Beautiful Blues

This is every beautifully intended comment that unintentionally, leads me to become blue. I write this post because I know and understand that your comment is completely good-natured and that a person as kind as you would want to see the detriment you may be causing to somebody who is sick in their mind and body, broken by the perplexity of their sadness, illness, and life.

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In one of my favourite TV shows, one character describes depression as being like a severed arm requiring urgent attention, but nobody can see it because all the direness is occurring inside one's head, for nobody to see. I think it's one of the most perfect descriptions of mental illness I've ever heard. This description is why I've always struggled with comments about my appearance such as 'You're looking good' or 'Wow, did you lose weight?' because I can't see why, as a society, we're focused on how others appear on the outside when they declare that inside, they're falling apart. I began to greatly appreciate comments that didn't assume everything was fine inside because of how things looked on the outside. Comments that were questions made me feel valued and understood, such as 'How are you?', 'Are you taking care of yourself?' or 'I've missed you.' Because it's easy, right, to avoid a difficult conversation because you want a face of makeup or a fake smile to mean there's no alarm bells ringing? But what if choosing easy, means you don't get the opportunity to comfort someone, love someone or save someone? Complimenting somebody with an eating disorder is more complex than you could ever realise if you don't have one. You might think you're being nice but if I had a penny for every time a 'compliment' made me relapse, I'd be one rich woman. So this is my guidebook to complimenting a person with an eating disorder because although it may be difficult, it's not impossible and everybody deserves to receive compliments, regardless of how difficult it may be.

My number one tip is to never, ever, comment on a person's body. In fact, I think this should be a somewhat blanketed golden rule in society considering how a person's body looks isn't indicative of their value as a person or their health. For example, having a slimmer body doesn't equate to being a good or a necessarily healthy person, in the same way it doesn't for a larger person. Two people may have completely different bodies but both are equally healthy. A person's body is not a measure of such things, it is far more intricate and individualised. If you want to compliment someone's appearance, instead of complimenting their body, compliment their features beyond their body. Think... their golden hair, big blue eyes or smile that lights up a room.

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The comment of 'healthy' deserves its very own segment. Health should be beautiful. Health is beautiful. But there is no doubt that this comment made to a person who is and has been suffering badly from an eating disorder is a completely uneducated comment to make. Why comment on a person looking healthy when you know they are not? It goes back to the unseen severed arm. Just because you can't see it, it doesn't mean that it's not there... Their will to starve, their lack of care towards nourishing their bodies, and their mind driving them to self-harm. There is nothing healthy about an eating disorder. This is why commenting that a person looks healthy can make them feel further unseen, misplaced and invalidated by the world than they already do. Health can be a picture. But health is never the picture of an anorexic. It's important to recognise that for the majority of eating disorder cases, it cannot be seen. There is a mere 6% of people suffering from an eating disorder who are clinically and medically underweight. It's a figure I encourage everybody to spread awareness about to reduce the immense stigma associated with this morbid disease. 

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Unfortunately, no matter what you struggle with, whether it be anorexia, PTSD or trauma, we live in a society where unhelpful comments are made by people who either don't know what to say or genuinely think they can make things better for you. I think although it's important to spread awareness, it's also important to remember that the majority of people have the best of intentions. I say this because if it's not recognised, other people's comments can be debilitating. Believe me, I've heard every single regrettable comment in the book considering there is so much misinformation spread about what an eating disorder truly is. I hope immensely that this post allows the comments to stop at me, and that I'll be the last person with an eating disorder to have been destroyed by the words of another.

Kisses & Hugs,

COS xo