Triumphs

Small Triumphs

So today was a small triumph for me! After spending all of yesterday in a massively triggered cycle at home worse than usual, with b/p. Today I actually didn't b/p at all, ignored the triggers and conquered the controlling, frightening, thoughts that plagued my mind,about me being a 'freak of nature' who is unable to lose weight regardless of what they eat. Consequentially, this usually leads to a 'fuck it' mentality. 

I am trying to lose weight in time for my Birthday on Tuesday. My ED and i are both frightened and furious at the idea of being heavier than last year when I turned 21, even if I have been in forced treatment for the past six months.

The less I eat the less triggered I am, the calmer I feel, the less agitated and angry. So today I ate a can of weight watchers soup, chewed three packs of gum (added up the calories for the gum and drinks), drank Pepsi max, 2 x 600 mls, ( I love that stuff!) and drank some water.  I was worried I would be hungry, I am not, I don't feel anything other than a sense of calm. My parents have been busy working today so I was able to get the food police off of my back.

What really helped to break the cycle was for me to just focus on today, not tomorrow or next week. I told myself this is my plan for today- I think that way it is less overwhelming. The evenings are usually a bad time for me when hunger can take over but today was fine, I relaxed in the bath, gave myself a facial and did my nails. Then watched some tv and now here I am blogging. I hope I can keep this up.

Tomorrow, I am going up to Lincolnshire to see a doll faced (not squished in face) persian kitten, who we might be getting; from the same breeder my cat is from. My cat lost his sister a few years ago, she lived with us and died due to a haemorrhage it was so sad :( we all miss her everyday, and my cat is lonely so we think this new addition may help. I must admit having something to love and care for sounds great to me. My cat being very attached to my mum, I don't often get a look in on his love! Anyways so up there tomorrow, the drive will be three hours each way, we'll visit the kitten (too young to leave his mummy ATM), drive home and then I am going to the cinema in the evening. A busy day which is good for me, and one which i hope will allow me to stick to the same meal plan as today. 

When I am in severe restriction mode I weigh myself in the morning and evening, (I did this today, and i was the same both from morning to evening!) but from losing weight before I know I can feel triggered and frightened by thoughts if i don't see any changes to the scale, the next day; so i have to remind myself that Usually for me it takes 4-5 days to see weight loss, is anyone else like this????

Anyways tomorrow, seeing as I will be in the car for six hours I thought this gives me a good chance to catch up on my reading for my English Lit third year course at Uni. So hopefully tomorrow will be productive.

I hope someone can answer my question above, and I would love to hear about others experiences over the week. Have you made any small triumphs happen? I await to hear from you. Wishing you all well.

Sweet dreams.

V

Xxx

Forgiveness

Forgive? can we, do we, should we?

I have been for many months after forced treatment in a punishment cycle that my mind can't seem to resolve. I hate myself for putting on weight I didn't want, and in order to serve my anorexia I left twice but was promptly brought back under threat of a section.

The ghosts and memories of treatment haunt me, I should have fought harder, I should have found a way to keep out of hospital, at best- I should have lost the weight by now. Despite not being the weight I was when I was in treatment (1/2 a stone lighter), I am not satisfied. I want to be 1/2 a stone lighter to feel more normal, and ultimately a stone lighter than I am now- I would settle for 1/2 a stone off for now though.

Because my parents have become watch dogs when it comes to myself and food that has triggered the b/p part of my illness out of sheer desperation. I find I cannot forgive myself for this and my guilt and shame of being unable to lose the weight I want and the b/p cycle makes me feel not only a failure to my anorexia but a failure to myself.

Not only am I furious with myself, my inability to forgive my parents has meant that our relationship is strained, I am livid with them, they thought they were doing the best for me but all it has actually done is triggered a compensatory measure- yes I am eating more now than I was, but I have to do something about it. 'Why are you miserable?', 'You never look happy', and 'What's wrong with you?' Are comments often directed towards me in my home. I would like to answer 'because you have destroyed me, I don't know who I am anymore, you have destroyed the one part of me that made me feel like me, that I was comfortable with, now I want to commit suicide every time I look in the
mirror'.

