All right... so I haven't posted here in about an eternity. A lot has happened, so I'll try to give a fairly brief overview, I guess.

I relapsed. Pretty badly, in fact. I was at a halfway house for four months, during which time I was having off and on ED symptoms, but nothing extremely serious. I would estimate I was purging, on average, about once a week. However, the desire to lose weight was always there, and there weren't very many times when I would allow myself "extras". But I was more comfortable with myself and my weight, for at least the first three months, than I had been in a long time. I was somewhere around the mid to higher 120s (at 5'3.75"), which was a healthy, normal, but not too massively huge weight for me. I started getting comfortable enough with my body to allow myself to wear some more fitted clothes, that actually showed my figure a bit. Etc.

My last month there was when things all started to spiral downward. During my last month, a lot of really unfortunate stuff happened. A lot of the staff was going on summer vacations, including my own day counsellor, who was gone the ENTIRE final month of my stay. I had just been starting to really get into some of my issues, so the timing of this was incredibly poor, but there was nothing I could do about it. All the residents who had lived with me my first 2-3 months there had left, and in their place had come residents who were much more high-strung, strange, or very annoying at times, and I found that quite difficult to handle. Groups often got cancelled because some staff member or another wasn't there; structure got a lot more loosey-goosey generally. As a person who does not like change, and also as someone who finds it very difficult to open up to many people, this combination of circumstances did not turn out well. It led to the last month of my stay not being a time when I should have started expanding on some more real issues when I was able to have support doing so; instead, it was a time when I was trying to cope with all the stupid little things being thrown at me, and feeling as though I was also being mostly left to my own devices to do it.

So... I started restricting a bit. And during my last two weeks, I was also going to the gym (residents got a free membership). I managed to lose at least a pound or two right at the end of my stay. I could feel, very strongly, that an ED relapse was basically inevitable. And I had no way to fight it.

My weight over the next couple of months went from the low-ish 120s to the low to mid 100s. People were noticing, and a few were commenting, and I guess a lot were worried, but I really really could not stop what I was doing, especially at first. I felt it was the only way to keep myself from completely falling apart. In short, I needed it to cope. But once I got started, I simply couldn't stop it on my own.

And then there was the bulimia. Towards the end of my stay at the halfway house I didn't even want to binge, and didn't often purge; I didn't even have any desire to binge, as I was finding it repulsive. That all changed, however. First I got into purging a little more: I would feel like eating a normal meal, but I wouldn't want to keep it in, so I'd get rid of it afterwards. However, as my weight continued to drop, I started getting really bad binge urges, and so I began binging once every 2-3 days, then every day, then between 1 and 4 times a day. Of course, I wasn't about to leave any of those in, so I would purge them too.

Around mid-August or so, I went to see my GP about a referral to the new eating disorders clinic that has just started up in the capital city here. They had had some of the services available before, but there was nothing cohesive about them -- they were sort of scattered and more random. This new clinic, which is basically an IOP setting, offers a more comprehensive sort of program, all contained within one suite in a general outpatient services building. Anyway, I went to my GP, who started me off on getting the bloodwork, EKG, etc I needed to be medically cleared for the program.

But... I ended up having a very small abnormality on the EKG. My doctor didn't think it was a big deal -- she didn't really think it meant anything, in fact -- but she was pretty sure the ED clinic wouldn't take me with any sort of abnormality on the EKG, and so she decided to refer me to a cardiologist to completely clear me for all things cardiac. However, just to get to the point where I knew I needed this cardiology referral basically took a month, and then I had to wait another month to actually get in to see the cardiologist, etc etc... and ED started filling in the time gaps very very strongly.

So... I guess I'm still underweight, especially for my body type, but I'm not (and was never) at a weight that is superbly, dangerously low. At my lowest this time around I was 100.2 lbs; I think I'm somewhere around 104 right now. That would put me at a BMI of around 18. I don't know whether to consider myself a b/ping EDNOS, or an underweight bulimic, or what. I have not so far lost my period, although I've had some of the other starvation side effects (cold, very very tired, hair falling out, etc).

Things are not altogether bleak, however. I've continued to see my psychologist, psychiatrist, and my counsellor / social worker from the halfway house program. The referral to the ED clinic has finally gotten through the medical clearance stage, and my orientation is on December 9th. I am also currently seeing an intermittent dietician, who my social worker, god love her, referred me to so that I would have some ED support while I was waiting for this stupid bloody clinic to come through. All I can say is that it's a really fucking good thing she did that, because if she hadn't I honestly don't know where I'd be with regards to food... but I know it would not be at ALL good. As it stands now, however, I have been at least semi-tolerating a meal plan that has increased so far every week (have seen the dietician three times), and is now somewhere around full food guide compliance as far as I know.

