Dying to be thin

March 1, 2010 by Haley Etchison 

Student shares her struggle to conquer an eating disorder

Amanda Sharetts is pretty.

But though she is now open about her struggle with anorexia, she says she doesn’t really remember feeling that way.

Amanda used to hear her dad make comments about her mom — “Why doesn’t she look good? Why doesn’t she look like this for me?”

And two years ago she started dieting.

“I felt like the fat friend,” she said. “I just started eating less and then I just drank coffee instead of eating so I wouldn’t have to feel that hunger feeling.”

Whenever she felt hungry, Amanda told herself, “No, you don’t need it.”

She went up to two weeks without food.

“I’d keep losing weight and I’d get on the scale and it would go down a little bit and it would like a little victory,” she said.

But she was conscious that something was wrong.

“It wasn’t really me anymore,” she said. “It felt like someone was telling me, ‘No, you don’t need that.’”

Sometimes, after going a particularly long time without food, Amanda would “snap.” She would start eating and not stop.

She recalled thinking, “Since I’ve already eaten I might as well just keep going.”

But binging made her feel out of control, so she purged.

“It would be like it was OK,” she said. “Nothing happened.”

It was about a year after her struggle began that Amanda reached out.

“I wanted help but I just couldn’t ask anyone for help,” she said.

At work, Amanda sent her mom a text message: help.

But when her mom called, she couldn’t bring herself to face the problem.

“I was like, ‘I didn’t mean to text you that. Nevermind. Sorry, nevermind.’”

By the next day she had worked up the will to talk about it.

“Next day I told her, ‘There’s something wrong and I can’t do anything and I can’t do anything and I can’t take care of myself and I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’”

Later that day, Amanda found herself on the bathroom floor, miserable, not wanting to live anymore.

She had a razor in her hand.

Looking in the mirror, she thought, “I don’t want this. I don’t want to be here.”

Somehow Amanda made it through that weekend. It was Friday when she came close to cutting herself and she couldn’t see a counselor at UNLV Counseling and Psychological Services until Monday.

When she finally spoke with a professional at CAPS, Amanda found it good to hear someone else name her illness.

“I knew I had anorexia,” she said, “but she said it to me and it was like ‘OK, now I know.’ And it’s OK that I’m not in control right now.”

The CAPS counselor told Amanda to get a physical at the Student Health Center. Amanda remembers the doctor there being so frightened by how low her heart rate was that it frightened her too.

In a condition called bradycardia, which is a common side effect of eating disorders, Amanda’s heart beat only 30 times per minute, compared to a normal rate of 60 to 100 bpm.

At the doctor’s recommendation, Amanda went the hospital.

“[At the hospital,] they were asking what was wrong and I didn’t want to tell them,” Amanda said, “but it was pretty obvious.”

She was released from hospital care after several tests and she bought a book that she thought would help her get better.

Amanda thought she could do it on her own — but then she relapsed.

She remembers thinking, “No, I’m going to gain weight if I start eating again so I don’t want to do that.”

Real help came when Amanda started attending Center for Change, an out-patient clinic in Las Vegas that helps people recover from eating disorders.

At first she attended the center from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday but was on her own during weekends as part of the Day Program.

Center for Change says this program “focuses on actively treating the illness, preventing relapse, setting goals, facing fears and accomplishing specific social, vocational and educational tasks.”

Patients participate in “individual psychotherapy, family sessions, dietary counseling, experiential groups, psycho-educational group and therapeutic meals and snacks.”

They also visit weekly with a psychiatrist, a medical doctor and a nurse.

After a while in the program, Amanda slowly cut back her visits and now she sees a therapist once a week.

Amanda has made important friends at Center for Change.

“They’re like the best kind of support because you know how each other think and what they’re feeling,” she said. “You know how perfectionist some of them are.”

Knowing how people with eating disorders often think influences the way Amanda tells her story.

She chose not to disclose her lowest weight because she says she knows someone with an eating disorder like hers who reads it would draw unhelpful comparisons.

And because she knows how difficult the journey of recovery is, she takes care in thinking about advice to give friends and family of people struggling with eating disorders.

“Show concern, but don’t accuse or judge,” she said. And refrain from ‘you should [and]shouldn’t’ statements.”

Amanda’s friends sometimes asked her what was wrong but never asked further questions once she said everything was OK. She said it would have been helpful if they had pushed her harder.

“I think it would have been the best if my family or friends would have given me some kind of pamphlet or literature for help,” she said. “That way probably would have been best to make it easy for both parties.”

Amanda recommends Center for Change and a book called “Living Without Ed,” by Jenni Schaefer, for people fighting eating disorders.

Amanda is still working through anorexia. She said some days are good, but most are bad.

She is still tempted to stop eating, but eats more now than she used to.

Some foods are safe — most vegetables, she said — but some, like any kind of candy and especially liquid calories, are completely out of the question.

The fight is not over for Amanda, but her future still looks bright.

She hopes to land a summer job with Pixar and might even start helping other people with eating disorders one day.

More than ever, it seems Amanda knows her worth.

Her words of wisdom to others: “People should just be content and be happy with who they are and what they look like. Everyone’s different. Everyone’s a different shape.”