Because mental illness.

 

I'm not competitive with anyone to be honest, I simply do it to cope with anxiety and depression. Less energy and focus helps disconnect myself from my feelings and anxieties. I've only recently fallen back into anorexic behaviours after self-recovering for a year and a half, I don't really consider myself the typical anorexic as i'm not doing it for body image... in fact I hate the way I look more when I AM thinner it's just I can't control myself anymore.

 

I’ve never understood why people are competitive with their eating disorders, or any other mental illness for that matter. It seems incredibly bizarre to me.

 

i've only ever felt competitive with myself but i think there's just a lot of "sicker/skinnier than thou" that comes with the territory of losing weight/eating disorders.

 

I guess I should’ve explained more. I’m not actually sure why people are competitive with others. I’m competitive with myself. Even my thinspo is a picture of myself from last time I relapsed. I’m self competitive with everything though. It easy to compete with my last “achievement” but I cannot compete with others. I’m built differently and am a completely different person. I do know the mental shit is why I’m that way though

 

It's an example of how we're perfectionists.

I believe we all a little of it so we want to be the best at what we do.

That goes to our perfectionism. Perfect!

 

For me I think it's more to do with validation than anything else. I wouldn't say I'm competitive with it, but I do compare myself to others. I think I look at other people and compare my weight/illness to theirs to see if I'm "sick enough." I can see someone else with an ED and have absolutely no doubt in my mind that their illness is completely valid, but I struggle when I look at myself. If I'm as "bad" as them, I feel more validated. Bonus points if my BMI is lower, as much as I hate to admit it.

 

Yeah I watch my BMI go down, the more it goes down the more likely I am to finally get help that's the goal in the end I think for myself.

 

I didn't think I was competitive with my losing weight untill a few days ago I was looking at people's photos and then there weight and goal weights on here and I realised I am less than them and I couldn't believe it as they look way smaller than me . that feeling made me feel good and want to keep going ( I am a lot bigger than people in that post too and that made me want to keep going too )

 

I'm more competitive with myself than others tbh

 

Whenever my fiance says he's lost weight, it triggers me. I think I need to lose weight, and faster than he's lost his. For some reason I decided I need to be at least sixty lbs less than him at all times lol it makes no sense