November Blue

“gut”. ick. what a strange phrase, “gut instinct”. a bizarre suggestion to “trust your gut”. i hate my gut, both in the anatomical tissue and fat and skin sense and the biological functions – er…dysfunctions it contains. the vast majority of the time i either try to ignore my gut or become overcome with anxiety about what disasterous embarrassment it will serve up next in my day. 3 immodiums today. just because i was nervous that my lunch might maybe not perhaps sit well. just in case. can’t hurt. i’m probably the only bulimic on the planet who abuses antispasmodics instead of laxatives.

so the point is that somewhere beneath the softness and the jiggling, beneath the gurgling and the growling there seems to be an intuition the old adages refer to. and i can say with great confidence that I’m not often in close connection with said intuition.

but Saturday night, 4th of July, after much internal and vocalized parts arguing (commonly described as “wishy washy” “flip-flopping” or just plain indecisive), I went with my gut. i listened to the quieter parts. the ones that couldn’t explain exactly WHY they didn’t want to spend the night with a male friend at his family’s riverhouse. the ones that sat by through the “but he’ll think I’m a bitch if I leave” and  the “but sex feels good” and the “but what if he’s the one“. the parts that just said quietly “you’ll feel more comfortable if you leave”. i listened. and i left. and i felt more comfortable.

i don’t know why I wouldn’t have felt comfortable staying. the anxiety of “what if i can’t sleep and I’m up all night” and “what if i get hungry in the night and there’s no safe food for me to eat” and “what if I stink up the bathroom in the morning” are just the superficial layer. beneath them it feels like more. more along the lines of “something about this person doesn’t make you feel relaxed and emotionally safe”. and that is not to say that said person is anything but a wonderful human being. it just means it didn’t feel ‘right’ to some of my parts. B. has really been encouraging me to notice what parts get activated around different people. i think if i successfully did that that i’d understand my behaviors (sane and otherwise) in relationships (platonic and romantic). so saturday i trusted my gut. i listened to the part that i never really listen to. the part that’s looking out for me.

i just re-read whatIposted aboutmy thoughtson my crazy brain in relationships andIhad another revalation (damn,i’mon a roll).

I see parallels betweenthe anxiety and build-up of speedof thoughts andtheimpulsivity and the methodical planning that I experience surroundinganew relationship and the same types of thoughts andbehaviors aroundmoving. As Iread the last post I recalledthe anxiety I felt after C. andIhooked up this weekend.I wound up saying I wanted to sleep on the couch because I couldn’t fall asleep. He tookthecouch instead (chivalry is alive and wellin the South,folks) and I could finally relax and fall asleep. That awfulanxiety. That avoidanceofclose contact of stillness of quiet. It’s likeI’mgoingto explode if I have to sit with my feelings. And so I don’t. I bet ifI rereadsomeof my posts prior to moving I’d hearechoes.

I checked out a new yoga studio yesterday which seems already like potentially a better fit. The energy of the place was good – I didn’t feel anxious the way I did at the other place. I went to a beginners class that was only myself and one other student  and the teacher, which makes it intimate and personal and great. The other was a guy – approaching middle age – who was taking his 3rd yoga class…ever. It made me so happy knowing the journey he had no idea he was in for. I was also glad that his first classes were in what was a slow and gentle grounding practice. Some of the postures were new to me or variations of old favorites but I really liked it and it was easy enough for me to modify things to avoid the ole wrist.

afterwards went to my friend, T’s and we got drunky skunky on 2 bottles of wine and stayed up way to late gabbing and psychoanalyzing our friendship. felt like total shit this morning so I’m off to sleep now. i’m not sure if it qualifies as “self care” when going to bed at 9 is a result of “self-destruction by alcohol” the night before. But whatever it is…it’s gonna feel great to crash.

Lately, I’ve been really fighting these dark insidious whispers of disordered thinking. I’m well beyond my comfort point in my body – I am conscious of lumps, bumps, curves and rolls for what seems like every waking minute of every day. My brain bounces between the following 3 lines of thought:

1) okay, so you’ve gained some weight and it feels yucky. so just get a little more active and watch the sweets and alcohol. just focus on being healthy and you’ll be fine.

2) this is what recovery is. it feels gross. if it feels disgusting to your ED brain then you must be at a healthy weight. relax and forget about it.

3) ewwww. must. lose. now. i know how. i can drop back down to a comfortable weight in 3-4 weeks if i try.

Note the unintentional use of the second person in the #’s 1 and 2 but the first person in #3. Interesting. I don’t quite know what to make of that but I’m sure a psychoanalyst would have a field day.

