Vicious Relapse Cycle. Suggestions?

So…here I sit again relapsing. Though wt was down from yesterday this morning meaning I have only gained x lbs in a week on this plan…I have chosen to relapse. That’s right…chosen. That’s what sucks about these relapses I am in now…I don’t unknowingly slip into them…I am choosing them. Sitting, contemplating, realizing (and being pestered by the thought) that what I am doing isn’t right and is completely ED. Yet..I am choosing ED. I am choosing to exercise and restrict. And this time it’s even worse…because 

I am choosing to do this and I really don’t want to.

It’s weird. I am waiting for someone to tell me the right thing to make me not do this again. I am trying to make a definite end point. And I am trying to figure out how I am going to stop this new pattern I have gotten into. Gain weight, freak out when get close to x lbs, lose the weight back, get back on plan, gain weight, freak out….and so on and so on. It’s like it’s some way to cheat the system. To experience recovery without commiting to it. And it’s wrong. Reality is, in order to recover I am going to have to stop this pattern. I am going to have to break the weight barrier I have in my head and just keep gaining. Even if it is a faster rate some weeks that I want. Even if my brain yells for me to go back to restricting, I am going to have to push on.

Honestly, I know today I could do that. I know that deep down, because I honestly don’t want to even do this. I want to do my plan. Especially since weight starting to go back down on its own. What if it could keep going down without me having to restrict? But now I won’t ever know because I chose to exercise again and have plan set out to restrict. It’s so frustrating. And I don’t even know the goal of this relapse. Do I want to lose back to x? Or to y? Or do I want to just restrict till see new therapist on Thursday? Honestly…I don’t want this to last longer than today. I honestly don’t even know why I am doing this?

So to make myself feel somewhat better and to make me not feel like a complete asshole for going against God…I am using this lapse to make sure and guarantee I get full portions, especially if use food scale. That’s something I started slipping on again. But I realized something this morning when I did that at b-fast.

You see restricting anything now when I am logging calories means I am eating less than the calories I say I am eating and with how low they are that’s dangerous so I really need to ensure I eat them all. Well…I realized this applies when/if I go back to old plan…the same thing applies. Restricting portions for my exchanges is restricting the nutrients that exchange represents which is even more important than calories. It’s means missing out on fiber, protein, vitamins, minerals…whatever my body needs. And the things/amts I restrict are so minimal caloric wise that they probably wouldn’t make a difference to add back in…other than the fact it would stomp ED to the ground.

So when/if I go back to this plan…which will be easier knowing only makes gian x lbs/week and that I will be going on it after restricting less than had before…I am going to make sure to get full portions. I am also going to (try) to only weigh weekly or maybe biweekly. This every day thing is so confusing.

So I am really hoping somehow I manage to drop back to…idk… I just somehow hope and pray it happens overnight so this doesn’t have to drag out. Heck…maybe I will just go back to plan tomorrow. I don’t know….for today just going to focus on full portions and eating what I have planned. Even doing a fear food. But really…I need to break out of this pattern. I need to just buckle in, lean on God, and gain this weight. 

Have you ever found yourself stuck in this cycle? How did you break free? Are you in this cycle now? 

May trigger but need vent

Alright so I ate stupid cake. I trusted and I did it...what happens? Worst fear! Ed is proven right and I gain 1.2 lbs overnight. Could it be from eating late? Yes. Could it be because didn't poo as much? Yes. Does my brain blame cake and meal plan? Yes!
What does this mean? It means I want to restrict and feel I can now. Hasn't even been a week and gained 2 lbs. It feels so wrong especially when wt was down slightly yesterday. But honestly a bigger part of me doesn't want to restrict. It's hungry and wants to give plan just one more day. Heck...if throw in towel now...well won't have even made it a week on this plan.
So I want to give it till tom. Now before you get all excited and proud of me for doing plan let me be honest. Right now I have plan in tom to eat low amt of calories so can lose this wt if its still there. And I plan on exercising. That is if wt is still up. So I'm hoping and praying its not...and I am gonna try and not think about fact having high sodium jimmy johns tonight. I'm scared to eat today...but know tom I can just to back. Will take the two weeks till school off from nutritionist and then when go back to school will try again.
I know its crazy and makes no sense. This cycle I have where gain, get scared, and lose back. That's why I am hoping this wt be down tom and have only gained a lb or less in this week.
For today...just keep with plan. And get timing on track. That's my focus. Wish me luck.

