Another Transition

Tomorrow. I leave tomorrow. For my first summer as a real adult. I will pay rent, own a car, buy my own food, clothes and gas. Completely and totally on my own. I'm not scared, but I am anxious. I am worrying about money, about my horse, about failing Bruce. Okay, yes, I am worried about being imperfect, about not being perfect. I am going as a student. Students are supposed to be imperfect; Bruce is the only one who could even possibly be expected to be perfect. I am okay with him falling off, so why am I so paranoid about falling off myself.

So, yes, I stand upon the border of yet another transition. And that is okay with me. I like the idea of transitions, I just get nervous about them. I will be okay. But the lead up is unsettling.

And I am going to miss my horse, a lot. I was laying in the grass with him today and he nosed me after about ten minutes, to see if I was okay! It was adorable. Bruce may have a lot on me, but I would never let him touch my horse. UP is a very special horse and traditional training, any force, any lack of equality and he becomes what Jackie called "a killer." That's why he and I get on so well--equality. We both demand respect, neither of us can lie about anything, and we can laugh at each other. UP laughs at me all the time and I tease him big time. I think my relationship with him must feel like what people think love is. HEHE! And this (hopefully) will be the last three months I ever have to spend away from him.

Being Home

Honestly, being at home is miserable. I don't like living with large groups of people, or any other people for that matter. I don't like other people believing they should have control over my life or behavior. I don't like people paternalizing me, at all. Perhaps this is why I get on so well with Dr. B, minimal to no paternilization. I'm a bright adult and if I screw up, I probably should pay the consequenses. Besides, it is an incentive to not screw up again. (Okay, so I am clearly an economist!)

I have had a tough few days home, really slipping up good. But I am not going to submit altogether. I have a new plan that includes one of the strictest, most obsessive MPs and keeping a notebook of daily commitments toward recovery. I am going to keep very open email communication with M and continue to work on my assertiveness. And keep journaling. I do feel really desperate right now, but I have pulled myself out of worse spots than this before so, here goes nothing!

This is weird

I am feeling so much dissonance about my weight and body right now. Half of me, the rational half of me, is scared. Two people have assured me that I look thinner. Really?? I don't really see it, but my perception is all screwy. The other half of me, the eating disorder voice, is screaming about how successful I am. How much control I have.

I get excited every time the number on the scale drops, even a half pound. And at the same time, I worry that I will not be able to get out.

I enjoy not having to eat. And at the same time, I know I need to eat more.

I like the fact that I completely control my intake and I know my weight and I know my calories. And at the same time, I know that knowing those things is dangerous and self defeating.

I like the feeling of jeans that get looser and looser. And at the same time, I am scared that someday what were my skinny jeans will fall off me.

I don't feel like this is my mind going right now. I am not supposed to be disconcerted by weight loss. The dissonance between what I believe and what I know is overwhelming. . . and that perpetuates itself. Of course, this couldn't be easy.

I am going to miss her. . .

and I am sad that the relationship is ending, even crying a little. I really liked my T and I think she is going to be one hell of a therapist, but summer is here and both she and I are headed to new places. I hope she learned something from me and I know I learned a lot from our sessions. I cannot do anything to prevent the end and it is okay for me to be a little sad. It makes me kinda want to use behaviors to get this feeling away from me, but that would be silly. Marking the end of T by giving in to all that I have worked so hard to get out of would be akin unto blasphemy. So guess what? I am going to celebrate my achievements and developments and keep opting in for recovery. I am going to acknowledge that I am sad, but that I don't have to act on it.

Now it is time for my morning snack and I am going to eat it while I edit a paper.

A New Day!

Today is a new day! I just finished breakfast and I used the meal as an opportunity to eat something different than my normal yogurt. And there were A LOT more calories in it than normal. But that won't hurt me. Sorry, Ed. Those calories will not make me f*t or obese or cause my body to swell beyond control. Those calories will give me energy and nutrition to enjoy life and do everything I want to do.

Previously, when I have had these moments of high motivation I crash. I tend to crash HARD. But I have some strategies to deal with it this time. I am a little more settled with myself and the Zoloft is working well.

No more crashes.

Body Image is a BITCH!

I know I am not a horrible person.
I know I am even a pretty bright.
I know I am not fat.

But I still hate my body. It is like I am at war with my body. I don't feel comfortable in my own skin, in this body that I have. As stressful as my mind can be, my body is worse. It is as though my body is completely alien and wrong to me. It's so weird. And I don't know what to do with it. It's not a part of me. I often have a desire to scrape my body away. Just cut it off every little bit of fat and flesh. Bones, for some reason, seem to have some sort of special property that makes them not entirely terrible. Just bones. I want to be just bones. No fat, no flesh. I don't even understand that.

