Offline for a few days

Just wanted to thank everyone for the support I've gotten with my constant whining about the upcoming move. I'm webless starting tomorrow morning, and will HOPEFULLY be back online by Friday afternoon, but you know how it is dealing with cable companies. Full story to follow, too tired right now. Today was a roller coaster, but in the end everything that needed to be done was accomplished. I am so thankful for my amazing friends. I had a slight meltdown when the person that was supposed to take me to get my moving truck was 1.5 hours late (ok, there was nothing "slight" about it, it was crying and chest pains and anxiety saturating every cell).

Tomorrow I pick up my boys (dad and brothers) from the airport, and do the remaining packing and heavy-duty cleaning; Thursday morning we hit the road.

Last session with H....I have a lot of feelings about that, but it will warrant a post of its own once I have time/energy to process and articulate everything.

Ok, off to try to sleep, take care.

Anxiety Rising

I think I had a real life Anxiety Attack today. I feel like I have so much to do that I don't even knwo where to start and therefore am unable to do anything. This is VERY unlike me. I had this humming headache, just wandered around my place looking at all the things I need to accomplish but not knowing how to start, and had chest pains and general shakes.

Also, I am officially out of energy. Cammy is kaput, mentally and physically. Tomorrow is going to be the most intense day of the whole process, and I'm already dreading it. Because of the convoluted way my move is happening, I am getting and loading the truck tomorrow, doing the cleaning and maintenance stuff and picking up my family from the airport on Wednesday, and then finally leaving on Thursday.

I am so thankful for my mother. I called her in a complete meltdown this afternoon, sobbing and sputtering like an imbecile. Just like always, she knows how to talk me down without either coddling or roughness. I do, though, wish that I could make her understand that when I am sobbing "I'm too tired" I do mean yes, real energy and lack of calories, instead of just lack of sleep.

One other thing: I had an accidental clumsy moment today that resulted in minor injuries, and that more than anything else cleared my head and calmed me down. The anxiety leaked away with the blood. Surely that can't be healthy. I know the biochemical explanations, the adrenal system can be both a blessing and a curse sometimes. I will have to talk about this in therapy tomorrow.

Which will also be my last visit with H. I haven't given myself time to process this yet, but I know that when I do I am not going to like it.

A Race Incident

Race has been in the news quite a bit recently, and I had a relevant experience yesterday that really broke my heart.

There is a black family down the street from me with several kids, including a girl that is about eight years old. She usually waits on the curb in the evenings for G. and I to pass by on our routine walk. She'll join us for the last little bit (we only live about six or seven houses apart). She likes to pet G., tell me about what she's learning in school, gripe about her baby brother, and other things like that. She's really sweet, and I always feel disappointed on days when her family is out or she can't meet me for some reason.

There are no sidewalks on our street, but it's a quiet neighborhood so that is rarely a problem.

Except yesterday, when some prick in a pick-up truck (complete with confederate flag bumper sticker) blasted by and yelled out the window: "Keep your monkey out of the street!"

This kind of thing is not at all uncommon in my area, unfortunately, but I am still always astounded at people's imbecility. Usually I am witnessing it directed at strangers, except for a couple of times when I was with J (who happens to be Japanese, which is NOT the reason I assigned him the J. pseudonym, that is just a slightly un-PC coincidence). But having it happen to a child that was technically under my supervision really, really unnerved me. What to do?

I tried to think fast for a way to "fix" the situation, so I pretended as though the guy had been talking about G., not the little girl.

"Wow, that guy was pretty dumb, huh? Doesn't he know that monkeys swing in trees, they don't walk on all four legs like G!"

The girl just gave me this "What the hell planet did you grow up on?" look, and it was obvious that this was not the first time something like this had happened to her. And the other times, there were probably no hairy quadrupeds present to shoulder the insult.

Then she burst into tears. And you know what her first remark was, sputtering through the sobs?

"If I was white, would I be skinny like you?"

Dear world, you suck, was all I could think.

Again, trying to think fast on a good response (parenting must be like a mental tour-de-France every day, good grief). I had already failed with one patronizing, sugar-coated remark, and I didn't want to disrespect her by doing that again.

So, I was just honest. Novelty of novelties, right? I told her that: #1 she is beautiful just the way she is, and #2 the reason for my weight is that I have been very sick for several years, and that it kept me at a weight that is really not healthy. She commented that I'm "not as skinny" as I was when I first moved in, my "veins used to be way more sticking out." (Have to love the bluntness of children). I said that's right, and I feel much stronger and happier now that I'm healthier. That seemed to satisfy her, and that conversation also seemed to distract her-at least for the time being-from the incident with the idiot bigot.