Piece of Cake!

So I finally did it! I went to Publix and bought and ate (well am eating) a cake slice. I was feeling so good about it…then the food scale came out and I weighed it and it was over the 3.0 oz it said it was. So I cut it down to size taking off two layers and putting in garbage disposal. As soon as those layers were gone…something I thought would ease my anxiety…I was overcome with guilt.

ED (who was the one that had me cut out the cake in the first place) started on a guilt trip of how I was disgusting and would never be able to eat a whole thing of cake. Honestly, I was going to let it hold me back from even eating the cake. I wished I had thrown away the slices, not put them down sink so could undo what I had done…but I couldn’t. The only thing to do was to repent and move on. And I did. And I am eating my 3.0 oz and praying God take away the guilt and shame from not doing the whole thing. Still this 3.0 oz is more than I would have ever done before and I am proud God has given me the strength to get through.

One day I hope I won’t have to weigh the cake, but for tonight I choose to look at the victory in eating my cake, and not in the regret I have from the decision I made. For “There is now no condemnation in God.” Plus the part I left had the more icing...the rest was more just cake...and I much preferred the icing to the cake! And it was the scarier part!

WIAW: Recovery update, not food edition

So it’s another rendention of my spin on WIAW (What I Ate Wed...but I am doing Where I'm At Wed) and sorry to say, there aren’t any food pics this time, because I just want this to be an honest post about where I am at in recovery today.

Well…I had weigh-in this morning and it didn’t do what I wanted it to do and I got scared because that didn’t scare me. That’s right…I got scared by the lack of fear. Strange, I know. In fact, my fear of the lack of fear kept me from sticking to my plan or making any recovery decisions, because I wanted to wait for my nutrition appt.

Well…the appt snapped me out of my fear of the lack of fear. It’s just scary to feel myself mentally changing and to know I am physically changing as well. But the reality is if I want a life other than my ED, things are going to have to change. If I feel things are normal…that’s almost bad, because it means I am still acting in my ED. So I did snap out of it and have gotten back on track…something that is great about ED recovery. If you make a mistake, you can choose to the next moment to go back to recovery. One slip doesn’t have to make for a horrid day.

And that brings me to my nutritionist session. We met in  the middle with what she wanted me to do and what I was willing to do. The weigh-in I will admit filled me with some trepadation. I have been hungrier than normal lately and honestly didn’t feel I had gained…but I had. Of course…my brain is saying it’s a fluctuation…we will see. But enough about that.

My nutritionist wanted to increase the meal plan, but I just didn’t feel I could. Instead we are implementing rules to get me to diversify my diet and stop eating foods for numbers but start eating them for nutrients. This means I always have to choose to eat a food if it is calories that are holding me back. It also means facing 5 fear foods this week. AND…the craziest one for me….is eating a real dessert but can’t count it as anything.

So those are the goals for this week and to stick with meal timing which has been going better. But I don't know…I’m just kind of down about recovery. It hit me I am going back to school in two weeks and nowhere close to where I wanted to be after the summer….in fact mentally I feel I am worse than I was at school. I just kept letting myself lapse because school seemed so far away…but it’s not.

And I feel my nutritionist has just given up on me. She is just letting me get away with whatever I want just to appease me, and that is not at all what I need. And then in session today she just kept asking: “What do you want Jessica? Seriously, what do you want?” I want to recover! I do…that doesn’t mean I want to gain weight. So yes…I’m still disorder. Yes, I didn’t want to eat today. But I did anyway…and these guilt trips don’t help.

So I don’t know where I am. Trying to rely on God and not my own understanding…but it’s hard. Today I have the opposite of extreme hunger and I am just so frustrated with my body. I just want it to figure out what it is going to do. So I am fed up, angry, depressed, and scared for the future. But for today I am just gonna go through the motions of recovery and hope for a better tomorrow. 

