Avoidance.
I’ve not been writing much lately because it would require me to acknowledge some things I’d rather not. But as much as I don’t desire accountability right now, it’s the whole reason I started this blog and it’s time for honesty.
I’ve been restricting what I eat. I’ve been counting calories and calculating how little I can eat without just shutting down my metabolism and I’ve been weighing and I’ve been trying to figure out how quickly I can get back to my lowest weight without anyone noticing I’ve reverted to my disordered behaviors.
I’ve been fantasizing about my waistband slipping off my hipbones, my round cheeks melting, my inner thighs curving away from one another, my belly turning inward.
I’ve also been very sad. Very, very sad. Very lonely. Very nervous. I’m talking to myself in ugly ways. I am hungry and I am scared all the time.
Yeah.
It seems rather familiar. It’s pretty much the entire reason I decided to stop dieting, isn’t it? Because the level of self-hatred that it takes to produce results? Is excruciating.
The thing that kills me is that this weight? This weight I am right now, this 145 pounds that can run and lift weights and is healthy and plenty fit? It was my original “goal weight” from way back in ‘01 when I started my diet. It’s the weight I wanted to be. And of course, now that I am this weight, now that my body itself has chosen it and is fiercely hanging on to it, it’s not good enough. That’s the point, isn’t it?
Every commercial I see tells me I should be smaller. Every lady at work is dieting. At the grocery store, the shelves are filled with diet products and the checkout line is wallpapered with magazines promising to make me thin, thinner, thinnest. To make me pretty. To make me perfect. Everything serves to remind me that if I’m not thin or trying to get thin, then I’m failing. I’m a delusional quitter who is kidding herself into thinking her fat ass could ever be attractive. I have no right to feel okay.
But I do, don’t I? I know I do. I know there have been shiny, sparkly, magical moments in these past 8 months when I have felt beautiful and strong and valuable, not in spite of my body or because of my body, but in tandem with my body. I felt like a whole girl, a whole pretty and happy girl. And I got to feel that way without having to suffer for it.
I close the door on those moments if I turn all my energy to fixing what is not broken. That’s what I need to remember.
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The no right to feel ok … I know that feeling. It’s what spiraled me into my relapse a year and a half ago.
Digging my way out …with some help …some resistance on my part …it’s really hard for them (treatment team) to dig me out of my hole when I keep pulling the shovels away from them.
*hugs*
Oh boy howdy this is a fun time of year for all of this. I think that it hits especially hard because there are a lot of people who ‘let it all go’ for the holidays, which often just means eating until they’re full (though there’s gorging, too, I really think that for a lot of people they’re just experiencing what it’s like to not be policing themselves all of the time).
Anyway, that means that you (and the rest of us) don’t feel so freakish by comparison - I’m not the only one who’s eating a second cookie! We’re talking about stuff other than diets!
And then the New Year hits, and while everyone else moves on to camaraderie about their new diets, we’re left without anything to do in those conversations.
Even if that’s not your experience, the fact remains that this stuff just sucks to have to deal with. Thanks for sharing it, to remind the rest of us that we’re not alone in it.
don’t be afraid to vent and rant here, you will better when these thoughts come up. because you know that something is out of whack which is why you avoid writing here. i know it sounds mundane and trite, but try and focus on the positive and know that no matter what, you have friends and an online community with open ears
While I can understand it, your fear of “accountability” makes me quite sad. I’m less concerned about the behaviors that made you feel guilty, and more about the guilt itself. I completely agree that this time of year is really hard for so many reasons: the holidays are usually a time where we come together with families whose love for us is not always manifested in healthy ways, the barrage of new year resolutions that almost always include “lifestyle changes!” because otherwise you’re bad bad bad, the season itself is dark and introspective and sometimes we humans just react by concentrating on those things we hate about ourselves. And I think there’s a huge cultural impasse going on where, on the one hand, consumption is GOOD! and, on the other hand, consumption is EVIL! So sometimes we just say “fuckit” and hurt ourselves instead of bucking that particular paradigm. I have read every. Last. One. Of your posts, and I believe that you have seen glimmers of that core of beauty that resides within us all regardless of our exterior appearances or behaviors. It’s still there, that beauty, and I hope you get to see it again soon. Thank you so much for sharing your painful but wondrous journey with us all.
