Why Me?

All things work together for good right?

Every cloud has a silver lining.

One day you’ll look back on this and…

Suffering strengthens character.

You will be better for this.

There’s light at the end of the tunnel.

It’s what we do when people are suffering. We look down from our good place to their bad place and say, “Don’t worry you’ll join me up here again soon.” “You will get through this.” There’s another side and one day you’ll walk/crawl/run out of it.

I wonder if you’ve ever asked “Why me?” Chances are you have. Perhaps when a relationship ended. Or when a loved one died. Or you broke your leg the day before you were heading to Ibiza with the girls? That’s when we tend to ask the “Why me” question. When life is shit. When things go wrong. When’s there’s pain, confusion and unanswered questions. When we feel like we have been wronged somehow by life or by God or by people.

That’s when we ask, “Why me?”

It’s nearly always as a response to a negative life experience.

I’ve said why me a lot in the past 6 years. Sometimes it was a gentle wondering, “Hmm I wonder why this/that happened to me.”

Other times it was a broken exclamation, “Why the fuck me?”

But whether gentle or broken it was always in response to a negative. Every single time.

I wondered why I would lose my faith. Why I would become anorexic then bulimic? Why I would be depressed. Why would I want to take my own life? Why was I spending New Years in a hospital? Why couldn’t I pull myself out of it? Why was I hurting people? Why couldn’t I hold friendships? Why couldn’t I stay at university?

Why, why, why me?

I know self - absorbed right? Guilty!

I’ll tell you a few questions I didn’t ask.

Why wasn’t I born with HIV in an African township to a struggling single mother? Why wasn’t I trafficked into slavery as a child? Why wasn’t I abused by a family member or an institution? Why me? Why wasn’t I any of those things?

And just one more question. This question I have asked before but from a completely different perspective to which I ask it now. Why didn’t my eating disorder kill me? When I was at my “worst” I wanted to die. I yearned for it. But I didn’t want to actually kill myself willfully. I knew I couldn’t.

So I wanted it to happen by “accident.” As I binged and vomited my way through day after miserable day I longed for the time when it would be one episode too much. When my heart would fail and I would be gone. By “accident”.

I’d heard about that happening to people. Honestly I envied those people. That’s strange right? It’s hard to admit, but it’s true. I asked why me? Why didn’t my eating disorder kill me? Or rather, “Why won’t my eating disorder just kill me?” Why do I keep wakening up every morning?

I still ask that question. Why didn’t my eating disorder kill me? It could have. They do take lives.

But what’s the answer to that question? Why did I survive when others didn’t?

Wait for it…

I’ve worked it out…

Drum roll please, keep scrolling…

I honestly have no idea. No clue whatsoever.

Good genetics? Em possibly.

So that I could help others? Em hopefully.

Because of God? Em bit of a sore point.

Maybe because I just got lucky? Quite probably.

Maybe all of them or none of them.

For me, more important than the why is the what now? 1 year into (recovery). One year into life not being controlled by an eating disorder anymore. The answer to what now? Absolutely no idea either.

Hah so much for clarity…

Yet passion and purpose are coursing through my veins in a way I never thought they would again. Where that takes me who knows? Doesn’t really matter either. Twill be what twill be.

I am incredibly blessed/lucky/fortunate to still be here. Others aren’t and at the start of this Eating Disorder awareness week my thoughts are with their families and friends. They were ill. They didn’t choose to have an eating disorder and if they could have fixed it they would. May those who knew them find the strength to celebrate their lives whilst continuing with their own.

To every single person who has shown kindness to me – I am truly thankful. I am blessed to have people who hung in and fought when I couldn’t, wouldn’t and didn’t want to. They helped me for nothing in return. True acts of kindness.

Thank YOU.

Why me?

Darren