I Hate Ed!

“Um I may not be at IOP any more,” a friend told me a couple days ago. After dropping weight a couple weeks in a row she came to a place I am all too familiar with. A place which involves a treatment team dropping you as a client. A place filled with confusion and pain. A place of sorrow and destruction. A place of isolation and loneliness, fear and dishonesty. A place I never hope to return to. A place that hurts to think about. That brings tears to my eyes even writing about.

Another friend messaged me a week ago telling me she had entered a local IP treatment recently again. While I am grateful she is getting the help she needs, I am frustrated that her eating disorder has again taken a hold of her life to the point that this was needed. I met this friend in residential treatment. A girl with a bubbly personality, vivacious, caring, a heart of gold, but a past that no one should have to deal with. It pains me to see how much her eating disorder has taken hold of her life knowing what amazing things she could bring to the world.

Yesterday I received another phone call from a close friend informing me that she had been in the hospital since Thursday. Her liver enzymes were at levels in which she was lucky to be alive. Her eating disorder has put her in situations multiple times where she has barely escapes death. I have cried myself to sleep many times wondering if she will be alive when I wake up the next day. Sadly I have had to set a boundary with her in the last 6 months making me unable to see her. My eating disorder competes with hers to the upmost extreme, comparing my sickness level constantly. I am always wondering whether she will die and I will have not seen her.

I hate eating disorders. I hate what they do to people physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. All they do is take. They never give. They are selfish. I want my friends back. I want them to experience at least some of the life I am grateful to be experiencing today. Some of the joy I feel. Some of the freedom I have found. I want to again laugh with them, enjoy days at the farmers market, random dance parties, or a coffee at Starbucks without having to talk about how to avoid a crisis with Ed. Life can be full of so much more. I originally felt selfish writing this message, saying that I want this, I want that but that’s not all this is about. I’m pissed. Eating Disorders are taking away the lives of some amazing friends/women. I’ve lived it. I understand. It’s not an easy battle. But it IS worth the fight. One day at a time is all you have to focus on. Don’t get caught up in the big picture, that’s what I did for too long. Just focus on the task at hand. Recovery IS possible. You CAN do it!

Photo from http://www.hungertorecover.com

Thank You, but No Thanks

Dearest Ed,

I have written many letters to you. Goodbye letters. Hate letters. Love letters. Letters simply because I had to write them. Questioning letters. All of these served their purpose at their time, just as you have served your purpose in my life. That’s what this letter is about: to honor what you have done for me, but also to tell you, again, goodbye because this time, I really sincerely mean goodbye. I am letting go of you slowly. I don’t desire or need you like I used to, but we’ll get into that later.

Self confidence. This is something that I always lacked but pretended to have. My perfectionism allowed me to achieve high merits in all activities giving me a reason to appear confident. After all, why would a person with perfect grades, playing varsity athletics, have state honors in band, president of a club, etc. not feel confident? This wasn’t true though. Deep inside I was falling apart without you. I never felt good enough. Never smart enough. Pretty enough. Skinny enough. Fast enough. Outgoing enough. Then I found you. You promised me all of these things. All I had to do was follow what you said. I could follow orders. That was one thing I was good at. Before I knew it, I started to feel a false sense of confidence through others comments. Others told me I was skinny. They were “jealous.” I had a drive I hadn’t had before. I found something I was truly good at.

Control. There were times when I ran away from you. I saw where my life was going and I did get scared. For good reason. At those times, my life did seem to spin out of control. My grades dropped. Alcoholism got bad. I gained weight. I ran back to you. You gave me exactly what I needed.

Protection. This is the one that touches me the most. The one that I have held onto the hardest. The one that makes me afraid to give you up. One of those times that I gave you up was when I was sexually abused. For a long time I blamed it on the fact that I had gained weight and was more appealing to men. I never wanted to be that weight again. For many years I refused to hit that number. If I ever got close, I would relapse, harder and harder each time. There came a point though when I realized that you were no longer protecting me. My mom told me that my family was worried about whether I would live or die. That is not protection. I can no longer rely on you for this, for if I do, I will die. My faith in God is what will protect me.

You have done a lot for me Ed. You really have. However, you have taken away more. I am rebuilding my relationship and trust with my family. I have to reorganize my school/career plans. My family and myself have medical/treatment bills coming out of our ears. I lost many friends. You have outstayed your welcome and I am ready to move on. I have life awaiting me. Last weekend I played with my little cousin. She’s only 5 years old. As we played, she did not judge me on my weight or how skinny I was. She did not care. She was simply thrilled to have someone to play with. We laughed together. We were carefree. You were not a part of that interaction and it felt great. Every moment I have without you now feels free. Before it felt lonely and anxiety provoking, but now I feel a sense of freedom. I feel like myself again. I am ready to be me. To experience life. To laugh. To dream. To explore. To fall. To get back up. I am ready to live.

Love, Jenn

Clean Slate

10....9....8....7....6....

As we counted down last night, my stomach was turning. Not with excitement of a new year but with anger. 2011. A year I had been looking forward to for quite some time but for the past week, I had suddenly started resenting the year. 2011 was the year I was "suppose to" graduate from PT school, move to Cali, get a job I loved, and start really living MY life but as the end of 2010 came to a close I looked at what I was doing with my life and it was not at all close to that picture. I am not graduating in 2011, I have had to stop school and move in with my parents in Kansas City after treatment, I'm still in therapy many days of the week, if not in therapy, I'm at AA meetings (which don't get my wrong, I love the friends I've made there and wouldn't trade them for the world) and I don't feel like I'm living the life I want at all right now.

5....4....3...2...1....

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

So I could choose to sit in self-pity? Crying to myself about how my life sucks right now. But instead, I am choosing to look at 2011 as a clean slate. This is a new year with new opportunities. I get the chance to go back to school in April if I work my butt off between now and then. This is something to look forward to, not take for granted. I get to shape my future how I want it to be, while in recovery. I mean, how awesome is that! Ya, it's hard work, but a future in recovery is a lot less miserable then a future in my eating disorder, or a future using some type of substance. It all begins today, with this clean slate. I get to paint on it however I feel. And it's ok to mess up every once in awhile. It's all a part of the process. Two of the biggest lessons I learned in 2010 are 1). I'm not invisible and 2). I can pick myself up when I fall. I will take those two lessons with me into this year along with acceptance, self forgiveness and willingness.