Before I met my husband, I’d had one other significant relationship in my life, and it was with my eating disorder. The thing about being entangled with your own illness is that you can anthropomorphize that sick part of your psyche and blame it for all your relationship problems, leaving you the victim in an abusive, manipulative partnership.
I can’t speak for everyone who has lost a chunk of their life to an ED, but this is my experience. However, now, surrounded by assisted reproductive technology print-outs and $5,000 worth of fertility medications, I can’t help but feel senseless guilt. As if I chose to prioritize a toxic beauty standard over my health and starve away a menstrual cycle that had run like clockwork since age 12.
Through the years, doctors reassured me that if I restored my weight to a “healthy” range, my period would return, and my fertility would be spared. I dutifully attended appointments, completed two intensive outpatient programs, kept food logs, reduced my exercise, and watched the scale steadily creep up—however, my period remained MIA. Over two decades, I repeatedly tried and failed to earn the prize I’d been promised, and every time I reached and maintained a goal weight but failed to regain my cycle, I slipped back into my disorder and started all over.
From 16 to 36, this dysfunctional dynamic with my body remained the primary relationship in my life outside of family. When I tried to date, the prospect of an actual human infringing on my long-term relationship with my eating disorder overwhelmed me. Somehow, someone broke through that barrier. Four years later, I’m married to that someone, sickeningly in love, happier than ever, and completely consumed by guilt, convinced my decisions led us to take up residence in the uncertain, astronomically expensive land of infertility.
Two facts are important here: eating disorders are not a choice, and neither is infertility. About 14 million people worldwide experience the former, and a startling 1 in 6 experience the latter. Every case of each is complex, nuanced, and the result of myriad factors. But intellectually, knowing these facts hasn’t halted my shame spiral, even though I know them better than most. I’ve penned so many stories on EDs, I’ve lost count. And for the last six months, I’ve contracted as an editor at Carrot, a global fertility care benefits platform that spares employees from incurring the full costs of treatments like in vitro fertilization (IVF), egg freezing, and—what I’m currently doing—embryo banking, which is the process of freezing one or more embryos to save them for future use. The irony is that as a non-full-time employee, I’m not eligible to benefit from the benefit company I contract for. I’ve never understood my Canadian husband’s gripes about this country’s tie between employment and healthcare like I do now.
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