Ed Mode VS. Me Mode

Hello Hello, I'm currently at work on my lunch break and blogging in the attempt of saving myself from a binge/purge episode. Nothing like pulling out the distraction skill to curb the desire to numb.

I actually have been doing better the last week behavior-wise, but Sarah told me she doesn't think I'm really doing any better. Thanks for raining on my parade! Sarah also said she doesn't know how to explain it, but I sound different when I talk...more in my eating disorder.

O_o Okay, that got my attention. Because truth is, I do feel different inside. Something made that "switch" again into ED mode. I thought I was hiding it. I've been watching what I say and trying to be louder than the eating disorder voice, or at least keep it quiet until I'm alone with it. It took me by surprise when she noticed and I know she right. The scary thing is I don't know how to make the switch back from Ed mode to Me mode. How did I do it before?

That also lead me think about how I'm really doing. Am I doing as well as I think I am? I am notorious for fooling myself and my treatment team into thinking I'm doing better than I am. I can't outright lie so convincing myself that something is true is essential if I'm going to blindside my team.

So. Where do I go from here? Oh, I have so much more to write about- especially new boundaries with food my mom made with me. But my 30 min lunch is about over so I better wrap up. I would love nothing more than to sit here and blog, sharing my thoughts and feelings with you lovely people and maybe sort out what's going on inside my head.

Love to you all. I read your blogs, even when it seems I'm absent from blog/vlog community.

Coffee Time Contemplations

I love chill weekends like this one! And I LOVE when I can enjoy the weekend without being completely engrossed on my eating disorder. Purging has improved a bit over the past week, though I wish it was nonexistent in my life. I think the biggest improvement has been in the amount of food I've been eating and keeping. I can see it reflected in my energy level and how I generally feel. 

At the same time, a part of me is upset that I find food so pleasurable. 

Right now, I'm just chilling at Starbucks, drinking my americano and reading blogs. I ended up talking to this middle-aged couple for the past hour and it was such a fascinating discussion. We talked about sex-trafficking, communism, how thinness doesn't equate healthy, holistic lifestyles...It was stimulating and we could have talked for so much longer, but they had to leave. We're going to try to meet up again next Sunday which would be so lovely! They're such nice people and I really enjoyed the interaction.

I thought I might write more, but right now I'm feeling quite contemplative, going over all the things we talked about. So till next time my loves!

A Good Start to the Weekend ;)

Yesterday was actually a not-so-bad day :) I kept accountable every hour to my friend's Andi and Sarah about eating/purging. I started the morning off with breakfast which I haven't really properly done in ages. First I had toast with peanut butter and honey and a yogurt. Here's the problem though: When I start eating, I find it so difficult to stop. It's either eat nothing or eat a lot and purge. I felt so hungry and ended up having another slice of toast with PB and honey and a banana. I couldn't believe myself! I didn't want to start the day off purging though, like I have been lately. I felt so full throughout the entire day, that I didn't really eat much during work.

Problem #2: It was about 5pm and I'm covering for a girl at work who is on a cruise for the next two weeks. She's "the late person" and so I end up being alone at work for the last hour. Surrounded by food. I ended up eating a larabar (nuts and fruit) and couldn't stop again, ended up eating some Reese's buttercups and purging. Yes, I was disappointed I ended up purging, but my goal is 0-1 times/day which is much better than 4-7 times/day.

Shock Moment: (WARNING: TMI) When I purged, I was like...is that broccoli? WHEN THE HECK DID I HAVE BROCCOLI?! It took me a bit, but I eventually remembered my mom had broccoli with her dinner and I had a few pieces she didn't eat. But that was 24 hours ago. I'm pretty sure it wasn't supposed to be in my stomach after 24 hours, right?

I ended up going to Andi's house and we made dinner, well, what was safe for both of us. We had lemon pepper tilapia and brussels sprouts. She had a bottle of red wine we could absolutely not open which was actually quite funny because it took us forever. We had a glass while talking about life and eventually watched Ever After. It was a nice way to spend the evening with my best friend. I love you Andi!

Satisfied

There was actually a few things on mind I wanted to write about but I'm so engrossed in experiencing this feeling I haven't felt in...well, too long.

Satisfied.