In an attempt to combat the deep urges to isolate into my cave of sickness, I joined a large outdoor adventure club in hopes of some kayaking, hiking and general get out of the house activities. Went for a group run tonight which was pretty good. I met a few people who seemed nice, got some exercise and came home hungry for a home-cooked dinner. But it always feels like “recovery” and “health” require such deliberate effort and intention on my part. Like if I let my guard down and stop putting myself out there I’ll slip back into it. If I give myself “down time” then these thoughts will take over. It’s making me cry right now just typing that. It just hits me sometimes how unending this fight seems to be. Even when I’m not struggling outwardly I’m fucking fighting on the inside.

On that note I’ve been crying a little bit lately, which I guess is good. I wept on the car-ride home from a “new therapist” appointment Friday. I didn’t like her. We didn’t click and I felt uncomfortable with her banter and her comments about what I had said. I also felt really really gross having spilled a huge steaming pile of my historical shit on the floor of her office at our first meeting. It’s not what i want. I want to wait until I’m comfortable. I want to wait until there’s trust and all parts are ready. To wait until I feel ready to commit to a therapeutic relationship with her. But I’m not good at that……

(insert 40 minute pause from typing) …..and now back after sobbing head down on my desk, emailing B. to request a phone appointment and then climbing into a hot bath to cry some more. I’m not sure which comes first – the hopelessness or the eating disorder. But I feel brainwashed by the hopelessness right now. I just feel like I’m wandering aimlessly through life. I’m 28, single, in a new city, new job. Just feeling unanchored and meaningless. What AM I healthy for? What AM I fighting so hard for? Some days I forget. The only answer I can pull is Sam the dog. I’d never let him down. But I look at my friends with husbands and children and exotic vacations and well-decorated homes with manicured lawns and they seem so…permanent and settled and…real. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to have those things. Some days I feel like I’m too messed up to have them.

The last thing I want to put out there in this jumbled headspace of a post is that I am so sad from talking about food. Being in a new place and being out to eat with people I don’t know well and being offered cake at work on someone’s birthday and having a great italian place recommended to me on tonight’s run…it’s just all too much. It’s hard enough to have an eating disorder but to have a ridiculously restrictive food allergy that fucking EVERYONE wants to ask 10 billion questions about is just downright cruel. I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT FOOD. I DON’T WANT TO TELL YOU WHAT HAPPENS IF I EAT GLUTEN. SHUT YOUR FUCKING FACE AND EAT YOUR CAKE IN PEACE. Okay. Maybe there’s an angry part in addition to the sad part. I just have never been able to come up with a script of what to say in such situations that doesn’t (a) sound rude, (b) let on that I have an eating disorder, and (c) discuss my bowel functions to perfect strangers.

I’m trying not to isolate. But how do you NOT isolate when all anyone seems want to do or talk about is EATING!

good night. thanks for listening.

1) my eating disorder is my dirty secret. the shoplifted token. the guilty pleasure. the concealed weapon in my back pocket. it whispers to me, taunts me. it is power.

2) even though “my parents are coming to visit this weekend” has rolled off my tongue 30 times this week it makes me wince inside. it’s not my parents. it’s my fucking mom and step-dad. my father is not a part of my life. i don’t have “parents” anymore.

must.seek.therapy.

not.doing.well.without.

i really wish i could be warm and fuzzy and hopeful and all about love and peace and joy and family and strength and courage at times like this. but i’m just angry and bitter.

my little cousin. my fourteen year old cousin. the one whose family  i lived with for three months during an internship a few years back. the one who had a nagging sprained ankle and wore an aircast while he got into mischief with friends in the  backyard. the one who delivered his sister’s girlscout cookings to my bedroom door and lingered there awhile to “hang out”. the one i showed the greatest movie ever (”The Neverending Story”, which as I recall he did not love as much as I do). the one with the sprained ankle that turned out to be bone cancer. the one who has been in an unending cycle of remission and relapse. of three years of non-stop chemo. he’s dying.

he’s been dying. i’ve known it. i’ve been the pessimist, a few weeks back wondering aloud to my mother when they would formally call it terminal. the one who faced the medical facts instead of all the ooey gooey gushy lovey crap about keep you chin up and battle and win and fight. i know how these things go. i’ve seen it with my aunt. even when hope claims to be alive and well, those in the room with any medical wherewithall or experience with cancer start to see the writing on the wall. and then the conversation switches from treatment and prognosis to morphine and comfort and pain management. all euphamisms for “he’s dying. and it hurts like hell. and he’s miserable.”

and i don’t care what all the fucking messages on his website say about staying strong and fighting. i say, go into the light. close your eyes and rest. all of us here will be okay. you can go if you’re ready, Cam.

and fuck you, universe. you can take him if you want but why do you have to make him hurt so bad on the way out?!