I still am so pissed and confused over it, though, for two different reasons.

A) EDs and body image issues are often painted as white, middle-class disorders, which of course is far from the truth. I took a Medical Anthropology course last year, and anorexia is on the list of "culture-bound" syndrome, meaning that that it's a combination of symptoms that is only recognized as a true disease/disorder in specific cultures or contexts. I was indignant about that at first, because I strongly believe that many biological factors are involved, until I thought about the significance of "recognize" in the definition. Many things considered maladies in some settings (geographical, temporal, socioeconomic, etc) are not pathologized in others. Anyway, I digress, whole books have been written on that issue.

Back to my point, it infuriated me (at the world in general, and somewhat at myself, not the little girl) that her first response to a racist remark was to think about her weight. I have had experiences with black friends with body image problems before (that will warrant another post), and so many aspects of the issue break my heart.

B) Next, racists suck. They defy physics: they suck and blow at the same time. While I am going to miss this town for many reasons, I'm ready to get out of the state. I live in the Deep South, and while there are many aspects of southern culture that I love, anyone who denies that racism is still alive and active is in denial. Don't get me wrong, I'm not claiming that all southerners are racists!!! But the fact is that it's still rampant around here. I live in what is probably the most integrated, progressive city in the state (due to having a large university with a relatively multicultural student body), and I still see shocking examples of bigotry all the time.

I have seen people in cars throw things out their windows at Mexican men. On multiple occasions. During the election, there was terrible racist graffiti about Obama that the city waited FOUR MONTHS to clean up. And this wasn't in back alleys or on train cars, it was on cross-walks in high traffic areas of downtown. My neighbors tried to put an Obama campaign sign in their yard, but gave up after the sixth one was stolen. J dealt with remarks and looks quite often (I had honestly never even heard the term "gook" until an incident when I was with him, and he was too ashamed to tell me what it was, I had to google it later). There are definite black "sections" of town. (I live in the transition zone, where both students and black families occupy relatively affordable duplexes). The incidents I have seen involving black people are too numerous to recount. Again, I'm not claiming that all southerners are racist, or that this only happens in the south, but it is indeed very present around here. Also, I know that as a blonde, blue-eyed, middle class white girl there are certainly a multitude of things that I am not exposed to.

One reason this bothers me so much, I think, was that I was naive to the whole race thing for a long time. I grew up on military bases. There, I was never in a real racial majority. My classes were always about 1/3 white, 1/3 black, and 1/3 Hispanic and Asian. I was taught that all adults were "sir" and "ma'am", no matter what race. Everyone's houses were identical, everyone went to the same schools, everyone's parents made roughly the same amount of money and wore the same outfit to work. I went to Catholic school for a couple of years, but even there it was the same, because most of the students were also from military familes at the nearby base.

A picture (limited time only for privacy reasons, I'm squeamish and will take it down soon, but wanted to illustrate the point) from my 9th birthday party is a decent microcosm of my peer group (I'm the one with bunny ears, and the kids are Brother and Littlebro):

When I was in middle school, we moved to an off-base assignment and I had my first real experience in a civilian school, in a rural area of a southern state. Culture shock, anyone? There was one black kid per grade, and one Asian in the entire K-8 school. I know, I know, you're thinking: "Poor little white girl in an all white school, cry me a river." But truly it was a strange experience. Not just the lack of diversity, but the attitudes in general. Again, there are plenty of non-prejudiced people in the south, I do want to emphasize, that, but the Good Ole Boy network is still alive and well. I hope it is a generational thing, and that it will slowly improve, although it's hard when children themselves are never exposed to "other" as they grow up.

In that area, there simply weren't many people of other races. In my current city (well, it will be my current city for 3 more days), though, the population is probably roughly equivalent, but the social stratification is extremely significant.

Now I'm rambling and this has become WAY too long. Just general thoughts. I used to make angry comments about these incidents to J., and he is so jaded about it. (Keep in mind his English is flawless and unaccented, and yet he deals with people giving him the "talk slow and loudly to the foreigner" treatment on a daily basis). And again, I know I may seem pretty silly, griping about racism when I've never been directly subjected to it myself. The only real discrimination I've dealt with has been religious. My family is Catholic, and I was one of 5 Catholic kids at my high school of 1,500 people, in a region where the "Papists" are just one rung above cult members. Our church was vandalized on a regular basis, and the local newspaper refused to publish our events on the community calendar.