I've come to the point (and no, I'm not ready to accept I've relapsed!) where keeping any food down is a challenge/rare occasion. After an extremely stressful and behavior-filled day at work, I came home and was just so WEARY of purging. I feel so tired of fighting the desire to eat everything in sight, giving into that desire eventually, and getting rid of it soon after.


There are permanent red dry spots at the corners of my mouth. My mouth is ripped up and sores cover every surface inside of my mouth. I can barely swallow, my throat hurts that bad. I'm always cold. My fingers are always purple. I'm growing a beard of lanugo, a fine white layer of hair, on my face. My skin is blotchy, breaking out and ill looking. My knees give out and I cover it up by acting like I'm a silly clumsy girl. Shaky. Sometimes I feel like I'm floating. Sometimes I feel like there are weights tied to my body. I pass out randomly. Most likely smell of vomit. 
(^glamorous, huh?)

I hope you're catching on to where I'm going with this- EATING DISORDERS SUCK. It would ALMOST be worth it if I felt thin. That was the deal, right? Ed said,"Yeah, you might have some of this not-so-fun stuff, but you'll feel thin so obviously it's worth it!" Ed doesn't keep his word and his trades are bullshit. I never feel thin AND I feel like crap all the time.

Coming back to feeling satisfied- I came home and was like, FUCK YOU ED. FUCK YOU EATING DISORDER. I made a plan for tomorrow. I set up accountability so maybe, just maybe I can have one purge free day which is all I'm asking for at the moment. I ate dinner and albeit, I didn't keep it the first time around. But round two I kept it! I don't know why I didn't keep it the first time considering what I chose to ate was much healthier and balanced. Round two I had two pieces of (weight watchers recipe) banana bread with yogurt butter, an apple, a few veggies, and hot chocolate (ok, yes DIET hot chocolate but I put 1 TB of caramel brûlée cream in it so bonus points for me!).

I feel satisfied and I'm kind of in awe of this feeling. I'm actually excited to fall asleep now feeling satisfied. I won't be waking up in the middle of the night from hunger pains. My body is like, "FINALLY this bitch isn't treating me like shit and actually taking care of me."

Okay, sorry for all the language but when I'm feeling a lot, especially concerning my eating disorder, using dramatic and offensive language seems to come naturally.

Night everyone! I AM SO FREAKING HAPPY!

INCED Event

Sorry I haven't really been around lately. It's mostly because I've been feeling down and have been avoiding pretty much everyone. Being unable to sleep hasn't helped things. I ran out of seraqol a week ago and I thought, hey I'll just take ambien since I have some lying around. For some reason, ambien doesn't work for me anymore! I've barely gotten a couple hours a sleep per night since last week, and not even a solid couple hours- half an hour of sleep, two hours awake, fifteen minutes of sleep, an hour awake and so on. I FINALLY got my seraqol refilled yesterday and picked the WRONG night to start taking it again. I had the early shift and was supposed to get up at 4am but I slept through my alarm and my mom woke me up at 5am. I felt groggy all morning. Apparently my body is not liking me for the abrupt halt and reintroduction of my nighttime meds.

I got off work at about 2pm and so I spent my good old time getting ready for an INCED event (the american equivalent of the UK's BEAT program for Eds). The event didn't begin till 6pm so I thought I'd hang out in the coffee shop across the street, which ended up being miserable because I was completely bored, stared at the wall, and eventually binged and attempted to purge a huge ass cinnamon roll. The whole afternoon was a fail.

The INCED event was actually quite nice! It was at this theater called The Magic Lantern, known for showing foreign and indie films. There were for horde'oeuvres  and drinks before watching America the Beautiful II: The Thin Commandments. It's a documentary on the whole dieting industry and America's obsession with weight. Afterwards, there was a panel of therapists, doctors, dietitians, a recovered ED girl, and her grandma (caretaker).

I was anxious all day about this event. Actually, it's probably why I binged and purged (FAIL) right before, not that I'm excusing my poor choice. I was going to be around other women, other EATING DISORDERED women, and professionals who deal with eating disorders. I felt intimidated by these other women and their silent opinions of my appearance. Do I look fat? Thin? Are they thinking there's no way I have an eating disorder? To sum up the thoughts running through my head: INSECURITY.