My family trigger my b/p part of the illness, I hate myself for that. I find it hard to be at home and not b/p because of them. There comments, and view that I am the drag to their perfect family hurts. My parents have always favoured my twin brother that's just the way the non fat, gluten free, sugarless, cookie crumbles. My friends have commented on it, my parents ignore that the issue exists, my brother enjoys it. I accept the situation  for what it is, it has always been that way but it doesn't mean I like it. I want to forgive my parents for this, but the problem is how can I forgive for the doings of the past when it still plagues me in the present? My parents behaviour and views won't change despite me discussing it with them. It's not really a discussion when you get called an ungrateful, jealous, spiteful bitch, but all the same the issue gets raised.

I want to forgive my brother, for milking the favouritism of our parents, for saying he wishes I would just hurry up and die, that he wants me sectioned to get rid of me to relieve the unhappiness in our
home, for saying that their lives are better when I am not present. He meant all of those things and
has never apologised to me. I can assure you if the roles were reversed I would not have been treated the same.

I am angry with my Consultant- she put me through hell, two mental health assessments and a parting gift of another should I not 'comply' with local services. She saw me begging her not to make me put on more weight when I was stable, to let me go home and manage- she knew I was a long term anorexic yet she simply replied ' I can't do that V, you'll just have to get use to your new weight'. I
hadn't been 6st7 since I was 17, but she would not compromise. 'Bmi 15, has to be reached in an inpatient facility, as condition for you remaining a voluntary patient, if you choose to ignore me, we'll have to do things more formally'. I don't want to forgive her, but I want to forget. But every time I look at my body I see her craftsmanship, her handiwork.

I guess the question that lays in my mind is, how do we forgive ourselves, when we feel that the thing we have done is not forgivable?

I feel as though it's important for me to forgive myself, to get some closure, but there are some things that can never be taken back. I can't take back the 6 months I spent in an inpatient facility, I can't remove the things that have been said to me and are engraved in my memory and I especially can't forgive myself for the weight gain that I so desperately didn't want.

I want to forgive, but when you can't forget, how is that possible?

Do you find it hard to forgive yourself? If you found a way to do it, how did you?

I look forward to hearing from someone.

Take care of you.

V
xxx

Food and Feelings

Food and Feelings The basic function of food is to fuel the body; to provide energy and nourishment in order to survive. However as humanity has evolved society has used food as so much more than fuel. Food is at the heart of most celebrations all over the world; Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, Diwali, Hanukkah, the list is endless.

It's a communication of generosity, hospitality, wealth and even religion. It's used to provide comfort, to congratulate, to commemorate, commiserate; it is without doubt that society has utilised food as a unification and bonding tool throughout the world.

As a consequence of the multi purpose relationship society has placed within food, it's no wonder that human beings have a complicated relationship with food, because of its ability to be both feeder of the body and feeder of emotions.

It's my opinion that we all accept the love we think we deserve. When food implies failure, to an eating disordered person that's when we begin to get into murky water.

My Relationship with anorexia and my eating disorder is a bond like marriage, I feel there is no two separate entities rather just me, which includes anorexia. I am nearly 22, and my anorexia actively started when I was 17, and heightened when I went to university. I believe that my anorexia is punishment driven; I had always hated my body and was diagnosed with BDD at the age of 8. Coupling this self hatred of the body with a major disappointment ( I didn't get into the University I wanted to go to, despite having the grades), my anorexia began as a way of outwardly communicating, how much I hate myself, how awful it must be for others to look at the pulsating fat on my body that I would butcher with a knife if I could.

 My anorexia is also a way of striving to achieve something I have always wanted; a thin body; it concretely demonstrates an achievement that was measurable. It serves to punish me for a failure that was like a dagger to my heart, whilst simultaneously dimming the wound that had been created, with something much more important to focus on and achieve.

