Who...me? And a question for my readers.

So I should be studying right now, but God put it on my heart to post this, so here goes nothing. Btw, if you are here just for the question, scroll to the bottom :)

So something I have really struggled with of late is feeling like an utter screw-up. A complete and total failure. The reason: I have been to treatment 10 times and have yet to fully recover. Here I am trying to do it outpatient, and I still struggle. I feel like people are looking at me wondering: "Is she ever going to recover?" I've even had doctors tell my parents I never will because I have had the disorder too long.

I've also started to wonder why the heck I was put on this earth and if in fact God looks at me as a failure. It's one of the reasons I struggled with rather to continue this blog. I started thinking about it and thought....whose gonna read a blog by a person struggling with an eating disorder? I'm just an ordinary person, my blog will never make the difference I want it to. I will never impact lives like I want to....I'm just a failed life.

But God has started to put something on my heart. The other day as I was realizing that I am writing a blog that is helping people, that I may be pioneering a Master's program at my school in the human-animal bond and its impact on people with addictions, and that my current position as a resident assistant has me impacted lives I wondered...why me?

Why has God chosen me? When he started to put on my heart the idea of this blog and the idea of human-animal bond studies (a big leap from what I thought was my destiny of becoming a veterinarian) I told Him He had the wrong girl. Didn't He know who I was? I was the girl who had failed at recovery. I was the girl who turned my back on Him for years. I was the girl who some days struggled till 2 pm to start her meal plan. And you know the response I got...."I know. I knitted you in the womb and I know your heart better than even you do. I also know your capabilities, your struggles, and My desires for your life. What you see as flaws, I see as gifts. What you see as mistakes, I see as opportunities to teach others. I see the truth, and you see what the world tells you. Listen to Me, to My ways, and you will begin to see the beauty in who you are...who I designed you to be. You are my child, I have a plan for you, and you are beautiful."

Wow! The God of the Universe has a plan for me and for what I see as mistakes. And the same goes for you all. I think that's why He wants me to write this, because someone needs to read it. God knows you. He knows you more than you know you. He hand-crafted you for a purpose you can't even imagine. The limits you put on your capabilities He wants to blow through. He does not see, nor does he regret your past. He knows your past, and your struggles, and He will use them to make you strong.

You are not a mistake. You are a beautiful creation with a future to take hold of. Every part of you is there for a reason. Your shape was hand crafted by the same God who carved out the Andes. You face was hand painted by the same God who puts the stars in the beautiful night sky. And your struggles, they are there so you can make triumphs....triumphs that will impact more people than you even know.

So I guess that's what God wanted me to share. And now it's back to studying. But first, my question. I was thinking something that may be helpful with the creation of my Freedom Foods Fridays is if I got some companies to send me some Freedom Food samples...I figure spur of the moment treats are obviously something I need to work on. But I am at a loss for what kinds of treats there are out there. So if any of you have any Freedom Foods you want to face, or companies of ones you have faced, or anything like that...well let me know. I will see if the company can send some and then maybe we can do them together? So anyone with any ideas let me know.

Back to the books.

I survived!

Just popping in real quick to let you all know I woke up today and survived eating the cookie. Actually...I don't feel half bad about it either.

Took a little break from studying to work on some posts for next week and am trudging through the meal plan post, but its gonna be a long one. I will publish it on Monday and it will be a mix of general meal plan stuff and semi-specifics about my plan and what has worked for me. Also, I think I got all the topics down for next week.

• Meal Plan Madness
• Team Up: about my team and what makes up a good team in my opinion
• Eyes on the Prize: My goals (who knows this may become a tab I can edit as a quick reminder to me)
• Something more?: Faith and how it has inspired and motivated me
• Keep Calm, Carry on: Difference between slipping and relapse, how to pull yourself out
• Reach Out: Building a support network, who is in mine
• Learn from me: Mistakes I've made, experiments I've tried, and how you can learn from them not working out so well

Again, if you want any more topics, let me know :) So excited to know this blog is making an impact. Honestly I was thinking about giving up on it for awhile, then prayed about it, and all the sudden got comments and pageviews and e-mails. Feel so blessed to be a part of your lives. 

Pre-warning. The recovery week post will probably be long....but recovery is a long, complex task I haven't quite mastered yet. 

