It was therefore both exciting and refreshing to see actor Ashley Hamilton come forward with his bulimia and anorexia struggles. The more men that come forward the more eating disorders will be seen as problem that transcends gender.  The more it will become accepted to seek treatment. The more it will be covered by health insurance. We need more brave men like Ashley Hamilton.  It’s just one guy but each one that comes forward is one more voice to the masses. I am Brian Cuban.  I am an eating disorder survivor.  Let’s spread the word for everyone who suffers in silence, men and women!  Let’s give them hope!

This is an excerpt of my book  “Shattered Image”.  Shattered Image is the story of my struggle with, and recovery from, a compulsive behavior clinically known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). That struggle has included recovery from bulimia, anorexia, alcoholism, and addiction to cocaine and steroids. I also suffer from clinical depression. For decades, I engaged in self-destructive behavior with the single goal of correcting a terribly distorted sense of self-image, a self-image rooted in early life experiences.  Release date is August 2013  See what people are saying about Shattered Image!   

Summer 1971. I’m at Emma Kaufman Camp near Morgantown, West Virginia. Emma Kaufman is a summer tradition for countless Jewish children from Pittsburgh, and it was a tradition in our family. My brothers went. I went. But that summer of ’71 stands out in my mind, marking some of the earliest memories I have of feelings I’d later associate with embarrassment and shame about how I appeared to others.

It is the night of the Emma Kaufman Camp annual talent show. I walk up to the front of the wooden stage. I sweat a little more with each creaking old wooden board echoing throughout the structure. I am suddenly facing 100 ten and eleven year olds. They are laughing and joking with each other. In my mind, they are laughing and making fun of me. I am terrified. I am nervous and nauseous. Teeth and braces grinding enamel. The musty smell of the wood building and the damp rain falling on the leaves outside intensify the feeling.

The Beatles hit, “Let It Be” is the song. There is no microphone. There is no music. I am standing naked and exposed in front of a hundred other kids. I remind myself that this was my choice. I chose to sing this song, nobody was making me, and I chose to sing because I wanted to take control of my fear. To cast aside uncertainty. To become popular. To be noticed. If I could sing “Let It Be,” my weight would not matter. My shyness would not matter. I hoped this would be no different from the piano recital. I handled those. I could handle this. Take a deep breath. Count to ten. Focus on a fixed point. In recitals it was the piano keys. I focused on the wooden floor in front of me. I was too terrified to look at the kids staring me down, talking and laughing. I opened my mouth.

The only sound that emerged was a guttural groan, such as a wounded animal might make.I started to sweat. Kids were laughing. Now I was sure they were laughing at me. I was humiliated—not much different than the humiliation of shyness and the shame of body that constantly gripped me, but this time the feeling was focused like a magnifying glass in the sunlight bearing down on a blade of grass.

Continuing to focus on the wooden floor, I walked off the stage and moved quickly through the door. I broke into a run back to my cabin. I cried. I knew that the worst was yet to come. My cabin mates would be back soon. Some were just waiting for the next excuse to ridicule me as if they were bored with calling me fat. Our cabin counselor would intervene and tell them to leave me alone, as he had done before. I wanted to go home. I couldn’t

My fellow campers filtered back into the cabin. One made his way straight for me as I lay on my bunk. “Not only are you fat but you sing like shit.” Still crying I jumped up and attacked him. I ran at him as hard as I could and used all of my 200 pounds to knock him back onto the bunk bed. I had stood up for myself. It felt good. He never bothered me again, but I was banned from the Camper vs. Counselor softball game, the one event where I felt I’d be comfortable around my peers.

The talent show was just the beginning of my embarrassments. At Emma Kaufman, I had a camp crush. I remember her smile, dark skin and long, dark flowing  black hair, almost Greek features,  as she stood on the porch of her camp cabin. I remember making any excuse I could to get within feet of her in various camp activities. I tried to befriend others who were her friends to be close to her. No matter how close I got, I was unable to say anything other than mumbling, barely audible  hellos as I looked at the ground. She sometimes smiled and hello back, but that was as far as we’d get. I finally remember her laughing derisively to the unwanted and embarrassing shout from my friend that I had a crush on her.

