August update

Wow, it's been a while (again). So what's been going on? Well I think I can safely say that i'm over the vertigo et al that I was struggling with, thank goodness. I gained weight, and consequently freaked out. I began a strength training program and established a new meal plan for myself. I want to add HIIT sessions to this as well, but 1) i'm unfit as heck now, and 2) can't find the time just yet. I am enjoying my weights sessions though, i'm doing heavy lifting 4 days a week, focusing on just one (sometimes two) body parts. I have been seeing strength gains at each workout and this is motivating me to keep going. I am not as of yet seeing any change in my body composition however, so am giving myself regular pep talks to continue with the plan for just 6 weeks and reassess things then. I was just going to use the mirror to judge this, but I weakened this morning and did hop on those blasted scales- two weeks and no shift, but not pulling out anything drastic just yet.

I am also in to the fourth week of my mindfulness-based cognitive therapy group course. I haven't formed a consensus on this yet, other than the home practice is time consuming and this distresses me as it takes me away from the exercise i'd otherwise be doing. I counter this at times with thoughts of the longer term benefits this may bring, so am persevering.

I also just finished a relatively good book- The Eating Disorder Sourcebook, by Carolyn Costin (the women who established Monte Nido). What I wouldn't give to go there right now and see if that wouldn't make the difference in my recovery. I'm just so tired of this fight- it remains ceaseless at whatever degree of progress I make. Why can't I just get over myself and accept that i'll never have the body that I deem acceptable for myself, with our without compulsion and obsession. I really wish I could let go of the focus of my size/shape/weight and concentrate on other areas of my life, things that could potentially make a difference in this world. Why do I remain so hooked in to this? Why does it continue to present itself as the main concern in my everyday living? And why is it so distressing to maintain a bmi over 18.4?? I did learn to manage my emotions over my size/weight at a higher bmi than this, but as soon as I hit 19.5 I cannot actually stand to be in my body, and this is not scale-led, but the way in which I view my physical self; I detest my body at this point, I look awful! So scale or no scale there is always a point I reach whereby I can no longer maintain a recovery effort and lapse in order to contain my emotions. This point has moved along the years, and it's the best it's ever been these past couple of years, but still there is a sticking point, a place I can not move beyond. What is it going to take to break through this?!

Full recovery

What if I actually decided to commit to a full recovery, including the attainment of my set point? How would I cope with this? At present I don't think it's at all possible, and I suspect my treatment team thinks the same, and that is why I do not receive the same treatment as everybody else. For example, I get away without weigh-in's, I don't have to follow a meal plan or even see the dietician, there are no protocols in place if I start to slip, everything is on me. And while this is kind of nice, at the same time, I feel like either I don't matter, or the prospect of ever recovering is limited, hence the lack of input. I assume that others presenting to this same service (with anorexia) are required to meet regularly with the dietician and adhere to the meal plan, have an expectation of continued weight gain, and reach their set point. So why am I different? Is it because i'm older, or have struggled for longer, or what? I guess i'm disappointed that there is no expectation upon me, for perhaps if there were i'd be able to stand up to it and achieve a greater degree of freedom than I currently know. I would actually like to return to the place where I no longer obsessed over calories, weight, etc, and actually live a full life. I've experienced this once for a brief period after a residential stint, and it was the best time of my life. It has only been within that residential context however where I have ever managed to reach my set point and maintain it until I was able to accept it. I fear I will never reach that point again. How do you do it? How do you just let go and get on with it? Is support vital or is personal advocacy enough? I'm convinced I do not have the tools to cope with this task alone, but I would like to learn. I would like to know how to manage distressing emotions, and I guess i'm about to start this with my mindfulness course i'm taking, but I don't yet have this knowledge or experience. In Mercy I had staff and my counsellor to turn to at these moments, somebody else whom could talk down the voice of the eating disorder and help with my perception and reality. And while I have therapists i'm working with now, they are not at my beckon call 24/7 as they were in that setting. I carry so much shame in still being caught up in this, it's such an adolescent illness and yet here I am at 36 years still struggling. How do I get out of this entanglement?

