Tracy, it is just so kind of you to respond. I am so happy that you have found support here. I was kicked off the last website that had to do with eating issues. Basically the site was for people who weren't really severe cases, either up or down the scale or behavior-wise, and who didn't have the multitude of medical complications that I have. But this is just a wild guess on my part. I guess the site owner saw "anorexia" and freaked, probably envisioning that I weighed what my tiny dog weighs and ate nothing but a piece of bread every six months. People assume, and they put a stereotype on us. It's not only ignorance, it's discrimination, just like racism. Singling out people because they look different or have a different god or no god at all. You show up at school wearing the wrong color socks and you end up getting bullied for it. Anyway, I was terrified to join on here, fearing getting kicked out of yet another situation where all I am doing is trying to find help. I only what I suppose everyone wants: to be loved and wanted and cared for. And accepted for who I am and can be. And no, the world is not like that. People and institutions have spat on me so many times, especially since my relapse (2008, after I was raped), that I have learned not to trust. I shut people out. I am scared. I go for days without making any conversation whatsoever. In April, I think I had face-to-face with other human beings four times the entire month. The phone is useless cuz no one calls. I have no therapist, either. Brick walls...no money, on public assistance (psychiatric disability), long waiting list at the clinics, which I am on. I'm not sure I want to be in therapy again, but my minister thinks I should have someone to talk to. I do have my church. Thank goodness. It is not the religion I was born into but the spiritual connection I feel there is very deep, and I feel that I can in fact celebrate and appreciate more my Ashkinazi Jew ethnicity and cultural past...all that I have inherited and have within me, my family roots...even more now...and again, celebrate that I am different, that everyone is different and just as human and wonderful as anyone else. Thankfully, I don't have to walk too far to get to the church, and when I do, the minister always takes time to chat with me, even if he is busy. So no, no family. They gave up on me. They live nearby and won't have anything to do with me, or I won't have anything to do with them, for my own sanity. I get a call from one brother now and then and once in a blue moon, the other, but the situation is pitiful. So back to HHH...food behavior as metaphor...the current chapter I'm reading. I deprive myself socially and financially. I deprive myself of fresh air. I call this "simplicity" and "downsizing." Poverty has taught me a lot, a whole lot, actually. Debt has never bullied me. It's just there. I don't spend money. But maybe I'm kidding myself and should ask my brothers for a bit of money to help lower this ridiculous credit card bill. That and the other extreme...such as this post being ridiculously long, for example. Excess. Going overboard. I spend so little time with people that when I do converse, it tends to all come out of me, having been bottled up for days on end. I spent a couple of weeks being an angry motor-mouth and I kept asking myself, "Wow! This isn't me! What has become of me?" Really shocked and scared that I am so angry. I left the hospital at the end of Feb in a whirl of anger. Looking back on over 30 years of abuse in mental hospitals (restraints, forced drugging, shock treatments, filthy conditions, and more)...now I feel like I've just escaped from this brainwashing cult called Mental Health Care, running for my life, and scared.