But religion is a choice, race is not. And maybe some people will think this whole post is just a run of the mill self-righteous hand-waving tiptoe across the eggshells of political correctness about how unracist I am, out of some kind of guilt or fear of some kind. I don't think I'm in any way unique as an un-prejudiced Caucasian person. But the fact that it's even still an issue is so frustrating and idiotic, and I don't understand. I guess because growing up I connected with a diverse group of friends, I tend to take it very personally even when it is indirect to me.

And just for the record, the girl down the street from me is beautiful and not at all overweight, but more importantly she is smart, sharp, and good-hearted. After Obama was elected, she confided in me that she might run for president someday. She has my vote.

Contagious Stress

The anxiety around here is so thick in the air that I almost need a shovel to make it to the bathroom.

I rode horses and worked at a stable when I was younger, and I learned very fast that animals are good barometers for our own mood and tension levels; they pick up on the slightest cues and reflect our emotions to some degree.

So, G. has been on a hunger strike for two days AND had an accident in the house today, something that is absolutely positively unheard of for him. And I was a bad, bad parent and yelled at him even though I knew he was already upset and scared over it.

And my snake bit me not once but twice when I was transferring him from his big tank to his "apartment," the smaller travel carrier he'll be riding in on our car trip. Again, this is unheard of behavior, I handle him all the time and he's never done that. He is still too small and dweeby to do real damage, but I definitely saw where the term "hissy fit" comes from.

Sigh. Are we there yet?

Moving Moans

Wow, I had forgotten how much energy it takes to move. I am at t-minus one week until the regional transmigration. We moved all the time when I was a kid, but the military pays for a crew of big burly men to come do all the hard work and pack, load, and transport everything in your house. Now, though, it's just me and G., and his lack of opposable thumbs means that his main method of helping is to constantly situate himself in my path, especially when I'm moving heavy objects. I am flat-out exhausted in a way that I haven't been in a while, both mentally and physically. Funny because just yesterday I posted on how exhaustion made me feel strong, but I think I am beyond the help of even my beloved endorphins.

I operate on a very narrow margin in terms of energy anyway, which is not at all unique for people with EDs, obviously. My calorie "budget" is meticulously balanced to get me through the day with reasonable oomph, and little more, especially since I have wimped out on the weight-gain thing for the past few months.

That doesn't leave much reserve for emergencies or other non-routine energy requirements, though, and boy am I feeling that this week. I guess times like this are good opportunities to be reminded that life takes energy, in both planned and unplanned ways. You can keep yourself on a razor thin edge in terms of health and vitality, and float along fairly well in your daily routine, but it is a nasty shock to fall short when something unexpected or out-of-the-ordinary happens, especially since performing in these situations tends to be pretty urgent/important.

Now back into the cardboard labyrinth for me.

(Image credit)

(PS I did NOT use the moving as an excuse to consume all the alcohol left in my kitchen so it wouldn't "go to waste," I actually threw it all away and found satisfaction in the wastefulness).

When Purification Goes Wrong

Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if sweat and exhaustion did not make me feel so clean and strong.

Loose Connection

So, my snake was sick today. Seriously, I thought he was dead. It may seem dumb, not to know whether an animal is dead or not, especially when one's profession is studying animals, but with ectotherms it really can be hard to tell. They are always cool to the touch, don't breathe very conspicuously, etc. I poked him, picked him up, shook him around a little bit. It was not looking good.

Finally I remembered the scene from Little Women where they put the bird in the oven, and decided to try something similar, although instead of making Roasted Reptile in the kitchen I opted for a heating pad to warm him up. I made a little snake burrito with the heating pad wrapped around him and poof, worked like a charm, once he was warm he started moving again and even hissed at G., which was a good sign.

Still, I was kind of disturbed about this Playing Possum episode. Surely that can't be healthy. I know freezing up is a defense mechanism in many species, but I have never heard of it for kingsnakes before. And he had no reason to go into defensive mode, he was just in his tank hadn't been exposed to any obvious stimulus. He is very young, just about 9 months, and I keep him well-fed and watered. He seems to be growing steadily, he's up to about 20 inches now. I buy his mice frozen instead of giving him live ones, I guess it is always possible that they let one sit too long before freezing it, so it would be spoiled, but he wouldn't eat one that was "off" enough to make him sick?

So anyway, the point is that I called around to several vet clinics to see if any of them could diagnose why my snake went comatose. I got the same answer everywhere I called: "we don't do snakes, sorry."

Kind of reminded me of when I was first seeking treatment on my own, and was turned down by campus counseling services and a succession of independent psychologists, who said they "don't do eating disorders, so sorry." This was in January of my sophomore year in college, and because of the initial rebuffs I put further pursuit of treatment off for almost another year, in the meantime suffering an extremely severe relapse.

