TW: Binge eating disorder, weight loss, fat-shaming, mention of self-harm
I used to have a binge eating disorder. Being the only stable thing in my life, I used food as a way to soothe myself whenever life became too much. My family was the same, my sister would starve herself to the point we could count her ribs while my parents would scarf down whatever they could fit in their mouths like a pack of wolves. I remember a specific event that sends shivers down my spine now that I’ve grown older. I was ten years old, stuck in the desert for 8 hours because of a flat tire and so scared I ate most of the snacks we had brought to distract myself. I ended up puking from a mix of fear and overindulgence and my first thought wasn’t horror or disgust but happiness that I had more space to finish the rest of the snacks. My parents laugh about it to this day.
My disorder used to be less noticeable. I used to be an athlete so my binges were “quirky” and necessary to maintain my muscle mass. I’d be praised for being able to eat mountains of food while still being physically fit and somewhat pretty, “you’re so lucky, I’d turn into a whale if I ate like you” was a common comment I got and I, too, was proud of my capacity to eat. All of it stopped during COVID, my club shut down and my laziness took over. I’ve never really been disciplined and have always hated competition so all things considered, I was very happy to just be sitting on my ass all day pretending to study while watching anime and reading smut.
I ended up gaining 25kg the last two years of high school. I couldn’t go to the gym because of the amount of exam preparation I had to do and figuring out what I’d be doing for the rest of my life wasn’t exactly a piece of a cake either. I was officially the heaviest I’d ever been, without the muscles to excuse it. People were now worried about me, telling me my eating had become a problem and that I should try to focus on my health. Coincidentally, all of this started when I became “ugly” in their eyes.
Despite this, I never considered myself to be ugly. I’ve never limited my definition of beauty to weight so I’ve always been confident-ish which is hard to do when you have parents that love commenting on your and other people’s bodies. While security in my looks wasn’t an issue, being secure in my femininity was an entirely different topic. I have quite a masculine build, years of swimming and having archers for ancestors caused people to mistake me for a millennial guy with a man-bun from the back several times. One of my old friends actually used to say I looked like a “buff guy playing dress-up” whenever I wore skirts or dresses and I’d laugh it off, thinking it was a bad joke and not something that would rewire my brain for the remainder of my days.
It started to become an insecurity soon enough. I grew up in very misogynistic settings, I used to sail as a child and was the only girl in the club (they had to build a female changing room just for me) and was unfortunately quite shit at the start so I was constantly being bullied by my peers for being a girl. Like bro please, I don’t suck at sailing because I’m a girl, I’m a girl AND I suck at sailing. This of course ended with me thinking that masculine = good. Being handsome is better than being beautiful because it brings me closer to being a boy and being a boy is good. I started being proud of my shoulders and height instead of insecure because it allowed me to be seen as somewhat equal to the boys my age.
Things didn’t really change until was 16-18 years old. Before, being masculine was neutral, it was me exploring my style and identity, it was me going through a tomboy phase. Now that I’m closer to being an actual adult, having masculine traits isn’t allowed. Now it’s gay and bad and embarrassing for my family— I need to think about getting a boyfriend, wearing makeup and acting more ladylike.
So of course, I decided I wanted to be beautiful. I craved femininity more than any muscle I ever had and the realisation that extra weight helped soften my features by filling my cheeks to hide my square jaw and augmenting my cup size to distract people from the wingspan I call my shoulders was like discovering a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. From the front at least, I looked feminine. I’ve been masculinised my entire life for things out of my control like my ethnic features and height as well as things within my control such as my personality (which I’m unwilling to change) and my dislike for traditionally feminine clothes and hobbies (wtf is a feminine hobby) so when my weight allowed me to be more “womanly” than I’d ever been, of course I’d want to keep it— especially since doing so allowed me to do my favourite thing: eat without guilt.
This realisation happened right around the time I got rejected by my crush so you can imagine how much that would’ve affected a teenage girl. The stress of picking a career and the sting of rejection made my binges go out of control. I started buying food and keeping it hidden away in my room until it rotted (if it survived that long), lied about my whereabouts to go to fast food chains, ate before and after each meal in order to seem as if I wasn’t eating as much and would throw food in the trash, squeeze cleaning supplies on it and then eat around it like a rodent. I even changed the settings on the scale to make it look like I wasn’t gaining any weight.
I started seeing this guy from my high school and funnily enough, what motivated me to get over BED was him thinking my stretch marks were self-harm scars. Mind you, I didn’t even get those stretch marks from gaining weight, I got them from the many growth spurts I had in a very short about of time. I’ll admit, the situation was hilarious, especially since the person it was coming from was someone I was completely indifferent to and who only wanted to sleep with me.
At first, I didn’t have the resources to get better. I gained even more weight when I went to university where the stress of living alone in a country where I didn’t know anyone, coupled with the knowledge that my french wasn’t at the necessary level to study Law caused me to eat nothing but O’tacos for two months straight. That shit is heavenly and disgusting, drunk people food at the same time. I’m genuinely salivating thinking about my usual order as I’m typing this: nuggets, spicy tenders, fries with fromagère, Algerian and burger sauce with cheddar and jalapeño bites wrapped in a tortilla topped with grilled cheese and fried onion. The food of the gods— or a depressed 18 year old girl, there isn’t really a difference between the two. I ate that shit for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day for two months straight.
