"My Baby Saved
My Life"
A Story About Bulimia and Pregnancy
by Fatima Catangay
What made me do it this time? It's been months since I did it last
time and it was then when I promised myself that I would never do
it again. Last time I got very sick. I was so sick I had to go home
to have my mom help me with my 8th month old son.
I could barely talk. My throat was stinging. I would cringe every
time I swallowed food. My mother encouraged me to see a doctor, but
I gave every excuse not to. What if the doctor knew what I was doing
to myself? I would be so embarrassed. What would I say?
I went into the bathroom to see if my throat looked as bad as it felt.
It looked worse! White patches covered the back wall of my throat
and my tonsils seemed to have disappeared. They must have deteriorated
from all the acid that came up while I threw up meal after meal after
meal.
I'm in my 20's years old now, and I started binging and purging my
first year of college.
It was odd how it all began. A younger cousin of mine who has always
been heavier than the rest of the cousins slept over my home one night.
My cousin's mother called the house yelling at my cousin. Apparently
she has been calling her cell phone many times throughout the day.
My cousin forgot to charge her phone that day and did not receive
a single call. Her mother was infuriated! My cousin apologized over
and over again. She hung up the phone and buried her face in the pillow.
"It's okay! Your mom's just trippin', she'll get over it, you
know how it goes," I said. "She's so mean to me, I just
want to die." "Don't say that, everything we'll be back
to normal soon, just watch," I replied. "My mom hates me,
I do everything wrong, she hates everything about me, how I look..."
she pauses and cries some more. "What?" "I've been
throwing up all my food for more than a year now Ate! I want my mom
to love me!" "What?" "Haven't you noticed I got
skinnier?" I totally noticed how drastically my cousin changed.
She probably went from a size 13 to a size 5. I felt very bad for
her, but didn't know exactly how to respond. "You can't do that
to yourself anymore, your teeth will rot and all your insides will
get screwed up. Just focus on school, get your grades up, and then
you can move out of the house like I have. It works, it really works.
Your mom will miss you and you'll make her so proud."
Would you believe that through that experience I ended up throwing
up my food the very next night? Here, I was consoling her through
her terrible situation, and the next thing, I went and did the very
same thing she was doing. It's very twisted, I know.
I continued to purge throughout college. I began losing weight after
about a week of purging. Did anyone notice? Not really. I would go
into the bathroom after eating and run the water so no one would hear.
I would do this at restaurants, at home, everywhere?
After a couple of months I noticed a white ring of dry skin around
my mouth. The corners of my mouth became sore and cracked very easily.
Some mornings I could barely open my mouth to brush my teeth. My throat
was always scratchy and my teeth were turning yellow. I was always
tired and extremely on edge. My emotions were intense. I would snap
at my parents and throw attitude at my boyfriend at the time. It was
weird. I was achieving the look I wanted, but I was more insecure
than I have ever been.
The following morning after throwing up my food I would wake up swollen
and hungry as hell. The first thing I would do was eat. My stomach
was empty and I couldn't control my hunger at all. The purging started
early in the morning and lasted until after my midnight snack. It
was a tiresome process, but I could not stop. There were days where
I would not purge, but I would feel disgustingly guilty about how
much I ate that the next day I would not eat until I couldn't stand
it anymore, eat and then purge again. It was ridiculous.
Things didn't change much the next few years. It slowed down a little
bit, especially when I came into a new relationship. This person whom
I met really liked me, he gave me so much attention. I was more myself
in this relationship, which made me less stressed about staying thin.
The bulimia subsided after a couple months of being in a healthy and
loving relationship. Until, my life turned upside down.
After a few years of being in a committed relationship, my partner
and I made love for the first time. A month later I went into the
doctors because I was feeling sick. This was during a time where meningitis
was going around and everyone was feeling extra cautious. My mom advised
me to see a doctor. I went in and was checked out by a nurse practitioner.
I told her that I have been getting headaches pretty bad for the last
few weeks and that it might be from my wisdom teeth coming in. The
nurse practitioner considered that to be a possible reason for my
headaches but asked me to take a pregnancy test anyway because my
symptoms could point in that direction. I laughed, but took the test
anyway.
Five minutes after she took my urine sample from and had it tested,
she returned to my room. "Turns out you are pregnant. Do you
have someone here that can pick you up? You have options. You can....."
The rest of the conversation is a blur to me. I just remember my sight
becoming hazy and that I kept on asking her if I can leave for a second.
I called my partner. I only received his voice mail. I called his
brother and got through. "Can you please call your brother and
have him meet me at Kaiser? It's really important!"