Also, if you all have any ideas/ suggestions about tabs at the top that would help you or you would like to see hit me up or comment below and let me know. Thinking of making one of my freedom foods, but not sure yet. And maybe after recovery week I will make one about my meal plan, maybe one for discoveries I made, and maybe a brief one about my team. Also, maybe one about goals....not sure..we shall see :) 

Love ya all...back to the books with me. But gonna leave you with how I feel about all my readers: 

Cookie UPDATE

Once again I should be studying but had to share with you all.
So I took a tiny bite of the cookie earlier and a smile broke across my face. It really tasted good. Like the childhood I never got to have. But ED started firing off telling me to stop. And at that moment I did. I took a little break and saved the rest for after dinner.

Well, I just got back from dinner and ED was screaming. Loud screaming. Anyone live near railroad tracks? You know how loud it is when they blare their horn? That was ED's whisper. But I pushed through. Tears welling up in my eyes I reached for the drawer I stashed my Santa in.

There his jolly smile was looking back at me. I could almost see the twinkle in his eyes. It was just enough to get me to unwrap and eat his little booties. The first bite was the hardest but something strange happened. As soon as I bit in and swallowed...there was silence. ED stopped. Perhaps stunned by the fact I was eating this cookie.

Didn't stop there either. As I continued through the cookie a weird thing happened. My true voice got louder...and with anger. Basically I'm done. At least for tonight I'm done with my eating disorder and its games. I have commited 14 years of my life to protecting the bastard I call ED and its enough. He has kept me from joy and peace and the innocent happiness of enjoying a jolly cookie.

What do I have to show for my commitment? For my protection of the ED I have grown dependent on? I have medical problems I will be on medication for the rest of my life. A letter from the University Health Center deeming me too medically unstable for their services. Letter from doctor after doctor telling me I am a case to give up on....that I will never beat this. And a heart shattered by the abusive words of my ED himself. And you know what I'm done.

So tonight jolly ole' St. Nick cookie had to lose his sugary life to this cookie warrior, because ED...it's time for him to leave. And you know what...I do feel a little guilt right now. But I feel the guilt with a smile on my face, because I get to tell you all I finished my cookie and tomorrow my nutritionist will have a lovely e-mail in her inbox telling her the same. And I feel proud about that. Because tonight I chose me and said screw you ED...and you know what...after 14 years that feels good :)

Who else is ready to break the bond to ED and seal our bond to our future, to our true selves, to freedom?

Silence is Golden

So I don't really have time to post right now, but I need to get these thoughts out of my head, because I need silence. This is about to be a real honest post about a currently in progress struggle. That's why I am blogging...I need the voices out of my head and onto paper..I need silence.

So I had nutritionist session today and it was good though I didn't get meal plan decreases like I wanted (and always tried for). Also wanted to weigh today, but fate intervened and I didn't get to. Then went to a bund of study sessions and finally made it to lunch...that's where I was greeted with a lovely smiling Santa cookie....

Don't let his innocent smile fool you...this is one evil santa. You see...my body craved this cookie (well not this specific one, but the one at my dining hall). I haven't let it have one since I was probably 7 or 8. And for some reason...today of all days....it couldn't help but sneak one out of the dining hall. 

Alrighty...that's fine...I could still throw it out. ED was cooperating with me sneaking it out...but then my brain ventured to the land of recovery. And started to think....hmmm...maybe I could have this as my mandatory Triumph Treat (this is part of my meal plan I will talk about next week). Oh....did the fireworks go off then. ED started shouting how I don't know nor do I have access to the calorie or fat numbers for this cookie and thus it cannot go in my body. If I eat it...well tomorrow I will be huge. And plus I am fighting really hard with not restricting the portions of my food and today I had done good so I didn't need to push myself any further. And today wasn't a workout day so I can't justify this treat at all. 

But that little girl in me...the one who wishes she had a childhood where these cookies were there. Where there was a smiling face like this to greet her at least once. She just wants me to eat the cookie. She wants me to be free and stop letting the darkness of my past cloud my future. And I really want to listen to her I do. But I'm just so scared. 

And so damn frustrated. Why the hell am I still scared of a cookie. It's a damn cookie. One cookie this one day...that's it. It's not a killer bee hive or anything..it's a cookie. It's a cookie others in the dining hall were eating just fine. And here I am and for the past 3 hours have been freaking out about eating it and surfing the web trying to find the calorie counts. Seriously...its finals...I don't have time for this and need to just eat the dang cookie.

So it's time to muster up some serious courage. Support texts are out (I can talk about these next week too), both nutritionist and therapist have been contacted (nutritionist told me to do it), and I am just looking for outside motivation. And thus, here I am. 

I am going to do this cookie for you all. For my readers. I am going to have the courage to step out on a limb here and branch out so you all know when times  like this come, you can do it too. I am going to eat this cookie because the crazy weight gain ED is telling me will happen will only be temporary, but the freedom...it will last a lifetime (or at least until the next cookie comes along). I am going to eat this cookie for my christmas angel, a complete stranger who is believing and investing in my recovery. Geez I will do this damn cookie and just curse my N (how I abbreviate nutritionist) for telling me I need to do it. Okay....deep breathe, exhale...here we go...

