Disordered eating hides in plain sight.

This phenomenon is something I never had a name for but knew I was grappling with. I watched myself monitor what I ate; I religiously followed a regimented exercise routine but never counted calories or eliminated any foods from my diet. I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t know what. Thanks to Taylor Swift’s Miss Americanaoriginal Netflix documentary, I now have a better vocabulary to describe what I could not quite articulate last year in an article I wrote about my relationship to food and my body as an athlete in the “offseason.”

Disordered eating, as Taylor Swift describes it, “doesn’t mean stop eating all together… but rather eat[ing] very, very carefully” (Buzzfeed). That either means emphasizing portion size over type of food being put into your body or emphasizing what food you are consuming rather than the amount of it. Orthorexia, an obsession to eat healthy and “clean” foods, gives name to a disorder so normalized people might not know they have it (NEDA). In Miss Americana, Taylor Swift recognizes how her rapid rise to fame contributed to her fixation on food consumption. The film cuts from her talking about her experience in the present day to her in a recording studio with producer, Joel Little, discussing burritos a few months prior; he is surprised that she had never tried a burrito until two years ago.

This moment, and Little’s surprise, perfectly illustrates how disordered eating hides in plain sight. The act of deeming burritos “unhealthy” narrows the number of acceptable foods to consume and restricted Swift’s diet. The film illustrates this by cutting between different images of Swift on the red carpet at the height of her disorder —disordered eating can go unnoticed, but the body will always be hyper-visible and hyper-scrutinized. Swift recounts how paparazzi and tabloids endlessly commented on her figure and how no version of herself was ever good enough. The pressure to look a size zero, if not bea size zero, warped Swift’s body image to always viewing herself as not good enough. Her reliance on compulsively exercising, however, helped justify her orthorexia. She was “doing all the right things.” What Swift emphasizes in Miss Americana is how the passive thought to “starve a little bit” normalizes obsessive compulsions to fit a standardized norm which is dangerous and unrealistic. These standardized norms are not attainable and are detrimental to self-esteem and body image. They do not give young girls a “goal” to strive towards but instead give them reasons to critique their external appearance. 

Like Taylor Swift once did, I find myself following a consistent intense exercise routine due to a lasting belief that through hard work and discipline, the body type I strive to maintain will be achievable. Especially now more than ever, since my competitive collegiate swimming career is over, I’m trapped inside my house due to covid-19, and a once-scheduled routine is now irregular, it is more difficult to break out of this hurtful mindset. The fear of never having a consistent routine at such an intense level petrifies me. I want my body to eternally look like it is in a peak “swimming shape” but I know that it will not. Running is not a form of exercise I enjoy, and I have to constantly remind myself that there are others ways to release endorphins. For example, weightlifting makes me feel strong. Even then, my body’s peak “weightlifting shape” looks different than my peak “swimming shape.” I constantly remind myself to not compare one body to another. Instead of not eating meals and only eating less, I remind myself to continue working on fueling my body properly despite changing how I exercise.

As I sit here typing during lunch, the thought of eating only an apple sounds appealing. Even though I know it won’t sustain me, my disordered eating brain is still activated and tries to take over. I don’t want to feel dizzy and fatigued and I know I will if I continue to sit here and type. For now, I will leave you all to eat a meal. I encourage you to reflect on how you interact with food, recognize the different ways disordered eating can manifest, and promise to be more conscious of any (unnecessary) self-imposed limitations. 

If you ever need uplifting material to raise your spirits, look at the Instagram accounts @feminist, @femalecollective, or @girlboss. Scrolling through such empowering messages, whether related to body image or not, never fail to make me smile and find the positives when the world seems dark. 

Your body is beautiful not matter what it looks like.

Forever yours,

Anna