I think the break that I took this last week from posting here really helped me get a little more perspective on things. Did it shut up E.D? No. But it helped me remember that I have a voice and I can scream back if and when I need to.
This weekend has gone alright. I’ve managed to only get on the scale once a day, which is huge for me. I’ve managed to not obsess about food…much. I did have a few moments when I questioned things, but I pushed through and ate anyway. I just hate when I do all the right things but the scale still shows a gain. I know at heart that I need to get my eating disorder under control before I’m going to be able to keep the weight loss going, but it’s frustrating and panicking when I know that my health depends so heavily on me losing weight. I also know that my metabolism is so screwed up from years of restricting, binging, purging, obsessive exercise, and popping pills that it is going to take some time for my body to truly understand what it is supposed to do with food. And that because of that, I might see some gains. Losing forty pounds in five months is still quite an accomplishment and even if I have to sit at a plateau or gain a few pounds back to get my metabolism straightened out, I’ve already made a huge improvement in my health.
I’ve been talking at group a lot lately about the endocrinologist that I see and how focused she is on weight loss. The group has really been pushing me to get a second opinion and find an endo who really understands both the polycycstic ovarian disease AND the eating disorder. But E.D. is loud and has been working on convincing me that they’re just jealous that I’ve lost weight and they haven’t. Idiot. E.D really can be a dick sometimes.
Posted on 2 August '09 by Amelia, under ED, MNCOME, PCOS, balance. 3 Comments.
It’s been a helluva week. Damn, really it has been a hell of a month when it has come to me struggling with this damn eating disorder. See, it’s been….well this month I’ve only managed to lose three pounds. Three measly, miniscule little pounds. (Hello, Mr. Ed. Thanks for popping your head into this post. Try to keep it to a minimum okay?) So, I’ve been struggling. A lot. I can’t seem to focus on what it is that I need to do to stay healthy. Today I’m struggling to even eat. I’ve managed two cups of coffee this morning. I tried to eat some toast but I gagged the minute it went into my mouth and I spit it out.
I’m still attending the groups every week, but ED screams constantly through those and for a good couple of hours after about how much bullshit they are feeding me. And there have been a couple of instances when I can’t keep quiet and it slips out loud and wow does that cause for a kerfuffle.
Realizing just how loudly the ED voice was, I called and made a follow up appointment with my dietitian. I think I want to talk to her more in depth about formulating a meal plan that fits ALL of my medical needs, physical and emotional.
I just can’t seem to find that balance. In order to get my hormones under control and help my body to function properly, I really need to lose weight. But I don’t know how to do that without food completely and totally taking control.
Posted on 13 July '09 by Amelia, under ED, balance. 4 Comments.
I’ve spent the last few days processing all of my therapy sessions for the last week and a half or so. Between the therapist at Melrose and H, my regular therapist, I’ve been challenged to the bone and left very raw on numerous occasions.
We talked about redefining “health” about a week ago and this week we started out with talking about how changing that definition is going to take away my “finish line”. That by giving up a predefined idea of where I would have to be physically/emotionally to be “healthy and happy” I’m leaving things up in the air and more spontaneously flexible. Part of what has made me feel safe for so long is having a “finish line”. It gave me a way to add protection and structure and planning into my life. If I had a goal to work towards or some distant horizon, it was easier for me to focus on that instead of the every day. At that point, I would be at ease and “better”. Without a plan, there is no protection. It leaves me feeling so vulnerable.
That vulnerability really makes me feel unsafe and open to a lot of pain and that is why I have always lived this way. The “plan” keeps me safe. It keeps people at a distance and it makes life more predictable.
We talked through some hard stuff about how I deal with people and how i always feel like a victim and that when the people who hurt me take advantage of me, I assume that it is something fatally flawed about me, instead of something about them. And that in order to get to the level of peace and happiness I want, I’m going to have to start being real with people. But that means that I am vulnerable to being hurt. Because literally everyone I have ever trusted has taken advantage of me and hurt me in some gigantic way, I have come to think that everyone will always hurt me because I deserve it. By blaming myself, I’ve always been able to maintain the idea that people as a whole are generally good and safe, since it was my fault. By taking the blame off myself and putting it on the people who have done it, I start to feel like everyone is unsafe.
So, I guess I’m in the place where I’m trying to figure out how I can let people in, because I’m not “flawed” and I deserve to have people in my life, without constantly getting hurt. And I’m trying to figure out how I can re-adjust my thoughts about the world as a whole, because right now I’m feeling like if I’m not the unsafe/unhealthy/broken person causing all the problems, then everyone else is unsafe/unhealthy/broken, and not to be trusted. I’m feeling like without the safety net of my overly planned life and “finish line” in the distant future, I have lost the only thing that helps me feel safe, and then I’m also trying to be “real” with people, which leaves me even less protected.
I started thinking about it some more this morning though and I realized that I have locked myself inside this little box of perceived safety, and in reality…that box is made out of lead. I’ve been slowly poisoning myself with my own protection. Time to open the box, as scary as that is. Maybe I can replace the walls of the box with screen and let some air in.
I received a fairly angry email this morning about the fact that I call this an eating disorder recovery blog and yet I keep track of my weight on a seperate tab. First, I want to apologize to the reader that was offended by this. That is in no way my intention. I know that weight can be very triggering for women with ED. I was hoping that by putting the weight tracking on a seperate tab that could only be reached by conscious decision, it would be okay.
Here’s the situation though. I’m going to track my weight. One of the problems that my personal experience with ED has caused is an incredibly messed up metabolism. I have health problems due to my weight and I’m losing weight with medical supervision, as well as while working with my ED therapist and a nutritionist.
