The Silent Struggles of Eating Disorders: My Journey and the Urgency of Early Detection

Have you ever felt like the world around you was shaping how you saw yourself?

For many of us, these influences go unnoticed until they start impacting our well-being. Eating disorders are a profound example of this—a silent struggle that too often goes unseen and untreated. Today, I want to share my journey and why early detection is not just important but can be life changing.

From Athlete’s Pressure to Eating Disorder Recovery

What happens when the drive to succeed as an athlete turns into something harmful? Soccer has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I started playing when I was 5, and the sport quickly became my world. By the time I got to college, soccer wasn’t just a passion but part of my identity.

Anybody Can be a Sick Body

When I first became sick with my eating disorder, I was 11 years old. I didn’t choose to get sick because eating disorders are never a choice, but it was a coping mechanism that came out during a challenging time in my life. My parents were divorced and the strict visitation schedule took a toll on me. I needed a friend and anorexia was more than willing.

A Reflection of a Younger Me: The Time Is Now to Notice

I’ve been struggling with these thoughts for years, never fully connecting any of them to something dangerous until I started noticing changes in my appearance in my early 20s. Even then, I wasn’t fully aware of what was happening. It wasn’t until I began to get better—years later—that I saw the full picture. Only then did I grasp how deeply I was caught in an eating disorder.

How I Used Film to Spotlight Eating Disorders in the Black Community

Speaking with my peers in the Black community, we all came to the same conclusion – One of the main challenges with being in a Black body was living up to the pressure to meet Eurocentric beauty standards… aka ‘slim