Updates! And Recovery Week plan :)

Hey everyone--
So few updates real quick. One, I may not be posting a lot this week because I am SLAMMED with finals. Luckily though they end next Monday...so I figured next week will be Recovery Week. In addition to any inspired blog topics I come up with, each day I will post a topic about my recovery and tools that are helping (a fellow reader gave me a few ideas). So here are the topics so far for that...not sure on order yet. Also, I need a few more ideas to fill up the 7 days :)

--Meal Plan Madness (committing to and building a meal plan)
--Team Up (about building a team that fits you....maybe I will even introduce some of my team members)
--Eyes on the Prize (my short, mid, and long term goals)
--Something More? (How my faith helps me pull through)
--Keep calm, carry on (dealing with setbacks)
--Reach out (who is on my support network and how to build one)

I need to keep my focus on recovery that week since will not have stress of school to keep me preoccupied from ED. Also, I have really exciting news, but I want to have time to share it...so be looking for me post about God's gift to me in a christmas angel :) Honestly, God brought a woman in my path who is amazing beyond words, more generous and giving than anyone I know....she is my Christmas Angel.

And check out the new tabs :) I have an About Me section and a Contact me section. Get so sad nobody post on here, but I set up an e-mail account just for you my readers. Send me ideas, questions, whatever :)

I am also thinking of making a goals and maybe freedom foods tab (btw enjoying one right now...Skittles...sometimes its scary to taste the rainbow).

Told you this one would be short...back to the books with me. Love you all :)

The real goal

One of my lovely friends in recovery said something nonchalantly to me today that honestly has begun to revolutionize my thoughts. These past few days of thinking (perhaps from the area in my brain cleared out by putting ED in time out) I honestly think are preparing me for that next step into true recovery. And this piece added today...it just pushes me more.

Basically I was struggling with a food ritual I do that has led to restriction. I was texting her about it because I was trying not to do it and needed support. She then told me that " 'normal' eaters wouldn't do it." Woah...what? Brakes on...why are we talking about normal eating?

You see these past few months of fighting weight gain and struggling with that and fighting to switch over to exchange based system and just being so focused on not being anorexic...well it has me purely focused on anorexia. Somehow my end goal has become gaining weight...no wonder I struggle. The whole reason I developed this disorder was to control weight gain so fighting for a goal I don't want is well....pointless. But normal eating....why that's something I want.

Normal eating can set me free!

In fact I realized that's always been the point of treatment. When I am inpatient or residential the reasons they have so many rules about how you eat the food is to avoid doing behaviors that aren't normal. If the goal was just to gain weight....they wouldn't care how we ate they would just care that we ate. 

If the end goal of nutritional therapy was to gain weight...I would never have to see an outpatient nutritionist when I left inpatient treatment and was at my goal weight, but treatment centers always made me. Why? Because I still wasn't normal with food. I still had a mistrust. I still had distorted behaviors and beliefs around it.

This may seem trivial...realizing I am in treatment not to gain weight, but to become a normal eater. But it's far from trivial. You see I can accept the task of learning how to eat much more than learning that it's okay to gain weight. I can kind of look at nutrition and my meal plan as a class and all I am doing is learning how to eat again. So I have to stop the minor behaviors I have because they stand in the way of my "learning."

Another groundbreaking thing from this....I have lost the excuse I have with some of my behaviors. You see whenever I am using some of my ED behaviors like skimping portions I rationalize it because I say it doesn't matter if I am gaining weight anyway. If I am gaining weight doing it and my end goal is to gain weight....then I have met the goal and don't have to get rid of it. But if my end goal is "normal" eating and I take prepackaged items and leave some behind "just in case" it's too big....well that's not normal and it stands in the way of my goal. Weight gain, loss, or maintenance plays no factor...it's just the "normalcy" of the behavior that matters.

Same thing with eating the same, safe food or with meal timing...pretty much everything I still do that I justify as okay because I don't think it will stand in the way of my gaining weight. If it is not part of the "normal" eating I am supposed to be practicing...then it can't be a part of my life. It needs to be talked about with my team and removed.

