Gonna Try

Today I really came to the understanding that I need to make so major life changes. Yes I have know this before but I have been feeling myself slipping backwards again. I know that I cannot let things get bad again. I need to really focus on making TRUE friends. I have had a lot of difficulty with this lately. College has not been my friend in this area of my life. I feel lonely and disconnected. I am going to see about changing rooms so that I can live in a dorm with at least one good friend. This will hopefully encourage me not to isolate so much. I want to focus on school and work but also on having a life. I see people I used to be friends with all around campus and I see that they are spending time with people and I want that. I admit I am jealous of them. I don't really have a social life here and that just keeps me going down the path of loneliness, hopelessness and despair. I am crazy busy with work and things but I also need friends I can rely on for support. I am hoping to find this. I am going to really try to stabilize my life. I am making that commitment to myself.

Back to School

Well I am back at school and moved in to my room. I have had two days of classes and I am still alive. I made it through this summer at home. Being back has its pluses and minuses. I love my school but it can get stressful and there is less accountability with no one around to see that I am eating and not abusing the gym. So of course ED would decide that this is a good time to try to make a reappearance. The thoughts, feelings and urges have increased of course and I am finding it harder to ignore them and stay focused or distract myself. Having been back less than a week I am proud that I have yet to hit the gym. I have been cutting back on my meal plan and am making an effort to get back to where I need to be with that. This is my senior year and I am not going to let ED ruin this for me. I am going to have fun and enjoy my last year here, ED be damned. This is my life. I do not want to be struggling just to stay awake and survive. I cannot let ED control my life like he has in the past. I want to make every moment I have left at college count. I want to be functional. I am scared that things may get out of control and ED feeds on that fear. He feeds on my emotions saying that he knows how to deal with them. I know that he is wrong. I know there is going to be a lot of pressure and I am already freaking out about not having a job when I graduate in the spring. I have to stay in the moment or this fear will run wild and I will turn to ED for help and control. I need to accept that right now the future is uncertain but I know that I can and will finish my college career at the end of this academic year. Nothing is going to hold me back. I know that my determination can keep me going even if ED gets in the way but I do not want to be running on strength of will alone. I do not want to isolate myself the way I did last year. I do not want to feel so alone and little and scared. I do not want to see the hurt and disappointment in the eyes of my boyfriend and others I love should I relapse. I do not want to go through that pain again. It is hard walking around campus and seeing all the girls who are anorexically skinny. It is painful being jealous of them. I don't want to be but I can't help it. I do not want to walk around comparing myself to everyone I pass, judging who is skinnier and who is not. I am afraid to go to the gym because I know how much time I spent there and how much time and energy I wasted there last year but I am also scared of not going and getting fat. I hate the feeling of food in my stomach and the emotions that wash over me every time I bring food to my mouth. I hate the constant constant fear of everything. If I could only live without the fear. I used to say that I was afraid of nothing. I used to be the biggest liar on the earth. Now it seems I am afraid of everything, even things I know I don't have to be afraid of. Sometimes I feel like it would be so much easier if I just never existed but I know that is not the answer and that that would be the coward's way out. I know that I am a fighter but fighting something within myself is the hardest battle I have ever been in and I hate it. I hate that I hate myself and my body. I hate that I ever opened the door that let ED into my life. I cannot change that now. I have to live with it. I just want to be able to move on but I know that I will carry ED in some part of me for the rest of my life. The only thing to do is to figure out how to lock him up and keep him away from me.

Oh who am I and where will I go????????

“Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.” 
― Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go...” 
― Dr. Seuss, Oh, the Places You'll Go!

“we accept the love we think we deserve.” 
― Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

My mind feels like it is going everywhere at once. There is no one thread that links my thoughts. I am here and there. I am tired and exhilarated at the same time. I am everything and nothing. I want to be happy and healthy and whole but I feel broken into tiny pieces and I don't even know if they are all there to put me back together again. I guess for me this is part of the process of recovery. I know that ED/Ana broke down and apart the person that I was. I do not even know who that person was. I do not fully know who I AM and for someone who likes to be in control of things, that is a scary feeling. I know that I can decide who I am and who I choose to be but I am a very indecisive person. With ED/Ana I knew exactly what I did and who I was. I was the girl who did not eat, who went to the gym for at least an hour, more often an hour and a half. I was the girl who stood on the scale multiple times a day. I was the girl with the incredible self-control. I was the girl who was envious of everyone around me. I was the girl who was here but was not really here. I was the girl who was terrified of her own shadow and so sought to make that shadow disappear. There was certainty with ED/Ana, a clear and definite path. Now I have hips. I have breasts. I take up space. I am messy and dealing with messy emotions. I have thighs. I have power and a voice. I have a body. But I do not have a set path anymore. I do not have the clear rules. I do not have the defined categories. I feel like my life is unraveling but in reality, it is just beginning.

