Welcome to the life of a bulimic. On my right rests a grocery bag stuffed full of empty boxes. Boxes once containing chocolate-coated cakes with miniature candy eggs nestled cozily amidst milk chocolate flakes.

Now the milk chocolate pastries sit mished and mashed within my bowels, joined by strawberry breakfast sweets, chocolate-coated cookies, cream-filled mini rolls and sugary chocolate cake bars. In front of me sits a pint of vanilla ice cream.

I eat this right before it is time — time to stick a silver spoon so far down my throat that my reflexes give in and my protruding stomach finds relief, as particles of discombobulated food sink slowly into the toilet bowl.

Yet tonight the toilet bowl isn’t an option, as my other roommates are close by. A pink plastic trash bag inside my room will have to do, and I still have one more pint of ice cream to go before I can unload this emotional pain.

The first time I made myself throw up was the Easter of my sophomore year in high school. I was sixteen.

Six years ago, yet it all seems so recent.

As my mom, dad and grandparents sat around our large, mahogany dining room table engaging in syncopated conversation, I overdosed on food.

My stomach began to hurt uncomfortably, growing fuller with every bite. I nonchalantly excused myself from the table and went to my upstairs bathroom. I had tried this once before, but it didn’t work.

Maybe it would today.

So I doubled over and stuck two fingers deep down my throat. I gagged. Nothing happened.

One more time I opened wide and wedged five prickly finger bones behind my tongue. I gagged again as droplets of clear liquid hit the toilet water.

Another go. I had to try because my exhausted stomach needed deflation. In again went my hand — deeper this time.

I choked a bit.

Then, magically, up came chicken bits and celery pieces. My stomach breathed a sigh of relief as I stood looking with disbelief at the matter in the water below.

I tried a couple more times, with each go losing more undigested food. Finally I flushed the toilet and returned downstairs in a state of lightheaded bewilderment, wondering what the consequences would be of the trick I had just discovered. If only I had known.

Now I am a senior in college, still living with bulimia, wondering when, if ever, it will go away.

Sometimes I feel like I have cancer, a chronic illness, some silent tumor residing in my mind.

This thing, invisible, lives inside of me, takes over me, killing me, ruining my life, leaving me powerless, victimized and alone.

People wonder why I can’t just stop. Eat normal. Be like everyone else. But the truth is, it is not a choice.

I am an addict, craving, needing, feigning for a fix of food like a junky needs a hit of heroin or an alcoholic a taste of liquor.

All of us abusing a substance. Trying, attempting, longing to escape a world that sometimes seems too much to bear.

For me, the food, the bingeing, the purging serve as a coping mechanism, helping me numb anxiety, sadness, loneliness and anger from both the present and from the past.

I was always a perfectionist, wanting A’s on every test and feeling like a failure if I ever did anything less than perfect.

My perfection led to anxiety, an anxiety so painful I was often left silently alone in my mind, afraid to speak and worrying about literally everything.

This, combined with a controlling, sometimes verbally abusive father, and a passive, emotionally complacent mother, left me inconsolably alone. Alone with my feelings and my fears, and lost in my adolescence with little guidance or support.

It’s not that my parents didn’t love me. They did and still do. But instead of emotional embraces and affectionate words, their love comes in material ways – nice clothes, new cars, expensive vacations and hundred dollar bills.

I have also always been very self-conscious about my body. In middle school, I began compulsively exercising, feeling guilty if I missed a day at the gym.

When I was 12, I started dieting, eating fat-free foods and cutting out candy and carbohydrates, and my eating patterns became increasingly strange.

Sometimes getting up at 3 a.m. and eating huge portions of bread and strawberry jam, then fasting all day and finally filling myself with cheese and Cool Whip and turkey and peanut butter when I came home from school.

Then exercise, homework, sleep, repeat.

And, somehow, the entire time, no one ever said anything to me. My dad, ignorant of eating disorders and a stranger to his teenage daughter, certainly didn’t notice.

As for my mom, she had her own set of food issues. Once an obsessive dieter and over-exerciser, she had become an emotional eater, unable to help me, her adolescent daughter, who each day delved deeper and deeper into disordered eating.

So, at age 22, I have come to the realization that I have never known how to properly eat.

I don’t know when I am hungry. I don’t know when I am full. I am not sure how much to eat of what, and what to eat when.

I obsessively count calories and carbs, sometimes afraid to have a slice of cheese or drink a glass of orange juice. Afraid of becoming fat.

I literally have lived in a state of deprivation for years. Only recently did I begin seeing a nutritionist, and with her guidance, started eating fruit again. The last time I ate a piece of fruit was sometime in seventh grade.

During my senior year in high school, I began eating a 1,000 calorie-a-day diet. Oatmeal for breakfast. Tuna for lunch. A salad for dinner. I maintained this diet for three years.

Finally, it backfired. In less than a year, I have gained over forty pounds from bingeing, eating foods I have not allowed myself to eat in virtually half of a decade.

I feel miserable. I hate my body. I feel worthless. My size zero pants no longer fit. I constantly obsess about my weight, longing for my thinness to return.

I know it will, in time. But first, I have to learn to love myself for who I am and not for my clothing size. Easier said than done.

I started seeing a therapist in high school. One night my parents heard me vomiting. My mom confronted me about it the following morning. I had to tell her the truth.

When my dad learned of my disorder, he yelled at me violently, accusing me of being selfish, playing a game and wanting attention.

He was, at least, partially right. I was trying to get attention. In fact, I was screaming for attention, self-assurance and support.

But I will never forget his biting words, an open wound still yet to heal.

Soon college came, and my parents thought I was well, and I was afraid to tell them I wasn’t. I spent many nights alone in dorm rooms, bingeing on food I had bought from a nearby convenience store. Numbing the loneliness.

Finally, after my sophomore year, I knew I needed help. My disorder was spiraling out of control, and I realized I would never accomplish anything in my life if first I did not at least try to get well. It has been a long road.

Every week I see my therapist. Together we analyze events in my life, measuring my reactions and my feelings, trying to identify and uncover buried emotions.

I also have monthly visits with a psychiatrist and routinely meet with a nutritionist, all of whom specialize in treating patients with eating disorders.

I recently considered staying a short period of time in an in-patient treatment center. But I didn’t go. The centers are expensive: up to $40,000 for one month, and insurance is not often willing to pay. Plus, I would not have been able to spend Christmas at home with my family.

Every week, I work on small goals. Trying to eat new foods. Maybe adding some brown rice to my customary plate of vegetables. Or eating a snack between lunch and dinner.

I am also trying to cut down on what I call my “episodes” — bingeing and purging. I have gone from five days a week to two days a week. My next goal is once a week.

I am not there yet.I am aware that I may have to fight this illness for the rest of my life. It is a part of me. I accept that. It exists for a reason.

I am getting better. I have gotten better. But I still have a long road ahead.

All I can do for now is try to live in each moment, maintain awareness of my emotions, and simply take my life one day at a time.

And be patient. Be patient with myself.

Lara Farrar, a senior in the College of Communication can be reached at [email protected].