“Pro Anorexia on Xanga and Across the Web” Comments, Page 7

95 Responses to “Pro Anorexia on Xanga and Across the Web”

1. 

   Hayley

   15th December 2005

   61

   Hey Guys im 15 Im an a aussie… OMG i luv this site!!:) I hate people that are anti ana so stop bagging us!!! I ve been ana 4 about 1 year.. & i understand all of u guys being ana is so hard!! I got 2 my lowest point where i couldnt take being fat any more!! & i hated my family they would tell me lies like ur just big boned!! (that was the biggest lie & i hated em 4 that) im still slowly losing the weight its just really hard trying 2 hide it from ur friends & family!! 2 people out there who want 2 become ana i tell u this ask ur self this Q How much do u really want 2 b thin??? coz being ana is really difficult but if u want it bad enough u can become the person u want 2 be & dont let anyone hold u down if people comment there jealous & just ignore them!!! memba ana is a friend she will take away ur biggest insecurity being FAT… ana is a life threatning disease but so is being obeast so u choose!!! i cant stop being ana so i will live with it & embrace it 4 eva!!! peace out
   
   
2. 

   Robby

   16th December 2005

   62

   Okay you know what? it disgusts me how pathetic and low people are. And why are girls doing this? because we are loaded with images are that potrayed as beautiful as in being 10 pounds. YOu know what, i was ANA. i loved it. i loved being thin.i was like this for 2 and half years and let me tell you. That is the most f**** pathetic situation any person can be in. You dont have to be 10 pounds to be beautiful. I realized that when i was sitting in a hospital almost near death and im still recovering. ITs the hardest thing in my life to deal with but i am in total disgust for you “ana’s” out there. thats NOT beautiful. Its morbid and absolute s***. Your ugly. IM NOT BEING MEAN. THATS UGLY. YOUR UGLY. you wanna be beautiful? BE YOU. THE REAL YOU. NOT ANA. F**** REALIZE THAT. SERIOUSLY.
   
   
3. 

   Holly

   17th December 2005

   63

   Bobby, actions speak louder than words. Even if the words are in all caps, derogatory, and filled with foul language. Amongst all the insults, you want to convince me I look beautiful as I am? The actions I am referring to that are louder than your words are the actions of my own husband who cannot climax while making love to me unless I tell stories about skinny women… or if he is looking at magazines with their bony pictures. Or the fact that I am the wallflower at Christmas parties and I remember being the life of them when I was skinny before children. I remember when sales clerks would fall all over themselves to serve me. Now I must patiently wait my turn for the beautiful people, and even then I am annoying them with my presence. You can leave the caps lock on for the rest of your life, and your words will never outweigh those experiences.

   Referring back to the article written by Greg Maulhauser, “The strong initial judgement against the pro anorexia perspective which I have read expressed on so many anti-pro sites is, to my mind, a highly effective means of ensuring that few if any individuals inclined in a pro anorexia direction will ever stick around long enough to take their messages seriously.”

   He also said that such words might “risk implicitly perpetuating an anti-therapeutic relationship between the potential pro ana and the rest of the world.”

   I felt safe to post here because of his plea to the world “to attempt to understand how the world looks from the other person’s perspective.” I desperately wanted my perspective considered. I want you to help me be happy again without being skinny again. Your words have just convinced me that that cannot happen. Was that your intended message? If not, please consider rephrasing.
   
   
4. 

   Managing Editor

   19th December 2005

   64

   Hi Holly,

   I’ve really been struck by your descriptions of how approval and respect and value have so often wound up being conditional upon looking a particular way. Whether individual people have done that intentionally, or whether it was just a side effect of “the way things are”, that has been your experience, and you’ve articulated it very clearly and movingly.

   As you’ve described it, trying to look a particular way seems like a natural way to ’satisfy’ the conditions and get that approval or respect or value. If I could just set aside temporarily the question of whether trying to acquire a life-threatening illness is a good way to do that (as you know, I don’t personally think that it is), I wonder about a different question: could there be any other ways of managing what seems like the conditional nature of the respect and approval and value you get from the outside world? Can you imagine a brighter future brought about because something else was different, apart from your having become anorexic? Could anything be different in your relationship with your husband? Could anything be different in terms of how you regard your own value — i.e., in your own eyes — that could enable you to feel valuable and respected regardless of whether the sales clerks are falling over themselves to serve you? Could you imagine yourself being happy with you, independently of how you compare with the girls in the magazines? If the answer to any of those is ‘yes’, I hope they might be worth exploring, at least hypothetically, as some other potential ways to address the way things seem to be at the moment.

   As this is a public website, and not by any means private or safe, I wouldn’t necessarily expect you to reply in any great deal — or even to reply at all, unless you really want to — but I just wanted to offer these questions as possibilities.

   All the best,
   Greg
   
   
5. 

   Holly

   20th December 2005

   65

   Greg,

   Thank you for your polite response. I realize you left your question open-ended because the answer would be different for each individual reading the post. I would like to answer in an open-ended manner as well for the same reasons.

   You knew before asking the question that the answer was yes. If I were your patient answering no, your next step would be exploring ways of developing self-confidence in me until I could answer yes. Yes is an open ended answer itself, but I want to communicate more detail.