On one hand, I appreciate people being upfront when something is not in their area of interest and/or expertise. There have been times when I know that trying to talk to me about making changes in my ED behaviors was probably much worse than performing an exam on a snake.

On the other hand, sometimes it just seems like a crime that it can be so hard to get help when you need it. I was fortunate enough to find a psychologist that was a good fit for me, but she is not in "the network" for my insurance and so it costs my parents an arm and a leg, for which I have immense guilt. I tried the DIY version of recovery for several years, and inevitably stalled out and slid backwards before getting anywhere near healthy. I was venomously anti-therapy for a long time, but now I realize there is no way, absolutely no way in hell, that I would have made it this far on my own. When I think about how many people slog along on their own, lacking access to an ED-specialist due to geography, being too ashamed to admit to family that they want/need treatment or simply not having adequate insurance, it is so frustrating. Reaching out, only to be denied or sent elsewhere, can be very invalidating, and can scare some people away from treatment entirely.

I'm aware that this is neither a novel nor profound observation, but it's what's been on my mind today. Just for the record, I'm not comparing my snake's health to the suffering a person with an ED goes through, not by ANY stretch of the imagination. I guess this is just a loose connection in my train (or train wreck?) of thought.

I suppose the point of this post is this: if you are out there, deciding whether it's worth it to seek help, please don't let yourself become discouraged. At one point I swore to myself (and swore at myself, and swore at others, come to think of it) that I would never, ever set food in a psych office again, that I just wasn't someone who could do therapy. And now it has truly saved my life. I'm not saying any one treatment plan is a universal cure. Just don't give up the pursuit of the right plan, because in the end all of the hassle of insurance, scheduling, trying different offices, etc., is nothing compared to getting your life back once you've found a situation that resonates with you.

Vice Versa

The one upshot to "the whole anorexia thing" was that it definitely kept my nose clean as a teenager. My parents never had to worry about drugs, drinking, wild parties, or anything else, because I was too busy killing myself to get into trouble. I did have a boyfriend, but I was both ultra-religious and ultra-unhealthy, so there were no real worries about pregnancy. Considering the over-acheiving atmosphere in my family, everyone pretty much lucked out that I "picked" a mental disorder that led to extreme focus and perfectionism. I may have been creeping out of the world one day at a time, but at least I wasn't making a negative scene as I did so.

It should be noted that my family tree is so heavy with alcoholics that all of its metaphorical branches are probably dragging the ground. Every generation on both sides of my family has had several people deeply mired in the disease. By the time my biological father was my age (22), he had already been in and out of medical detox three times, and had pretty much fried his liver. He started the habit when he moved in with his biological father, also drunken and divorced, and they apparently bonded by just intoxicating themselves all the time. He was 15.

So, ever since I 1) started college and 2) started making progress in recovery, my mom has been very concerned about alcohol. Lectures, lectures, lectures. I would assure her that it was one of the last things she needed to worry about ("Do you have any idea how many calories are in vodka, Momma?"), but she would just give me that furrowed-brow look.

Not that I can blame her. Her dad, both of her grandfathers, many of her uncles, and sort of one of her brothers were all alcoholics. She got married when she was 19, and he turned out to be not just a drinker but a nasty, violent, hateful drinker from a family of drinkers himself. And when I say hateful, I am not exaggerating. She had a dog that was every bit as dear to her as my G. is to me (he was also the same breed, incidentally, I must have imprinted on the breed as a baby). Truly that dog was her first child, and her only friend because her husband kept her isolated most of the time. And then one night, when he was very drunk and violent, the dog got protective of us, and he killed it. So I would say she is justified in being vigilant about drinking issues.

And yet I still thought she was crazy for ever thinking I would develop an alcohol habit. But lately I am starting to see her point. I haven't mentioned it at all before, because I didn't want to admit it was happening, but I feel guilty for hiding things when so many people have been so awesome with their support and advice.

I think that I need to put a foot down soon. Liquid calories used to be a huge taboo for me, according to my ED overlords, and now I am learning that the more I actually like alcohol, the worse it can be for me, although in ways much different from the reasons I initially avoided it for so many years. Vice A used to protect me from Vice B, and now I've fallen into the trap of using B to manage A. Vice versa.

