Eating Disorder Recovery and Transgender Identities
Part Two of a Three Part Series

As I mentioned in part one of this series, one of the biggest fears I had when I first realized that I was transgender was whether my feelings were real or due to my body image distortion and eating disorder. 

Two questions that I immediately raised were:

Part One of a Three Part Series

The Marginalized Voices Project is a collaboration between the National Eating Disorders Association and feminist activist and editor of Everyday Feminism, Melissa A. Fabello. Together, we put out a call for stories that focus on underrepresented experiences and communities in order to create a platform for people to share what it means to suffer (and recover) from an eating disorder.

People who know memay consider me to be a “healthy person” but in reality, most of my adult life I’ve teetered near the point of death, both literally and figuratively. Some might argue that what pushed me to this point was my battle with anorexia. In the past I would have agreed with them, but the more years I put between me and my disorder, the more I realize that my poor health was the result of a larger battle with myself – the eating disorder just served as the mask. 

The complexity of eating disorders and disordered-eating appears to be ever-growing, and the fear of those suffering and their families is never far behind.

As a survivor of an eating disorder and member of the LGBT community, I am often asked what it takes, or has taken, to identify, unmask, confront, battle and eventually overcome this life-threatening illness.