Cats and other things

I am sitting here on the floor with my cat, petting him and thinking. Petting an animal, or even being in the presence of one, can make a lot of things better. There is nothing quite like the purr of a contented cat. As I observe my kitty his ears got back and his tail starts to twitch indicating that he might not be in the mood to be touched or pet. In this moment I am jealous of him. It may seem weird and stupid to be jealous of a cat but who among us has not been jealous of some animal at some point in our lives? Cats are in tune with their emotions and it shows in their body language. That is something that is soooooo hard for me to actually do, and honestly it's not always safe for me to do. Cats are also really good at being selfish, another thing I often struggle with. I am so concerned with other people, their emotions and emotional well-being, being liked and taking care of others and not hurting people that it sometimes gets in the way of my needs and my recovery. While I recognize this, changing it is so hard. I am slowly learning, or trying to learn, to trust my instincts and intuition because it is often right and to allow myself to have needs and do what is best for myself. It's been a long and hard road to get to this point and I know I have a long way still to go but the point is that I am traveling that road at all, something I would not have done a few years ago. I know that there are certain things that are out of my control and that other people's actions are included in those. As I learn and walk this path to recovery I have gone back over memories and realized that not everything is my fault, despite what some people may say. It is such a relief to know that I was not the source of fights and other people's actions/reactions.

As I grow and learn more about how to take care of myself, I take tiny steps in my recovery and towards being my own person. This is a wonderful and terrifying thing. I don't really know who this person within me is. I know my eating disordered self very well, we have been extremely intimate for years but I don't know this healthy self and this fear is holding my back. I need to find a way to get past it so I can move on and not cling to my eating disorder, something that I have been really struggling with lately. It's hard when there is a constant tirade going in my head saying "i'm fat, ugly, stupid, worthless, unlovable, mean, evil, a bad friend/sister/daughter/student/girlfriend/person/human; i'm evil; i don't deserve recovery, to live, hope, happiness; people would be happier without me around; i'm a burden, a nuisance, a bore, annoying; i don't deserve anything; my life is meaningless; i wish i was dead; i should die; i have nothing worth living for; lose weight, lose weight; just a few pounds; food is evil and i don't need it; who cares if i ever eat again; am i really going to eat that/this; do i really need all this food; life's too much; this is too much food; i'm obese; no one will ever love me....." It's so hard to fight this all the time and keep my head up, to challenge and ignore it, to just function. I know I need to and I have a cheat sheet that I can look at for reframes and challenges but it's so hard to believe. Yes I can challenge and reframe these thoughts but I don't know how often I actually believe them and that is the most important part. I wish this was easier. I wish I had never relapsed. There is so much I wish but wishing will get me nowhere. I have to work hard and push through this. I have to have hope and trust that I will be alright in the end. I have to have trust that my team knows what they are doing and will not make me fat. I have to be open and honest and true to myself, whoever that person is. I have to be willing to change and face my fears. I have to accept that I will have days where I may not be okay or follow my meal plan or engage in other behaviors but that does not mean that I have to do so the next day or the next. I have to be strong and determined. I know that I am a very stubborn person and I can and will use that stubbornness and determination to my advantage. I need to accept that this may not be the last time that I go to treatment but it may also indeed be the last time. I will take it one day at a time because I cannot know the future and worrying and obsessing about it will do me no good. I do not need to worry about the next possible relapse right now but get through this to recovery. I will focus on this moment now and getting through this one rather than obsessing about the next and that way I will get where I am going, find out where I want to go and take the next step to get there.  