In a nutshell, I've discovered that alcohol can be very "useful" in some situations, probably a little too useful. With addictive substances, the line between use and abuse can be very fine indeed. I have been so wound up and stressed about so many things over the past few months, and it is more and more tempting to just let go and let myself forget about everything for a while. Also, I've been trying to stay on track with eating and everything, because I can't afford to slide backwards right now. Drinking 1) helps loosen my anxiety about food and 2) adds calories so that when I do eat, I need less food to meet my daily minimums. Feel calmer, have an emptier stomach, what's not to like? I don't go on drinking binges, don't pass out, don't get sloppy and stupid. I've only thrown up a couple of times. Basically, I have just enough to get me in the "zone" without making me feel to crappy to work out the next morning. But I'm afraid I'm getting too used to the buzz, too needy for that chemical comfort. And I know from past experience that if a problem is at the point to which I'm actually admitting it to myself, it is probably reaching a significant level.

I have read enough about alcoholism to know that you don't have to get drunk in order to abuse alcohol. It's like the myth that all anorexics subsist on nothing but lettuce and coffee. It's not so much the quantity of the substance, but the mindset and manner in which it is used, and the degree to which you are dependent on it. And dependence at level A often does lead to levels B, C, and so on, until the situation is unhealthy in both overally quantity and psychological quality. And I'm afraid and ashamed of letting myself cross that line. I don't want to be my father, and I don't want to crush my mother. But sometimes, everything is just so tiring.

Cohen on Caloric Restriction

Finally, a journalist that eschews all the hand-waving and awe over the "benefits" of caloric restriction and offers a more grounded perspective.

(No, not the same Cohen that I wrote about in my last post!)

How "Bruno" Offended Me

I saw "Bruno" the other day (wow! all I have to say is DO NOT TAKE YOUR MOTHER TO THIS MOVIE, several people in the theater with me had made that mistake). Doubtless everyone has heard about the movie right now, so I won't do a review of it. I saw Borat, and knew that Sasha Baron Cohen is extreme, but I was still surprised at the content of this movie, wow. I'm not a prude, I was mostly just taken aback at how much they were allowed to include while keeping the rating just at R instead of NC-17.

Yes, it is over-the-top and raunchy. But, considering my personal set of sensitivities, the issue that I kept fuming about afterwards was not homophobia, talking penises, or even poor victimized Ron Paul.

There is a scene in which "Bruno" holds an audition for baby models, and the camera follows his interviews with various parents as he gets them to agree to let their toddlers do a range of ridiculous things ranging from just plain silly to downright disturbing. (Doing high-speed chase scenes without a car seat, being exposed to creepy crawlies and fire, posing on a crucifix, etc etc) I can't believe those people actually agreed to be included in the film, for fear of Child Protective Services coming after them. Remember, these are not actors, they are real people that have no idea Bruno is a fictional character that is just pranking them.

The one that really got to me, though, was a gem of a mother who was happy to promise that her 30-pound child could lose 10 pounds in one week in order to qualify for a photo shoot. She agreed to those conditions with a smile on her face, no problem at all. This was not some obese 30-pound neonate (not that losing 1/3 of body weight would even be acceptable in any case that young, don't get me wrong), it was a healthy, beautiful, perfect little girl, probably around 3ish years old.

Really? Come on America, this just makes my heart cry.

EDIT: I didn't mean to imply that homophobia does not offend me, just that 1) I expected to see it in the movie, so it was no shock, and 2) As raunchy and crude as the movie is overall, the main theme is to expose homophobia, not endorse it.

On Brothers

Littlebro called me this morning to tell me about a book he just finished reading, and afterward I did some thinking about my relationship with my brothers. Just a couple of years ago, it probably wouldn't have occured to him to call me if his legs were on fire and I possessed the last jug of water on the planet. When I was 13 I started the ED dance, and essentially checked out of their lives. Before we had been like any siblings, involved in equal parts bickering and playing, conspiring against each other at times and being ultra-allies at others.

There have always been some underlying issues in my thinking about siblings. My mom and biological dad divorced when I was 2, my mom remarried when I was 4. I had a brand new dad (one that did not get drunk, did not hit people, did not kill family pets), and had this ideal image of a family with two parents and several siblings. When Brother actually arrived, I had major anxiety that all of the sudden my dad would lose all interest in me, now that he had a "real" child of his own. Of course, that didn't happen, and I fell just as in love with Brother as the rest of the family, while my position as Daddy's Girl was never threatened.

For pretty much all of my teenage years, though, I lived isolated from the family, both physically (I was the stereotypical teenager that was locked in her room virtually all the time) and emotionally/mentally. Then I moved out of the house to start college, and had pretty much zero relationship or contact with my brothers outside of mandatory visits home for holidays.

Over the 12-18 months, though, that has changed significantly. Part of it is probably due to the fact that the boys are growing up (Brother is 16, Littlebro is 13) and are a little easier to relate to as fellow human beings. But I have made an effort to reach out and make myself available to them to a much larger extent than I ever would have while I was still so incredibly entrenched in anorexia.