My partner met me at Kaiser. I told him. He hugged me. We cried together
in the waiting room. "What do you want to do?" "I don't
know, what do you want to do?" "It's really your decision,
I'll support you no matter what."
All I wanted to do was call my mom. "I want to call my mom, I
want to call my mom, please!" "Let's talk first about what
we want to do and then call our parents," he said. I persisted
to cry out, "Let me call my mom!" I knew I had to tell my
parents immediately after finding out. My partner was by my side when
I a called my mom. I was crying before she had even said hello. She
asked me what was wrong. I said to my mom, "I missed my period."
I could not bring myself to say that I was pregnant because the word
"pregnant" implied that I had sex. Even though my family
isn't the totally traditional Filipino family, it was understood that
having sex before marriage is absolutely forbidden.
"You missed your period?," my mom replied. It took her
a minute to make the connection between missing my period and being
pregnant. This is typical of our conversations, always referring to
uncomfortable topics in a very roundabout fashion. It is amazing how
we managed to avoid uttering the words pregnant in sex in our hour-long
conversation. She referred to having sex as "it" or "that."
"How can you do "that!" "I thought you were smarter
that to do "it."
I struggled with a decision for two long weeks. I asked everyone to
leave me alone and allow me space to decide for myself. It was one
of the hardest decisions I had ever made. My mother, father, and brother
did not want me to go through with my pregnancy. "You have so
much potential, I would not want to see you struggle at all!"
My partner said, "You are the strongest person I know, if you
don't think you could handle it then maybe you're right, but deep
down inside I know you will make the best mother and I the best father,
but I support you." His parent's remarked, "We don't believe
in abortion in our family, babies are blessings, we'll help you."
My cousin said, "No matter how much we will all support you,
you will be the one raising your child, not anyone else."
At one point I couldn't take things anymore, I just drove to the clinic
with the idea that I was going to get my pregnancy terminated. I didn't
tell anyone, not even my partner. My plan was to get an abortion and
then tell everyone I had a miscarriage. I was fearful of everyone's
reaction. It felt like the only solution.
I arrived at the clinic, surprisingly, very calm. I guess I felt that
going through with the abortion would fix everything. I went in and
was greeted by a very nice nurse. She sat me down on the examining
chair. She lifted my shirt and exposed my belly. The nursed then smeared
some cold jelly on my tummy and proceeded to do an ultrasound. I lay
back staring at the ceiling until she turned the ultrasound screen
towards me. "There's your baby she said nonchalantly." I
looked and it took my breath away, literally. I smiled.
"Really? It's so little. How many weeks am I now? "Eleven
she said." "Eleven!!!" The nurse practitioner at the
hospital said I was five. "Nope you're definitely eleven weeks.
She proceeded to show me how this is determined by measuring the fetus.
"So when would you like to come in and have the abortion?"
I replied, now a little unsure, "Can I call you back tomorrow
and schedule an appointment?" "Okay, but I strongly urge
you to come in within a day or two or the process will be totally
different since you'd be in your second trimester. "Okay."
The drive home left me more confused than ever. I called my mom again
and told her the situation that I was 12 weeks and not 5 weeks like
we initially thought. I couldn't possibly make a decision that quickly.
The answer she was so stuck on before became hazy for her as well.
I went home and wrote out why I should and why I shouldn't keep my
baby. After hours of going back and forth I had made a decision.
I decided to keep my baby.
The following day I phoned my partner and gave him my decision. He
was ecstatic to say the least. I had never seen so much joy and relief
in his eyes. "I love you, let's get married!" "What?!"
I exclaimed. "Marry me? I've been asking you to marry me way
before all this ever happened, you know it, marry me? In my head I
was thinking, "geez give me a break, I just made the biggest
decision in my life and then you throw this one at me?"
After about two weeks of serious thought I said "yes." I
called my mom and dad first. They were very supportive. I did not
have the heart to tell my older sibling so I had my mom call them.
Even though getting married felt like a good decision, I was still
hesitant and extremely overwhelmed. My mom told my aunts and a few
of my cousins that I was planning on getting married, but the pregnancy
was a secret from all. My cousins then called me and then I told them
my decision. They were confused and almost as overwhelmed as I was.
Nonetheless, they supported me.
The overall feeling of getting married and even being supported by
my family was how I ever thought it would be. I didn't just want to
be supported through my decision; I wanted everyone to be excited,
ecstatic, and overjoyed. But the news came out of nowhere so what
could I expect.
Since I was pregnant I wanted to get have our wedding as soon as possible
before I blew up. We scheduled our wedding for four months away. My
mom said that we could plan everything perfectly in that amount of
time and I will still not show. Sounded like a good plan.