I am no longer chained to death. I have free will. I have choice. I have a chance at life. I can be free of fear of food. I still feel that pull towards that old path but I know I don't have to go down it. Instead, I CHOOSE to go to school, to take classes and throw myself into my course work and my job and my friendships and relationship with my boyfriend, to in essence throw myself into life. I am getting ready to go back to school and this will be a new beginning, a chance to make the most of my final year at school. I don't want to waste time on ED/Ana. I am going to choose health, happiness and recovery.

Finding My Voice

Life is hard enough without having any disorder. There are always unexpected challenges and things thrown at you that you have to deal with. Being diagnosed with any ED means that you have to constantly be aware of what is going on, not just around you, but also within you. ED has a nasty way of sneaking back into people's lives. After so many years of hearing that voice it is so easy to slip into the ED mindset without realizing it. Being about a month and a half out of residential treatment I am still struggling a lot with the feelings and thoughts surrounding food and body. I still feel guilty any time something goes into my body. I hate looking at myself in the mirror and I hate taking showers because I hate having to look at my body. It is really hard to fight that critical voice in my head and I will admit that at times I don't even bother trying because I am just so tired. However this does not mean that I have given up, it just means that I don't win every battle. It does not mean that I am relapsing, it just means that I am human. I am learning to accept the defeats along with the wins and know that each time ED scores there is something to learn and I can take pride in the wins even more. Recovery is not a linear process. I know this but knowing and believing and experiencing something are completely different. When I get knocked down I know how important it is that I do not stay down. I am learning to keep getting back up. Being at home is really hard as many people who know me know and acknowledge. My mother is not the healthiest person in the world and is very difficult to be around and even harder to be healthy around. I have to take the fact that my weight has remained stable (even if at times I don't necessarily want it to be) as a sign that I am stronger than she. I am not lying down and taking her bullshit anymore. I have learned to use my voice rather than my eating disorder and even if that gets me in trouble with her at times, it is SOOOO worth it. I don't have to starve myself to get my point across. Speaking up is another choice. Knowing that I am going back to school is helpful despite the fact that I have reservations about that as well. I understand myself so much more now that I have had the experience of living away from home. Being in a different environment has allowed me to see just how unhealthy the one I came from is. I am able to take what I have learned and experienced now and use it as a reality check. I do not have to react the way she wants me to anymore. I do not have to take the bait. I can remain calm and hold my ground. Not that I am successful in doing this every time but my eating disorder is no longer the means by which I communicate.

The Reality of an Eating Disorder

Having left treatment at a healthy weight and being on a maintenance meal plan I sometimes, okay maybe more like daily, find myself thinking back to the body I had before treatment and where I was headed with ED. Idolizing that body is unhealthy and sick, I know, yet I can't help doing it. My brain is constantly comparing where I am in terms of weight and shape and size now and pre-treatment. When I see people on the street or anywhere who are skinnier than I am (or skinnier than I perceive myself as being which, face it, is most people) I get really jealous. When I see someone who is clearly unhealthy and anorexic I envy them. "It's not fair," ED says, "that person gets to be thin and bony while you have to be fat and ugly. I wish I could be like that. You really don't need to eat. You can restrict. Just cut out one item or food group a day and you too can look like that. Just a few pounds wouldn't hurt, right?" WRONG! A part of me sees the "WARNING. DANGER DANGER DANGER" signs going off. But ED always has an argument prepared to counter my rational self: It really wasn't that bad. My vital signs were still good. My blood work wasn't really off. I could still function. I could stand to lose a few pounds. It's not like restricting is dangerous. If I eat just enough to keep me going, that's fine. Hey, food isn't really that important. You've done it before. It won't kill you. Your team is just lying and wants you to get fat. I know what's best for you. RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGGHT. So, I figured it's time for a reality check. So ED what really happens when I get back together with you???

Well, for one it is that bad. Not eating deprives my body of energy and nutrients that it needs to function. The logic center of my brain shuts down. I get flighty and fidgety. I can't concentrate. I can't think. My skin get dry. My hair gets dry and falls out. I am constipated. I am tired and exhausted. I am sad and depressed all the time and I cry all the time. I worry friends and family. I lose friends because they can't stand to see me like that. I get dizzy really easily. Eventually my vital signs and blood work will not be okay. I am cold all the time. My grades drop. My teachers worry. I risk passing out. I am slow and sluggish. I am tired all the time and in pain. I am damaging my organs and my body. I am alone because I isolate. I shut off feelings as much as possible. I have no life outside of thinking about food and calories and weight. I am scared and anxious all the time. I feel immense guilt over everything. I hate myself and my life. I hate my body. I am lonely. I risk getting kicked out of school or maybe losing a job. I am irresponsible and selfish. I don't care about anything. I want to just die and as I am killing myself slowly, I eventually will die. This is not the glamorous image that ED puts in my head when he tries to get me to come back to him. This is not what I immediately think of when I think of going back to him. However, this is the reality and if I remind myself of this I will remember why I am working on recovery, why following my meal plan and listening to my team is so important. So ED, fuck off. You are not wanted. That is not the life I want for myself. Get lost.