Give yourself a chance

So today it was because I was too full, other days it has to do with weight, other times feelings..no matter  hat I look for excuse to get out of my plan, to get my way with this recovery. Why? Because I don’t understand it. Because I can’t reason my way through it. I will use today as example.

This morning I weighed despite huge increase yesterday. But timing much better yesterday. Still I was scared and I cried out to God. I got on scale…literally shaking, and my weight was down…and I almost started crying. In that moment, ED was proven wrong....and I saw that I could trust God and my body...that everything would be okay. That I needed to let go of the scale and just trust.  I praised God for it and then ED came in with his reasoning. I had prayed God would show me I could trust N and increase and food and body, but ED was determined despite God doing this he would tempt me otherwise. So weight being down became about being more active yesterday or just being a fluke.

This moment made me realize what I trust is a choice. I can choose to trust God…to view the scale through His eyes…that if it is down it means I can trust body…that I may need more nutrients…or whatever I feel my heart saying. And if it goes up a crazy amount its most likely fluctuation (unlike ED who says its food). Otherwise ED always wins with scale. If it’s up it’s always food to blame and not trust, if it’s down….it’s never about trusting food. That is unless I choose to trust food no matter what the scale says. To trust God has my weight in His hands and knows what He is doing.

So I went along my day with the thought of this weigh-in always there. Kept trying to figure out what it meant…so then I decided if still had extreme hunger of yesterday…well that means that weigh-in because of food.

That probably would have been good had I stuck to my meal timing. But because ED said timing doesn’t matter since I’m not weighing till Wed…well…that didn’t work out. And thanks to some other things causing high anxiety and having to eat really close to each other and of course choosing high fiber items and accidentally taking too much Citrucel…well I felt really full instead of really hungry. And that was enough to have me throw in towel and go to nutritionist telling her what was right and that I wouldn’t do plan. Told that to some of my support to. Then they hit me back with harsh reality.

I keep doing things and trying to understand food, body, weight, fullness…all these things that aren’t always understandable. I keep trying to enforce my own control yet say that I am trusting people. But I am not really trusting. Trusting means committing to your plan no matter what..commiting to eating meal plan despite anything..letting no excuses get in the way. But me….I seek out excuses…one tiny thing goes wrong and I want to run back to ED. That’s not trust…that’s not even recovery..it’s just living a temporary lie.

Not only that but I keep saying I can’t trust my body, yet I don’t even give it a chance. I don’t commit to meal timing or even a meal plan that would help my GI system and metabolism regulate so weight and hunger/fullness can repair. Why…because my body does something I deem “wrong” even though I have no right to do so…and then I run back to ED. I say I can’t trust body, but geez my body can’t trust me. I need to give it a chance to heal…so we can learn together to trust each other.

So I have committed to my N to give her at least till our appt on Wed. No matter what stick to meal plan, to timing, and to no exercise. If I screw up timing…well then the three days of trust is gonna have to restart and push past our appt. But after the misery I feel tonight thanks to timing sucking…well…I want the dang meal timing.

Oh and that fullness that was going to knock me off my plan….it went away and hunger came back. Had I trusted God…and heck…presented my fears and unbelief to Him to help me with…would have saved a lot of misery and time. This new agreement I think will help with that. Because I am commiting to not letting the fear turn me to ED. Instead I need to turn to trust and ask God to help me. I deserve and need to give myself a chance at freedom. A true chance. Not a temporary, guideline filled, wt/feeling/fullness dependent chance. But a---nothing is going to get in the way of giving this my all—chance. And that is only going to be possible if I stay in the moment, not wonder about weight, and completely rely on God and my meal plan. Keep a positive focus and think of what freedom will mean and how great it will be come Wed when ED’s lies are proven wrong. 

When Reality Hits...

Carrots…that’s right. Carrots. That’s what my brain in this moment is choosing to freak out about. Because I measured them with measuring cup and not with food scale my brain has decided to go off and tell me how miserable, stupid, pathetic, and (of course) fat I am. All because of carrots.