Until my appetite grew and grew. I was hungry pretty much every two
hours. I would eat anything and everything. I did make an effort to
eat healthy though. But I craved burgers, fried food, pizza, like
you wouldn't believe. After eating I would sleep for two hours. After
about a week I gained 12 pounds. Later during that first trimester
morning sickness started to kick in fast. Fried foods, creamy foods
would make me queasy. The only thing that didn't make me feel nauseous
was fruit. So I ate basketfuls of strawberries and gallons of orange
juice, and water of course.
Even though I was eating super healthy at this point I was gaining
weight like you wouldn't believe. I think a lot of it was water weight.
I was growing more and more paranoid, after all, my wedding was now
three months away and my pregnancy was to be a secret. I notice a
little pooch in my belly forming and that scared me half to death.
I was feeling pretty obsessed with my body changing so rapidly.
Morning sickness for most is a nightmare, for me, it was horrible
too, but what it did serve was an excuse to throw up my food. Everyone
around me understood and sympathized. I didn't even have to sneak
way to do it either.
I convinced myself it was normal to throw up. I blamed it on the morning
sickness. Right after I throw up, I would look in the mirror and say
to myself, "what kind of mother am I to be doing this to myself
and my child?" The tremendous amount of guilt I felt was haunting,
but as many of those who have dealt with eating disorders know, guilt
can trigger or intensify bad habits. That's exactly what happened
to me.
I went in for periodic doctor visits. I would ask the doctor if my
baby is receiving adequate nutrition even when I throw up almost everything.
She said yes, but only for the first three months. She said that during
the second month, babies grow the most dramatically and really rely
on my food intake. She also said that the morning sickness subsides
almost immediately once the second trimester begins.
It was that doctor visit that probably saved my baby. I stopped throwing
up that day. I started doing yoga and walking with my husband every
night. The activity really gave me the strength to feel good and become
less obsessed with the weight gain.
About 7 months later I had my baby. I went in to labor at 3:30pm and
delivered at 5:30pm. Only two hours of labor and no drugs!
My baby came into the world totally healthy. From that time, I promised
that I would do anything and everything to take care of this child
and myself.
It was a lot tougher to keep this promise to myself. I continued to
eat often even after I was pregnant because I was breastfeeding and
when I didn't eat I would not have enough milk. But I couldn't exercise
of even take walks because I was my baby was too young to bring outside.
Not to mention I was exhausted.
The guilt with eating crept up on me again. It came stronger and stronger
as the date of our family party was approaching. I knew everyone would
be excited to see our new baby and also see how well I popped back
into my pre-pregnancy shape. I started throwing up again. But I didn't
do it to the extent I had before. I would only throw up fried foods
or fast food, which I tried to stay away from. But still I was hurting
myself once again.
After the family party I felt good. Everyone said I looked great and
they were all so excited to meet the new member of our clan. We partied
all night.
I got sick the day after the party. I came down with a sore throat
of which progressed to a cold. My glands became so swollen especially
behind my ears and along my jaw. My scalp became very dry and flaky.
My hair started thinning out a little and I was growing very pale.
I was sick for nearly two months and during those two months our baby
came down with a cold too. I was sick and my baby was also sick. I
was tired, and completely overwhelmed. I knew that the purging pushed
me into this horrible state. I could barely function and my baby's
livelihood depended on me. How could I continue to do this? I stopped
purging.
For 8 months straight, I ate well, exercised about four times a week,
and had not gotten sick at all. I felt good, I felt as if I had conquered
my eating disorders.
The other day, I got a phone call from my mother saying the whole
family was planning on visiting me tomorrow. I was overjoyed! Later
that evening, I cleaned the entire house, ran to the grocers, stocked
up on food, drinks, and snacks. I had it all together. At about midnight,
after finishing everything around the house, I sat down in front of
the television and ate a salami sandwich, some cheetos, and a whole
tray of brownies. I threw up that night.
I started writing this immediately after I threw up. It is 2 o'clock
in the early morning and after reflecting on my whole experience I
come to a few realizations. Conquering my eating disorder is going
to take some serious focus and outside help. I cannot do this alone.
I have learned that the guilt I felt after throwing up my food pushed
my bulimia to get worse. So I am not going to feel guilty about what
I just did, I am not going to be disappointed in myself; I am just
going to get help.
I urge all those suffering or even surviving eating disorders to not
feel bad about yourself. Just speak up, get help, and break the silence.
_____________________________
Fatima Catangay is based in California.
