[NOISE] >> Spent a lot of time by myself
in high school, I didn't wanna get involved in the wrong crowd.
Everybody else was at parties.
I was at home, painting my walls and writing poems.
And so [LAUGH] this was just a book that I had.
Some of this stuff I look back, I'm like, what in the world was I going through?
Flo-Jo, that was my my idol growing up.
That's, I
was in a really bad place, it just all gets dark here.
So I suffered from bulimia, which started in high school.
I was always considered the bigger girl in track.
I was always very muscular, just naturally muscular.
And I was running fast and then I just kind of just plateaued.
The next thing I could think of was, okay, all my coaches talk about my weight.
Let me lose weight.
I got so obsessed, so I started throwing my food up.
No one knew, my parents didn't even know, I hid it.
I was throwing my food up all the time, every night and I lost weight.
I ran faster.
>> There you go, Bianca.
[APPLAUSE] >> I got hurt and
actually ended up not being able to compete my senior year in high school, but
I already had my scholarship, thank God.
I got a full scholarship to the University of South Carolina.
I think I had a little bit too much fun.
Started partying, started eating.
My coach, at the time, was just so harsh.
He'd always say, go back to the girl you were in high school.
That girl in high school was unhealthy.
But okay, if that's what it takes, being 18, 19, that's what it takes, okay.
So I went back to throwing up my food.
I had BED, binge eating disorder, because then I became so obsessed with food and
then I would hide, and I would just be eating because I'm upset.
And I'm just eating my feelings away, and I became so obsessed with food
that I just wanted to eat everything to the point where it just made me sick.
It is embarrassing when you think about it, but
it's a mental disorder that you have you have, and you have to face it.
And when track is your identity, you're running slow, you're just like, well,
nobody wants to be friends with the slow girls.
And you think nobody wants to be your friend.
This 18 year old immature mind just can't handle all of this.
You think this is the end the world and
that's what it felt like to me in that moment.
I was at a very, very, very dark moment.
I went to try to go talk to somebody about it,
to work through it all, and they put me on medication.
I end up leaving that college and
transferring to another college to try to start over again,
instead of facing my issues and thinking, I'm just gonna run away from it.
I stopped the medication, and you can't do that, you have to wean yourself off of it.
So when I stopped, everything came crashing back down.
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I got very, very, very depressed and I didn't know why.
I didn't know what was happening.
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I was like, I just don't wanna be here anymore.
So I tried to not be here anymore.
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I ended up in a psychiatric hospital.
I remember being in this room and it was a lady
on the side of me that was screaming all night long.
My parents are visiting me.
They are just in complete shock cuz they had no idea what was going on.
And now I feel bad because I feel like,
God, [LAUGH] they think I'm crazy.
I felt like a failure and, so that was the moment when I was like, I need to go home.
I can't keep running from college to college, and I have to face this.
I was able to sit there and talk to my parents.
And know that I have their support, that was the moment for
me where I felt very safe and I felt like okay, it's gonna get better.
It wasn't better at that moment but I felt like it's going to get better.