The reality. My mind wants to avoid emotions and thus is choosing to focus on something as silly as carrots. The reality is that is how deep in this ED I am. That I can even be so freaked out and distracted by carrots that I drop to my knees in the kitchen and cry out to God to help me. Let’s just say that was a harsh dose of reality. I have fallen deeper into this ED than I want to admit….and I am only going to get out with God. I am afraid of fruits and veggies. The very things my parents told me to finish I am afraid of.

Numbers still swirl in my mind and I am impatient in wanting them to go away. I want it all to go away. I want my mind to be silenced. But recovery…it’s a process. So I have to bear the seemingly unbearable fear and yelling in my mind and push through and do the right thing. But the fears and the yelling in my mind have been there so I can avoid emotions…so having to continue to face the fear instead of letting the yelling stop me from whatever “mistake” ED convinces me I am about to make…well that’s just against my nature…and it’s exactly what I need to do. And things aren’t going to get better that instant…maybe not even that week…but I have to keep pushing through. This is the part of recovery that sucks.

Want to know what else sucks. This has NOTHING to do with carrots. See…the carrots didn’t bother me till I realized I screwed up my meal timing again and thus felt like a let down to my nutritionist yet again. And this time I actually wanted to make her proud because she is going through a lot right now. But ED creeped in and I felt like I failed (something I don’t like feeling at all). While trying to cope with that guilt and shame I get a text from my therapist telling me she thinks I am too severe on an ED client for her to see because she isn’t specialized. So there we go…my whole team…I feel I have let them all down, let myself down, screwed up the recovery summer I set out to have. That brings grief, fear, guilt, shame, sadness. So many emotions that are just too overwhelming for me to feel…so what does my brain do? It takes it out on carrots.

It has me stand by the food scale with my cup of carrots for a good 15 minutes pacing back and forth deciding whether or not to weigh the dang things. “Do it Jess…you failed anyway” it says as I approach the food scale, but then reason steps in “Come on Jess it’s just carrots you CAN do this. Cry out to the Lord to help you.” I walk away from the food scale. “You will overeat if you don’t weigh them.” Back to the food scale. “You deserve to be free.” Away from the food scale. This is absolute insanity and I ended up not weighing the carrots. And now I am sitting here having to feel all these feelings and let the tears flow.

It sucks to feel disordered. It sucks to feel not good enough. It sucks to feel like the sickest in the room even if ED tells you that’s a good thing. Because when you are sitting there freaking out about carrots…you realize being sick just means you are trapped in your own prison. That being the sickest just means you are more enslaved…it just means you have a farther and harder time to get out….it means you, even moreso than others, need to become dependent on someone else to tell you how and what to eat.

I know, I know…it’s not my fault how sick I am. I didn’t choose to have anorexia…I didn’t choose to have this misery..but I am stuck in it. And I keep getting in my own way of getting out. But I guess…I guess tonight I took one more step towards the door…because I didn’t weigh the carrots and am feeling emotion. I guess that’s a positive…but still…I sit here…sad and scared at how stuck I am.

I want recovery. I want a carrot to be a carrot. Food to be food. I want to be free, to be normal, to be the case that got better instead of the case that needs more help. Heck….I want to be a person not a case. I want to feel emotions and be vulnerable…because it’s a heck of a lot better than being afraid of carrots. And you know what…I need to rely on others and on God to do that. Because I am so stuck in this dungeon, in this darkness…that I can’t see the door. But for my friends, family, and God who is standing outside the prison begging me to crawl out….they see the door…and I need them to guide me to it. It sucks to not be independent….but again…depending on others is a heck of a lot better than being afraid of carrots. 

This Independence Day...

I just got back from Denver (don’t worry I will do a post all about the amazingness it was but its time for honesty).I was only there for three days, but I relapsed hard. The reason I call this a relapse and not just a slip, because even just in three days of restricting, ED has reclaimed a lot of ground in my mind. I had a weigh-in today and was sure the number would bring me the comfort to go back to plan. Even though it was lower than I thought it would be…it didn’t bring comfort. I thought it would be so easy to go back to plan after this “vacation” from recovery….but it’s not. I sit here right now crying because I am about to eat my full b-fast, which before I left was my favorite and easiest meal.

