When starvation becomes a mental disorder

You know how some people seem to have everything together? I’m not one of them.

I’m typing this on my phone while waiting in line at subway, hoping to soon take the first bite of food I’ll have had in over six hours. Here’s a brief overview of my day: Test, Test, Lab Work, Super Important Paper due.

Then I had a three hour long class in which we workshoped each other’s papers and the teacher told us just how far off we were. Collectively, it was a lot: like 1,995 words off of a 2,000-word paper off. So, during our ten minute break around five o’clock, when my stomach felt like it was starting to eat itself, I followed my classmates outside for their cigarette break and interrupted their rant, asking desperately if anyone knew where a snack machine was. Someone suggested one building. Someone else suggested another. I went to both, but they were, sadly, snack-machine-less.

Nearing the library, I walked as fast as I could to the entrance, and straight to the coffee shop. There was a line, and I was in a hurry, so I filled my mug up with hot water thinking I could at least have tea. Then I realized I had used my last tea bag.

I arrived back to class, late, with a mug of hot water, missing an earring. To my severe disdain, the boy next to me was eating a Chick-fill-a sandwich. Come to think of it, it would have been a good idea to start looking for food at the cafeteria.

I starved through another hour of editing papers and receiving brutal feedback, until the teacher announced everyone could leave, as long as they had met with her one on one. Guess who was the only person left to meet with her? Me.

My friend took pity on me and, through a break in her laughter, pulled out a bag of hot chocolate (why would someone carry hot chocolate around in their purse? I don’t know, I asked, and she didn’t know either) and I could finally put the hot water to use (for the record, Raspberry hot chocolate is tasty).

But it still didn’t curb my hunger. Nope, that didn’t happen until much more recently, after I spent a long ten minutes in isolation with my professor who marked up my paper and read off her comments ("Good, terrible, good, terrible, excellent, terrible...), after I stumbled back through the cold to the food court, and after the nice woman at subway (who just so happens to have been a former friend whom I cut ties with after learning she was sabotaging my roommate’s drinks) gave me my sandwich. Know that if I die from food poisoning, it was worth it.