This Struggle

There are times when I passingly wish I was dead. There are times when I feel so full of life that I am bursting. Now is not one of the latter. For some reason my brain likes to think that death would solve all of my problems, that I would be free of my struggles and worries, that I would be at peace with myself and the universe. Well, as many have said, suicide is a permanent fix to a temporary problem. And I'm not saying that I want to kill myself, so don't take it that way, but my mind likes to send the thought through it every once in a while. So it's something I have to deal with. For some people this might sounds crazy and I realize that in the spectrum of mental health I'm probably not on the upper end. The important thing is that I recognize this and as long as I am recognizing this then I'm not too worried. I can still find reasons why my death would be more of a disaster and loss than anything else. I know that there are people who love me very much and care about me and I would never want them to go through the pain of something like that. So I keep forging on, praying that this will get easier, that I will be able to keep fighting off my demons. Life is not easy, nor is it fair and these are facts that I accept. All I am asking is for it to be a little more tolerable. Yes I am struggling now but I am trying to hold on to the hope that one day I will not struggle as much. Since I have been home I have not always been entirely honest with myself and I am working on that. I do not know if there has been one day that I have been at my house when I have not spontaneously thrown up. It is so hard for me to admit this and I have to say that it is not just that I am here with my parents because it has happened when I have been home alone. Part of my problem admitting to this issue is the fact that it has been so often misunderstood as me purging. I am not purging, I just can't seem to stop myself from vomiting. (Sorry if this is triggering to any of you who are reading this.) The other thing that I need to admit is that I do not always make up for what I cannot keep down. Part of this is because I am afraid that if I do I will throw it up again and it will just make things worse. The other part is my eating disorder telling me that if I eat it then it counts whether I keep it down or not. So these are issues to bring up now in therapy and with my nutritionist. I know that it is important that I deal with this, not just because of the issues with food and that I am not following my meal plan technically if I am not keeping the food down, but also because I can feel the damage I am doing. Specifically the other day when I think I tore something. The chest pain I have been having for years now has been linked to this issue of not keeping my food down. Today I jokingly said that my body's expiration date may be sooner than expected and I know that this will be true if I do not address this and get help for it. The problem is the shame. Everything comes with the shame. I know that my therapist and team will not judge me but I judge myself and that is the worst. So I start with admitting it and the next step is to try to be a bit easier on myself. I would not judge someone else who struggled with the same issue and I deserve the same treatment I show others. Today (it is technically morning) I will work on accepting where I am and moving forward. 

I Have a Name And It Is Not ED/Ana

I have a name and it is not ED, Anorexia, or Ana (though I am an Anna, two n's  not one, and not THAT ana). I have a name but I am not always that person. As I am continuing to work on recovery outside of treatment I find that it is much harder. There is no one around to watch me, no one to notice if I do not follow my meal plan, no one to check on me every hour, no one to stop me from exercising. Freedom is wonderful but it also means that I have the freedom to "engage in behaviors." (On a side note, I hat that term but I don't know how else to put it.) This freedom is a big responsibility. It means that I have to take charge of my recovery and that is an exciting but terrifying thing, partly because I don't know how much I really trust myself.

I know that in the past I have been a very good liar, both with myself and with others. If I want to get away with something, I will find a way to do so. However, I don't really want to get away with my eating disordered behavior and I KNOW I will not get away with fully engaging in my eating disorder. So what about just kinda, sorta engaging in it??? No. I know that I cannot do that either because there is no kinda, sorta engaging in it. There is no "just a few pounds," no "I'll just go back to it for a few days until I get where I want to be," no "I can just cut a few things," and no "forgetting" to have something or to follow my meal plan. These things are all signs that I am headed back to the dark place that I have worked so hard the past 5 to 6 weeks to change and overcome. Life now may suck because of my thoughts and moods but it is nothing compared the despair and hopelessness I felt before and the catch-22 I was in, nothing compared with the lose of self I experienced, nothing compared to the pain I was putting my loved ones in. So I keep working on reframing my thoughts, keep telling myself that I want recovery, keep on trying and sitting with the pain and discomfort. Because what else can I do? Yes I could engage but that would be pointless as I said. So I see my team and work on my issues to try to get back to who I really am, my values, my interests and learning and growing as a person. I am hoping that as I grow and learn who I am, things will get easier, slowly easier and maybe one day I will be happy and healthy and confident in my recovery and body.