Okay. So now that I’ve gotten that taken care of, what I really wanted to write about today was the appointment that I had with my ED-therapist yesterday. We were talking about the panic I was having over making sure everything was perfect this weekend for the barbecue that we were hosting and that everything is perfect for our upcoming camping trip. I was going to such an extreme that I was cleaning like a madwoman and going overboard with things as though I thought I was Martha Stewart. It’s not OCD related, because I’m really able to recognize when I’m having obsessive thoughts. It was totally anxiety about being perfect and not wanting anyone to judge me. Throughout the session, I came to realize that it all makes sense.
I was born to a young teenager who gave me up for adoption to her older sister: Rejection
My adoptive mother became a heavy drug user and stopped taking care of me when I was just barely in junior high. I went to live with my grandmother.: Rejection.
When I hit my pesky teenage years, my grandmother decided she “couldn’t handle it” and sent me to live with my sister. : Rejection.
My sister and I fought continuously until she kicked me out when I was fifteen. I lived on the streets and bounced around among the friend’s houses until I met my first husband. : Rejection
Now of course, I’ve had amazing and wonderfully supportive people in my life as well, but for the most part the schema of my entire life has been rejection for things that I perceived as my fault. I wasn’t “good enough”, “special enough”, “important enough”, “pretty enough”. I just wasn’t enough. In my mind at least. Who knows what was actually happening, but I now have a very strongly held core belief that I am not enough.
Nearly every action I take in the day, is trying to prove that I’m enough and when I fail, as all human beings do, I fall apart.
So, I binge. Or I restrict. Or I obsess over clean cement in the backyard and a shiny Coleman cook stove.
I guess the next step is learning how to find that approval inside myself and not look so much for external validation.
I had an appointment with my regular therapist yesterday. It was hard. Hell, when is therapy not hard for me lately? I think I’ve finally broke through some walls that I had up and it’s making it easier for me to let go and be open and honest. And at the core of it, open and honest is raw emotion.
We talked a lot about my frustration with the ED clinic and about how much of my identity is wrapped up in my physical appearance and weight. I’m not sure if this is what feeds my eating disorder or if my eating disorder feeds the identity issues, but there certainly is a correlation there somewhere.
We talked a bit about my comparisons of my life to other people and judging myself based on that. I have highly intelligent, highly educated and successful friends. And I beat myself up regularly about the fact that I don’t have enough education, or that I don’t have a career. She reminded me that during the time other people were going to college and developing careers, I was learning to survive and teaching myself to live.
She generally doesn’t send me home with actually “homework”. Usually it’s just something to think about or a phone call to make. This time though, I have to come back next week with three goals that are completely related to me. Not related to anything that I’m “supposed to be”. No goals that compare me to what other 31 year olds are doing. Three goals that are solely mine and are important to ME.
So, I’ve been using some software that I found that helps me create a “mind map“, which in turn is helping me to narrow down some of my actual wants/needs. We’ll see what I can come up with.
I’m consumed with frustration and almost a feeling that this all just isn’t going to work. My brain working the way it does, I know that there has to be a deeper root to the frustration.
My heart has just felt so heavy since I left Melrose this morning. See, after the initial assessment, I also have to have an intake with a therapist, a dietitian, and a physical therapist. Today was my therapy assessment….
I actually had to walk away from this post on Monday night because I was so fiercly flustered. I was wrapped up in the irrational part of my brain that refused to see anything but the negative. After a day of reflection and relaxation, I’ve remembered that I can take what is helpful and leave what is not out of any situation.
I went into the therapy assessment thinking that she was going to tell me all the answers, that she’d have some sort of insite into who I am and who I want to be, and that she’d say some phrase or concept that would instantly make me have some faith in the process of ED recovery. And she didn’t. It broke my heart at the time, but my expectations were irrational. I don’t need to have a sudden bright light of clarity. I can walk through a fog of confusion and uncertainty for awhile and eventually it will fade. It may be a slow fade, but it will happen. .
Posted on 6 May '09 by Amelia, under Melrose, balance, blogging. 1 Comment.
It seems as though the new medications are working. I’m not sure if they’re all working or if just one or two of them is working fantastically, but things are going well whatever the situation. My energy is fantastic. I can exercise without draining myself. My mood is really good. I don’t need to nap during the day. I’m eating three rounded meals a day and a snack. I haven’t had the urge to binge even once. AND I’ve lost six pounds this week! SIX pounds!
I have my very first therapy appointment at The Melrose Institute tomorrow morning. I’m a nervous about that. I’ve been so therapized to death in my life, that it’s not the therapy that scares me. So, I don’t know what it is about it that’s make me a bit scared. I’m sure it has something to do with losing the control that my ED has always let me feel. Or atleast that’s what therapy shoudl tell me. Honestly, I don’t know how it has helped me feel in control. But that’s the theory, right?
I’ve been really inwardly focused the past few days. And it makes it incredibly difficult to be effective in any other aspect of my life. I’ve been trying to wrap my mind around the ED treatment center and the new medications. I’m adjusting to the side effects of four new medications. I’m trying to stay mindful.
It’s H.A.R.D. I feel like my brain is being pulled constantly and I’m keep pulling it back. From past experience, I know that this feeling of being torn in two directions will go away eventually. For now, though, it’s here, it’s real, and it’s very, very difficult.
Compound this with “real life”.
I’m working very hard with my son’s school to develop his IEP (Individual Education Plan) That’s equated to running to a million appointments for testing and evaluations.
My partner has thrown her back out and has been in an intense amount of pain pretty much constantly since Tuesday. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her this miserable. And yet, I have to force myself to help take care of her, because I just can’t seem to stay present and out of my own brain.
Time to dig through the toolbox and figure out which skills I can use to help me find some balance here.
Posted on 30 April '09 by Amelia, under Famly Life, balance. 2 Comments.
