Clink, Clink!

Being anorexic and in college is weird in so many ways. But specifically in the realm of alcohol. I’m not a big party girl but I don’t mind getting a little tipsy with the girls every once in a while. But alcohol is so high in calories! Not. Fair. How am I supposed to have fun and stay skinny, amirite!?

My thought process before a typical night drinking goes like this:

“Don’t drink, that is too many calories and you DON’T need them, you’re already fat enough.”

“But if you drink toooo much you’ll throw up and get rid of pretty much everything you ate today, so pull the trigger and let’s do some shots bayyybeeee!”

“Okay, Ash, calm down. Your ex from senior year of high school not going to re-fall in love with you over this drunk snapchat.”

“Jokes on you sober Ash, he’s going to realize all he missed while I’m sitting in this apartment with your eyes going two different ways and your shirt falling off.”

“Well, now that you’re drunk and clearly don’t care about your body at all, maybe you should smoke a little too.”

“Woooowwww, the world is spinning and time is going by so slow. Why is time a thing? I might be the most insightful person ever. But you should go eat some tater tots.”

“Wow, never heard a better idea. I should probably sleep on this beautiful oh so soft bathroom floor too.”

And then I wake up the next day!

Now, I missed a couple parts. Mostly the parts where I talk about all my secrets, like my shitty childhood and how people keep CLAIMING I have an eating disorder when really I CLEARLY do not. LOL. But like, back to the calories.

Anorexia takes so much from you. Fun times, friends, literally everything. Before I go out, or even to my brother’s apartment during this quarantine, I have to freak out and plan out my drinking. That’s not normal. On my 21st birthday, I had to convince myself it was okay to let myself go for one day. It was my freaking birthday!! Granted I have two drinks and my mindset completely changes, the hours leading up to those drinks are filled with panic.

This particularly impacted me before my sorority date party. I was worried the whole day. Do I eat so I don’t get trashed after a shot? Do I not eat and save those calories for alcohol? Do I cut myself off? Shit, I should just stay home and not go and avoid all of this. Luckily I went. And I ate. And I drank. But it was not that easy. I could have easily refused to go. Shout out to my “date” who ditched me two hours before the party and gave me the prime opportunity to miss out on what was one of my favorite nights. I ate a little before the party, meticulously counting my calories and making sure I fit into my favorite XS dress. My date ditched me so I laid on the floor doing an ab workout, calling my family to complain, and hoping I could get skinnier before I had to go embarrass myself and tell all of my perfect sisters that my really attractive date cancelled on me. It was so awful. I’m already so insecure and this guy I had genuine interest in, waited until 6p.m. to tell me he had no interest!? What an ass but also I took it so personally. What was wrong with me? Did he really think I was so bad that he couldn’t be seen with me? I must be the ugliest, fattest, most worthless chick ever. But aside from my self pity, I put on my makeup and picked up my newg with her date. We went to my place and started drinking. Luckily my newg knew a guy who’s date cancelled and he went as my date, after I promised him all my liquor as a compensation for having to be seen with disgusting me.

We pregamed the pregame then headed out to meet up with the sisters. My new date got kicked out of the pregame because he was so effed up but we got some cute pictures before. So then it was just me, my bestie, Hayley, and her date. We really had a great time, we went to the bar, saw people, took pictures, then I lost my friends on their drunken quest to the bathroom. I made a lot of new connections in my loneliness though. A friend of a friend, who was also a sister, bought me a drink because men are trash and I “deserved better.” I had a date for a little while that I actually kind of liked. But most importantly I made great connections with my sorority sisters.

My eating disorder was with me the whole time. Counting the calories, refusing to drink a whole margarita because calories and sugar and “think of what the scale will say tomorrow” but I also lived a little. I did drink. I did force myself to put my anxiety and shame aside and go to the party after being rejected by someone I was into. It’s small recovery wins that add up to big ones. Alcohol is fun and it has calories. But such is life. You have to have fuel to have fun and though I’m not saying you should rely only on the energy of alcohol, a drink or two or seven won’t be the death of your eating disorder and if it is, didn’t you have fun when it died?