We are all human, and as such we all have basic needs that we must have met. There’s no escaping this fact, this constraint of our humanness. Despite all being essentially the same on this most basic of levels, we are all composed of many incredibly unique layers. Each and every one of us has our own gifts and talents, our own personality and perception, our own lens through which we see the world, and our own way of interpreting it.

This concept of being unique in my humanness is something I really had to come to accept in recovery. At one point, I spent a good three or four months stuck on this fact, discussing it repeatedly with my dietitian (M). I feared that without my eating disorder, without being able to defy my human need for food (which did not work all that well, just in case anyone was wondering), I could not be unique. It was quite the mental road block for me to work my way around—feeling as though controlling what I ate was the only thing that made me different. How wrong and disorder that thought was.

I am Jordan, and I am human. But I’m also…

a daughter of Christ

a flutist

a writer

a lover of learning

a high school senior

a brown-haired, brown-eyed, eighteen-year old girl

a traveler

a sister

a daughter

a friend

a niece

a cousin

a granddaughter

a dog lover (especially of our rescues)

a wanna-be intellect

a dreamer

a bookworm

a music lover

an Instagrammer

a blogger

a stereotypical, starbucks and iPhone loving teenage girl

a girl with her whole life ahead of her and not a clue of what exactly it will look like.

I am unique, but not because I had an eating disorder. Millions of people have eating disorders, which is far too high a number. I am unique because I am me and because God had the foresight to give us each a little quirk so that the world would not be a boring place to live in.