Anorexia's logic never makes any sense; it is simply the antithesis of logic. And, yet, despite all that CT training I have, I still give into the logic. But this time I am going to try to figure out some ways to argue with that logic. Because, frankly, there is nothing wrong with my body.

Losing Weight is Addicting

It just is. I know I don't need to lose any more weight. But I still get excited when that needle goes down. That's silly. It is a fucking number.

For a math student, I really hate numbers.

Finally Angry

I am finally angry. I am annoyed. I am frustrated. I am pissed off. My jaw is tense and I feel energy radiating in my chest. My movements are short and purposeful. My sentences are short and choppy. I use lots of fragments to make my point. That's me when I get angry. My speech would be rapid and short if I were speaking.
So what the hell am I angry about? I am pissed off that my parents seem to see no reason why they should consider my needs, wants, or desires in their opinion making. I am angry that they seem to be treating me like I am a two year old when I am really twenty. I am annoyed because they are ignoring the fact that I even have a voice to use. I am all grown up, an economist with the ability to run cost/benefit analysis. I know how to make my own decisions.

This is when my emotions are strong. When people ignore my voice. When people treat me like a two year old. I have a huge preference for autonomy over familial loyalty and I don't get worked up over familial duties or losses. They are just other humans with whom I happen to have common DNA. So what? I do get worked up when people skoosh my autonomy. Where do you think the bulimia came from? People telling me that I had to eat this and had to eat that. Fuck them, I said, I can eat it. . . and bring it right back up. Nobody said I have to digest it. Pfff!

So, yes, I am angry.

Learning Something

I don't have very strong emotions. Yes, I do have emotions that I have not learned how to handle. I have feelings and emotions, but I also have tools to deal with them. My methods are less than safe, but I am working on developing safer ones. But in reality, I am fairly Stoic in my philosophy. I have an awareness of the responsibility I have in given situations. Let me give you an example. . .
My grandfather died last night.
He was ninety. He smoked for seventy years. He was very lonely. He was not very happy in his life. He was happy that he got to see some of his grandchildren get married, great grandchildren be born, and outlive most of his friends and relatives. He did not want to go to a nursing home; he wanted to die in the house he built. He did.

I am not sad. My roommate called me inhuman last night because I am not sad about this. It's not that I don't care or don't acknowledge that some people would be sad in this situation, I just don't have any control over the situation and his death is not a huge trauma. He lived a full life, much more than many other people. I have no control over his death and I am happy that he did not let my parents and aunts push him into a nursing home where he would have been miserable, even if he had lived for a few extra years. I do, however, feel like an awful person because I am not sad. I wasn't close to him. I do have the emotion of sadness, but just not right now. Am I somehow less than human because I don't have the emotions I am supposed to have?

I do get sad. If my horse died, I would be sad because I would feel some responsibility. I would have lost something very important to me. I would not be convinced that my horse is better off not living. But the given the situation, I don't emote sadness. I am not an emotional person.

THAT'S OKAY. My entire life I have been told that I should feel this or have this emotion or not have this other emotion. My roomie labeled me inhuman and uncaring because I am not sad because millions of people do not have adequate food and water. I know, but why should I be sad about that? My roomie decided I don't appreciate beauty because I don't understand why people walking by a virtuoso violinist is a travesty. It's not that I am nonchalant or uninvolved or detached, I am primarily simply in control and very aware of what is going on in my mind.

I am hyper-aware of my mental processes (as if you haven't figured this out yet) and I use such awareness to my benefit. Is it wrong that I choose to control some of my emotions? Am I somehow not adequately experiencing life because I am so Stoic? Less human? Detached? Uncaring or heartless?

Haha! A few successes and some failures

NYC went better than I had expected. Oh yes, I got to obsess and obsess over it before hand, but I also got to make a whole hell of a lot of contingency plans and that was useful. Was I perfect? NOPE, far from it. Did I try really hard and keep myself from really severe ED behaviors? Yup. Did I keep myself from SI for the weekend, despite the fact that I had my razors? Kinda. I did get at myself with a plastic knife at lunch one day. It's amazing how effective a little plastic knife can be. . . I still have the lines! Yeah, there were a couple times I didn't eat every meal, but I did eat every snack. Yeah, I was way deficient on my protein--indicated by my protein binge when I got home *shame*

But I am pulling myself slowly out of a couple bad days on the rebound from the trip and in about nine minutes, I am going to opt in for my AM snack and I have plans for lunch. I still here the ED, loudly and I am still kinda giving in. I still want to feel empty and hollow. I still want to feel as though my belly button is falling through my body to my spine. But I am making myself disobey because I know that the ED offers nothing but pain and suffering and self loathing.