Just Five Months example essay topic

I closed my eyes and wondered how it had come to this. Just five months before, I had been a healthy, normal teenage girl with friends that I could trust and a life that I loved. Now I woke up every morning wishing I were anyone but myself. I looked back at my naked body through the mirror and did my normal nightly routine: scrutinizing every one of my physical flaws.

I saw my mother's wide hips and ugly, bony feet in me. I saw my father's corpulent arms and massive thighs intertwined in my genetics. I had worked so hard the past year to lose the fat I had been condemned for by kids since I first started school. Now I was thirteen years old and at my healthiest. However, it was at my physical healthiest that my mind set was at its unhealthiest.

I was so used to dieting that I didn't know how to stop it for fear of gaining the weight back. So I didn't. I kept losing the weight. Now here I am, every night, looking at my skin and bones, wondering how much longer it will take to lose the rest of the fat on my protruding hip bones and spine. I couldn't understand why my mom cried over me, telling me to eat; why people I didn't even know flinched when they saw me; or why every counselor at school had me seeing them more often than ever before, asking if there were problems at home. I wanted everyone to mind their own business.

This was about me. This is what I did for myself. Being thin was my award for my hard work. This was my Oscar, my Nobel Peace Prize, my Tony, and I wouldn't let anyone take that away from me. Sure it came with consequences -- all good things do. I was so cold all the time that I had to wear at least three layers of clothing (not that it helped; I didn't realize that the problem was internal).

My skin was constantly dry from lack of nutrition and scabby from when I scratched it. Hand lotion didn't help; it only seeped into the scabs and made it hurt more. My hair was falling out rapidly, and I had such thin hair that you could almost see my skull. I couldn't concentrate on anything except food. If I thought about a different subject for more than thirty seconds, I always remembered to congratulate myself.

It hurt to sit or lean against anything solid because my bone and the solid object would just pinch my skin. I couldn't rest my back on a chair because my shoulder bones were sticking out too far, but I only found these characteristics intriguing. It's what models had. I felt like a super model. The day I agreed to see a doctor for my problem was the day before Christmas. I didn't understand what any doctor could do for me.

The Irish in me made me as stubborn as a bull, and the mere thought of being made to eat had me tense. I went to the doctor on New Year's Eve, not knowing what to expect. I pulled up to a building next to a lake with beautiful rose bushes surrounding the place. I was never colder than I was that day going into the office. The next few months afterwards are more of a blur than a memory. The little that I do remember consists of tears and fighting over foods that ranged from grapes to ice cream.

What most people find pleasurable was also my worst fear and I had to experience it day in and day out. It wasn't until after I had been seeing a nutrionist for four months and a therapist for five months that I showed signs of becoming better. I started eating again, and although I still had to follow a food guide made just for myself, my life was starting to look better again. I will never be the same with food again. I will always fear that something will make me too fat and sometimes I will not eat.

However, the strength in me always overcomes the mental illness of my anorexia. I don't let magazines tell me what I should look like; I don't let the pretty thin girl at school make me feel bad for what I look like. I may not look my healthiest, but I definitely feel my healthiest and that's really all the counts. That is my true Oscar.