I did to "purge".

At 18 I became anorexic. Then I started learning about purging soon after (still 18) I became pregnant the at 19 and still abused myself just a little less, but I miscarried. My now exhusband was very abusive emotionally and physically. After my miscarriage my eating disorder hit my rock bottom. By the time I was 20 I was at my lightest weight of 92 pounds (I'm 5'3&quot I ran 2 miles a day I walked all day I starved myself and if I ate anything g even if it was a strawberry I purged. And took laxatives. I lived on 4 blow pops, and 2 packs of fruit flavored mentos, and unlimited coffee and diet coke for a long time. I also took about 15 dexatrim diet pills a day, i had devloped a tolerance to them and this is when dexatrim used to have ephedra in them. One night I felt (I really believed I was) like I was dying. I got up and ate 1/2 a sandwich.

To keep myself alive I began to eat 2 pieces of bread at night (11 or later) I developed a condition known as night eating syndrome which to this day I still struggle with.

Then when I turned 21 I was going through divorce and began to drink a bit and gained a bunch of weight. My weight climbed to 135, then it fluctuated from 103 to 120 for a while. I got pregnant was determined to take care of my growing baby and gave birth to a healthy baby. Dropped back down fluctuation to 103-115 all the while continuing to abuse laxatives. I had another baby 3 years ago then i had my tubes tied and lost all my baby weight was at 109 july 2014 then I was raped. At first my weight dropped to 103 then it began to climb.... and climb... until here I am at 130. And no matter what I do I can't lose any of the weight. I work out an hour a day I limit food. And my weight will not budge. It's a struggle to even maintain the 130. It seems ever couple of months out of no where I gain 3-4 pounds around my period and it won't come back off. I know I'm holding at least 15 pounds of water weight.....

In a nut shell I've Abused laxatives (I was at 6 a day) (I've stopped and haven't had much change in my ability to "go", in fact for a few days I was going just as often. But then I began trying a "better for you laxative" milk of magnesia. An attempt to ease my way off stimulant laxatives.

I've Abused diet pills, I've abuse many pills in general, I'm still purging from time to time, I'm being to be afraid to eat because everything I eat makes me insanely bloated and gassy (I attempted raw low fat vegan and fruitarian) bloat and gas and no change in my weight. I haven't had more than 800 cals (a day) in the last 4 days and my weight won't budge.

So my question is what are the potential problems (health wise) someone like myself after abusing there body over the years so that now they can't control their weight at all? I've been trying to lose weight since I began putting the weight on 1 1/2 years ago... I know I'm not consuming many calories I know I'm moderately active so what gives? I have an appointment with my doctor in 2 days but she hasn't been able to help me with a diagnoisis yet, I think my issue is beyond her, I'm trying to think of who I can request a referral to go see. A GI tract specialist is all I can think of, but I'm so desperate to get a handle on this problem and I can't seem to. There has to be some medical reason as to why I can't lose weight anymore, because I am doing the working out and practically starving thing and nothing is working.

Someone please point me in the right direction

2

Hi Bobbi - I will write a proper response to this later, but please could you repost without the numbers e.g. how many laxatives, and so on.

It's fine for me, and I understand your pain, but someone reading it in the thick of their eating disorder might try to copy the numbers, hence it's never a good idea to post figures and diets.

As said, I'm sorry to hear about the above and I'll respond properly later after work.

I have a lot of things which will help.

3

It's like you told part of my story. I'm sorry all you have went through. Recovering addict, active bulimic and anorexic. I used to night eat, only because that's when I feel most relaxed after I take my meds. I started gaining weight this way. Also after having my 3rd child and a back surgery my metabolism started slowing down. Now I'm in a vicious cycle again 😕

Wish I had more advice but I can only offer support and understanding

4

Hi Bobbi83, 

Our eating disroder stories are very similar. I have struggled with laxative abuse, anorexia, over exercise, and also night eating (which I have never heard of anyone else that has struggled with that and actually called it that). I actually was searching for eating disorder forums to seek other's experiences with the effects of laxative abuse. I have been abusing laxatives for over 4 years. I won't post any numbers, but let's just say I was taking A LOT daily. I have been able to reduce down to a much lower number, but have had a lot of trouble weaning myself off the last little bit. However, about a year ago I was going to the bathroom (sorry, tmi) and when I pushed, I noticed that it felt like my insides were coming out. I freaked out, but was able to push it back inside of me. I researched it and learned that it was likely a prolapsed rectum (aka. my rectum coming outside of my body). This causes a number of things, including fecal incontenece. Of course, the laxatives kind of do that already anyway, but from the research I have done the only way to correct it is through surgery. I am freaking out because of the idea of needing surgery, not only because it's surgery, but also because of the financial aspect of it. I have not told ANYONE, not even my doctor that I've been dealing with this. I know I need to, but I'm afraid of their reaction. Anyway, I was initially just seeking out other's experiences to see how they dealt with this issue, but I also wanted to warn others and explain that their are SERIOUS complications from abusing laxatives. I really feel that if I had known that something this serious could happen, that I would have been much more determined to discontinue using them earlier on or ever using them at all. 

I am so sorry for all that you have gone through and hope that you can find some peace and help. Are you seeing a counselor? WIth everything you have gone through, processing everything would be a good thing for sure. Best of luck.