There is also a positive side to all this. It also means that the weeks I don't gain because my body decides to rev its metabolism...that weight isn't a sign of my success or failure. How I did in practicing "normal" eating is what is a measure of my success. Actually, come to think about it, if my goal of treatment isn't reaching some ideal weight, but is normal eating, then I have no reason to think of weight whatsoever. Now, my team's goal may be weight gain, but if that's not my goal, then weight is only something my team has to focus on. All I have to do throughout the week is focus on whether my behaviors are normal, not whether they are making me gain weight (which leads to an obsession about how fast that is or is no happening).

So for this week I am going to try and look at my actions with a new perspective/goal in mind: I want to be a "normal" eater. My meal plan is the practice I need at normal amounts of intake and frequency. My meals and snacks are chances to practice normal eating techniques. 

Anyone else want to join the fight to normalcy? Found this quote below, just to remind us this fight for freedom and normalcy won't be easy, but WE ARE COURAGEOUS!

Fear of.....freedom?

Late last night I made yet another discovery (I know...when my recovery mind gets cranking, it gets cranking). I started thinking about how I am still struggling with skimping especially with my mandatory new york style bagel (gotta love how my nutritionist likes me to get over fears). Basically I am scared if I have the whole thing I will gain a bunch of weight. But here's the thing. Before thanksgiving I did great with my portions and guess what...nothing happened.

But then I went home, struggled, gained weight while struggling, came back to school, got back on track (though still struggle with portions), and lost that weight I gained (reassured it was water weight protection by body). And now I am still skimping. So I started to wonder...why did I let my freedom slip away? Why didn't I hold onto the realization that eating my portions doesn't cause weight gain? Why did I let the lies come creeping back in?

Then there is the other side of this. I have a scale back and am weighing myself...so why not take this time to test the hypothesis. How will I ever know if my lies are true unless I test them? How will I know if getting portions will cause out of control gain unless I try it? I don't. I am just blindly assuming something. Here I am a science person avoiding the very base of science...study and experimentation.

But yet I did experiment. I had the week where I did portions and bagels and what happened...nothing. In fact I lost a little weight...so why didn't I abandon my fear? Why do I keep giving into it instead of fighting it and seeing what happens? I have begun to wonder if perhaps its not the food I fear, but the freedom.

Perhaps these fears of foods are there to keep me from true freedom because I fear realizing the truth that my meal plan can be trusted. That my body can be trusted. That I don't have to focus and control food. That the chains that have been around me can broken.

If I truly wanted this freedom. If I truly wanted to be free of this disorder and the torment it brings, I would test these lies and (most likely) discover that's all they are...lies. Yet, I don't. I just keep skimping to see what that does...if it prevents me from ballooning. But that's not how experimentation works..you have to test both sides. I have to see what happens if I don't skimp and actually give in.

I honestly think I am scared to discover I can trust food, because that means my whole life I have been living a lie. My whole life has been about controlling food..I've had a disorder since I was 6 that was centered around this idea. So if I find out food doesn't have to be controlled...what does that say about my past? Was it all just a waste? Looking in the past is where the fear comes from.

But then if I find out I don't have to control food...what does that say for my future? That I can be free. That I can put my energy into my passion for helping people with addictions. That I can have enough free space in my mind and heart to find that special someone. That I can have the health it takes to have kids. The future seems so much brighter.

So I will have to step out in fear. I mean the reality is if I give in to freedom and spend a few days just doing my portions and I gain a little too much, my meal plan will be adapted and it won't be forever. Plus, the other fact is I AM ON WEIGHT GAIN...so all these actions I take to stop weight gain are futile. All that happens is my weight drops,  meal plan increases, the urges to restrict and cut portions get more intense, I eventually confess everything I'm doing, my N changes my meal plan so I can start over, I do good for a bit, fear comes back, I skimp, and cycle starts again. I am so freaking tired of it.

If I just give in, let this weight gain happen, don't skimp...then I have a chance at freedom. If I keep going the way I am...I just have a chance of dying or going back inpatient. I think I fear those two things a little more than freedom. So I am going to take this new mindset with me today. That I am just experimenting....that I am testing whether my lies are lies. Just a few days, doing my plan, no skimping, and we will see what happens. If I balloon, then the lies aren't lies and I go back to what I'm doing (or wait and get meal plan decreased--probably better option here), but if I discover I can not skimp and just gain at a reasonable rate...then I will have a little freedom and just see if its as scary as I think.

I would have never realized that rollercoasters are freaking amazing and not something to fear, had I never stepped out with courage and rode one (yes it took me till I was 15 but hey whatever). Now I absolutely love them. I would have never realized pit bulls are loveable, not something to be feared had I not worked with one....now they are my favorite breed. And now I will never know true freedom from food and that it is not something to be feared or controlled unless I try some time not controlling it, just doing my meal plan....perhaps then I will realized food is just a part of life and life is something to love.