   I worked hard to get exactly what I wanted out of life, and I succeeded in attaining it. For the few short years that I had it, I never took it for granted and enjoyed every minute. It was ripped away from me in a manner that would insure I would never see it again. Not coincidentally, this was when I started having problems with obesity. Obesity is a deadly eating disorder too. Right now a family member is in the ICU again because of obesity. We think she might really die this time. Obesity and anorexia are two sides of the same ‘unhealthy relationship with food’ coin. I just wish I got the other side of the coin for the reasons I have already mentioned.

   So now you would recommend finding another open-ended “it” to bring me self-worth? It would be easier if I were a man. The feminist movement worked so hard to make women acceptable in the workplace that they actually lessened the social value of motherhood in the U.S. Even in the workplace the measurement for social value, salary, is less fore women than it is for men. The only profession where women make more money than men is prostitution. If you want to sell something, it will sell better if you use a scantily clad woman to hawk it. All societal measures of value point right back to the skinny body for a woman. Having exhausted all other avenues, if I cannot find a way to develop anorexia, I do not see a reason to exist. You encouraged me to look for ways to find value in myself outside of society. Please tell me how on earth that can be done.
   
   
6. 

   Managing Editor

   21st December 2005

   66

   Hi Holly,

   Without delving into the details here on the website, I get the impression you’ve had some pretty big events to deal with, and finding yourself in an ‘unhealthy relationship with food’, as you described it, happened around the same time as losing some things that were really important to you. Now, as if to add insult to injury, you find the world around you telling you that what it really values is skinniness — and that’s not something you’re offering it right now.

   You used that phrase “societal measures of value” and wondered how on earth to find value in yourself outside of society. When I mentioned finding value in your own eyes, it was just that sort of distinction I had in mind: the distinction between self-value that derives from what somebody on the outside says or believes about you, and self-value that derives from what you believe about you. I may have really misunderstood you, but I do get the sense that actually, you do value yourself in at least some ways — the very fact that you are willing to put the effort into articulating what you have, the fact that you are actively entertaining the possibilities for your own sake, these things say to me (I think, anyway!) that you believe you do have some intrinsic value that is independent of judgements from the outside world. Am I wrong about that?

   If that’s somewhat on track, could that intrinsic sense of self-worth be something you feel you could build on, as an alternative to modifying yourself in order to acquire more positive judgements from the fickle outside world? (And I do mean that as a real question: I accept that you very may well feel the answer is ‘no’, and prefer to do what you can to get more of that self-worth via the outside world.)

   As I’m writing this simultaneously for you as well as for any others who might happen along and read this, I feel a little awkward about what I’m saying — as if there’s too much explication (intrinsic, extrinsic, yada yada yada) and not enough focus on you. I would imagine you’ve already thought about it, but if not, I would urge you to consider working with a counsellor or therapist directly, where you could have some space to explore the kinds of things you’ve written about here in a safe and pressure-free environment, and where the focus could be entirely on you.

   All the best,
   Greg
   
   
7. 

   Louiseanna

   27th December 2005

   67

   hey, im louiseanna and after reading all of these comments, i think it is sooo stupid that a person would like to become anorexic. from my experience of suffering from bulimia i can say that you do not get attension for doing this to yourselfs. well the attension can be negative. in the long run as i have found out, you end up putting more weight on and suffer serious effects. my mother was anorexic at the age of 17 and this continued until she was 19. at the age of 37 she became anorexic again and sadly passed away when i was only 11. i think this was the cause of my over eating. i did not want to become anorexic like my mother so insted i over ate and became bulimic. i would like every person to consider what they are getting themselves into before choosing to become bulimic or anorexic. it is not something to be proud of. there are many different ways to loose weight with out all this starvation. a healthy balanced diet is all you need with light exersise. to gain weight, a person must eat over 3500 calories a day- 3500 calories is equal to 1 lb in weigh. soo if you stick to the healthy 2000 calories a day (for women) and 2500 for men then you shouldnt gain any weight! simple. and if you want to loose weight all you have to do is cut down the calorie intake a day by 500, ie a women would be eating 1500 calories a day and loose a successful amount of weight. i no longer suffer from bulimia, as i have had therapy for the past 2 years. this is not cheap and did take alot of my time!! soo to all you out there- just re think ur ideas. please xxxx
   
   
8. 

   Jordan

   28th December 2005

   68

   listen im 13 and i way 145 im going to become anrexica and there is noting anyone is going to do about not even my family
   
   
9. 

   youre all dumb

   28th December 2005

   69

   you guys need to seriously shut up. if someone thinks they’re fat then whatever you tell them isnt going to change it.

   your wasting your time and energy typing away at this useless information.

   im not going to state whether or not im bulimic/anorexic but i will tell you that whatever your putting on here is not reaching out to anyone.

   i will be studying psychology in college and i have had many problems as a teen but when i would read the stuff people like you put … I LAUGH.

   it wouldnt help it would just make me realize the world that you, the “normal”, people think you live in.

   and as a future psychologist, these websites do not help and will preach that once getting my masters.

   they will just make the people communicating throught online journals laugh and want to rebel more, causing more sarvation and more purging.

   im just putting this to prove you all are f**** dumb that think stating that you oppose ednos is going to help.

   IT FUELSES IT. IT FUELSES IT. IT FUELSES IT.
   
   
10. 

    T girl

    28th December 2005

    70

    Okay… I don’t agree with this pro-ana stuff. But I think it’s funny how many people can’t spell! What is “IT FUELSES IT.”. Do you mean “IT FUELS IT”?
    
    

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