HUG HUG HUG HUG
We all love and care about you. We worry when you don’t post. Keep posting, even if it’s stuff you’re ashamed of.
You can get through this, we all believe in you!
I just want to send you hugs & best wishes. I am sorry that you are going through a bad time & I hope that you will come out the other side soon. Please know that you are beautiful & special just as you are & try to ignore all the bullshit we are fed in this body image disordered culture…fed by people who care nothing about our health or happiness & who only want to make a profit. Take care.
It may shock you to hear this, but you are normal. You are not alone. This time of year sucks for many reasons - the let down of the HOLIDAZE, the cold dark winter days, no more paid days off until May ;), and I know you have other “stuff” going on that you don’t post about, but really, but everyone has the winter doldrums. You are falling back on the coping mechanisms you know best and whether they be good or bad, it’s what you know. It helps you feel in control when so many things feel out of your control. There is a part of you that is healthy emotionally and physically - don’t drown her out! Listen to her and post here and get all the encouragement you can handle from your blog buddies. And don’t forget - this is the Year of the Cheese - and you STILL rock supreme!! Take care chickie!
I get it. I just…get it.
I’ve been doing the same lately and while it makes me sad to hear about someone else going through the same thing, it also makes me feel less alone. Less like a freak who can’t even get EATING right.
[...] November through, say, the end of January isn’t a good time to eating disordered recovering. Not that there ever is a good time, really, but these few months are especially trying. Just ask Meg, Charlynn or Megan. [...]
Hey Megan - you aren’t alone. I think this season is especially trying to anyone trying to recover from an eating disorder. And you’re right; it does take a great degree of self-hatred to continue with an ED. After I was first prescribed medication for depression, I went off of it because I needed the depression in order for the eating disorder to “work.”
Hey-just a note to say that I was glad to see a post today. Sorry to hear you’re having a rough time-as others have said, hopefully you can post about the ugly stuff and glean some support and love from us out here in blog-land. I hope this doesn’t sound too cheesy, but I think learning to love yourself (and your body) is a tough thing, and learning that others will love you unconditionally (i.e. whether you post that you’re doing well or having a bad time) is a great step towards learning to love yourself that way too!
Also, as others have mentioned, believe it or not, us readers get concerned when you appear to fall off the face of the earth (i.e. not post)! Hang in there!! Big hugs to you!
You guys rule. I can’t thank you enough for all the supportive words!
Rachel, what you said about going off your medication because your ED needed the depression really resonates with me. When I start getting into my old behaviors, I get almost frustrated that I can’t be as ‘disciplined’ as I used to be. What it is really is that I just don’t hate myself like I used to, so I can’t make self-punishment a way of life now. I can do it for a few days or a few weeks, but I don’t have the endless well of self-disgust to draw from anymore. And good day or bad day, that’s pretty freakin’ awesome.
Longtime lurker, first-time commenter…count me in on the “big hugs” crew. Reading today’s post made me want to show up on your doorstep with a basket of cheese and all the Melrose Place DVDs.
this was one of the most powerful things i’ve read in a long time.
your words swept through me, haunting a very deep part of my heart, touched my quiet, secret broken parts. i want to cry “mercy!” after reading this. and yet, nestled in the depth of this post, i sense a very, very bright light. i sense hopefulness and holiness. these words you had the courage to share? these are the words of scarcity, of sacredness. i am a firm believer that for as far as the emotional pendulum can swing in one direction, it also has the capacity to swing equally far in the other direction. i don’t mean happy vs. sad. i mean despair, darkness, loneliness vs. deeply satisfying, pure joy.
“I have felt beautiful and strong and valuable, not in spite of my body or because of my body, but in tandem with my body. I felt like a whole girl…” this is prayer. this is lightness and healing. this came from you.
thank you for sharing.