 I was/am/ and will starve myself physically to counteract the feast of negative emotions I feel inherently. Anorexia in my opinion, is about hating yourself, I am my own worst enemy,having never been at ease in my own skin, combined with devastating failure my self esteem died there and then.

So whether we binge ( I see it as treating ourselves like a rubbish bin, putting in crap because that's what we think we are; then getting rid of it. Or starving ourselves, which we pray brings the promise of a change to the self; hoping to remove some of the physical rubbish we see every time we look in the mirror- we are communicating a deep seated toxic hate.

As I said early, I believe we accept the love we think we deserve, and it frustrates me so much that people not suffering with an eating disorder don't realise that by starving or bingeing and purging that we are making a very strong statement regarding the self; that essentially we are treating ourselves like nothing because that's what we think we are worthy of.

Just my thoughts on food, feelings and a few facts. Any comments always welcome, Xxx

Returning to uni- the appointment

So, I have an appointment with the Educational Support office at my uni about returning at the end of September to do my course part time and finish my third year over two years. I feel quite frankly sick to my stomach. Not about returning, though that does provoke anxiety but the meeting itself.

You see going back to Uni, feels strange. For one thing many ghosts are there, many memories both good and bad, and a few rather painful. The primary memory that sticks out the most is me being there at my happiest weight of 5 stone. I am now a stone heavier, after forced treatment.

Going to the meeting itself makes me feel like jumping off the next roundabout I see, knowing that the feelings the people at the meeting will catalyse in me will be acutely negative. I always try to,prepare myself for e comments people make when you have not seen them in a while, but each time they feel like a dagger, like taking a bullet, like salt being rubbed Into an already angry wound. I expect to here about 'how much weight' I have put on and 'well done' and 'how much better I look and must feel'.

All I want to scream is 'FUCK OFF, I feel worse not better, I am angry and hateful and resentful and at times suicidal. I have no idea what I can eat or can't eat since treatment triggered the b/p side of my disorder that was otherwise dormant and I have felt has had to continue since coming home and having the food police also known as my parents at my heels. I hate food, I hate what food does to me, I hate how food makes me feel, I hate weight gain, I hate how much weight has been put on me. But mostly I want to scream that this evil moral rape that was projected onto me, was not my choice. Because no person would choose to be made as miserable as I am. The words mental health section were raised constantly throughout treatment, and a mental health assessment did take place; which I passed with conditions to not being sectioned, I.e. staying in treatment. So don't project assumptions onto me about my happiness, about my looks, you don't know me, the hell I have been through and the demons I faced. I. Still have nightmares about treatment now, I wake up a sweaty mess with the fear of food inside me, the fear of weight gain. Better? You don't know the meaning of the word, if you think I am better. I am physically more stable but better, well if you want to go inside my head for a while and be the judge for yourself, go ahead because the torment goes on and never leaves'. Sorry if that sounds like a massive rant, it is but I wonder, can anyone identify with the anger? With the hate? I hate myself right now. I feel like my identity has been moulded and shaped into an ugly mess. I guess my question is, how do I get over my anger and hate? Is it even possible to let this go? Xxxx

Being mindful- managing anxiety and painful emotions.

Speak the truth

We all want to escape, forget, let go and relieve the emotional baggage that we carry with us. Being anorexic, bulimic, Ednos, Or eating disordered in general captures certain people who are highly anxious, emotional, stressed, worried people; who carry painful memories and feelings with them.

I have always been labelled 'The worrier', even from childhood. I was nervous, jumpy, neurotic. When I first went to school I used to always ask my mother 'what should I do if 'x', happens?- 'x' would always be the worst case scenario to a situation. My mother would always reply with 'I know that won't happen', we would then return to me asking 'But would do I do If  ''x'  Does happen?', my mother assures me this cycle was never ending. My thought process was and still is to assume that the worst scenario will happen and I should try if possible to prepare myself for this, this leads to chronic anxiety and often depression.