Making It at Home after Discharge

Well, I did it. I survived life at Klarman and have returned home. It's not the smoothest transition nor the easiest. Being back in the environment I was when I was still sick is hard and I have had a few slips but I am moving forward. Yes it is hard but I have done this before so I know that I can do it and this time I have my boyfriend. Sure he is not living in Vermont anymore but he is my main source of support outside my treatment team and I know I can reach him if I need to and just knowing that he cares helps. While behaviors have changed drastically since I was last home, my mind is still the same prison it has always been. I find myself hating this body more than ever and morning the lose of my eating disordered one. I wish there was a switch I could flick to turn off my brain but sadly there is no such thing. I work and work on reframing my thoughts but I just keep doing the same thing over and over. I wonder if I will ever be "normal," but what is normal anyway?

Looking through my journal from treatment and before I do see the progress I have made and it gives me hope. I did a lot of very hard work in treatment and I know that I need to continue that work if I want to truly recover. Some of my first steps in treatment were to make sure that my scale was removed from the house and other methods of body checking were disposed of. The scale was the hardest thing to get rid of but I felt so much better after doing so. I still have moments of regret associated with relinquishing my hold on a means of monitoring my weight but I know it was the right decision. If I had my scale, I would be quickly back to where I was before treatment. As it is I have to resist the urge to purchase a new one. I feel so torn. Within me I have two sides at war and I am pulled between the two. I can't get my eating disorder to shut up or leave me alone. Since entering my range everything has just gotten so much worse. The notion of "just losing a few pounds" is so strong but I know what it leads to and I don't want to go there. I don't want to throw away all the work that I have put into getting to where I am. I keep trying to stay positive but some days I just want to hide from the world and disappear all together. Fighting that urge is sometime the only thing I can think about. I feel like I am losing energy to keep pushing through and I am hoping that I can get to a better place before I do.

Treatment Days

I'm sitting in the computer room at treatment on a website I'm not supposed to be on. I don't care. I have missed my blog and the sense of release and the ability to type out my feelings. Yes, I journal while here but for someone who is used to having her laptop whenever she wants it, not being able to blog is a huge adjustment on top of all the other adjustments I am having to make in my life. I wish that I could have my computer but I understand why we are not allowed to do so. Being back in residential treatment has been a difficult adjustment but I have settled in and met some amazing girls here. Yes there are the annoying and frustrating ones, the girls who engage in behaviors and trigger everyone else. There are the girls who do not follow the rules and the contraband smuggled in. However the overall feel here is nice now. Some major drama players have either been transferred or discharged and the place has settled into it's normal routine. While I am able to follow the meal plan and gain the weight they want me to, I am still having so much difficulty accepting the need for this weight gain and the changing body I am experiencing. I grieve for the body I once had, though it was unhealthy and unattractive, according to others. It is so hard to get past these feelings of self-hatred and loathing I have for my body. I know it will be a long process and it will be hard. I just hope that while I continue to work on feeling better about myself and my body I am able to remain on the track that I have begun and not slip back into old ways. 

