Just visited this website about anorexic people. Kinda disturbed by the images I've seen. The girls were really stripped down to just BONES. Hip bones and shoulder blades and skin sagging on their skeletal system.

And I'm even more disturbed by the fact that I'm experiencing some of the symptoms already (constant feeling of cold, constipation, lack of energy sometimes which makes me really cranky, lying about what I eat, compulsive exercising, restricting myself certain foods, reducing the amount of food I eat, preoccupation with calories).

And then I looked at myself properly in the mirror. I realised that my body seems to have shrunk in size. (Anorexics risk becoming shorter or more dimunitive in size; even after they're cured of this disorder, they might never grow back to their original size.)

DO I REALLY HAVE ANOREXIA?

Anorexic people are said to deny they have a problem, but if I don't see myself being an anorexic, does that mean I'm not one - or does that merely mean that I'm blind to the fact?

Sometimes, I feel guilty when I eat, like I'm not expending enough to be eating so much, so why the hell am I stuffing my fat face with food? That's what goes through my head. That's why I make sure I exercise enough to burn off all the energy I've taken in, sometimes more.

IS THAT THE WRONG WAY TO LIVE?

You can see my veins running along my arms now, and my wrist bone is protruding even more. But though my upper body may seem a little emaciated, my thighs look great. I think I'm one of those bottom-heavy people, who look fine from waist-up, but not so waist-down, with my chunky thighs (it doesn't help that I'm bow-legged too) and all that.

But my thighs were chunky in secondary school because I kept eating and didn't really exercise much right? Now that I'm exercising regularly enough, does that make it okay to eat like how I did in secondary school?

I suppose this whole anorexia crap (if that's really what it is) is more of to show those people who said I was fat how UN-fat I can be. My second aunt commented on how I was growing fatter when I was in secondary four, and so did my dad's friend (his best friend's wife who's from Dalian, China). It's like I sorta want them to feel sorry for ever saying I was fat. Now that I'm skinnier than them, they'll have to shut up - right?

But I enjoy being skinny and light. When I run, I have an extra spring. Less load to carry, you could say. And my face looks slimmer, you can see the cheekbones better because of the slight hollows beneath it. It's just the fatigue that I don't quite enjoy sometimes. I sometimes feel so weak I can't even walk. And then I get really cranky and people around me - usually my dad - get affected. And then everyone's in a bad mood.

But. I'm not as crazy as those girls. I've got control. I can control myself, my diet - can't I? I won't allow myself to become like them.

On that website, the web-creator (who was anorexic before and is now cured of it, but sometimes still has 'relapses', or so she calls them) made a couple of statements that made me think hard about this situation and whether I really want it for myself. The first one is "People like people who like themselves', and another one's 'You can never be skinny ENOUGH," which is true. I was 49-50kg in secondary school and 1.64m (BMI: 18.6). Then I came into JC, and started this whole weight-conscious thing in February, when I took up running with Jasmine and Chooyan. My weight dropped to my initial dream of '48kg forever'. And then in June, when I started my diet proper, my weight became 47, then I aimed for 45 and reached it, now it's 43 (with my height as 1.65m, my BMI's become 15.8). It's a never-ending cycle of creating loftier goals and struggling to attain them. It's true that I should always set goals for myself (A's are getting more difficult to get these days in JC), and it really gives me tremendous satisfaction when I get what I worked for.

BUT WHEN IS ENOUGH? WHEN SHOULD I STOP?

How do you know when is enough? If you can go further, why not?

My mind's a battleground, bloodbath between the thoughts that plague me. I guess that was obvious from all that rambling I'm making. I'm like contradicting myself all over the place, arguing with the pro- and anti-ana (ana is short for anorexic) part of me.

Sometimes, I recognise that I have a SLIGHT problem - with my weight, my appearance, my self-esteem, my struggle to please everyone, my being affected by the slightest comment about my imperfection. But sometimes, I want to deny it. Because that would mean another shortcoming that I've acquired.

I eat, but I feel guilty. I only feel less guilty when I've hit the gym and pushed my body to exertion, or feel the burn in my thighs after I've swam 10 laps nonstop or cycled for fifteen minutes, or the ache in my abdomen after I done my situps.