In the midst of struggle

I'm not doing particularly well right now, ever since I weighed myself and saw that my weight had dropped. I'm no longer over-joyed at this however, the reality of what it takes to restrict and keep it down (or less) has hit me, and it sucks away all life. Once again I find my thoughts near 100% devoted to eating and not eating, and my weight, leaving little room for anything or anyone else. I don't want this to be my life anymore, yet I find myself stuck here unable to make that first jump over the hurdle into regular eating again. I saw my therapist yesterday and she asked how can we help to get you back on track, I told her there wasn't anything she could do, that I just needed to make that choice and get on with it, kind of like feel the fear and do it anyway, and we left it at that. My next appointment is in 3 weeks so I have plenty of time to get back on track, or plenty of time to lose more weight. The latter is inviting but simultaneously will only make things more difficult for me to resume non-behavioured living, oh this is so ridiculous. I just need to fucking throw food down my throat. My mood however is also low at the moment, no doubt due to the many weeks of illness I've just had/continue to have. We still don't have a diagnosis, but are making headway in the process of elimination. Yesterday my GP put me on a beta blocker to prevent the migraines, it was the lesser of two evils, but i'm not particularly happy about it. It causes my bp and hr to drop, and leaves me with absolutely no energy. I was supposed to be back at work this week, and I managed Monday and Tuesday (with repercussions, but worked none-the-less), yesterday was my day off, and today I was meant to be back, but I woke up this morning and could not open my eyes. I don't know if that was the result of the beta blocker, or if it was another atypical migraine, or if my body is just so exhausted from all of this it still needs to rest. I called in sick anyway, and then went back to sleep until midday! At that point I could have rolled over and continued sleeping but decided i'd better get out of bed or i'd be awake all night and still exhausted come tomorrow morning. But coming back to my mood, it has definitely taken a downward turn, which makes the whole eating thing harder- it's like i'm lacking the motivation and am filled with lethargy. I'm not even committed to returning to hockey to complete the competitive season anymore. I hate depression, it's so damn debilitating. Anxiety I am far more comfortable with. So where to from here? I need loving support yet am not prepared or able to reach out to anybody irl, and the shame of this damn disorder is so great that it prevents me from doing so even if there was someone. If only I physically felt well enough to exercise, then i'm sure I could turn this around. Unfortunately that is not yet the case, so what does one do?

Re-centered

After a wee lapse whereby I consciously restricted my intake, and engaged in a bp session over the past few days, I have since considered my actions, and decided that I should have engaged my brain before the bp and employed the opposite action, which would have been one of self-care/self-soothing. I've also decided to find some positive quotes to help with my body image to write up on the blackboard on my wall, and on my bathroom mirror. It may sound trite but i'm prepared to give it a go. I also want to feed myself all the positivity I can, and try and recognise any negative messages I listen to and see if I can contradict them- or at very least, recognise them and let them pass. I am supposed to be starting a mindfulness course in 4 weeks time, so thought i'd try and get some practise in first, for i'm surely going to suck at 'experiencing/living the moment'. I think I am doing better at this, but it's never been a strong point of mine, and has typically been something I've run a mile from. Anything to do with feeling or experiencing and i'm done.

