"You look better"

Those three words you look better, or any other form that brings across the same message, such as you look healthier, has taken up a whole new meaning ever since my arrival down at the intensive station. I no longer dread those words.

Last year when I tried to recover on my own, with the help of my parents through the Maudsley Method, I couldn't bare those words. Hearing them - hearing that I was getting healthier; getting my life back in a sense - was pure torture because it meant that I was distancing myself from the anorexic thoughts, behaviors, etc. Back then I was still so intertwined in my eating disorder that the thought that I was slowly returning back to my old self was anything but pleasant news. Everytime I heard a remark such as "you look better" my world shattered into a million pieces - just like that of a little child when it discovers that Santa Claus and the Toothfairy don't exist - and the negative thoughts started racing in my mind. Comments like "You're a failure for gaining weight", "See, you heard them, you're getting fat" and "Don't listen to them, they don't know what's good for you. But I do, stop eating; you don't deserve it" would circulate in my mind for hours on end after a comment regarding my eating disorder was made that was supposed to be positive.

Now, everything is completely different.

When I hear those words now, instead of being in shock and pure hatred at the person who delivered those news, I am thrilled as it means that others can physically tell that I am getting better. Like I said before, I no longer dread those words; on the contrary, I am overcome with joy when hearing them.