Struggling and Thoughts

So it comes as no surprise to me that having a scale is a bad idea which leads to much unhappiness, however I cannot seem to part with the damn thing. I am constantly stepping on and stepping off. My day or night is determined by what that number is. If it goes down it's good, up is bad. So as I start to eat in preparation for treatment my weight goes up. It does not matter how much or little it rises, each time it does I feel that self-esteem I already have so little of fall a bit more. I would give anything not to care about weight or how my body looks in the mirror. I would give anything to be free of this obsession. I do not know how many hours, days, weeks, months, years I have spent thinking about food, weight and my body. It makes me sad that I am so consumed with these issues. As a child I used to have fun and have a life. Now I find myself unable to enjoy times with friends and family because I am so self-conscious and food is part of every meeting. I think about how I can make it look like I had more than I actually did, if there is a way to get out of eating. I always scan the table to make sure that I am the one having the least. There is a running count in my head, a table of body types. If I am the skinniest one there I can feel good, if I am not then I am a failure. All I want is to be normal but try as I might I keep being drawn back into this pattern. Now it is time to get help to work on this but even though I know deep down that I need to go and get help, I am still fighting with myself constantly because I do not want to go. I am scared and sad. I don't want to miss my summer but I have no choice. I need to spend this time focusing on me and my needs and I need to learn that that is okay. While in treatment I have many goals but I still plan on working on things for the outside world. I will bring my GRE books. I will continue to write and journal.  I will do reading. There is so much that I want to do and I will find a way to do it. I know that by bringing things to do to treatment I will have a chance to practice balancing what I need/want to do and what I am able to do. I will be able to test my boundaries and limits in a secure environment and this is something I am excited and scared to do. At school, I constantly seem to be running from one thing to another and I need to learn balance. I cannot do everything all the time. I need to learn to say no and speak up when I am overwhelmed and most importantly, I need to learn to ask for help and advocate for myself. The first step in this, I believe, is doing something about the nutrition information that is posted on all food in the dining halls and the Vermont laws that require restaurants and chains to post calories. This is my next step of advocating for myself since I know that if I go back to school and have to face the caloric content of every item all the time I will relapse. It sucks but I know I am not the only one with this problem and someone needs to stand up for us all. 

Reflections Before Bed

Wow. So I have been really bad about posting here. I guess I have had a lot going on which explains why I have been lax in my blogging. A lot has happened since I was on here last. For starters, I have finished the semester. I made it! There were times when I was not sure if I would but I completed the year and just in time. I have been slowly and not so slowly slipping since I was discharged from Walden. While the time I spent there probably kept me able to be in school, it did not help me get back on track with recovery. I could say that I had so many external factors going against me this semester and that these were the cause of my relapse but that would not be entirely honest. I don't' think I ever really was able to deal with the issues that helped create my eating disorder. I was able to deal with the behaviors but the thoughts and feelings never went away. In someways it feels like this relapse was a ticking time bomb that was just waiting to explode. My low self-esteem, a major contributor to my eating disorder, was talked about but I never actually changed the way I think and feel about myself. It doesn't matter that people say that I am a good person or that I should feel good about myself, the plain fact is that I do not like myself, I barely tolerate myself. If someone asked me why this is I don't know that I could answer that question. There are many times, in fact most of the time, I cannot stand being in my body. This is a common feeling among those of us who struggle with body image issues and eating disorders so the knowledge that this is an issue for me is nothing new. What I want to know is why I feel this way and the fact that I cannot answer that question is frustrating. So, although I finished the semester, I do not feel that it was an accomplishment or that I should be proud of myself for that. The fact that I was able to remain at school is just something that I know I had to do and there was no option of not finishing. Tonight my dad said to me that I am a judgmental person; I disagreed with him. But if I look at the way I talk to myself and the standers that I hold for myself especially, and for others at times, I'd have to say that I am. So, armed with this knowledge I approach a new chapter in my life. Once again, I am going to residential treatment for my eating disorder, this time as an adult.