This is full day #2 of my new plan, and even though it's extremely, extremely tough to do it, I'm bloody trying. I am so tired of this ED thing, and what it has taken from me and my life, and I know that unless I fight it, it will never go away. This stupid crap has been living in my head for over three and a half years now, torturing me, making me believe that if only I lose a little more weight my life will be perfect... but it is fucking lying to me. That doesn't make it any easier to be faced with the fact that I've really fucked up, and now have to face the idea that I may have to regain to the 120s range. Actually, I don't like that idea at all. But maybe I actually have to do it if I want to get better from this ED thing. Maybe I do.

So there you have it... an update on how the last zillion months have gone for me. It's not exactly positive, but I suppose it could be a whole hell of a lot worse. Actually, I know it could be. And so I hope that maybe I can prevent this from getting worse, and if and when I finally get started in that fucking clinic I can actually make some changes in my life, and my eating, that will stick, and that I can own as something I really want to do for myself.

So I've written a new entry, but made it protected for privacy purposes... I think I have most of you added to my list, but if you can't see it and think you should be able to, feel free to let me know.

Absolutely. For example, GPs will give out antidepressants to people who show signs of depression, no matter what the underlying cause may be. In fact, nobody asks about underlying causes.

The real problem, though, is that the public has no more interest in underlying causes than doctors do. Doctors can recommend diet and exercise for weight- or diet-related problems until they're blue in the face, but what are the chances that a person will actually go off and radically change his or her life just to accomodate some doctor? Nope... they, too, would rather be on bunches of pills that make their vitals okay, and continue to live the way they want to live.

So... it's a double-edged sword. We are all part of the reason why.

   

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I haven't written here in forever, although I've been writing in my ED LiveJournal some.

The truth is that, lately, I really just haven't had much to say along ED lines. My b/ping has decreased significantly in frequency, and I'm also eating a lot more calories every day without it being quite as bothersome to me (most of the time). My interests now seem to lie more with eating intuitively, and the idea of exercising a lot, toning up a lot, has more and more appeal to me as time goes on. I try to move some every day, whether it's through walking to classes and around campus, etc, or just doing some random jumping jacks or calisthenics in my bedroom.

I think the reason I stopped b/ping nearly as much is that I don't want anybody in my family to know I'm doing it, not even my sister. For a long while I thought they really didn't know... but then I got slightly more careless, sure they weren't picking up on it, and that's when my sister realized shit. And so she talked to me on MSN, a few days before Christmas Day, and was like, "You shouldn't do that" and blah blah blah. And it wasn't the words that affected me so much, but the fact that she knew something that was supposed to be "my secret". And so it didn't feel like a sanctuary anymore... somewhere I could escape to get away from life, to put it on hold for awhile. And so the appeal of doing it was lost to me for quite some time.

I actually went for at least two and a half weeks without purging... from two days after my sister talked to me until, I think, a few days after school started. And when I've done it, it's always been in ways that don't involve me going to my downstairs bathroom and turning on the fan and water while people are home, which is the obvious way that my sister found out about. When I do it I either binge in my room, privately, and purge in the shower, or I wait until all three of them are gone out, at which time I can binge quite openly in the living room, and then use the bathroom upstairs to purge, which has a toilet that flushes way better than my toilet downstairs. (Another sign my sister probably picks up on is that I have to flush the downstairs toilet at least 3-4 times, usually, to get it completely clean again.) I can't use the upstairs bathroom when anyone is home, since it's very close to many of the main rooms in the house, and there is only a wall between it and my parents' bedroom. I can purge in the shower, though, because at this point I'm able to purge very very quietly when necessary, and the running water clears it all away pretty quickly. I do get a little paranoid lately because sometimes the tub drain seems to smell a bit, which means I have to minimize my shower purging, which means, if I can't use my downstairs bathroom, that I get very little opportunity to purge.

I really hate talking in terms of recovery these days, too. The truth is, I never really recovered, ever, and even yet, although the "symptoms" seem to have decreased, it's not because I'm making any truly concentrated effort at totally, 100% getting rid of the bulimia. It's just because, for the moment at least, it doesn't work the same for me as it used to. If it started working better for me, I'm sure I would do it more. It's not really so healthy to think about this, I realize, especially because I'm very keenly aware of the mind-numbing and emotion-numbing effects it all has on me, which only adds to my emptiness and dissociation from life and vivacity and meaning -- but I still feel that I need the option. When I talked with the psychologist I'm seeing on Thursday, he mentioned that purging could be something I use to keep me grounded and more in the present moment... that it makes me feel more alive. I would probably agree with that assessment. When I'm anxious, it calms and soothes me, and when I'm numb and blank and hollow, the physical violent of stuffing myself to the point of pain with food, and then the act of purging itself, can serve to "wake me up", so to speak. After a b/p, maybe I can exist in the real world and actually deal with it. Perhaps it prevents worse dissociation to a degree.

And now that I haven't been b/ping as much, that emptiness and blankness is really starting to hit me more. I am more aware that in a lot of ways I lack anything really meaningful and significant in my life. I often feel like I'm just coasting, riding some kind of wave through the ocean but not taking in my surroundings whatsoever. There is no thrill of the rises and falls, no noticing of the biting cold of ocean spray, or the heat of blinding sun, or the beauty of a sunrise or sunset. All I can see is the dark blue right under my feet, and the coldness of the water blowing back at me seems only to add to my numbness. It is a huge struggle to be able to lift my eyes from the surface of the water, and so mostly I don't even bother. I am able to continue to coast, so why do anything else? And yet as I coast, more and more days of my life get wasted in nothingness, and even the things I do that I should enjoy are often things that are just "there". They give me some superficial happiness, but nothing more.