I was not really entitled to any reciprocation from them. I wouldn't blame them for writing me off just as easily as I wrote them off for so many years. But that hasn't been the case at all, and I am gradually developing genuinely close relationships with each of them. It is much more rewarding than I ever would have imagined. They impress and inspire me on a daily basis, and it gives me a major confidence boost when they come to me for girl advice, school advice, or parent advice; to vent, to share a joke or website, to ask a science question, or for any other reason, whether it be something profound or completely arbitrary. They have also been supportive in ways I never would have expected and never will deserve.

In a nutshell, so far one of my favorite benefits from recovery is rebuilding my connection with my brothers. I seem to have stepped out of myself just in time to watch my boys develop into amazing young men, and I never would have forgiven myself if I had completely missed out on that.

Slip SitRep

Yes, I am a born and bred Army brat, and I feel the need to do a a SitRep, "Situation Report," something my dad frequently demanded (and still does!) as I was growing up. Cut and dry, this is what this facet of the world is like at this moment in time. A SitRep can be anything from my status on the road during a trip to my thinking about pretty profound subjects. My dad's military nerdish way of checking in with me. And, due to my scientific training and general personality, I tend to think in terms of enumerated lists and indented bullet points, so this type of thought processing usually for me.

So, yesterday I laid out the basic facts of my recent slippage, and the incredible support and insight I recieved has led me to do a little more in-depth thinking about the situation. I spend so much of my day "just doing it," not giving myself the option of contemplation when it comes to ED behaviors. So, the Slip SitRep:

-I had a stomach virus last week, which was miserable but also allowed me to achieve that feeling of ethereal emptiness, feeling powerful for being so weak and still persisting, if that makes any sense at all. Major trigger. I wrote a research paper once about how periods of fasting or other involuntary calorie deficits can trigger endorphins and other biochemical processes that lead to restricting in people predisposed to EDs, and I know I am definitely susceptible to this.

-I have had a lot of upheavals/changes in my life over the past few months, and am anticipating more. Last month I went through an extremely "down" period, where I was depressed and overwhelmed. I managed to pull out of that after a while, but part of me wonders if slipping back into ED behaviors is what "helped" me to decrease my anxiety about other things.

-I am starting graduate school next month, and while I know that I was recruited for my brain, I still feel this urge to be the "whole package": not only intellectual, but trim and attractive and witty and sophisticated and fun. And on most days, I feel like I will never be ANY of those, but that weight is the one that is most easily manipulated. Thus, another way to use the ED as an outlet for anxiety.

-I am stressed out over mi madre's exercise and food stuff, and the fact that although she still seems pretty clueless about many intricacies of my ED, I also worry that her relationship to food and body is digressing into the unhealthy zone. Maybe I am just being paranoid? Probably a little of both? Thinking of her losing weight doesn't make me want to start losing also, don't get me wrong, but it does contribute to the overal cloud of stress.

-Even though I have lost weight over the past few weeks, I am still not as thin as I have been for most of my adult life, prior to starting therapy with H. This makes it hard for me to take "slips" seriously sometimes.

-Since my weight is not as low as it once was, I have noticed that I do bounce back much faster than I used to. Yesterday I resolved to do better, and ate very well, and even after one day I can tell a difference in my energy and mood stability.

-I think meat might be an issue related to the previous point. Over the past month or two I have drastically, drastically cut my meat consumption. This honestly was not by conscious decision, actually, it just happened as a correlate to the other changes I was making in my eating patterns. I used to eat meat (including fish) about 5x a week, and that declined to about once or twice a week. I know that there are many people that live most of their lives as vegetarians, and I think that's great, but I'm not sure if my system can handle that. I've noticed that I tend to drop weight when I decrease meat, even if calories remain constant, and even though I am good about my nuts, soy, dairy, and other protein sources. Maybe this has to do with the fact that meals containing meat usually have more sodium (at least for me, with the way I cook and construct menus), but I do think it's something more. Seems great, to the ED: eat the same calories and lose weight! But I also tend to feel really, really terrible and low energy when i do that. My exercise is still a huge issue, and working out X hours per day + protein deficiency is not a happy way to be. The meat thing is just a hypothesis that is a much smaller factor than is it would appear considering the proportion of this text that has turned out to be devoted to it. Ihope I am not offending any vegetarian readers.

-Dealing with the T. situation last month was a trigger, partly because of stress and partly because all of the sudden I was very aware of someone else being very aware of my body. Yikes.