Man, I hated camp.

This is an excerpt of my book  “Shattered Image”.  Shattered Image is the story of my struggle with, and recovery from, a compulsive behavior clinically known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). That struggle has included recovery from bulimia, anorexia, alcoholism, and addiction to cocaine and steroids. I also suffer from clinical depression. For decades, I engaged in self-destructive behavior with the single goal of correcting a terribly distorted sense of self-image, a self-image rooted in early life experiences.  Release date is August 2013  See what people are saying about Shattered Image!

I have recurring dreams. Scenes from law school, struggles with addiction, and failed relationships are in constant re-run.  They are vivid and colorful. Like full length movies played out in my subconscious . They say this is common with recovering addicts. That’s what they say.

This particular dream begins as I arrive at a party. I’m by myself as I walk into a dark, empty room. I am embarrassed and alone. I don’t want to be alone. Even in my dream,I can feel the emptiness in my stomach. The ache of loneliness and isolation. I want to be accepted and popular. I know high school classmates will be showing up, and I want to be included in their fun. I order a diet coke. The bartender tells me they do not serve it. He offers me a Jack Daniels and Diet-Coke, my drink of choice pre-sobriety. I take the drink from him but I can’t raise the glass to my mouth. My arm won’t move.. I go to the bathroom to do a line of coke. I’m can’t snort it. The cocaine is just out of reach of the straw. The white powder vaporizing into the ether of the dream. There is always a barrier keeping me from drawing anything into my blood that will transform me into the Brian I want to see in the mirror every morning. Attractive, slim and confident. The Brian I never see. Sometimes I wake up with the familiar, peculiar smell of cocaine in my nose, the smell of ether and baby laxative. They say that is a sign of recovery. So they say.

I am walking through the room. I see a high school classmate. He said he was my friend. Before he and others assaulted me and tore my pants off.  Exposing my fat, ugly body to the world.  He is sixteen, I am fifty-one. He wants nothing to do with me. He makes fun of my weight. I run to to the bathroom and  look in the mirror.  I am no longer a heavy teenager. I am a grown, mature adult. Why is he making fun of my weight? Doesn’t he see me? The room is filling up. More high school classmates. More bullies of my childhood. They are all teens. How did I get so old? I ask “Can I join your group?” They all laugh and otherwise ignore me. I am right here! You know me! The room gets darker.  I can no longer see them. The familiar feeling, the familiar ache. The loneliness. An empty, gut-wrenching void. Wanting to scream in my dream with only a guttural groan emanating from my sleeping mouth.  Dream shifts. I am standing up against the gym wall at the high school dance, wishing someone would talk to me. They are back. My childhood bullies appear again. . They start pulling at and tearing my clothes, exposing me. I am crying. I am screaming. Why Don’t You Like Me!  They laugh in response. I am awake. The ache is still with me. The nighttime remnants of a once shattered image. It will fade. Hopefully a different re-run tomorrow night.

Dreams fade to morning, and morning brings with it decisions that will have consequences for both the mind and body. The choices I make through the day can leave me feeling calm and happy by sundown, or feeling like I’m still stuck in a nightmare. But this feeling is not a dream. It is the reality of Body Dysmorphic Disorder.

This is the fourteenth excerpt of my book  “Shattered Image”.  Shattered Image is the story of my struggle with, and recovery from, a compulsive behavior clinically known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). That struggle has included recovery from bulimia, anorexia, alcoholism, and addiction to cocaine and steroids. I also suffer from clinical depression. For decades, I engaged in self-destructive behavior with the single goal of correcting a terribly distorted sense of self-image, a self-image rooted in early life experiences.  Release date is July -August 2013  See what people are saying about Shattered Image!