My point being, that as worriers people with eating disorders often have anxious uncontrollable feelings that lead to a cycle they cannot break, this includes negative coping behaviours such as self harm, purging, laxative abuse, drugs, and alcohol. My new friend Ruby, on her fabulously decked out blog over at 'Andthenshedisappeared' on blog spot, wrote a wonderful post on managing binge eating, whether it be for bulimia, anorexic binge purge sub type, or people with BED.

One thing that I felt could help with the desire to engage in negative behaviours is to keep something that I have now devised. It's called a 'Mindful response diary', it's kind of CBT, meets your daily journal.

The format of the diary can be in any shape you like, as long as it has 4 columns that are labeled 'Feeling and/or emotion', ' First response', 'Mindful response', 'Course of action'.

The idea is to identify a negative feeling and observe it, ( write this down under 'feeling and or emotion') recognise what your first response to this emotion is ( write this down under 'First Response' for most of us it will be a negative coping strategy), then in the 'Mindful response' column take a moment to write down other ways to deal with this emotion even if it is just temporary, chances are that by the time you have engaged in a mindful response the emotion will have passed and so will your desire to engage in a negative coping strategy; which is ALWAYS temporary relief, and demands that you repeat the action again and again in order to cope- this is no coping strategy merely a placebo to emotions. In the 'Course of action' column, you will then later write down what you decided to do, e.g. Negative coping strategy or mindful response.

By doing this every day, not only are able to review our progress, but also we take a moment to

logically think through the motions of what we are doing. So often an intrusive thought will pop into my head that seems so unbearable to me, so unimaginably horrible, that I end up engaging In behaviour that ultimately brings me back to the same emotion and this spiral then continues.

Here is an example of my journal I started it today;

(My feeling came in the form of an intrusive thought that is a core belief, and subsequently reoccurs sometimes 6-8 times a day in my mind).

1) Feeling/ emotion

' No matter what you eat you won't lose weight, you'll gain or stay the same because you're a disgusting freak of nature'.

2) First Response

My first response was to b/p- the thought process was 'might as well i'm not going to ever lose weight'.

3) Mindful Response

I reminded myself to calm down, that on the day that I didn't b/p and stuck to my diet plan, I didn't gain I maintained, but by no means does this mean I wouldn't lose weight on this plan.

It takes days for the body to lose weight, as it has to register a calorie deficit. This is a complicated process that doesn't work overnight. I reminded myself that b/p would not achieve anything other than muck with my potassium levels that are already poor at best.

4) Course of Action

Engage in distraction- so I went for a walk.

I really think not only will this be useful to observe the emotional responses we all have to situations but to also identify triggers in our life. I'm taking the view that the power lies with me, if I want change I have to fight for it, even if the illness is part of who I am.

I end with the Serenity prayer

'God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.'

Hope this helps someone.

Enjoy the weekend.

xxxx

Early morning resolutions

So after a TERRIBLE  Sunday, I decided that I needed to sort my week out, so I made a plan for the week. I couldn't sleep knowing that i needed a structural plan in place. So my diary now has my days planned in it  With all the things I need to do like:

1) Stick to diet plan- most important, I feel like I have been in a shame cycle, being pushed and manipulated by others into behaviour that categorically isn't me. I am on a 250ish calorie diet this week. In order to get comfortable with food in the system again, even if it is weight watcher's soup, 3 cans a day (there tomato is really good).

2) Finish my novel for the week for my course, I just recently completed 'The woman Warrior' by Maxine Hong Kong Kingston. I am now onto 'My Antonia' by Willa Cather.

3) Avoid the scales until Friday/Saturday. When I stuck to the plan for one day and saw no weight loss my mind started over thinking, and felt like it was about to self combust with worry that I wouldn't lose any weight. Proper weight loss I tell myself has to be seen over days rather than one, the calorie deficit needs to be processed by the body and this takes more than a day. By avoiding the scales I'll be keeping myself safe from giving up hope and being in agony all day as a consequence.

