Who is that girl??

First off, I have been doing really well. Monday made me at two months without ED/SI behaviors and that two months included a trip home! I am generally happy, curious, energetic, and willing to push my boundaries.

One way I have pushed a boundary is by starting to give presentations about what it is like to have and recovery from an ED for a mental illness advocacy group. As I was upstairs getting ready to practice my speech, I looked in the window and literally felt that the girl I saw in the mirror was not the girl with the ED. In fact, in that brief moment, I could not imagine why I would chose to b/p or restrict. That moment has passed, but the truth of it has not.

I am not the same person I was with an active, severe ED. I am not the same person I was three months ago. My voice is two octaves, at least, lower. There is little hint of the "please don't hurt me" little girl voice. I stand up taller. In some sense, I have grown several inches in the last three months. I am more confident; I use my voice more, A LOT more; I smile a lot. Somebody told me that I had a "nun like sense of peace" about me. Joyful. Like a spring after a long winter. I'm not the girl I was. In fact, I am a stranger I know better than I ever knew the "me" I tried to be for so long.

Another Anniversary

Okay kiddos. . . This might mean nothing to you all, but I am pretty damn excited. . .about what?

I'm glad you asked. . .



Pause for Suspense. . .




I HAVE BEEN TWO MONTHS WITHOUT USING SEVERE ED BEHAVIORS AND ANY SI BEHAVIORS!!!!

I'm Confused.

I don't quite know what's going on. I am confused. About what? Not sure. Probably something to do with the first time in ten years I saw my parents that I didn't turn to Ed. . . How weird. Okay, it's only weird to someone who's never done any better than that. Maybe I'm scared. Maybe I'm uncertain. I don't know and I don't know what I need.

Remind me

the next time I say anything serious about humans being rational maximizers of their utility that I came home for this break. That decision certainly did not maximize my utility. It may have minimized it. . . I apparently chose the wrong extremum. My mental math must be off.

I don't fit.

That's been a little bit of an overwhelming feeling lately. I don't fit. Now, I am trying very hard to not let that develop into "and therefore I should starve so I do fit" but it is getting increasingly difficult to do. And when I am actively engaging in ED behaviors I have a place where I fit, with all the rest of the people who understand EDs. I know. It's pathetic. Humans are pathetic. We don't often rise above drives for relationships. Some of us do a decent job of denying the fact that we have or need any. But it is usually an unhealthy way of denial.

I am going to ask Dr. H. about life advice about this today.

The Past

Have you ever changed completely in a very short span of time? By changed completely, I mean changed your fundamental assumptions about the world, about people, about yourself, and represent those changes in the way you see yourself, your place in the world, the way the world works. And then have you had the old you be brought back up again? Or better yet, have people from your old life reappeared?

It's rather unsettling. It's frustrating. I don't really like it. I don't not like it, I just don't like it either. I feel pressured to resume the "right" role from my past. Remember these people from my past have radically different views of the world and what the world should be than I do now, but that I did once hold. How do you interact with that group of people? What do you say? You are primarily limited to the weather and every body's health. Well, even health is contentious because their perception of health is distinctly different than mine. I certainly cannot discuss any thing that I find fascinating (except perhaps my horse) because there exists a fundamental deep disagreement among the interlocutors. The situation is both potentially explosive and potentially mundane. Escaping from those extremes is very difficult, and I am not sure that it is even possible in every case.