Summer, 1984.  Five in the morning.  Standing at attention. The early morning, thick Virginia humidity giving me the shower I had not had yet. Sweating my ass off.  Grimy, sweaty clothes I had worn for two days.  The fear and uncertainty of what I had gotten myself into manifesting itself in a paralyzing fear gazing out into nothing.

“GET YOUR HANDS OUT OF YOUR FUCKING POCKET CANDIDATE CUBAN! YOU ARE AN IDIOT PIECE OF SHIT CANDIDATE CUBAN! YOU SPEAK TO ME IN THE SECOND PERSON! YOU ADDRESS ME AS SERGEANT INSTRUCTOR!  ARE YOU EYEBALLING ME? “YOU WILL NEVER MAKE IT HERE. YOU ARE A D.O.R! (Discharge On Request), punctuating each letter like daggers directly into my gut.

My second day  at Officer Candidate School, Quantico, Virginia.  My radical attempt at self-help.  I did not enlist in the US Marine Corps because I was patriotic or some other noble cause. I did not want to be one of the “few good men”.  I wanted to be able to look at myself in the mirror and see a man.  I wanted to become the man that girls would look at and see past the ugliness I saw in the mirror.  The Marines could make that reflection right. The fat Brian.  The burgeoning alcoholic Brian.  The shy Brian. They would all be gone.  I wanted to see a Brian that I could love, and that others would love as well.  The Marines could make me into that one good man. I would get in great physical shape and gain self-confidence in who I was. The million shattered pieces of the mirror would be miraculously put back together in ten weeks over the summer. Humpty-Dumpty never fared so well.

In reality, what I was doing was at its core no different than the binging and purging, anorexia, or the binge drinking I had engaged in since college. I was looking for someone or something else to change me. Basic training, of course, isn’t a therapists office. The goal of basic training is not to make young men feel good about themselves. It’s about breaking down the ego of the individual and replacing it with the ego of the group, so that everyone can depend on each other in hostile situations. The Marines have produced tens of thousands of soldiers. It’s not their job to produce psychologically healthy adults. I simply had the wrong mindset. As with self-help, basic training is no solution for those with real psychological problems.

By my second day at Quantico, I was completely overwhelmed. I went from being a loner and doing as I pleased to fuel my unhealthy obsessions to having to conform within a platoon of candidates I did not know and a platoon sergeant and sergeant instructor whose job it was to degrade me.  Break me down and then build me up.  I was already broken.  Soon I was confused and terrified that I had made a huge mistake. On our second day, we all had to go in front of the Platoon Captain for a brief interview that all officer candidates went through.

Son, what were your scores on the PT test?” “This officer candidate thought he did pretty well.” “Son let me tell you something. You’re pretty arrogant. You did not do well at all. You are not in very good shape. If you don’t get those scores up you won’ make it here.”

The captain went on about my arrogance and unworthiness to be a US Marine. In doing his job, he had trashed the one remaining pillar of my self-confidence—my physical fitness. He was a grown man telling me I’d never become a grown man myself. I heard the voice of my mom calling me a fat pig and a dumb bunny.  I heard the voices of everyone who had ever picked on me or made fun of my weight. It was too much. I was terrified and lost. The final nail in my marine career coffin was the realization that they were going to shave my head. For someone with Body Dysmorphic Disorder,  that thought was terrifying to the point of severe depression. I had never thought about it before I joined. It seems trivial but for someone who already saw himself as a deformed it’s terrifying.  I knew right then I was not staying in the Marines.

As it so happened,  I had been having some knee pain as was normal for me as someone who was running over 80 miles a week at that time.  They sent me to Fort Belvoir Virginia to be examined. I  knew nothing was really wrong and knew that they would probably just tell me I had “runners knee” if anything at all. It was something I had lived with and could have lived with in OCS.  It however, would give me some time to think.  After some conversation, the Navy Corpsman who examined me knew what the deal was. He had seen it before.  He asked me a simple question. “Do you want to go home”? I gave him a simple answer. “Yes.”

