Opinion
What NEDAW means to me, a survivor
By Maddy Maher ’18
March 3, 2016
Tags opinion
On Sunday, Feb. 21, my phone was flooded with messages from a group text that is seldom used these days. Most of the messages from each member were identical, but profoundly impactful nonetheless: “Happy National Eating Disorder Awareness Week, ladies.” While I hardly talk to these girls anymore, I can say with full confidence that they are some of the most important friends I have ever made and will ever have. These are the girls I met during my year off from Hamilton, who helped me feel like I was not alone in my struggles. These are the girls who helped save my life.
In our group text, my friends and I decided to make this year’s National Eating Disorder Awareness Week (or NEDAW) count on our respective college campuses and resolved to share the stories of our struggles on Facebook in order to help fight the stigma against mental illness. We wanted to show our friends and peers that you can still be a so-called “normal person” while battling a mental illness and that being sick in no way means that you are “crazy.” Yet, while I am unashamed of the obstacles I have overcome, I was worried about sharing such personal struggles so publically with the Hamilton community in particular.
Here on the Hill, students are expected to perform at the top of their game all day every day. We do not get tired; we do not break down and we do not settle for anything shy of excellence from our peers and from ourselves. I procrastinated sharing my post for a few hours out of fear that my Hamilton peers would view my story as documentation of my weakness and shortcomings rather than my strength. Yet after contemplating, I finally realized that this fear of being seen as “weak” or “falling short” was feeding the very stigma that my girls and I were setting out to fight.
In the days leading up to NEDAW, I was disappointed by that there was very little mention of the nationally recognized week meant to address such serious illnesses. Eating disorders impact over 30 million Americans alone and have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. Other than the “Our Voices, We Speak” meeting on eating disorder awareness, which speaker Alexa Merriam ’17 reports was sparsely attended, there was virtually no mention or recognition of eating disorders or eating disorder awareness on campus. I was rapidly losing hope in the Hamilton community’s ability to sympathize with the mentally ill until I finally posted my story.
In the following few days, I was reminded why I love this school so much. Countless individuals approached me, letting me know that they were inspired by how brave my post was. Many had no idea that it was National Eating Disorder Awareness Week until they read my post and told me that my message encouraged them to reach out to their friends and family members who have also struggled, in order to let them know how proud they were of their loved ones for continuing to fight. Multiple peers also expressed that they, too, have struggled with some form of mental illness and feared speaking out about it in this environment for the same reasons that I initially was scared. While the high-pressure environment on campus still concerns me, as well as the fact that NEDAW was so poorly recognized by the school’s counseling center or other on-campus organizations, the incredibly kind and thoughtful responses that I received from my fellow Continentals leave me hopeful for the future of on-campus mental health. Awareness on campus is not nearly where it should be, but Hamilton students are lucky to be surrounded by such open-minded and caring individuals if and when they choose to speak out.