Lost

Very original title, for very original behaviour. I've lost some weight. It was not intentional, and by all accounts I actually thought I had gained, which is what led me to weigh myself in the first place. The loss can only be put down to the nausea of which I've been near-daily experiencing and a reduction in intake on those days, but, the effect of knowing I've lost is most detrimental to my recovery. I am ridiculously excited by it, having struggled through my once-current weight for months trying to accept it. And now that it's lower, i'm paranoid i'm just going to gain it back again, and feel as uncomfortable as I was then. I am now consciously choosing restriction and relishing in the sensation of hunger, because assuredly this will mean I can't be gaining. This is the one thing on my mind again, well not the only thing, but it is taking precedence, and rationally I know this is not good, but damned if I want to gain any, and really, if I were completely honest, i'd like to strive for the next lower weight just to ensure I wont get back up where I was. Or maybe i'm just over-analysing it all, and as soon as i'm well and able to start exercising again I can drop the obsession with the number and work at feeling fit and healthy- if that day ever fricken comes, for as things stand, i'm currently at consecutive day #4 of vertigo and still bed-ridden. My dad did pop around this morning however, so I got up for that, and tried as I might to appear normal, but there was no fooling anyone, so I ended up telling him the truth. Now he will take that back to my mother and she will call this evening and ask me what i'm going to do about all of this, suggest I quit work because I can't handle the stress, tell me i'll never be able to work a full time job, and leave me feeling the guilt and blame for whatever physical mess is happening to me of late, like I've caused it, like I choose it, just augh!

Physical vs Psychological

Well it has been a while since my last post, and not for lack of "recovering" but for lack of ability. I have been plagued with severe headaches, migraines, intense vertigo, daily nausea, colds/flus/infections, a seizure, high blood pressure, high resting heart rate, low iron etc, and no one knows why. This all started about 6 weeks ago, and since then I've pulled back from all exercise and have rested my body, mostly because my symptoms wouldn't allow me to do anything, but things have only continued to get worse, and symptoms intensify. I have spent days in hospital getting fluids, CT scans, special blood work done, and to no avail. We now have to go through the process of elimination and see if by removing anything from my life, my symptoms disappear. So the first thing we are trialling is my contraceptive pill, as that is the last thing that I went on. I will have to undergo a meds review with my psychiatrist, and see if they are causing any of these 'side effects', though I imagine this is highly doubtful as I've been on these meds for a while now. One thing they are considering is that perhaps I do not have enough serotonin floating around in my brain, but goodness knows, for all and any medications the side effects contradict each other. Regardless, I really would like to get to the bottom of it and have my life return to how it was. Obviously i'm going to have to slow down in some areas, perhaps even give up hockey at this level, but right now I don't even care about that. I've not done any form of exercise in the past 6 weeks and I really haven't felt overly anxious about it, firstly because I've been so exhausted, but also because due to the nausea I haven't been able to consume a whole lot. I have been ensuring that I do eat as much as I can though, I realised after a mere two days of minimal eating how all too easy it would be to lapse and ride these symptoms for all they were worth. In just those two days my thoughts started to sway in strength of the eating disorder, and I knew then that I could not afford for things to continue. My GP prescribed an anti-nausea medication, which I was reluctant to take at first, but once I did have it in my system it was amazing how much better in myself I started to feel again. I did have moments of anxiety whereby I thought 'omg i'm going to eat too much' and even stopped taking the meds for a couple of days to control [restrict] my intake again, then got some sense back and am regularly taking them again. Honestly, at this point however, I just want to be well. I want to be able to go back to work, I want to be able to not feel anxious when I go to bed each night for fear of what the morning will bring. I want to have the energy to live life again. I'm all but bed-bound at this point, if not due to the severity of my headaches or vertigo, then out of pure exhaustion of fighting this. And it is starting to weigh on me. I'm tired of it and at times almost ready to give up and accept that i'm a current cot-case and can do little more than sleep. I don't know if I actually have it in me to really give up and accept defeat, for I hate to be in such a vulnerable position, relying on other people to help out in areas that are my responsibility. I hate to ever be in this place of need, it makes me incredibly uncomfortable, and the sooner I get out of it the better. My parents have been useless in regard to helping out any, despite the fact that my father is retired and at home not doing anything. I call him to say that i'm being driven to ED as my current symptoms at that time were resembling a stroke, and could he come over and collect the girls from daycare. He tells me he's busy 'working on the boat'. Yes, because that is far more important. My mother then calls me the following day to see what is going on, and the only message she wants to impart is that 'there is never a dull moment in your life is there'. No doubt she believes this is all due to the fact that i'm again engaging in e.d. behaviours, and hence the lack of empathy or support, but this is just how she is, how she has always been. Even as a child, there was no care or concern if I was unwell, it was always an occasion to yell at me. Even at 15yrs when I turned up at ED with severe abdominal pain by myself, to be told I had appendicitis and needed surgery, this was met with fury and was told it was my fault and a result from all the running I was doing, like seriously women?! Anyway, same story, same response well in to adulthood, and i'm over it. Just don't fucking call me if you're going to be negative, I don't need to deal with that on top of everything else. But clearly it has upset me, and is something I will take to therapy tomorrow, as I don't know what to do with it, how to let it go, how to not allow it to continue to effect me. And that basically is the past 6 weeks in a nutshell- i'm physically battling conditions with no known cause, not knowing one day from the next what i'm going to be faced with, if i'll be well or bed-ridden. I do know each day that i'm still making progress in my journey toward recovery, that i'm not going to use this as an excuse to lose weight, or to allow the thoughts of negativity and futility to reign.

