LAURA PAYNE: I replaced my eating disorder with bodybuilding.
LAURA PAYNE: Okay. I am eating.
COMM: Laura Payne has battled bulimia and anorexia since she was a teenager. But now
the 32-year-old is a champion body builder.
LAURA PAYNE: My lowest weight was 82 lbs. That’s with pants, sweater and everything
on it at the doctor’s office. But back then it’s just like ‘How skinny can I get?’
I do think I replaced my eating disorder with bodybuilding. With competing you're still
in control of what you eat and how much you eat. All your food's accounted for.
DANIEL DORETHY: One thing about eating disorders,
you don’t overcome eating disorders. It’s something that you learn to live with.
COMM: Laura started to struggle with anorexia
when she was in high school.
LAURA PAYNE: Starts out because you think you're too fat or someone thinks you're
ugly or someone doesn’t like you and then in college when the social events came along,
the bulimia started because that was the parts where I would have to go eat with fit people
that would be the only way to get rid of the food. So, that’s how that cycle began and I would
throw up, it would all my cares would be away, it made me feel good. Your day is consumed
with the thought of food. I remember in class I'd sit there and looks like I am studying
but I'm adding my calories up, ‘If I eat this. How much is that?’
COMM: When her parents found about her eating
disorder they took her out of college until her health improved.
LAURA PAYNE: I am okay now. But it’s not
gone. I constantly think about food. I am constantly worried about how I look or if
I have put on too much weight.
COMM: Laura met her husband Jason 8 years ago in her hometown of Odessa, Texas, and began
lifting weights with him shortly after.
LAURA PAYNE: He has helped me overcome it. I eat now because of him.
JASON PAYNE: I don’t diet. I like to eat.
I like to go have ice cream and that is hard going through this and struggling with Laura.
It has taken a lot of patience to get her to where she is at right now for me. And I
am not very patient at all, kind of hard trying to push that on her and I know I do it more
than I should. We are both working on it.
COMM: Now Laura consumes 2,000 calories a day and owns a gym where she works out at
least five times a week. And she is also a competitive bodybuilder.
COMM: When I compete, this year I came in
at 125. Right now I am around 150. It’s off-season. So, I mainly eat to lift and be
stronger and gain more muscles. This is my first competition. I won first place here
long time ago. Love my long hair. I miss it. It was fun. It’s hard. It’s frustrating though,
because you know you can look like and then mentally it’s hard because you just,
you like, I feel awful right now. It’s 20 weeks of dieting to get to this.
COMM: Laura keeps all of her old pictures
and food diaries to remind her how far she has come.
LAURA PAYNE: It feels crazy to look at the bones,
they stick out or how little my legs and arms are and face. There’s no butt, no boobs,
no there’s nothing. And it’s sad because girls want to be skinny but none of that's attractive.
COMM: Look at this one because my hair was falling out at that time. So you can tell
in the front that my hair was actually falling out.
COMM: In an attempt not to relapse, Laura
has ben seeing the same counselor since she was 22.
DANIEL DORETHY: When she came to me she was
consumed in her mental health disorder, which she was at a dangerous point of her life.
At the point of her life to where little mattered. I think the body building part is related
to the disorder. She learned to figure out what her mental health disorder was and learned
more about it than most people would know even in the profession. So, she was able
to take this negative and turn it into a positive.
COMM: As well as worrying about herself, Laura
also fears that her daughter Kylie might develop an eating disorder.
LAURA PAYNE: When I found out I was pregnant,
the worst thought that I had was, ‘I do not want to have a girl.’ If I found out
my daughter was having similar problems as I did. It would hurt because I would probably
feel responsible. I try not to obsess over myself in front of her, but it’s hard. It’s
very hard. After this competition season it hit me hard because I gained weight fast and
I just broke down in front of her in the car. You know, I know she sees it. I feel like
you will deal with it for the rest of your life. I think you learn how to deal with it
and make it work for you. I think it just, it’s always back there, always in the back
of my mind nagging me. I still obsess over myself.