I used to have bulimia when I was living with my parents. My mother was constantly saying that I am to obese. My self esteem was very low. I was constantly on different diets and it was my obcession at that time. Whole thing was that I was not even eating normaly. Person suppose to eat 3 times per day regularly. Not like not eating at all than eating 300 times more. After I got married my husband was not talking bad about me, he was not critisizing me, I was not pushed for perfection all the time. Plus he has culture of eating. He eats serials with milk in the morning. In the afternoon we went to restaurant and in the evening we usualy eat some salad ir half of can of soup each something like that. We also drant tea half and half because sugar makes you realy hungry. I did not have to follow any diets because after a while of eating normaly 3 times per day and nott concentrating on what I am eating all the time that thing passed on its own. I agree that eating disoder is part of our personality. when our personality changes that changes also. low self esteem can push you in eating disoder, all those models on TV and that staff.

It's a coping mechanism- we go to what is quickest to remover ourselves from the pain. My intake was restricted when I was young, it seemed natural for me to take it forward. After learning from my mother's obsession with being thin, I was unable to imagine a life where one ate three meals a day.

We do choose the behavior as a coping mechanism for dealing with emotions we can't really deal with because they are too painful to think about. Once we work on the disordered behavior and start leaving it behind, we might not be ready to deal with the emotions yet, so we choose another coping mechanism and that can be another ed, self harm, alcohol, drugs, whatever. So we need to completely deal with our emotions in order to be really able to let go of the unhealthy behavior.

Yes, my mother was obcessed with me being thin too. I would go for 3 month without eating almoust anything. Than after that I would eat like crazy everything I see. my constant thought was about food. I would skip breacfast, do not eat all day and than eating ungodly amounts of food in the evening, throwing up and eating again, never feeling not hungry.

As soon as I stoped care about being thin (my husband told that I am fine as I am) and started eat 3 times per day. That problem fixed itself. Now I have deep depression because my husband with whom I was feeling so secure and my selfesteem came to normal (we were even running for 7 years together 2miles every other day) he is possibly gay. He was forgiving me my imperfections, I was forgiving him his for long time and than finaly i came to crush and burn nerves breakdown because since i started look so good and my selfesteem improved it terned out that there were so many other men interested in me and i was so attached to my husband because of the years together as friends. My brain was not able to withstand that kind of choices. May be it was better when I was obease. At least I did not go through emotional pain I go now.