Andi was there which was a comfort, though she worries about me too much. She needs to not worry about me and focus on her own health (yes, Andi it's true!). There was this girl there named Katie who I had seen briefly at group therapy, but we're in different groups. She was sitting all alone in her university sweats and sweatshirt, obviously not dressed for the event and obviously not caring. I ended up sitting by her and we ended up having a nice chat. I wish I would have asked for her number so we could text and hang out sometime, but I suppose I can ask for it at the next group. If she wants to talk to me (see! insecurity again!).

I had a few glasses of wine and, against every fiber in my being and feeling like I was being judged, had a bit to eat, mostly veggies. I wasn't planning to but my stomach was raw and two glasses of wine on a raw semi-empty stomach is definitely not nice. So I thought, fuck you eating disordered people! See, I don't have a problem! I'm completely normal, here to support the cause!

Which leads me to the general feeling I've had the past few days: DENIAL. I'm having a difficult time admitting even to myself that I have a problem, which is so unlike me because I'm usually the first to be honest and say hey, I'm not perfect and I have problems. I think I'm just sick of having this particular problem. I should be "over it" by now, right? I mean, that's what's going through people's heads. I was supposed to snap out of it months ago when I came home "recovered" from treatment. People don't have patience when you don't get better within the time they deem is appropriate for addressing the problem.

Anyone else in a similar place???

Answering Questions :)

Do you ever just sit down and watch TV without any other distractions? Or am I the only one who DOESN'T do this? I can't seem to ever just say "I'm going to watch TV" and ONLY watch TV - I'm always on the computer/iPod, or doing homework at the same time.

I can never sit and watch something without moving around or doing something else simultaneously. It drives my brother mad! He wants my full attention to be on the movie but I get so restless. I think its common among eating disordered people though. It was so funny inpatient when we would try to watch a movie. We never could make it through one and we were all doing other things while watching so in the end, only one or two people were actually still watching the movie.

I have EDNOS. Why is EDNOS not as "out there" and common like anorexia and bulimia? U know what I'm saying?

I think EDNOS is probably more common than anorexia and bulimia. It just means the person doesn't strictly meet all the requirements for an anorexia or bulimia diagnosis. Most ED professionals find these "must-meet-requirements-rule" ridiculous and thankfully, things are starting to change. For instance, to be diagnosed as anorexic, one of the required symptoms was loss of a period. If you met every single other symptom but still had your period, even severely underweight, than you were diagnosed as EDNOS instead of anorexia. That specific req. symptom for diagnosis has changed, so I feel like we're heading in the right direction. Another example: I wasn't diagnosed as Bulimic because my binges were only a few hundred calories, and not thousands. Therefore, I was diagnosed as the purging subtype of Anorexia. Confusing, huh?

Are you a clumsy person?

I run into things and trip a lot, so I suppose I am. It's mostly because my mind in somewhere else more important than walking around a pole. Of course, after I run into the pole, whatever I'm thinking about becomes less important ;)

In my opinion, people who evaluate how "sick" you are based on your weight, BMI (wink!), treatment history, DSM diagnosis, etc. do NOT understand the illness or have experience in that area. thoughts? any good comparisons about this to a physical illness?

If you're speaking about professionals who use those things to evaluate how sick you are- YES, I don't think they get it at all. If an eating disordered person is comparing and evaluating how sick other ED girls are based on BMI, weight, treatment history, etc., that's wrong too. That's the eating disorder talking 100%

What kind of food do you eat in recovery on a daily basis? What about before recovery?

I LOVE toast with butter and jam! I have it every morning! I also love a baked sweet potato with butter and brown sugar, and cottage cheese with pita chips. Those are foods I'd never allow myself when I was in my eating disorder. Before recovery, I'd eat apples, egg whites, and LOTS of coffee and diet coke. Yeah, that's pretty much it. Kind of depressing to think about actually.

Honesty Time

I wish I could write about how awesome I've been doing and how I'm in recovery and it's a beautiful thing. I wish I wouldn't let people down.

This weekend didn't go so well. I didn't enjoy any part of it, and my eating disorder ran rampant. It's to the point now where keeping anything down is a challenge. How did I get here again? I'm supposed to be living my life FREE of this disease.

I just want to curl into a ball and have someone stroke my hair and cuddle. I want to be told everything will be okay.

I think actually FEELING things on Thursday really freaked me out, because I've completely numbed myself ever since. If I begin feeling something at any moment, I'll use behaviors to numb out. Why is feeling things so scary??