See here is the reality. I am miserable every time I choose to do one of these relapses and I realized I have kind of been doing recovery waiting for the next relapse instead of accepting and agreeing to recover. I jumped on new plan, knowing this trip would come and planning to not do plan. Even now, going back to plan my mind drifts to the fact I will be back at school soon and probably lapse then. But I am tired of it. I am tired of living relapse to relapse and misery to misery, I want to choose to leave victory to victory, to love glory to glory with God.

So in some desperate prayer time with God this morning when I realized just how far I had slipped and that the only comfort I would find in getting back on my plan (and only way it will be possible) is dependence and trust in Him…he revealed the date to me…4^th of July. Today is Independence Day. It’s Independence Day and today…once and for all…I am declaring my independence from ED and dependence on God. My body, my mind, my spirit…they can’t take these relapses anymore. They just can’t.

I am choosing to not wallow in this relapse, but to learn from it. To look at it not as steps backwards, but as an opportunity for a new start with new knowledge. I know see that I can’t give ED any ground. Even seemingly small slips can lead to huge falls and huge falls lead to where I am now. Please, if you read this and are in recovery listen to this truth…learn from my mistakes. One skipped snack is a big deal. One purge is a big deal. One exercise session you know you shouldn’t do. Any tiny use of your behaviors is a big deal….because one leads to two…leads to hours..leads to days…leads to your mind being in such a horrid place again. It may seem like the solution in the moment to use behaviors…but it just makes the fight that much harder later on. So fight it in the moment…even if you feel weak and tired, because the truth is you are powerful and strong and can recover.

So I am going to learn from this…from seeing that I can’t choose to just slip and get out of it. Because this isn’t just a battle over behaviors, but over mind. And every time I choose to use symptoms…the ED mindset takes back over. I have to surrender it. I have to stop looking for an ending point of recovery and just jump on board. It’s scary, yes. It’s scary to venture to the unknown and commit to not turning back….but I have to. There may be slips along the way, but I am going to stop trying to seek out chances to slip and as my brain puts its not “take a break” from recovery. Because each of these relapses I am miserable. At the end of them I beg and plead to God to make my wt or something be a sign I should get better…why? Because I don’t want this ED. As scary as that is…it’s the truth. I want life and I want victory. And you know what…I deserve it.

So this independence day I am declaring independence from ED. Independence from living misery to misery, defeat to defeat. Independence from searching for the next way to cheat my plan. I am declaring not just independence from ED but dependence on God and my team. Dependence on the guidelines He ordains through them. What does this mean? It means committing to the guidelines and at least giving them a chance. And in those moments when ED creeps in with excuses or fears I turn to God and rely on His strength and truth.

I know it won’t be easy…and it won’t feel natural.I know my mind may wander back to trying to find the next excuse to slip..to stop gaining…to lose back weight, but in those moments I will take my thoughts captive and turn them to God. I will learn to reach out for support and take the advice I am given. All those years ago America declared its independence from Britain.Were they excited…I bet they were. But were they scared…I can almost guarantee it. There were probably so many unanswered questions. They had never run a country….never been independent of the Brits…but they took the leap of faith…and look at America now. Look at how it is a top nation in the world. But it wasn’t without a literal battle. It wasn’t without fear. And it wasn’t without a leap of faith.

So today..as I declare my independence from ED and dependence on God it isn’t without fear…it isn’t with all the questions answered…heck it isn’t even with a concrete plan. It’s just with hope and with faith. With the knowledge that my God will lead me on the path everlasting…that He will guide me..that He has provided a team, loved ones, and countless support to get me through. With the faith that though I am weak He is strong in me and will get me through. Today…this day…I sign my Declaration of Independence from ED and with the same stroke sign my Declaration of Dependence on God, and with Him, my team who is led by Him. I will post those later today :)  

Update: You can see the two declarations here and here.