Jourdain Nearly Gone

"Pain makes man think. Thought makes man wise. Wisdom makes life endurable." -John Patrick


During volleyball my body endured physical pain. Never in all my life had my body been through so much. I pushed my self to get better and doing so, I dropped large amounts of weight. While dropping the weight, I also dropped my appetite. Without noticing, I gradually began to stop eating. I began to feel extreme pressure and became extremely stressed out. With volleyball leaving me exhausted everyday and leaving me with no energy after third period, my grades shifted and some dropped within the first six weeks. With my mom breathing down my back and my friends, upset that I had been neglecting them, I fell into a black hole. With stress, no food, no sleep still feeling the lows self esteem from third grade, and no answers I felt myself slipping away.
One day at dinner, my mom noticed that I only ate two french fries. After telling her I wasn't hungry she asked if I had been eating lately. Right then is when I realized that I hadn't been eating. My mom told me to start eating again or I would face serious physical problems soon. The next day, when I tried to eat a bag of chips at lunch, I felt queasy and sick. I ran to the bathroom and made myself throw up all I had consumed. This soon became a daily routine. I saw myself losing weight and dropping inches, and my mom and friends saw me eating again. Everything seemed fine. For weeks I kept this unhealthy habit going. Finally in the month of September, my habit came to bite me in the butt.
I was just finishing up a few carrots when I went to the bathroom to do my dirty deed. While in the bathroom though, red liquid poured from my mouth instead of the usual orange, blood. I sat there, stunned. Thinking that it was only a one time thing, I cleaned my mouth and gargled a little mouth wash. Walking back to the locker room, I felt myself getting extremely light headed. I sat down by my locker and rested for a few minutes.
For the next week, every day, blood came along with whatever I consumed along with light handedness and the occasional black outs. I began to fear that something was wrong with me, so I stopped making myself throw up and tried once more to eat again. Sadly with the months of not eating, and the weeks of throwing up, when I tried to eat, my body immediately rejected what tried to reach my stomach.
I wanted to tell my mom but I thought she would be mad at me, so I kept the secret to myself. The next day at practice, we were running because of a previous game loss. Coach Collins, the JV coach planned a grueling practice, making everyone do the most horrible punishment a volleyball player could do. While sprinting I felt faint and blood gathering in the back of my mouth, I ran out and into the restroom. Inside a stall I  spit out the blood, only finding that instead of it being the usual red, it was a dark red almost brown. I sat on the stall floor, crying, knowing that my body was slowly destroying it's self. I cleaned myself up, walked back into the gym and told Coach Collins that I would return my jersey to her tomorrow.
In the locker room I called my mom and explained everything to her and the next day had a conference with Coach Reed and Coach Collins about my situation.
I spent the next few months off from volleyball, trying to rebuild my body's strength. Although eventually regaing my strength with medicine and slow work outs, this particular situation left a little mark on me. Almost like a wound or a cut, I will never forget about how i nearly destroyed myself.