December of that year, I wanted to feel like I was in control of my life, of my body, so I subscribed to the gym closest to me and have been making monthly 40 euro sacrifices at its altar ever since. It helped me clear my head and deal with stress, I wanted to replace my food addiction for a “good” addiction (no such thing) but my 8am-9pm schedule made the gym something I could only go to on the weekends, when I wanted to do nothing but relax in bed. Building the motivation I needed to consistently go was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I managed to lose some weight but gained it all back during the summer because losing weight in a country where the food taste like shit is easy, doing so in Türkiye is impossible.
While I was back home, my family had several “interventions” about my weight that were just bullying sessions. My father was the only sensible one, he offered to create a meal plan for me and lovingly referred to me as his little panda while my grandmother made jokes about me not being able to fit through doorways. My mother told me I had the “wrong” eating disorder, as if a right one exists. Sometimes, she’d walk in on me changing and blow air into her cheeks while bending her arms to imitate a bigger belly and say “This is concerning, you need to take care of yourself and stop eating.” I promise you, comparing me to a Sumo wrestler and sending me pictures of hippos with the caption “you” isn’t helping me as much as you think it is.
It took me a long time to commit to my health. The mental aspect of it was so hard, I was like a baby crying for my lost pacifier. I knew it was for the best but eating normally felt so restrictive I fell into a pattern of binging and overworking myself in the gym, knowing damn well I should be studying for finals which stressed me out more which caused me to binge. It would be the same monologue every time my mother would come visit me in France “You need to take care of yourself” and “You need to stop eating” and I knew she was right but I wanted to get better at my own pace.
I know it came from a place of love and care, it’s always that way, but I’ve told my parents on several occasions to stop commenting on my body because it was doing more harm than good. I knew I had a problem, I was also aware of what I looked like so constantly reminding me how big I am and comparing me to the Leviathan just pushed me more towards food. It’s also so much harder to get over an addiction when its object is necessary for survival. We don’t need drugs or alcohol to stay alive but food is a bare necessity and beating an addiction to it makes it 10x more challenging because you need to eat a controlled amount of it, without going overboard, for the rest of your life. You have to do it properly because eating too much or not enough will both have severe ramifications on your body in a matter of months.
I was able to have more time to work out last year, I lost a majority of my weight and by summer, I had booked an appointment with a dietitian to learn how to eat again. My experience with her wasn’t the best, she valued the speed of weight loss over the actual sustainability of the diet but at least her methods were effective (because I was starving).
In the end, I lost 13kg in two months. If Hell is real, that experience was it. I’d wake up in the morning, work out for 3 hours on an empty stomach then choose between eating a single egg or a protein bar with coffee for breakfast. Nothing for lunch of course, and only steamed vegetables or 50g of meat for dinner. My entire family was (rightfully) against this diet, they called my dietitian crazy and I basically terrorised the house the first week due to my hunger pangs. The worst part of it was watching everyone eat my favourite foods without being able to have any after months of craving them since most of them aren’t available in France.
I started thinking my family was trying to sabotage me. My grandmother, who’d been most critical of my weight gain, was now offering me home-baked sweets constantly and then saying that a piece “wouldn’t kill” when she used to chastise me for so much as looking at a slice of cake. I wouldn’t let anyone cook for me for fear that they’d put too much oil or butter, wouldn’t eat snacks that didn’t have the calories explicitly stated on the label and even then, I was scared the company was lying to appeal to so-called healthy, skinny queens like me.
Eventually, I got used to the amount I was eating and when I went back to Paris, on a call with my dietitian, she told me I’d have to maintain this rabbit diet for the rest of my life and go to the gym 5 times a week to maintain my weight loss. I laughed at her face and fired her that same day. Not only is that an unrealistic expectation to place on a full-time law student but skinny is just not worth suffering this much for.
Thankfully, I’ve managed to reach a certain level of normalcy in my eating habits with a diet consisting of healthy dishes and dessert with every meal. I’ve stopped caring this much about calories and at the very least, I don’t feel the need to hide food or eat out of the trash anymore so generally speaking, I’d say that’s a win for sure.
I still have stretch marks from my years of being overweight and while they do bother me a bit, I’m starting to see them as proof that I managed to get better. I still think about the guy and chuckle, it has even become an inside joke between my friends and I.
I still have a lot of work to do in order to get better, I struggle with food noise and at times, it feels like it won’t ever go away. Going back home definitely brings out the worst of it, especially since my father has started a new “I can eat whatever I want as long as it’s cabbage” diet. At least, he’s not forcing it on my mother or I and cooks us normal food but I’m tired of the smell of boiled cabbage.
To end this, I just want to say that if you’re reading this and can relate in any capacity, I believe in you and I know you’re going to get better. Please talk to someone you love and trust and seek professional help because letting these kind of things snowball is how people end up dead. Eating disorders are both mental and physical so it’s important to speak to both a mental health and physical health professional if you’re struggled with anything resembling one. Please don’t lose yourself in obsessing over every bite, it’s not worth it and will make your life into torture.
© 2026 C. H. Gökdemir. All rights reserved.
Cece: Unfiltered 
Leave a comment