My labs and vitals indicate that, currently, I am medically stable. This is good news, though surprising news, for me and my team. While I am medically stable, I am in the worst place I have every been with my eating disorder in terms of weight and thoughts. Being at school granted me the freedom to do whatever I wanted. There was no accountability and so I could get away with anything. Except I wasn't really getting away with it, I was just postponing the inevitable and now I have to face myself and really look at the way I talk to myself, treat myself and view my body. I cannot hide any longer. Although my eating disorder is constantly trying to convince me that I am okay, that I do not need treatment, that I do not want treatment; objectively I know how much I need it. I keep thinking, well no one can force me. My parents don't have that power anymore. But really who am I hurting by refusing treatment when I know I need it. I would only be making life more difficult for myself and everyone who cares about me and loves me. As scared as I am, I need to face the truth: I need help. Admitting that is frightening and difficult. As someone who likes to be in control, who is the caretaker not the caretakee, someone who does not like to be told what to do, I know it will be difficult giving up this control and trusting my treatment team. I also have to realize that I am not in control anymore, I don't know if I ever was. All I have is the illusion of control and a body that will start to shut down, if it hasn't started already. Tomorrow I see my therapist I saw in high school. I know that it is going to be difficult. I am ashamed to return to her worse off than I was when she first and last saw me. I am afraid that I will disappoint her even though I know that that is not the case and the person I have disappointed is myself. I cannot help but feel that I chose to return to my eating disorder, that it is my fault. I do not know what this obsession with placing blame is a result of or why it is so strong, all I know is that it is there. The standards I hold myself to are unrealistic and impossible to achieve so why do I hold myself to them? Why do I clearly set myself up to fail? Again, I do not know but these are questions that I need to explore in therapy so that I can accept myself and start to move on with my life. There is so much more I want to write and say and do but for now I need to get some sleep. In the morning, perhaps I will see with new eyes. Perhaps I will be magically better. I smile and think to myself, 'If only it was that easy.' Although tomorrow is a new day and a fresh start, I know that the weight of today (no pun intended) will be there tomorrow, pulling me down, keeping me locked in a seemingly endless battle of wills with myself.

Imbolc, Purification and Re-Dedication

To those who do not know, I am pagan and tonight at our pagan/wiccan collective meeting we celebrated one of our sabbaths a day early, Imbolc. It is a time of cleansing, purifying and dedicating oneself. As I have been struggling through the past few (or more than a few) months I have been uncertain of my desire for recovery. I have become so entrenched in ED/Ana that I could not see where I ended and they began. With the reality check of the possibility of needing treatment and the realization that this could not be done while working part time and remaining a full-time student I have had to confront this demon head on. Over the break my doctor and I made plans for when I would come back to school that were delayed due to the fact that during our J-term, a time which has traditionally been a time to take fun classes, non-academic classes and such, our health center was closed. This provided the perfect opportunity for ED/Ana to step into overdrive. And so I found myself at the health center meeting with my doctor who was talking treatment ideas and the possibility of doing IOP. Still reality did not fully hit me until yesterday when I had my first appointment with a nutritionist since the beginning of college almost three years ago. Reality dropped on me last night and after a few panic attacks I was still unsure of how this was going to go. I knew what I had to do, I know what I have to do, but was still uncertain that it could be done. Well tonight the night before Imbolc I am cleaning out my head and dedicating myself to recovery.

"I will give myself the chance, the choice to live. I will give my body a voice, the words to speak its needs and take the time to listen. I will not allow myself to be drawn in to being with another but will make my boundaries known. I will allow myself to need and to satisfy those needs. I will be present in my body without judgment or critique. I will be seen, heard. I will give myself permission to exist, take up space and have a presence."

These are the words I wrote during out ritual and with these words I dedicate myself to recovery. I say good-bye to the demon that has made my life hell, turned me into a liar and taken over so much of my time and energy. I will not allow myself to suffer at its hands anymore. I may slip up. I may have bad days. I will make mistakes but that comes with being human. I will not allow a slip up turn into an excuse to go backwards. I am done starving myself to death. I do not want that life because it isn't a life. I have goals, plans, things I want to do, passions I want to pursue. None of this can be done with ED/Ana in my life. I am ready, I think, to embrace life again. I will start by doing all I can to follow my meal plan. Whatever it takes I need to do because there is too much at stake to allow room for failure. Failure happens only when you give up the fight and I WILL NOT stop fighting. I can't, my life is at stake and there are people who love me and care about me whom I cannot let down. I am a stubborn person, one way or another I will find a way to follow the path of recovery and take my life back.