-I am going to try the ED center in my new city, to see how that goes, and if it doesn't work out maybe I can ask H. for phone/e-mail support, at least on a trial basis.

-H. wants me to toss the scale (has wanted me to do this since Day 1), but sometimes I wonder if it actually helps me stay in touch with reality. I know this is the "wrong" idea from the POV of most recovery advice, but my body image is still so distorted, I genuinely feel as though my stomach has grown as I've lost weight over the past weeks. It would be so nice to be untethered from numbers, though.

-I truly do want to break out of this box and have a life that is more balanced. I have made much progress, but the ED still influences most of my daily decisions. When I started college, I made major changes that represented a leap forward, and I am trying to look at starting grad school as a similar opportunity to move farther along the path away from disordered life.

I guess that's it for now. This is indeed a ramble, I plan to return to more themed posts soon. Again, endless thanks to the comments and e-mails of support. <3

Facts of the Day

Fact: I am losing weight.

Fact: This is the most weight I have lost in one continual slip since Christmas break.

Fact: I. feel. crappy. All the time.

Fact: I am losing according to the scale, but I absolutely cannot tell from the mirror, and actually have increasing anxiety over the alarming size of my gut.

Fact: All of this is starting to affect my productivity and focus, something I cannot afford when I start grad school next month.

Fact: This is really not any fun. How have I let myself live like this for so many years?

Fact: I have only 3 sessions left with H., so it is a rather inconvenient time to start a new slip.

Fact: I know this game well enough to recognize the red flags.

Fact: It just doesn't seem fair that the times we are weakest are when we most need the strength to pull ourselves up and out.

Fact: I have enough on the line right now to push me back in the right direction, resolving to start that today.

Fact: It still disheartens me that I can work so long and so hard, yet still revert back to illogical, destructive patterns at the drop of a hat.

Fact: I feel like I get more and more jaded every time I repeat this cycle.

Stomach Ooglies and CliffsNotes on Trip

Believe you me, violent stomach viruses greatly compound the burden of being a compulsive exerciser.

My system is pretty much back on track now, but it has been a looong couple of days. As I have mentioned before, H. likes for me to keep a running list of ideas about what I envision "recovered" life will be like. I have a new addition: recovery means allowing yourself to miss a workout (hell, maybe even take a whole day off!) when your digestive system is involuntarily turning itself inside out. I guess you get the picture, not much more to say about that.

I intended to have a post-vacation analysis up on Monday, but have been too busy being sick. I have several topics to think/blog about as a result of the trip. In a nutshell, food was okish. I got in moderate exercise but still far less than I would have at home, and did not go crazy. I did cut back on food, but nowhere near as severely as I would have in the past. I had a fantastic time catching up with my high school friends. I am all about making new friends everywhere I go, but there truly is nothing like an old friend to just make the world feel golden.

I also actually got to take a break from being the most dysfunctional one from the family, and that was a breath of fresh air in many ways (not to imply I was pleased that someone was having problems!).

One thing that was obvious, though, is that even after years of seeing it, many times talking about it, and even going to a session with H., my mom really doesn't "get" the ED thing. I've pretty much given up on making her understand the struggles, just trying to stay open with her and deal with it as best I can. I have no doubt that she loves me and wants the best for me, but it is frustrating to feel like such a freak in a glass case when certain issues come up. She still cannot seem to grasp how hard it is for me to eat when I feel as if I'm under the microscope (especially around my grandmother) and when my meal plan calls for way more food than other people are consuming. I am open with her about the fact that I usually eat a max of half my mealplan when I'm with the family, and she always just seems to brush that off.

I can't help thinking that she doesn't take the eating/image issues seriously because I don't look so sick anymore. Do I really have to push myself all the way to the physical edge for people to believe that I am hurting?

And yet despite the fact that she seems just as clueless about ED issues as ever, I am worried about her. (Please don't judge my interpretation of the situation entirely from the brief version presented here, more in-depth discussion will be made into another post). She has really started taking her running seriously, and I thought she looked significantly thinner than when I last saw her, around 8 weeks ago. She also ate like a tuberculosis-ridden bird on the first day of the visit, which was both triggering and distressing for me. I was honest with her about my concern, but she blew me off, told me she has actually gained weight since starting running. She did eat more freely after that, but I suspect it was just for my benefit, and wasn't all that confident that she wouldn't make up for it when she got home.

Granted, she is dealing with an immense amount of stress. My dad is preparing to go to Afghanistan, she's planning to quit her job to start law school in the fall, and my brothers are having mega-issues (to be discussed in a forthcoming post). I don't know. Have I mentioned that I hate the hell out of food and weight issues?