It starts with breakfast

I am having breakfast this morning for the first time this week, and in goodness knows how many weeks tbh- it's always the most difficult meal for me. I am still struggling with being unwell, now with vertigo, I swear i'll never catch a break! It came on suddenly (and intensely) last night at 10pm, I was laying in bed reading my kindle, on my side, not moving, and boom got side-blinded by the sudden onset of dizziness. If I had of been standing i'm sure i'd have fallen over. It worried me somewhat as nothing precipitated it, I was honestly just laying there, as still as stone. An hour later I got up to go the bathroom and had to hold on to the bed, then the wall, in order to get there without falling over. I do not know where all of this shit is coming from, and I've had enough! This will be the fourth week now and i'm ready to be up and adam, feeling as I was prior to all of this, physically at least. I do not, and will not call in sick again this coming week. Even if I can't walk straight I will get my dh to drive me to work so I can work. My youngest daughter now too has my cold, so I can see myself having to take a couple of days off work to care for her if it gets her down as it did me. Thankfully the vertigo is quite mild at the moment and I can sit here and update, for later i'm sure i'll be back in bed with my eyes closed unable to do anything more. My husband has just taken the girls outside for a walk to offer me some quiet time, which is thoughtful. He has been better of late in things such as this, which makes me want to be better and work harder for him/our marriage also. I had all but given up on it about a month ago.

So where are things at in regard to the eating disorder? Well I failed at my one-month free of weighing goal a couple of days ago, and hopped on the scales. The dumb thing about doing that, is I wanted to hop on them again the very next morning (I only weigh first thing in the morning on any given day, completely unclothed, and after having been to the bathroom). I resisted this however, but don't think I have it in me at this time to see out the rest of the month, so this goal may be moved over to July. I have managed to keep away from MFP though, and instead have been writing in a notebook the contents of my intake and the time of consumption. I will take this with me to my appointment this coming Wednesday and ask if the dietician can go over it, setting up an appointment to see her and discuss where to from here. Unfortunately it's a little restrictive and perhaps not a true indication of what i'd normally be eating, as my appetite hasn't been on game since I got sick, but then at the same time, I am being very conscious of what i'm eating, and there is a fair bit of negative self talk going on, and honest refusal of foods, and this may well be due to the fact that i'm not counting calories so am somewhat anxious about that, on top of not being able to exercise. So the eating disorder thoughts are still very much present, and in essence i'm acting on them, even if not to the severity of the past.

I worked out that i'm about 20 months in to this recovery attempt now, and two years since my last hospital admission. I have had my slips and lapses along the way, but generally I've done the best ever outside of a supported environment such as IP or Residential. I put this down to attempting to do this in a manner which is slow enough for me to maintain, feeling like i'm controlling the tempo and overall process. As cliché as it is, it has been that 2-steps forward 3-steps back, 3-steps forward 1-step back that has brought me to where i'm at now. There were often times when I couldn't see the progress but taking a moment here and now I can view glimpses of momentum and success. I'm definitely not out of the woods so to speak, and have many a mountain yet to climb, but it's encouraging to see that it's not all for nothing. If only it didn't take so long LOL.