My time in the Marines was over.  I was once again a bullied child running for cover.  I have often regretted sticking it out in the years since and wondered what my life would be life if I had. I also know that at that time, it was not something I could have gone through. Body dysmorphia did not fit with the Marine lifestyle. It wasn’t just the calculated abuse.  In the end I was simply looking for someone to fix me. Not even the Marines can do that. Only I could do that. Unfortunately, I was decades from figuring that out.

 I wrote this about 2 1/2 years ago for a book I was working on.  It seems appropriate to post now in lieu of the tragic  events in Boston.

Al-Qaeda carries off a new series of attacks in New York City. First there is the bombing of a NYC MTA Transit Bus killing all hostages and a terrorist. The FBI determines that there is a cell of 5 involved. Next is a subway bombing. The 3rd is a Broadway bombing killing everyone in the packed theater.

Intelligence develops that it is a cell out of Yemen. The FBI is unable to locate it and seems powerless to stop the next attack.

The last explosion is the FBI building itself killing hundreds. Panic grips the nation. Pursuant to the War Powers Resolution, and executive authority to use military domestically in emergency situations, President Obama acts. He declares a state of national emergency. The National Guard and regular military are called in. The next morning, tanks are rolling down Broadway and across the Brooklyn Bridge. In response to outcry from the ACLU and human rights groups, President Obama releases the following statement:

“We are in a time of national emergency. Extraordinary measures are needed to ensure the security of our nation and prevent further loss of life. Furthermore,domestic use of the military against Al-Qaeda is legal because it serves a national security, rather than a law enforcement, purpose. I have constitutional and statutory authority to deploy the military against international or foreign terrorists operating within the United States”

Military intelligence further determines that they are looking for 4 Muslim males between 18-30 living somewhere in Brooklyn. Nothing more is known.

The military begins house to house rounding up all Muslims fitting that profile and putting them in the new Yankee Stadium for interrogation. The U.S. borders are closed to anyone flying in from selected “Muslim Countries”.

In “ripple in the water panic reaction” localities such as Deaborn Michigan with large Muslim populations begin rounding up all Muslims and placing them in their own detention facilities for interrogation and questioning.

Constitutional? Outrageous? Reasonable given the fact scenario?

When we are afraid it becomes all so disturbingly easy for us to dismiss out of hand the blood, sweat and tears that were put into the Constitutional rights we have today . Our rights when we are at peace and feel safe. Our rights when we are at war and/or a large portion of us are living in fear. Should it make a difference? It certainly has made a difference in our past. Who can forget The Sedition Acts of 1798 and 1918, The McCarthy Hearings or Korematsu v. United States where Justice Black writing for the majority stated that:

“Korematsu was not excluded from the Military Area because of hostility to him or his race. He was excluded because we are at war with the Japanese Empire”

While it has been frowned on publicly in every sense, it should be noted that Korematsu has never been overruled. Are we at war now? Certainly not in the traditional Congressional declared sense. If we are, how easy would it be to substitute names and nationality in Justice Black’s statement. There is no doubt that we have trended towards more power to the executive during times of “war” and national emergency.

No one wants to live in fear. That is what terrorists want but on a much broader scale than you and I. They want chaos at airports. They want us to engage in pure racial and ethnic profiling. They want us to round people up and put them in stadiums. They want our Constitution to change for the worse so that we feel less afraid, lulled by into a false state of calm by our new “Fear Based Constitution” They know that it’s always easier to justify a Fear Based Constitution when we are on the outside of the barbed wire looking in.

THAT is the fear they shoot for when bringing down planes. That is how they win. By bringing about fundamental changes to our way of life. What is a more fundamental than a change in our Constitutional Rights solely out of fear.

As we stand united this moment , Is our “Cup Of  Constitutional Rights” half-full or half-empty? One thing is certain. Whether the “water-level” rises or falls in the near future will be impacted by whether voices of calm and reason or voices of knee-jerk fear are doing the pouring.