I need to somehow figure out a way to escape this void I'm in -- a void which isn't dark or sad or full of any kind of negative emotion, but rather swirls with the kind of static you see on a television that isn't on the right channel for the VCR. Grey nothingness, a sound that never changes, a soul-sucking haze that doesn't want to let me out. That's the kind of void I mean. If only it was a dark void! Then I could try to find the light on the outside, try to pull myself towards it... have something to struggle against, a goal to work for. Only I have no real struggle, no goal to work for. The grey is like being given a decently comfortable bed when I am eternally and completely exhausted. It is hard to even want to get out of it, and it seems to fit so well with what I need that I don't desire to look much further than where I am right now. And yet lying in a bed all day every day isn't a life. It's an existence. And even barely that. So I feel my dissonance only slightly... enough to bother me, but not always enough to motivate me to move my body from the mattress.

What I can't figure out is... is this dysthymia? Is this what dysthymia has become for me? Instead of darkness, sorrow, there is a blank thing thrown over me that I can't escape from? Is this another way that dysthymia can manifest itself? Maybe, like the anemic who is constantly exhausted and lying in that bed, always trying to get rested and never succeeding, I just need a dose of something to feel better, to get my energy back. Fuck, maybe I should be on antidepressants or something. I really don't know. I'm so functional most of the time, and so non-depressed seeming, that nobody ever even THINKS that I should go on meds. Most of the time I don't think I should, either. And yet these sorts of periods of grey, of haze... they are bad in their own blank way. The fact that they don't seem to be continous only adds to my confusion, and my conviction that I don't need anything other than the counselling, that this is a situational/existential problem, not biologically based, and I just need to learn to deal with the warped way my mind works.

I'm really blanking out now, so this entry will end here. Not that it wasn't already long enough. :P

Today was a fucking awful day.

I binged and binged at suppertime, and yet didn't feel ill enough to purge. Didn't have the energy to purge, either, or even the desire. So all that food has been digesting for at least six hours, making me fat, making me a fucking whale.

I have been getting back into cutting, albeit kind of slowly compared to most, I am sure. Objectively it's not a good thing... so why do I feel as though it is good? Why does it feel natural and even soothing to be cutting again? I don't know. All I know is that it's like feelings I've been trying to restrain for so, so long are finally coming to the surface, and there is almost a kind of joy in discovering that this part of me is not gone -- that there is still something underneath all the apathy and anxiety that can feel, that can express the pain instead of suppressing it, that even realizes the pain is still there. And I revel in the self-injury itself. It is like an old, long-lost friend is finally returning to me. I know this probably all sounds ridiculous from an outside point of view, but in my head it's... not fully wonderful, but still, in its way, kind of wonderful.

I have stocked up on first aid supplies.
I bought some new binge food today, although it's not exactly a total supply... more like something to fill up the corners, after I grab whatever I want to eat from upstairs. Which is something I've been doing more and more often lately, because I never feel like binging solely on the food I have in my room.
I rediscovered a collection of utility knives and blades that has been sitting in my room for a good couple of years. Surprisingly, none of the blades are at all dirty or rusted. Probably because they've been kept in a closed container all this time, a container which yet aerates. (Hard to explain.) I never used a utility knife before yesterday, and I was surprised that I found it to be a good utensil. I remember not liking utility knives much before.

My exam studying... didn't happen today. At all. Which is really shitty, because my exams start on Wednesday, and I have one apiece on Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Now is really NOT the time to be slacking in my study. So why, for the love of god, didn't I study today?? My only attempt at an answer is that, mentally, I was completely tuned out of school. I could not face the thought of devoting any time or energy to rereading material yet again. [I don't mean that I read it recently... just that I HAVE already read it before, weeks or months ago, and studied it in-depth for exams before this.] I guess... I just did not care.

And yet I HAVE to care. Because this is the final haul, and I need to do well on these exams, or I am going to freak out. And in the case of my calculus exam, this is my one last chance to redeem myself. I currently have a 59% average in the course, and the exam is worth 60% of my grade... and if we do a lot better on the exam than we've been doing in the course, the prof has said he will adjust the grade accordingly. If I do well enough, I could come out of the course with a B (65% minimum). That's a long shot, but I have to try, don't I? And I do NOT want to have shelled out a couple hundred bucks for tutorials just to end up doing really shitty in this course. I ABSOLUTELY do not want to have to retake this fucking course!!!

Just five more days. I can do this. I have to do this. I must do this. There is no option to not do this. I do this, or I lose what semblance of sanity I am still clinging to. This is goddamned necessary, and I really truly mean that.

I need to pummel this thing to the fucking ground.