Negative Energy and a New Year

"Through the Goddess, we can discover our strength, enlighten our minds, own our bodies, and celebrate our emotions." Starhawk

I know that I have just used this quote in my last post but I would really like to take some time to reflect on what this means. In struggling with my eating disorder I am denying myself more than just food and the nutrients that comes with it. I deny myself the energy to get things done, to have fun, to  live my life. I deny my needs and say that they are not important, that they can be set aside as easily as one casts away junk mail. I am denying my very right to exist. In not eating and working my body beyond the point where it can safely maintain itself I am seeking to disappear, to become unseen, unnoticed, invisible. I have to ask myself why, why is it that I allow myself to continue down a path that I know deep down holds only pain, betrayal, anger, frustration and so much more. What is going on within me or in my environment that has fostered the right condition for such self-hatred? Growing up Catholic I was always taught that we are made in the image and likeness of God, with the capital g, and as such are we not god-like ourselves? But no with the sin of two people we were supposedly cast out of paradise and made to live a harsh life. I do not claim to be a theologian but this does not seem like the act of a loving god. The old testament, actually, shows an angry, vengeful god who deals out punishments to his people for disobeying his laws. I think that this punishment is what I really took away from my religious education classes and this is what I experienced at home. As a child I was filled with so much fear that I hid things and did things in secret so as not to be punished for being myself. I do not seek to criticize any religion but for me, I need to work on my relationship with the goddess. I think that I have allowed the daily difficulties of life to get in the way of time spent in reflection. This is not wholly my fault. There has been a lot of negativity this past year and that is what I need to work on first.

Negative self-talk is a major problem. I can never seem to shake the critic in myself. I do not use the same critic when talking or thinking about others so why am I so hard on myself. I do not know the answer but I would like to make a fresh start this year. I am going to try to reduce this negative self-talk. I am going to work on staying positive and not letting myself get bogged down when things get difficult. This past year I had to deal with a lot of shit and I need to work on cleaning up the wreckage that was left in it's wake. Included in working on the negative self-talk, I need to start taking a step back from other people's lives. I love my friends but I seem to make friends with people who have a lot they are dealing with and I have learned that, though some day I may become a therapist, at this moment I am not equipped to handle all of the worries and trials of my friends. I need to learn to set boundaries if others are unable to set healthy boundaries themselves. I need to learn that it is okay to say no and that I need to take care of myself before I can even think about taking care of others. I have known this for a long time but this year I am making it a goal, a priority to carry the knowledge into action.

Boundaries themselves have always been difficult. I never seem to be able to have healthy boundaries with friends. I need to be able to say no, to define what is and is not appropriated in a friendship. So this year I am going to work on boundaries. Already I have been trying to set up strong boundaries with my mother. In the past we have had a lot of issues and I have felt that she is often invading myself, my very being. I have felt crowded by her and have been working to not let her get through my defenses. I have to do this before I can get better along with many other things. This is just the beginning. I know I have a lot of work to do and a lot of reflecting to do. I am going to make a commitment to take time each day to reflect and grow closer to my goddess and to myself.

"What the caterpillar calls the end the of the rest of the world calls a butterfly." Lao Tzu

I Can't Fight This Feeling

I cannot fight this anymore. I am really struggling. I feel so guilty when I eat anything. I take every opportunity to go to the gym. I feel like I'm a total failure and completely worthless. I am depressed and cry myself to sleep most nights. ED's voice is in my head all the time and I cannot shut him out or shut him up. This was the case even in recovery so once again I believe him. I feel like I'm fighting a losing battle. I am tired, so tired, all the time. I just want to give in and give up. All I want to do is curl up in my room and hide but I cannot do this for obvious reasons. I am sure that part of the problem is it's finals and I have a lot to do but this was bad before that. I cannot say that it came back when my friend attempted suicide because I was struggling before that. I was struggling on and off even before school started. Honestly part of it I think was the realization that I had been in recovery for three years this summer and that freaked me out. I don't know if that is the sole or main cause or factor but I know that I am not doing well and I don't want to admit it. I don't want to say that it is a problem. I do not have the time to have an eating disorder that needs treatment right now. I just don't. I have too much going on in my life to take the time to stop and get help for this. I have goals that do not include treatment. Writing this and reading it sounds crazy and my rational side can argue and say that those goals are the very reason that I need to get help but my mind is not rational right now. I am not myself. ED has just completely taken over and I am torn between wanting to get better and wanting to get worse. I know that as an adult I cannot be forced into treatment. I know that I have to finish this semester. I know that I have friends and family who love me and are worried. I know my boyfriend is in a lot of pain because I am not eating right. Yet none of it matters to me. All that matters is the anxiety I have about eating food. The fear of gaining weight. The belief that I am too fat. The need to lose weight and deny my needs. I am so scared of myself, of ED, of others, of what I am willing to put myself through. The self-hatred that I carry is huge and it scares me. I know that I am in a lot of pain right now and I don't know why or how to deal with it but ED does. ED is giving me the answers right now and I am listening because I am weak and scared. I know that I need to stop listening, stand up for myself and figure out what is going on but that is scarier than ED and I don't know if I have the strength right now. I am overwhelmed. I know what to do but I don't know how to do it.