Our Constitution has been around for well over 200 years and while getting its edges torn now and then has always managed to withstand moments in history of and moments of great fear. I hope it will escape this fearful moment in-tact.

I am also aware of the eleventh tradition about anonymity.  I however, believe that no one has the right to tell me how I handle my own program.  If I want to out myself for whatever reason, or no reason at all, that is my right.  There are those in AA who disagree with me.  They believe that we should tell no one  unless asked.  That’s their right.  Every time I write about my sobriety,  I get angry emails and comments from those who take the that position.  Reasonable people can disagree.  One thing I think we all agree on however,  is that NO ONE (except Radar Online) has the right to take away someone’s  anonymity.  To out someone for financial exploitation gain to a tabloid is is especially despicable.  There can also be consequences. It could affect employment offers and bonding rates to hire him for a film.

This is what was done to actor Jason Segel by RadarOnline and whoever their “source” was.  If Jason want’s to out himself as someone who attends Alcoholics Anonymous,  that is his right, but to out him publicly is  outrageous. I can’t say that I am surprised. We live in a tabloid culture in which there are no privacy barriers.  Where all potentially embarrassing  information is broken down to a dollar value, even at the expense of the mental health of those who want nothing more than to free themselves from addiction. I could go into a long rant on this but I will just say, shame on Radar Online and shame on the person who either was in the meeting and outed him, or followed him for the purpose of outing him. You are lower than low.

This is the thirteenth excerpt of my book  “Shattered Image”.  Shattered Image is the story of my struggle with, and recovery from, a compulsive behavior clinically known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). That struggle has included recovery from bulimia, anorexia, alcoholism, and addiction to cocaine and steroids. I also suffer from clinical depression. For decades, I engaged in self-destructive behavior with the single goal of correcting a terribly distorted sense of self-image, a self-image rooted in early life experiences.  Release date is July -August 2013  See what people are saying about Shattered Image!

September 1987, 2:00 am.  Just hit my one year anniversary in Dallas.  It still feels like 100 degrees.  The lack of breeze is stifling.  I am sweating like I have stepped out of the shower.  Not sure if it’s the humidity or the three huge lines of cocaine I just did.  Cocaine is my lunch and breakfast with tequila on the side.  Have not eaten all day. Did get in my twelve mile run. That familiar dehydration and heart palpitation feeling. Dabbling in Drunkorexia.    Feeling a little bit like a bad high. Edgy. Lockjaw. Maybe I bought some bad shit. Have to find a new dealer. Then again, maybe the next lines will be better. The rational of a developing addict.  Five Bacon, Egg And Cheese McMuffins from Mickey D’s to be scarfed down followed by a knuckle scraping, tension cleansing, purge.  It’s easier both mentally and physically to toss my binge after I’ve been drinking.  I’ve learned all the little tricks of the long time off and on bulimic.  It’s not throwing up. It’s just life.  

Four hours earlier.  Night out at the new local sports bar, Legends. A boxing ring in the middle of the room with the table’s surrounding the ring.  Televisions ringing the room. Yuppies, pool sharks and sports team groupies. Pretty waitresses dressed as ring girls carrying around the latest knockout potions. There is she. Tall, pretty, curly blond hair.  My mind starts working its developing  BDD thoughts.  You want to sit down at our table?  You’re too pretty to want anything to do with me.   Maybe it’s the eight-dollar, diamond stud, zircon earring I purchased at Target, dangling from my ear.  Waiting for her to laugh at me and tell me I’m ugly.  Memories of the freshman Penn State redhead who did the same. I feel like an idiot, but I am desperate to try anything to draw the interest to me.  I am a frightened child at twenty-six.  Trying so hard to be noticed when I can’t look at myself in the mirror.  It’s the only way I can socialize.

