Anonymous Story

From around the age of 13, I really began to struggle with my mental health due to issues at home. This led to me comfort eating a lot and gaining a considerable amount of weight. This only made my mental health worse and it became a vicious cycle of feeling low and eating, then feeling lower. I really began to hate myself and even hurt myself to try to relieve these feelings. At around 15, I decided to lose the weight I had gained and became extremely obsessive with counting calories and exercising as much as possible; this led to me losing around 30kg. Looking back, I don’t how I remembered but I could recall the calorie content of every food I or others around me ate. I went to counselling to try to get to the root of why my mental health had plummeted in the first place. While I thought I had dealt with many of the issues, I was still extremely conscious of my body image to an obsessive extent.

It wasn’t until I went to university and was introduced to lifting weights that I started to move away from this unhealthy obsession. I found lifting weights enjoyable and liked the way I felt and looked fitter in the mirror. I have never lifted super heavy weights, but just shifting to a more weightlifting-focused routine helped me feel better about how I looked. I also began studying for a BSc in Sport and Exercise Sciences, which allowed me to understand food and exercise better. I gradually became more relaxed about what I was eating and my body image. Ultimately, this has led to me gaining around 10kg of my weight back. I don’t feel a strong hatred towards myself for this, which I definitely would have 6 years ago. I am now a much healthier weight and much happier in myself. Fitness and learning more about the gym has really helped me to establish a more positive attitude towards myself and my body image.

Although sometimes it seems like your problems aren’t getting the better of you, there’s always a solution and always someone to talk to. It’s so important to talk to people you trust about what’s going on because there is always someone to help. I’m usually quite a private person and I don’t like to tell everyone my personal life, which is completely fine. As long as you have someone you can trust to open to, that’s what helps to prevent people suffering in silence. Mental health is super up and down for everyone and it is perfectly fine to need a little bit of help from time to time. I really wish I had been told that it’s normal to experience bad mental health sometimes because I always felt like there was something wrong with me. My overall advice would be to be patient with yourself and try to understand that you’re doing an amazing job, even when you don’t think you are. Even if you’re taking baby steps to help improve your mental health, that is still amazing!