Psyching Up for Travel

Hitting the road for a few days tomorrow. I'm going across a couple of states to visit with family and friends from high school over the 4th of July weekend. Historically, I tend to suffer pathetic ED regressions when I travel, and going back to the town where I went to high school makes it even worse.

Why? The main reason is that I feel some twisted sense of obligation to slide back into the role that I played in high school. I wasn't open about my ED, but you would have had to be blind and deaf not to pick up on it, so my friends all just came to expect that Cammy wasn't going to eat. I didn't get invited out to dinner, if we were hanging out and someone passed around food, I was automatically skipped. I know that they were just trying not to stress me out by putting me in the spotlight, but after a while it just seemed like one more padlock on the door to my little disordered cell. At times when I truly wanted to try to do better, I'd go behind the gym, in my car, or in some corner of the library to eat at lunch, because I didn't want to draw attention to myself by eating in the cafeteria.

Was this logical, rational? No. I had/have incredible friends, and I know they wouldn't have reacted negatively to me eating. It probably would have thrilled them. I guess I just wanted so much for the disorder to fly under the radar, I felt like an obvious change in behavior patterns would call attention to it more than the disordered behaviors themselves. Does that make any sense? If not, then that is precisely the point.

So, now I go back up there, still not in that ever-lauded "normal" weight range, but significantly heavier than any of them have seen me. My mealplan demands more for lunch than I used to consume in an entire day. Thusly, it's a wee bit awkward for me.

I have been up there once or twice a year since between high school graduation (2005) and now, so they've seen me at various stages, and I have eaten out, gone drinking, etc with them. I'm sure they think about the food thing much less than I do. But I still feel like I'm under the microscope. And I still feel the need to take preparatory measures in the days leading up to the trip, to make sure my tummy looks as flat as possible, things like that, even though I know my friends are much more interested in what is going on in my head than in the status of my midsection. And outside of worries about other people's perceptions, toying with food and limiting weight probably serves as an outlet for anxiety leading up to the trip. Not a good or desireable outlet, don't get me wrong, but it is what it is, just calling it like I see it.

So, I went over all of this with H. this week. I am going to try very, very hard to be as normal as possible so that I can enjoy this trip. Historically, I freak out, restrict, and feel weak and spacey after a day or so, greatly impeding any enjoyment, which is supposed to be the point of the trip, right?

I'm staying with a friend tomorrow night, then visiting with family on Friday and Saturday, coming home Sunday. My mom and brothers are going to be visiting as well (they live several more states away, so my grandparents' house is the central convergence point). I'm very glad my mom will be there as well. My grandmother does make an effort to cook Cammy-friendly food, but it is nice to have my mom around, because she is sort of a health nut (without being unhealthy about it), and so I won't feel spotlighted so much for my food preferences if she is there preferring those foods as well.

Also, I am looking forward to time with mis hermanos, known around here as Bro and Littlebro. (Slightly misleading names, because they're both "littler" than me in years, being 16 and 13, but are both much bigger than me in stature). I was such a terrible sister to them when we were kids. When we were very small I had no patience for them, always yelling and telling them to leave me alone. As a teenager, I still lived with them but pretty much checked out of their lives so I could devote myself to ED-dom, and I am really working to make up for that now that we're all semi-adults and can have intelligent conversations, go do fun things, etc. Bro was recently dumped by his girlfriend, and we're hoping the trip will help him take his mind off things.

So, what can I do to make this trip positive?

-Don't restrict. Such a simple idea in theory, right? But seriously, being out of my daily routine is very challenging. If I try to eat intuitively, I end up with way less than my meal plan. So I should probably break this goal down into more specific chunks:

-Don't over-compensate for calories not burned when I miss exercise sessions. I am in the terrible habit of knowing that I haven't burned X, and thus cutting back 2X on my calories. Must not do that this time.

-Don't abuse caffeine. I need some whilst on the road, but I can't let myself overdo it. It makes me sick to my stomach and increases my anxiety about everything (food and exercise always being the favorite topics) if I have more than a cup or so. And when I am that jittery I have no appetite, so it also contributes to restriction.

-Don't try to imagine what other people are thinking about what I am eating.

-Don't try to imagine what other people are thinking about my size.

-Focus on making the memories I want to have with my family. Meaning to relax and allow myself the energy to enjoy the time with them, instead of making just another edition of all the "I felt too tired and weak to have fun" weekends I have had in the past.

I will probably be sans internet after tomorrow night, but I may pre-write a post and schedule it to go up while I'm gone, depending on how my time goes tonight. I hope you all have a fantabulous 4th of July weekend!