The alcohol and cocaine make me the person I want to be. The bulimia releases the pain when it doesn’t happen.  The image in the mirror never changes.  In this moment however, I am talkative, aggressive and confident until the coke wears off.  A conversation of lies.  To tell the truth is to face the truth about myself.  I am a eleven years old.  What is that dribbling down the side of my mouth?  The cocaine has frozen my throat muscles.  With every lie I tell,  spit either drools out of my mouth or like a projectile finds it’s way onto her arm.   I can see my reflection on the glossy marble table top. I have rabies.  “Are you ok” she asks?  Yes, , why are you asking? I don’t even know I am doing it. “Well you keep spitting on me!  I’m sorry, I did not realize I was doing that. 

“Do You like Billy Joel?  We should go see him in concert the next time he’s in Dallas.”  Had to get that out before the cocaine wore off.   “Here’s my number,  just please stop spitting on me”.  I sense that I may be hitting critical mass of revulsion with her.  I have McDonald’s on the brain.

Pulling up in front of my apartment.  Door opens. Stepping out of the passenger side. I am airborne!  Feet taken out from under me.  I am propelled into a full somersault.  A death grip on my McDonald’s bag.  Boom! Slamming back down on the windshield of the car that hit me  with the bone jarring force.  What the hell happened?  Where did this car come from? The windshield shatters like I am looking into a mirror.  It  releases from its frame and drops into the vehicle.  I never saw it coming.  I never looked up. I have a McMuffin in my mouth.  My buddy is driving on down the road, oblivious to my street acrobatics.  I roll off the car and into the street face up.   A male is now standing over me.  He is screaming at me. I am laughing.  My  sweat drenched, bar smelling, white polo shirt is soaked in blood.  The blue horse is now red.  A female  is now screaming at  me. “YOU WALKED IN FRONT OF US!  CALL THE POLICE!  I am still laughing at my airborne somersault.  Maybe it’s the cocaine.  “GET IN THE CAR BITCH!”  They are gone.

I am still laying in the street amid the broken windshield glass.  Where are my Egg McMuffins?.    A  lot of blood coming from somewhere.  Into the apartment  Lots of cuts and bruises.  Some cocaine left in my pocket. No biggie. Still have my McMuffins.  Shower, change, sniff, shot, binge,  puke. Just another night in Dallas Texas.  Add in three broken ribs.  Another line.  Calling the blonde.  She gave me a number for a local pizza joint.  Next.

See what people are saying about Shattered Image!

In a field strewn with myth and fiction, Cuban provides us with an absorbing account of his struggle with body dysmorphic disorder, giving a human face to a scientific problem. In my years of working in addiction medicine, I have seen that sometimes it is easier for a patient to realize the need to seek help when they see themselves in the stories of others; Cuban’s book is an important addition to scientific texts, and we are all the richer for it.”

Andrea G. Barthwell, MD, FASAM Past President of the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) and Former Deputy Director of Demand Reduction, White House Office of National Drug Control Policy

 “Shattered Image is one man’s compelling and rare account of his long struggle with and recovery from body dysmorphic disorder. In my professional experience, BBD is a condition that is not often recognized, and I am thankful that Cuban is shedding light on the eating disorders, alcoholism, drug addiction, depression and other psychiatric illnesses that can result from it.” 

Gerald A. Melchiode, MD, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry,  UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Tx

“Shattered Image is infused with relentless resilience in the face of  the eating disorders, addiction and despair often associated with Body Dysmorphic Disorder.  Brian Cuban’s candid revelations of the human spirit’s ability to overcome significant obstacles will strengthen and encourage all who are fortunate to read this page turner.”

Jacquelyn Ekern, MS, LPC
President, Eating Disorder Hope  Fort Worth, Texas

“Having helped people learn to lose weight and keep it off for more than 25 years, I now believe Brian Cuban has had the courage to open an emotional door that will give both men and women a true understanding of how they perceive their body image and unlock that door for a lifetime of success!”

Larry North

Healthy Living Lifestyle Expert, Bestselling Author of Get Fit and Living Lean

“Brian Cuban tackles a subject nobody talks about with honesty, grace, and hope. This book will help countless people.”

Bob Beaudine Author of the best-selling book The Power of WHO & CEO of Eastman and Beaudine