First Day of Classes and Fear

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end." -Seneca

Today was the first day of class. Overall it wasn't bad. I had three academic classes and the introductory class for my T'ai Chi class. Going through today made me realize that I can't take a fifth class. Life is crazy and I can't make life any more complicated than it already is. I need to have time to breathe and relax. I need to learn that it is okay not to do everything. I think that I need to give up one of my clubs. I am doing too much and I know that starting an Active Minds chapter at Mount Holyoke would look really good on my resume but I have to think about my emotional and mental well-being. I am getting chest pain more often now which makes me think that it is probably stress and anxiety. I am going to try to contact my psychiatrist about maybe getting something more for my anxiety. I just really haven't been doing too well lately.

I am really excited about my classes but it is going to be a lot of work. I am taking two 300-level English on the same day which means a lot of reading. I am hoping that I can handle it but I'm really nervous about it. I am terrified of failure and hold myself to high standards. I need to learn that a B+ or B is not the end of the world.  It is okay not to ace every class. Perfection is not a realistic goal. I know this but I still try to hold myself to those standards and when I inevitably fail then I am a horrible, worthless person, or so I tell myself. This year I am going to try to work harder on that. Maybe I will try to purposefully do something imperfectly and work through it, telling myself it is okay. Life will not end if everything is not perfect. My perfectionism keeps me from even beginning something because I am too afraid that I will mess it up so I don't even try. This is not okay with me. I do not want to be holding back on life because of fear. I used to say that I was afraid of nothing. I now see how big of a lie that was. So now I will work on conquering my fear. However the paradox is that fear of failure to conquer my fears makes me not want to try. So I guess step one is to work on my fear of failure and go from there.
"Do the thing you fear the most and the death of the fear is certain." -Mark Twain

ED's Gifts To Me

ED has brought many things into my life. He has made my life a living hell. He has given me anxiety. He has taken years of my life. He has set me up for constant failure with his demands of perfection. He has worked to manipulate my relationship with food, weight and exercise. He has disrupted my body's balance and more. He took me from my family and friends. He ruined my junior year of high school and my transcript. And now that I am in recovery he is still haunts me and tries to ruin my life.

I am not talking about the constant reminders that he is there. I am talking about the possible long term effects of ED. I have been having chest pains for over a year now and recently it's been getting worse. This summer I have seen all manner of doctors, been to the ER and they have found nothing. It is frustrating not knowing what is going on and not having any answers, any clue about what is wrong. It almost feels like another method of trying to get me to return to him. And I almost feel like doing it.

Not knowing why I am having this pain or what is going on is not only frustrating but scary as well. Not knowing anything has brought up feelings of hopelessness and ED is once again offering his help. He is calling to me, saying that he can help. If I just focus on food, cut down my intake, exercise, I can feel better, he will help me to feel better. But I know, even though I am scared, frustrated and feeling hopeless, returning to ED would only make things worse. I cannot go back to him but more importantly I will not go back. I will stand up to him. I will deal with it and I will emerge stronger for it. I do not want anything more from ED. He has given and taken enough. I am not ED and he is not me. I will not be fooled again. I won't, I won't, I won't, I won't!!!!!!!!!!!!!