Eating Disorder Help Options

[JFed19]

Hi, I am new to the board. My name is Jeff and I'm going to be 20 years old in August. I was always very happy my whole life, until I turned 16. My life completely changed. Within three months I was diagnosed with depression, anxiety, irritable bowel syndrome, insomnia and A.D.D. The depression really is what lead into all of these problems. I am 6'1 and always weighed a healthy 160 lbs. The average weight for somebody of my high height with a small build is 155-170 lbs.

With all of this going on, I fell into a deep depression, I couldn't even get out of bed somedays. I was very popular in school and since I was so sick I had stopped going and wasn't going to parties and social events like I once had. I had lost a lot of my friends who believed that I was just "avoiding" them and didn't like them anymore. This only made me hurt more.

The summer going into my senior year of high school was really the turning point. I became so deeply depressed I was put on 200 mg a day of Zoloft, and was given Xanax, Klonopin and Aderal. Needless to say they surpressed my appetite so much.

I had gone from 163 lbs (the exact weight at my last physical) to 138 lbs in one summer. I was literally a skeleton. Rumors spread like wild fire throughout my high school that I was using drugs and that I had an eating disorder. At the time the rumors were hurtful because neither were true, but once all the attention came rushing back to me, I couldn't help but want to lose more weight.

On graduation night I weighed 132 lbs, less than 85% of the recommended weight for somebody my size, which legally placed me into the diagnosis of anorexia.

After consulting another physician, they found out that I was misdiagnosed, and that what I was actually suffering from was bi-polar disorder. I gained weight back to 154 pounds, but have stopped taking my medicine because its increasing my appetite and now I am deathly afraid of gaining weight. I went on the weight watchers diet and exercise regularly and have dropped back to 143 lbs, but I can't help but set my goal weight shorter and shorter.

Is there any advice I can get?

[JFed19]

being bi-polar doesn't mean you have mood swings. it has been very played up in the media. in medical terms it is called manic depression. the dopamine levels in your body are so high that it wears your body down so much and with the depression it makes you very deeply depressed. its at these times that a person can develope schizophrenia. generally the average person with bi-polar disorder becomes more impulsive and finds it hard to make decisions. they become perfectionists and they develope strong obsessive compulsive tendancies.