What happens next?

It's been a little over two weeks since I first shared my bulimia struggles with you. It's been fifteen days (to be exact) that I first admitted I am not perfect to the world. I know not everyone is reading this, but it sure feels like it. I've thrust myself into the open, spilled my biggest secret and have become vulnerable.

It's been awfully scary. But also pretty freaking cool.

When I first had the idea to write this blog, my biggest hesitation came from a fear that people (readers) would treat me differently. Would people suddenly deem me inadequate to be their friend? Would my friends scrutinize each piece of food I put into my mouth? Would each trip to the bathroom leave someone wondering what exactly I was doing in there?

It was possible. In fact, it's still possible. BUT it's also something that I've accepted.

Before I launched my first post I told myself that if anyone made a mean comment or acted differently towards me, they didn't deserve to be part of my life. Harsh? Yes. But it brought comfort.  No matter how hard we try to think otherwise, what people think of us does matter.

I was worried that people would think I wasn't "skinny" enough to have an eating disorder, that maybe I was starving for attention, or being uber dramatic. I voiced these thoughts to my family, my friends, my eating disorder group and one by one, my fears were put to rest.

"Emily, you have to do it," they all said.

So I trusted their advice ... and did.

But now what?

With over 3,500 page views as of this morning, I feel overwhelmed. Actually, I've felt pretty overwhelmed since the first few text messages came through, encouraging me that this was amazing.

My mom warned me that a lull would hit. That the time would come when my adrenaline rush from the first few posts would wear off and I'd be left with just myself. I think that's where I am now.

Thanks mom, once again you're always right.

I'm suddenly worried that each post won't be better than the one before that - that what I'm saying may have been new, exciting and fresh at first, but is now just another crazy thing Emily once did.

Only I must continue. It's the lull, confusion, and uncomfortableness that often lead us to the change we've been looking for. It doesn't feel easy, it doesn't feel good. It sure as hell doesn't feel perfect - but I think that's how it's supposed to feel.

So, though you've all been beyond kind in offering your words of support for As Told By Emily ... It's time I start cheering on myself.

This morning, as I was reading my latest favorite blog The Wunder Year, I came across this quote.

"A friend once pointed out to me when I was insisting that I couldn’t do something, that the way we speak to ourselves would sound absurd if we spoke the same word’s aloud to somebody else."

So while I'm struggling to support, accept, and continue this change within myself, I have a good feeling that if I imagine what you would say to me, I wouldn't even consider stopping.

And that's important. Because we aren't in this alone.

I think one of the most useful tools I've ever been given by my therapist, the one and only Staci, is to imagine myself as a young child.

"Emily," she'd say, "Imagine yourself as a four-year-old child, maybe even a ten-year-old, looking at yourself in a mirror. As you pick apart your stretch marks, cellulite, and body fat ... what would twenty-one-year-old Emily say to this little girl?"

I'd protect her, I'd cheer her on, I'd tell her she's crazy. It's what I would tell anyone in that situation. It's what's true.

Em, you're still the same person as you were when you used to barricade yourself in your bed with your stuffed animals, unable to sleep otherwise. You know how to protect yourself.

The first time my parents told me I had to remove those stuffed animals, that sleeping with twenty toys in bed can't possibly be comfortable, I lost it.

No, I thought. This is what keeps me safe, this is how I must sleep, anything else will produce a night of terror.

I'm only now realizing that really, all I needed was myself - and that's still holds true today. 

Here's to being our own biggest fans.