4) Listen to my stress tape 'Overcoming Anxiety and Panic Attacks', everyday when in a situation where I feel the rising anxiety. It's a great CD, taking 45 minutes to reduce stress. '


By making plans for each day with times, people and places scheduled I feel like I am in control and have a relatively solid plan for success. The theory behind writing the plan as if you know how every moment will go , is that you are acting as though you have achieved the success you want already and by having the will to believe it will happen, you cause the thing that was potential to become realised and therefore your reality- (little bit of William James and Aristotle in the mix).

It's 2am now so I am going to bed. Determined to make this week succeed. Sweet dreams.

Do you ever make plans for the week? If so have you found them helpful?

Xxxx

Crazy crappy life

I am sitting here on my bed, beating myself up about food, this is a regular occurrence.

 Food is evil. Food is revolting, you are revolting. You shouldn't have eaten that, you have no self control. People will think you are lazy, greedy, Undisciplined- out of control. This is a comtnual dialogue that passes through my mind when eating but sets in at its heaviest after eating has finished.

The word fat, runs through my mind like a dirty word,the ultimate taboo,to me being fat is a sentence akin with death. One of the things I learnt in CBT,in treatment was that the individual will resist any form of action associated with the consequence of social rejection, as evolution saw humans living in a society, to be rejected was to die as without a group for support to provide shelter, comfort and protection a human being would perish. Well for someone with anorexia, being fat is aquatinted with the same level of social suicide perceived by our ancestors.

I would agree with the statement above and apply it to myself. When I was In treatment I attempted to leave (but was dragged back 3 times) because I felt that I was in a dangerous and threatening situation that was going to ruin me, and to some degree i believe it has.

I was forced to face a reality of weight gain before I was ready and I hate myself and my body for it. This has led to parents being on my case which has caused the b/p cycle everyday. I feel like a fraud and a fake because if I could I would restrict and see If I would lose weight. I desperately want to lose half a stone.

To add insult to injury I went to a party last night, (getting dressed when every piece of your body repulses you is a nightmare), I felt like an unworthy piece of crap walking in. Then to make an even more uncomfortable situation even more difficult, the mother of the girl who was hosting the party made a bee line for me and said

' It's so good to see you (she saw me just before I went I to treatment at a bmi of 11.7) you have put on so much weight since I saw you last, your parents must be so pleased you have recovered, well done for making the choice to put on the weight, doesn't it feel good to be normal?'. 

My whole demeaner sank, 1) she had commented in my weight gain- which I already felt horrific about, I beat myself up about, and cry about.
                                            2) I don't feel recovered or normal, and she looked at me and decided that my bmi of 13.6, a massive increase from 11.7, means that I am normal. It's set my mind into a frenzy about how I must be someone who medically has to have a Lower bmi than normal people (18.5-25) to look normal. Therefore I must look at bmi 13.6 much bigger than a normal person would at that bmi and I therefore must look at least 5 bmi points heavier than I am.
                                           3) Thirdly it wasn't my choice to put on the weight I wouldn't have done it out of choice, I hated every 1lb that went on and every person who did it to me. What I wanted to say to her was, actually I left and was told if I left again I would be sectioned under the mental health act where they can force all treatment on you whether you like it or not, so i did it because I had no choice and I still have little choice now with my parents at home and the local services constantly on my back and GP applying the same pressure.

The party was a dinner party, I hadn't wanted to go because of the food, and eating in front of people but mainly the concern that if I ate it I would put on weight. But it was one of my best friends 21st birthday parties ,so I went. I didn't manage to eat any food but just pushed the food around the plate. The comments didn't help, I just wanted to crawl into a hole and die.

Anyone else experience the comments of others, that have impacted them as they did me? Today I am in my room hiding and wishing the whurling thoughts that spread throughout my mind would die. Telling myself Monday is a new day and that I can get myself together. I will lose weight, I won't b/p. I will reach my goal weight by my Birthday, 2 weeks and I REFUSE to be heavier than I was last year in my Birthday.

Any comments totally welcome!

Xxxxx