Striving To Be Perfect: Surviving An Eating Disorder In A Perfectionistic World
By B. Imei Hsu, RN, MAC, LMHC, Artist
Recently former television news anchor Katie Couric and music and media superstar Lady Gaga were in the news about something that hits close to home for me. The experiences of these two women intersect with the presence of three banker boxes with assorted papers on the floor of my home. There is nothing special about the boxes. Unmarked, ordinary, and crunched in the corners from overuse and stacking, the only reason I would mention them is that nearly every person who has struggled with an eating disorder (commonly referred to as an E.D.) will know exactly why sharing about these benign boxes has everything to do with understanding the underpinnings (and the signs of recovery) of one the most recalcitrant but treatable psychiatric disorders: