Building Beauty Beyond Body

Yoga Stress and Other Conundrums

2012-01-30T19:32:00.000-08:00

I've talked before about how satisfied I've been with the Pill (none of the side effects some people dread from it, nice weight redistribution), but I have one gripe: in the process of going on/off of placebo week. I get pretty dramatic mood swings. I was on top of the world yesterday, and tonight I specifically avoided all phone calls because I was afraid I'd just end up crying in the unlucky caller's ear. Such is life. Fortunately the mood swings (for me) are only in the transition days between the placebo pills and the real hormone ones (or actually from no pills to the hormone pills; I never actually bother to take the placebo ones, just take a break from the pack for a week).

I just discovered the blog Eat the Damn Cake, it's pretty awesome. Definitely my recommendation d'jour, especially this post: This One is Your Real Body.

A friend of mine invited me to go to a power yoga class with her tomorrow morning, and it's given me a maddening amount of stress over what should be a simple decision. The main issues are 1) is that it's during my normal workout time, and thus would automatically interfere with routine (What! The OCD monster is rumbling to life...), and 2) I also have no idea how it would compare to my usual workouts in terms of energy, which means I don't know how much it could substitute for, whether to count it against my exercise budget (at a time when I'm trying to cut back), how I should time my food intake in relation to it, and a million other calculations/quantifications/evaluations. Welcome to my brain, watch where you step because it's a mess. This is really frustrating me tonight, because it's just this kind of bullshit that eventually robbed me of all the team sports I used to be involved in, Ironically, I couldn't play sports because they interfered with my exercise routines. Makes a ton of sense, right? Anyway, we'll see.

I blamed the Pill for my mood swings, but it seems as though the fact that I haven't slept for more than 4 hours per night (and never 4 contiguous hours) since sometime last week is probably not insignificant. Hence I should probably wrap this up. I hope everyone's week is off to a great start.

Baffling Body Works

2012-01-29T05:56:00.000-08:00

I have actually had a really great week; my mood was pretty high, despite a few external stressors going on. I was on top of the world yesterday for no immediately discernable reason. I had a pretty kickass session with D. on Wednesday, as mentioned in my last post, and it really lit a fire under me to start tackling some real exercise challenges. I think I was finally at a point at which I was realizing--and, more powerfully, resenting--just how much those routines really do control my day and rob me of a lot of productivity and life experience. I also think this week was the first time I really started to believe that I can eventually get a handle on this, and that really helped me in putting myself into action mode.

The important part to me is not just to do it a few times to prove that I can, but to make the reduced amount into the new norm. And then work on progressively creating newer norms until things are where they should be. I am an incredible creature of habit, and making something into routine is really critical for me in 1) remaining compliant and 2) not freaking out.

My body is an enigma to me sometimes. For the past few days I have been hungry.as.hell. I honestly don't think I've felt unhungry in days. I don't just mean that my tummy is a little growly, I mean like "my stomach is going to consume itself from the inside out" hungry. And even though I have not reduced food at all (woot) despite the exercise cuts, my weight has been incrementally down a little bit for the past few days.

All of which highlights the degree to which we're misguided sometimes when we treat body and energy maintenance as a simple "in versus out" equation, especially during the recovery process. As Carrie pointed out on Twitter last night (see her excellent post on the science behind hypermetabolism) when I was whining about the hunger issue, oftentimes if your body suddenly has extra energy available, it will rev up and burn it, and sometimes even burn some extra while it's at it. Bodies are not nearly as passive as we sometimes seem to think.

I went through periodic hypermetabolic stages during earlier weight restoration, and did not miss it. I know the omnipresent "fitness"industry is always advising us to maximize our metabolisms! increase your calorie burn while sitting still! eat these five foods that burn more energy than they contain!, but believe me, it's confusing and frustrating when your body function changes and suddenly your balance is completely disrupted.

Anyway, I'm highly aware that the logical response to being hungry all the time and seeing weight drop is to . . . eat more. Imagine that. As T. pointed out, you're (and by you I mean me) not being fair if you claim to sometimes undereat because you're "just not hungry" and then don't allow yourself a supplement when you are actually famished. I think that if I hadn't been doing the exercise cuts this week I might have been a little more liberal in allowing myself extra calories. Another factor (which I am obviously using to rationalize my actions, acknowledged) is that I'm going to be traveling away from home for over half the days in February, and am really getting the pre-travel anxiety about how my body will handle all of that, the sort of anticipatory clenching down to pre-compensate. Not by restricting, but just by being terrified to boost anything at all. I don't say that as justification, more of explanation, I guess. Going to work on that this week.

I get to see M. soon! We tend to have a sort of U-shape in our interactions in between visits--we end a visit on a huge love-high and are really happy with each other, then after a couple of weeks we get cranky, lonely, etc and have a fight, then make up and rise back to the top of the mood-closeness curve in anticipation of seeing each other again. I think we've been good at making the U a little bit shallower each time, but I'm just glad we both recognize the pattern enough to know that we spend most of the time near the top.

Anyway, I hope everyone has had a great week. Despite the metabolic woes and a few stressful things, I've been feeling really awesome lately. Participatory prompts: 1) Have any morphing metabolism stories to share? 2) Tell me something great that happened to you this week?

Return to D. is Vindicated

2012-01-25T12:18:00.000-08:00

I had a session with my dietician this morning, and we did not specifically mention food once the entire hour. And honestly, it was one of the most productive/thought provoking therapy sessions I've had in a long time.

The irony abounds, right? I'l take it.

Watermelons and Stuff

2012-01-23T21:11:00.000-08:00

I'm starting to get blogger's guilt for not updating for a while, but I haven't really had much to say. Pretty much 'same old same old' around here I suppose. I feel like this entire semester is just a holding pattern in which I putter around keeping myself busy while I wait to find out what direction my life will go in next (meaning where I will be moving for my PhD).

Anyway, an unplanned guilt post means you get randoms:

--My sleep has been screwy this week. I am usually one of the world's most consistent sleepers (fall asleep between 11-12, wake up 6:00-6:15 with no alarm), but the other night I randomly just got up and surfed the web, texted with a friend on the west coast, etc from 2:00-4:30, then was wide awake at 5:30 again. I guess I had a lot on my mind. That was Saturday, and then last night Match and I had a blow-up fight (we have them infrequently but I hate them more than anything when they happen) that had me up til 1 again. I feel like I should have passed out by now, as it's almost midnight again, but behold, the wonder of caffeine.

--The fight picked up again this morning, and I am 100% convinced neither of us could have told you what started the spat in the first place, it was that ridiculous. I think one reason they tend to drag out for us is that we have very different coping strategies. After we have said what we need to say and are not in inflammatory mode, I *need* alone time to cool off and repair myself (note that this is after we've hashed it out and are aimed towards making up, I don't withdraw in the midst of a discussion). I will definitely get over it, but I need to do that in private, and then I'm happy to re-engage and be back to normal. He, on the other hand, doesn't want to disengage until he's convinced everything is completely fine and happy. Which, if you are dealing with someone who has to have some recharge time to be okay, is an exercise in futility and frustration on both sides. I don't think either way is right or wrong, they are just glaringly incompatible when coupled. Participatory prompt: do you need alone time to get over an argument?

--In evaluating what my lifestyle will probably be like for at least the next few years (lots of time in Third World countries), I've convinced myself that I really need Lasix, for myriad reasons related to hygiene and convenience. I can't figure out how I'd pay for it, though, and honestly the idea of anyone doing anything to my eyes really scares me. Participatory prompt #2: has anyone out there had Lasix, and if so how was the recovery, are you happy with results?

--I love that even though my dog is showing his age more and more, he still acts like a puppy when his favorite squeaky tennis ball is brought out. It's one of those little things that is guaranteed to make me smile no matter what kind of day I'm having. Participatory prompt #3: Tell me something cute that your dog does? Or your cat, or your kid, or whatever other small animal that might be living in your house.

--I really wish I lived within reasonable visiting distance of any of my friends from college or high school. I've been pretty lonely lately.

--I got to teach a couple of classes for my adviser when he was out sick last week, LOVED it. I really get a great feeling from explaining things and convincing bored college students of how kickass my little corner of science is.

--I think it's time for Ryan Gosling to make a new movie, I need a fix.

--According to today's page on my Page-A-Day trivia calendar (nerd alert), it takes 100 gallons of water to grow the average watermelon? Which is approximately how much I always have to pee after eating watermelon...the cycle suddenly makes sense.

--I always, always have a Page-A-Day calendar and at least 2 wall calendars for any given year.

I'm starting to feel at risk of face-planting on the keyboard, so I better sign off. Hope Monday treated everyone well, love y'all.

"Purposeful Practice" in Recovery

2012-01-16T09:53:00.000-08:00

I often catch myself taking lessons, quotes, anecdotes, etc, and drawing analogies to EDs/ED recovery. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing, but I think it's probably a pretty normal thing, considering I'm working on recovery with a treatment team and that topic is running in the background of my mind quite a bit.

Anyway, I read a book this weekend (Bounce, by Matthew Syed) that explored the "innate vs acquired skill" issue, mostly in regards to highly performance-oriented activities, such as sports and music. The author's main argument was that skill actually matters very little, and that top athletes, music "prodigies" and the like are actually most likely the results of two overwhelmingly large factors: 1) hard, progress-oriented practice and 2) external environmental advantages (having access to coaches, being in a supportive family, being born in a country/generation where your race/gender is given enough rights to participate in an activity, etc).

In the book Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell popularized the idea that one needs about 10,000 hours of practice to really achieve professional expertise at an endeavor, although work by Anders Ericsson in the '90s was really the first development of the theory. For example, Tiger Woods is often seen as the ultra golf guru and/or child prodigy, but in reality his father started him off when he could barely walk, and he had racked up thousands and thousands of hours of practice by the time he hit adolescence and the magic 10,000 by his mid-teens. Not to say he had no talent, of course, but if he hadn't worked so incredibly intensely to develop his skills, he wouldn't have been able to perform to such a level as to warrant becoming a sports legend.

One thing that is emphasized, however, is that not just any "practice" counts. If you go out and run the same laps around a track for an hour 10,000 times, you are not really "practicing" in a progress oriented way. You're just repeating a routine (sounds like my life as an overexerciser, actually). What all of the psychologists emphasize is that if you're actually going to improve and build skill, you have to engage in focused practice that tests your limits and pushes you to go beyond your current capacity. It's often painful, and frustrating, and exhausting, but it pays off. One of my favorite quotes from Bounce: "Research across domains shows that it is only by working at what you can't do that you turn into the expert you want to become."

And it goes much deeper than just pushing yourself through the motions, as author/table tennis Olympian Syed points out (emphasis in original): "Sure, clocking up thousands of hours of purposeful practice ultimately determines how far we make it along the path to excellence: but it is only those who care about the destination, whose motivation...is 'internalized,' who are ever going to get there."

All of this seems directly analogous to ED recovery, as I have experienced it at least. It's one thing to go therapy, claim to be in recovery, make certain incremental changes to get you to a point where you're not in acute danger of needing medical hospitalization. Coasting along in sub-clinical complacency is a really common issue for people in recovery, especially since ED sufferers are often highly successful in other areas of their life, making it seem like the status quo with their disease is acceptable.

And yet...actually tackling the core of the ED--and its control over your thoughts and actions--is a whole different ball game. It takes "purposeful practice" that will push you, make you uncomfortable, but also take you beyond what initially seemed possible. It seems like common sense, of course, but making it happen while you're still caught in a disordered quagmire is actually incredibly difficult. And you have to have that 'internalized motivation' to make the changes meaningful enough to stick.

Anyway, as I'm really starting to get serious about the exercise challenges I've set with D., all of this was extremely thought provoking for me. I pride myself in being a hard worker and high achiever in other areas of my life, but when it comes to breaking down ED patterns, I am very prone to just give myself the easy way out, not push myself beyond my comfort zone, and basically roll over and invite the ED to keep kicking my ass. I cut myself slack that I would never tolerate in my professional life.

And I really, really can't keep making excuses for that.

I did a back-of-the envelope calculation, and I'm fairly confident that I've logged over 10,000 hours of exercise since my ED first developed. Of all the things I could be an expert in, being a disordered person was never on my list of goals.

Onwards and upwards, right?

What about you? Have you struggled with complacency or spinning your wheels in recovery? Care to share what finally lit a fire under you to challenge yourself and make progress? I'd love to hear some comments about it.

Era II of Sessions with D. And some bad news.

2012-01-12T08:30:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned last week, I resumed sessions with my dietician (D.) this week. It was nice to catch up with her, and she told me that she always has mixed feelings about seeing clients she likes again--good to see them, but bad that they still need the help. Anyway, even though I like her a lot and she is friendly, she didn't hesitate to jump into ass-kicking mode. Which, of course, is why I went back to her, because although I like T. for a lot of things, she is way too easy on me.

No such problem with D. I think the part of our session that stuck with me the most was this:

D: When do you think this is going to come easy to you? Do you think that if you just carry on complacently, in two weeks, or two months, or two years, you will spontaneously decide that it's okay to cut the exercise, gain weight, and shed the eating disorder? How has that worked for you over the past 12 years? If you keep just waiting around for that to happen, you will be stuck in this lifestyle for the rest of your life. Some things are important to do not in spite of being hard, but because they are hard.

Indeed.

We set some concrete exercise reduction goals, stepwise fashion. Funnysad moment: she suggested an increment to decrease, and I agreed to do that the first week...but then she clarified that she wanted it done the first DAY. My bad...

I chickened out of compliance the first two days, but I actually stepped up and did it yesterday. I chewed all of my fingernails off in the process, but I survived and didn't compensate by cutting food. In reality, I know that it wasn't a very meaningful amount, energy-balance wise. It's amazing how that doesn't really seem to matter, I still get anxious in an OCD way.

I have my first session with T. since before the holidays today, so I guess I'll go over all of this with her. D. also wants me to get labwork done, so some bloodletting is in my near future, joy. I will probably gripe, but I honestly don't think I would make much progress on some things without seeing her regularly again. My mom agreed to help me pay for sessions (she fell all over herself to do it. #baddaughterguilt), so that is taken care of, although I still hate to have to ask.

This morning brought some pretty depressing news: Match didn't get into any of his PhD options that are within. 10 hours of any of the ones I am still considering. Fuck. He literally called me in tears when he found out. We are both very aware that doing this distance thing for another 4-5 years, including periods when I am out of the country for 4-6 months at a time, could be a game-changer...or a game-ender. We are taking it a day at a time, but there is definitely a shadow over things now.

Breaking Down Eating Disorder Stereotypes

2012-01-11T08:04:00.000-08:00

If you haven't yet discovered Arielle's "Wednesday Warrior" videos, then you are missing out. They are all great, but this week's video, challenging common stereotypes about eating disorders, is so important that I just wanted to give it a shout-out. I think it's really useful for both ED sufferers and anyone who knows/is close to someone with an ED.

I personally have dealt with a lot of frustration and shame about struggling with an ED for so long (literally half my life now), partly because of everything that it has taken from my life and partly because the issue can so commonly be seen as a shallow, selfish problem. This latter assumption is not true (it's always so much easier to say that objectively than to apply it to yourself), and I really, really think it's important to broadcast that message.

Philosophy, Addiction, and Recovery

2012-01-10T07:15:00.000-08:00

There are some striking parallels between eating disorders and other addictive behaviors, like alcoholism or drug addiction. Both an eating disorder and an addiction are issues that can start out innocuously, grow into a much bigger problem than you realize in real-time, and makes it hard to acknowledge and/cease behaviors that, somewhere deep down, you know are destructive. Some research has suggested that a family history of these issues may predispose individuals towards developing an ED, and that substance addictions are often comorbid with EDs.

For me personally, the issue of recovery that I continue to struggle with the most, overexercise, certainly feels more like an addiction/OCD issue than anything else.

So although this column in the New York Times focused on alcoholism and drug abuse, I thought that it seemed extremely relevant to ED recovery also. Snippet:

What had perhaps started as fun and harmless use begins to grow troubling, painful and difficult to stop. The alcoholic becomes chained to alcohol in a way different from others who “drink normally.”

In various scenarios of addiction, the addicted person’s fixation on a shadow reality — one that does not conform to the world outside his or her use — is apparent to others. When the personal cost of drinking or drug use becomes noticeable, it can still be written off or excused as merely atypical. Addicts tend to orient their activities around their addictive behavior; they may forego friends and activities where drinking or drug use is not featured. Some may isolate themselves; others may change their circle of friends in order to be with people who drink or use in the same way they do. They engage in faulty yet persuasive alcoholic reasoning, willing to take anything as evidence that they do not have a problem; no amount of reasoning will persuade them otherwise. Each time the addict makes a promise to cut down or stop but does not, the chains get more constricting.

Read the whole thing here; I would love to hear your thoughts on it.

Back for More

2012-01-08T16:43:00.000-08:00

I'm seeing my nutritionist tomorrow, for the first time in 18 months. I was really glad she was so friendly about taking me back, and I'm actually looking forward to talking with her. There is definitely a taste of humility in coming "back for more" after quitting last year (although there were some extenuating circumstances in that; I was temporarily living 5 hours away).

I have learned that nutritional therapy really amounts to what I'm willing to put into it. I have to be honest on food records, to take advice seriously, and actually be willing to put recommendations and plans into action instead of just nodding my way through sessions and then going back to the same old routine when I'm home. I love that this person focuses on the relationship with food and how it affects overall lifestyle and cognitive state rather than just trying to tally exchanges for me, and I need to take advantage of having someone like that available for the last few months that I'm living here.

I'm really nervous about running into my old therapist--they work out of the same practice. I don't think she'll necessarily be uncivil, it's just ultra-awkward. Oh well.

I also can in no way afford to pay for the nutritionist (tomorrow's session will have to go on credit), but I haven't had the courage to ask my parents to help me with it yet. I don't know if courage is the right word. Maybe it's more accurate to say that I'm ashamed to have to ask and haven't swallowed my pride enough to do it. There's no way they will get angry with me for asking for help for this, I just have immense guilt about the amount of money they have sunk into my treatment over the years, just to have me continue to be a freak over 12 years after they first dragged me to a psychologist. I pay for my own sessions with T., because my insurance covers 80% of that, but I don't get any coverage for nutritional therapy.

In other stressors, I have been sunk deep in thought for a few days doing major assessments, analyzing, and over-analyzing about certain aspects of my personal life, and I'm wondering if a dramatic change might be in the immediate future. I just don't know. I wish I did. I wish I just didn't care, but I do.

Despite all that, I have high hopes for this semester, both professionally and personally. I actually have a fairly full social calendar this week, and am hoping that will help distract me from the loop of introspection about other things.

Controlled Experiment in Perception

2012-01-07T16:53:00.000-08:00

I am very much aware that my perception of my own size/shape/general physical being can be significantly skewed. It can vary day to day, and some days at weight X I can feel huge, while other days I'm happy with myself at the exact same weight. I can feel like I look fine, then see a picture of myself from that day and wonder how I even let myself leave the house looking like that. Go figure.

So the issue of how I percieve *other* people's weight has always been fascinating to me, because obviously I never see anything except through the Cammy Lens. It is my impression that my view of other people's bodies isn't nearly as skewed. I can look at a woman with a nice figure and think "damn I wish I had her body" even though I *know* she probably outweighs me by double digits and I would have a heart attack if I reached her weight overnight.

But still, for a time I did have major envy issues when I saw someone that might possibly be thinner than me. I don't think I even processed whether it was attractive or not, it was almost like a challenge to my legitimacy in some sad, twisted way. If I wasn't the thinnest person in the room, then who was I?

Fortunately, those days are passed, I could probably write more about that whole issue but I don't feel like it right now. Being Not the Thinnest Person in the Room doesn't phase me anymore, and I've noticed more and more at the gym that not only have I lost my envy for the emaciated, but I'm starting to see how it truly is way more attractive to be healthy than to be WowSkinny, and it's still sort of a novelty when I realize I have no desire to be a lower weight.

The incident that sparked this post: it turns out that a girl I have met through a local volunteer organization has an identical twin. Now this girl is ultra-fit: she runs half-marathons, is training for a triathalon, and can out-bench press me almost one-handed (we use the same gym). She isn't an obsessive orthorexic gym addicted type of ultrafit person, as far as I can tell after getting to know her over a few months, she just loves to run and workout and seems to nourish herself in the right ways to enable the enjoyment of that.

I saw the girl and her twin together for the first time at the gym today, and it was a fascinating case study in the whole "skinny isn't better" issue. Basically the closest type of "controlled experiment" situation you can get outside a lab beyond just seeing photos of the same person at different weights, I guess. Her twin is significantly thinner than her (they are much shorter than me, so I wouldn't really know how to estimate the actually # of pounds less and probably wouldn't share that even if I did), so superficially you essentially see two different versions of the same person, one at weight X and one at weight Y.

And you know what? Twin #1, at the higher weight, is SO much more attractive. I don't think that Twin #2 is necessarily unhealthy and am not in any way saying she has an ED (I had never met her before today and know nothing about her habits). But to be honest, if I had to choose which one I would want to morph into to maximize my health/hottness/overall appearance ratings, it would definitely be Twin #1 at the higher weight. In my opinion at least. Maybe not everyone would think so. But I'm glad I'm in a place where I do.

The downer part of this story--another girl came over and the first thing out of her mouth was "Wow, your twin is so much smaller than you!" #facepalm

I don't want this to come off shallow and overly appearance focused. I'm NOT saying Twin #2 is absolutely unattractive because she's thinner. Or that even if she were, she would be somewhat less of a person for that. Disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer dontthinkI'mabadperson. I really don't consider myself to be an appearance focused type (my make-up routine takes under 90 seconds....on the days I even do it. I own more pairs of hiking socks than high heeled shoes, and I use the "scrunch and go" method on my hair instead of ever bothering to wrestle with it in the mornings). And I don't actually go around analyzing everyone's size and shape all the time (although I won't deny that I do it sometimes just out of fascination, not to be judgmental. I think it's common for recovering EDers. It's almost like an anthropological interest in Normal People). I think that I'm just finding it interesting, freeing, and just overall significant to notice how my perception of very thin people has shifted from immediate jealousy to actual recognition that having the lowest scale measurement isn't always the most desirable state of being.

More updates soon, things are starting to get exciting around here in several ways. Major news on the PhD front, and I'm re-establishing treatment with my nutritionist on Monday. Also, I did ZERO formal exercise yesterday due to travel, and was surprisingly non-anxiety freakish about it. Could have done better with food, but could (no, WOULD, in the past) have done a lot worse.

Hope everyone is having great weekend, love y'all!

Holiday Roller Coaster

2012-01-03T20:57:00.000-08:00

Hello there, it's been a while. I hope everyone had a great holiday break. I'm way, way behind on reading/commenting blogs, apologies. This is my first day back to "normal routine" in about two weeks, it's been kind of a long haul. I think I did pretty well with food over the break--which involved being at both of Match's parents houses, my family's house, and then back at my house with M. for a week. Eating didn't go ideally all the time, but decently enough to act (mostly) human and not lose weight.

It was sort of a roller coaster of a holiday, honestly. My brother (age 18) was dumped by his girlfriend right before Christmas and was an emotional mess most of the holiday--and has the personality that means that if he's unhappy, he makes sure everyone else is unhappy. My mom is under a lot of school/job stress and had a meltdown on all us "kids" on Christmas Eve, which freaked me out because she is my best friend in the world and the incident resulted in both of us in tears for a big chunk of the evening. And my dad automatically takes her side even when he doesn't understand why she's mad, which is frustrating and sweet at the same time. That was the family stuff. Aside from those things, though, it was a great Christmas. Everyone made up and cheered up, and we had a horde of people over for Christmas dinner and all of that went smoothly.

Match and I got into an awful fight on the phone while we were both on 8 hour drives (from different directions) to meet at his mom's house, which was sort of a low point, with much sobbing and snotting and second guessing. We've both been under enormous stress this semester and I think it really took a toll on "Us". There were some other tense moments, especially when we first got back to my place after Christmas and were sorting ourselves out. It was the first time he's ever really lost his temper with me for stressing about food stuff. That hurt, in part because I was just as frustrated with myself as he was with me.

But we got ourselves sorted out the second day or so and had a strong visit the rest of the week. It turned out to be extremely relaxing. I think when he left this morning it was the hardest either of us have cried on any of these partings. And I think that it was partly anxiety on both of our parts about how well we'll hold it together during the upcoming semester. It's just hard to judge how things are going when you know there are so many external pressures at play. How do you know how to weigh whether you're getting less happy over time if you are inevitably feeling more emotionally intertwined over that time, for better or worse, just as part of being together? Does that make any sense at all? We'll see what happens I suppose, can't do much besides take it a day at a time, right?

Okay, so that was all the stressful stuff. There was definitely a lot to love about the holidays this year, though. I got to be with my family and bond more with Match's, the weather was absofuckinglutely beautiful, and I was successful in being a sufficient degree of non-crazy required to relax with the people that I love. I enjoyed Christmas Eve mass, a family tradition that I really value even though I'm not Catholic (or religious at all) anymore. I was undefeated in the traditional family Scrabble tournament, and Match and I kicked ass as a team at Trivial Pursuit. I found a new way to mess up the Christmas cookies (inevitably happens every year, I am NOT a chef) and we laughed about it and ate them anyway. One night I laid in front of the fireplace talking to my teenage brothers so late into the night that all three of us fell asleep on the living room floor.

And Santa brought me an electric Snuggie. You might judge me, but I, for one, shall not get hypothermia this winter.

I think back to previous holidays, when I was just one big walking stress hormone because of the messed up routines and mandatory family meals and EDness consuming my brain, and I both resent and pity that creature. I never want to be that again.

I think that 2011 was a rough year in places, but a pretty durn good one in others. I'd settle for that in 2012, but am going to try to proactive in making it even better. It will definitely be a significant year, with me finishing my MS, moving to another part of the country, starting a PhD program somewhere, and likely starting research and learning a new language on a continent that I've never been to before. Right now just finding out where that will be is the next milestone in sight.

I hope that everyone, whether you celebrate Christmas or not, had a great holiday break and is starting off 2012 with strength and hope. I think my mantra for this year is going to be that every day you have the chance to make decisions that will affect many, many more days in the future--and that can be for better or worse, so it's important to consciously try to make it for the better.

Happy 2012, love y'all.

Holiday Trip Eve

2011-12-20T20:38:00.000-08:00

I'm heading out of town for the holidays tomorrow. Lots of travel/visit (read: nonroutine) time, but I've been handling that better lately and hope that it will all be okay. Will try to make it so.

I've been having a lot of largely inchoate relationship anxiety this week, and am trying to tell myself it's just because Match and I haven't seen each other in a few weeks and are both stressed about grad school decisions. Sometimes I'm afraid that relationship stress is an easy target for my general anxiety to glom onto, and that it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy if I'm not careful. Going to try to avoid that. He and I will have a pretty long visit over the break, and I really want to try hard not to let anxiety and other stuff ruin it.

I have been working really, really hard at forcing myself to be okay with the fact that I'm finally starting to put back on some of the weight I lost last year. Still only about halfway to restoring all of it, but it's enough of a change that it's taking a lot of conscious rationalization to keep myself from freaking the hell out, especially since I haven't increased my food or decreased my exercise. I think that what's happening, to logic it out, is that this year I'm not going to my field site in the tropics and losing weight 2-3 times a semester, so the gain isn't so much a ton of adding but a lack of that periodic subtracting just as I was starting to gain it back, if that makes sense.

The weight thing is interesting at this stage: 1) seeing the numbers goes up and really challenges my sense of control. I HATE it when people reduce EDs to just being about control issues, because they're infinitely more complex than that, but I can't deny that it's at least a partial issue in my case (whether it's a cause or effect of the ED is up for debate). It's my body and I hate feeling like it's doing anything without my "permission." And yet... 2) I really don't dislike how my body looks and feels right now, at least a good bit of the time (Fat Days still happen, but I guess that's par for the course at this stage). I am noticing effects from the strength training, and I suppose there is some irony in the fact that I had to gain weight to get the best abs of my life, LOL...So I'm faced with admitting that I'm letting numbers freak me out without really paying attention to anything else, which is a recovery no-go.

In positive news, I arranged to start seeing my previous dietician after the holidays. She definitely remembered me and seemed excited to be working with me again, which made me feel a lot better. It will be a blow to my budget, but I really, really need to try to make as much progress as possible before I head off to the next stage of my career later this year. Plus, I felt like at times she was even more helpful than my regular therapist, so it will be nice to have her advice again.

I literally spent hours today combing through my Facebook Timeline...talk about memory lane.
Definitely spurred an overdrive of introspection.

I hope everyone has a great Christmas, and if you don't celebrate Christmas I wish you happy Hanukkah, solstice, New Year's, or just hope you have a good week in general. Love y'all!

Pot of Hot Mess

2011-12-16T12:26:00.000-08:00

So I just got an official offer from what, at this time, is my #1 choice for PhD programs. I am resorting to this forum for extra squee because I have pretty much saturated everyone I know in real life with my obsessing over this stuff.

Of course, I can't just accept it and celebrate, because that would be far too easy and simple. I still haven't visited a few of the others on my list, and will give each place a chance with due diligence. It has taken me about an hour to get from "omg anxiety because this pot of hot mess in my thoughts about grad school decisions has just been stirred" to actual "hey I think I might be happy because this opportunity that I want so badly is actually mine for the taking."

Not sure if I've ever felt this degree of seesaw between anxiety and glee, but it's better than anxiety and crying, so I'll take it for however long it lasts!

'Tis the Season

2011-12-14T16:13:00.000-08:00

Well, it's that season again. And no, I'm not talking about Christmas, Hanukkah, or Solstice. Although the Solstice might actually be involved, since it involves the days becoming shorter and shorter.

I'm talking about S.A.D. season. I was doing really well earlier this fall, but I have felt the shadow of the "winter blues" sliding over me pretty steadily for the past week or two. I am back to the point at which I find myself crying at least twice a day, sometimes for reasons that I don't even understand. Poor G. is really sweet about nuzzling me and sitting against me when I'm upset, but that just makes me feel guilty for not even being stable enough to parent a fucking dog without stressing him out too.

And I know that this isn't the worst of it; I almost invariably bottom out with it around the middle of February. Plenty to look forward to.

This is nothing new, but never easy either. I think I'm just sick of it, because last winter it seems like it took me until the end of May to shake it--at which point it's really not S.A.D. anymore, I suppose, that was just the initial trigger and then even the returning sun and spring weren't enough to chase it away. It just makes me feel kind of suffocated to think of spending 5-6 months of each year like this for the rest of my life.

I'm really trying not to let myself be a victim with it, though. I think one reason it was so bad last year was because I was pretty socially isolated and was not in therapy. So hopefully this year will be better. I'm going to be taking a class in the spring (first time in a over a year and a half!), which should help with the general feeling of purposelessness and loneliness. I took full loads the first year of grad school to get my credits out of the way so I could focus on my research, but I've found that I desperately miss the discussion/socialization aspect of being in class.

I'm also in therapy this year, which should help, I hope.

I am sort of conflicted about therapy right now, actually. I really, really like T., and feel like we connect well. But I don't feel like I'm making any progress, ED-wise, for whatever reason. I'm not saying it's her fault, because nobody is going to be able to achieve changes in my life except for me, but I don't know. Sometimes I feel like she's playing cheerleader when I still need a coach. Or a drill sergeant. But then that makes me feel like I'm shirking responsibility for my own actions. I am glad that I have her to talk to about everything going on in my life, but I still leave her office feeling unfulfilled a lot of the time. If I bring up some place I'm struggling, she will do a lot of reassuring that I can overcome it, without us talking about specific strategies or goals to accomplish that. I don't know, I'm going to stop because I'm afraid this post is getting too whiny.

I think I may contact my old dietician to see if I can take up appointments with her again, because she was very into helping me with the specifics of my exercise stuff, which has been the hardest ED issue for me to shake. The only reason I haven't done it before now is 1) my insurance doesn't cover her and I be broke and 2) she works at the same practice as the therapist I saw my first year here, who was totally not over her own ED and didn't work out for me.

I also need to get a grip on the fact that I started with the strength training with the excuse (and honest intention, I swear) that I would use it as a way to build some muscle and gain weight in a way that wouldn't freak me out. At first I seemed to gain the muscle by just changing my body composition, and not adding weight, but now I have added a bit. Just a bit. But outside what I can attribute to normal flux. All my clothes still fit the same, but I notice it on the scale and am working very hard, with limited success, on keeping up the "not freaking out" part of the bargain. Suck it up (not in), Cammy.

This is pretty much just a mind-dump post, apparently. Apologies to anyone still reading. I'm feeling really demoralized and disempowered by a lot of stuff going on with my adviser right now, which I won't get into here. Match and I had a bicker last night but are doing well overall. This Christmas break will be our longest continuous visit with each other, so that will be interesting.

Anyway, general Eeyore post, I suppose. I hope everyone is surviving finals and general pre-holiday craziness, love y'all.

Randoms on Starving Secrets

2011-12-07T08:23:00.000-08:00

So I sort of just want to write a post so that the last unhappy one isn't on top anymore. Last weekend was pretty bad, but things have been a lot calmer and more peaceful since then. I just wish I understood my moods sometimes. I weigh the exact same this morning--to the ounce--that I did on Sunday, and yet my body anxiety is an order of magnitude lower. Yeah dunno.

As one ever-astute commenter asked, which came first, the fighting with Match or the unhappy body image? I don't honestly know, sometimes it's a snowball type phenomenon and it feels like a chicken vs egg situation (wow, how many other cliches can I fit into one sentence?). I think sometimes more than one type of stress can just hit at once and it the resulting emotions are exponential rather than additive. And yes, I'm a nerd, hopefully you knew that already.

One variable I could tentatively pick out regarding the god-awful body day, with no assurance that was actually causal, is watching 'Starving Secrets,' the new Tracey Gold series that is basically Intervention for EDs (even though Intervention does ED cases periodically also). So I guess it's ED Intervention for the Lifetime Channel with an Ex-Child Star Host.

Objectively, I think that it has a lot fewer triggerpoints than many other things I have seen/read, but "triggering" is such an overwhelmingly subjective descriptor that it is rarely the same for any two people, or for the same person on any two occasions. I think the trigger factor often has a lot (not all) to do with what's going on inside someone's head rather than what they're seeing on the screen or page. I think that it was just a bad weekend for me to watch the show.

I know there has been a lot of press and controversy over this show. I think, as most people have opined, that there are some things that are done well and some that aren't.

I hated that they revealed any numbers. Yes the woman was skinny as fuck, we can tell that without you giving it to us quantitatively.

One review that I read (sorry I can't remember which one, speak up for credit if you wrote it!) pointed out that they gave the weight of the woman with anorexia and not the young woman with bulimia. I'm not sure if it was a permission issue from the women themselves, or if they simply didn't think the weight of the person with bulimia was shocking enough.

You see what I did there? A woman with anorexia. It bugged me that they were simply labeled "anorexic" and "bulimic" under their names like a title. The behaviors are anorexic and bulimic. The women are people with a disease.

I was VERY glad that they didn't do any exploitative body shots. I have seen some episodes of Intervention that included scenes with an ED sufferer in a state of revealing undress that almost certainly had to be staged for the purpose of parading her clavicles and ribs around. Newsflash: at those low weights most people live in a state of bundling limited only by the necessity to bend one's arms. If bones turn you on then go look at an anatomy textbook, and get some therapy on your way.

I have to admit that I had an incessant fascination with Tracey Gold when I was a teenager. I had been a huge fan of Growing Pains in middle school, and it wasn't until later that I found out she had had an ED--and by that time, when I was dealing with one myself, it made me feel some kind of ill-defined but powerful connection to her story. I think I watched her E! True Hollywood Story episode every weekend for a few years of high school.

So I am not a TG hater. But I hated the way they handled her involvement in the show. She does voiceovers, visits to the patients, and then little feature spots where she's just sitting there talking. The thing is, she does the "sitting there talking on camera" parts EXACTLY as if she is doing a voice-over, and is obviously reading from a prompter. The irritation of this might not be clear unless you've seen someone doing this. Voice overs are often kind of halting, dramatic, emphatic, whatever, because you don't have the person's face and body language to go by. But doing the same narration style when we can see you just doesn't work. Especially when you're an actress and we know you know how to handle a camera. Sorry TG.

I liked that they actually showed some of the treatment process. On Intervention, you invariably see the person dropped off at the treatment center and meeting the staff, and then it's suddenly 2-6 months later and you either see them being discharged successfully or you get a screen-text update about how they flunked out of rehab. The most important part of the entire process--the healing and dealing--is completely glossed over. I don't want video of every part of every therapy session, but I am glad that at least a good bit of time was given to showing just how complex it is to give up a lifestyle that you've been married to for years.

One point that I've tried to hold onto as the take-home message from that first episode came from the last interview with the woman in recovery from anorexia, where she has (SPOILER ALERT) finished her residential treatment and looks amazingly more healthy and happy. TG asks her how she feels about her weight, and she says that she's not always happy with her body at that stage, but that it is more than a fair trade-off considering the fact that she essentially just won her life back and is able to enjoy friends, family, and being her true self for the first time in many years. Damn skippy, and a message that I'm really going to try to reassure myself with on future bad body days.

So those are my extremely random thoughts about the show. If any of you watched it, what did y'all think? I don't want to imply that I'm saying anyone should or shouldn't watch it, btw, as with anything like this, Handle with Care if you are still struggling at all.

A Weekend I Could Have Done Without

2011-12-04T20:35:00.000-08:00

Well I was on a roll with having a long stretch of good days and successes, and for some reason this weekend has been awful. Today was one of the worst body image days I've had in forever, Match and I bickered on and off, and it culminated in a combo showdown/meltdown this evening that involved me literally crying until I threw up. Glamorous, right?*

I know for a fact my weight wasn't higher today than it was yesterday, lower actually ( but well within the normal flux zone, promise); I wish I knew what exactly precipitates a Fat Day sometimes.

I don't think "feeling fat" was the main issue upsetting me, though. I think it was more of being totally frustrated, scared, sad, and angry that I still let the ED permeate my thoughts so much. Gth away from me, damn disorder...

Oh and one of my cousins had a random stroke today and the right side of his body is paralyzed. Having that happen to someone so young is scary as shit. Wish the world could just pretend this entire weekend hadn't happened.

Anyone else ever marvel at how it is both great and disturbing that one can come across as pretty normal and cheerful in some forms of social media (thinking Facebook mostly) even when they're actually having a shitty time of it? I think I tend to do most of my real venting on Twitter, where I'm pseudonymous (although a lot of the people I interact with on Twitter actually do know who I am), rather than on Facebook where my entire family, high school class, a bunch of professors and colleagues and students, etc etc, would be exposed to my real moods. It seems to me that one of the biggest problems with people doing more and more socializing via the web is that it's so easy to skirt around your actual state of mind.

Anyway, just glad today is over, sincerely going to try to start the week off better tomorrow. The only way out is through, right?

*Trust me that it was an involuntary result of emotional physiology, NOT a purge. I've never in the 13 year history of my ED purged food intentionally, throwing up actually kind of scares me.

Steve Jobs and Disordered Eating

2011-12-01T08:42:00.000-08:00

I'm listening to the Steve Jobs biography on my iPod (appropriate coincidence, I know) right now, and to be completely honest it is largely boring me stiff. The majority of it actually functions as a biography of Apple and every product they've ever produced. I'm a Mac user and fan, don't get me wrong, but Isaacson seems not to have left out any detail of every bureaucratic machination that went into the development of every single product of Apple and Pixar since the early 1980's. Blah.

But since I have a pathological aversion to not finishing any book that I've started, I am through 20 of the 24 hours of the thing so far. And I'm sure that now that you're through two paragraphs of this post, you are wondering why the hell I am talking about this here.

One thing that is strikingly obvious to me is that Steve Jobs had serious Eating Issues that started as a teenager and lasted until the end of his life--which may have occurred earlier than necessary as an indirect result of his diet. There are frequent mentions of his "crazy diets" and "binging and purging" and "routine fasts", but the fact that these could result from an actual eating disorder instead of just his inherent eccentricity is never addressed.

I'm neither a psychologist nor a physician, so maybe I'm overstepping myself here. I won't claim to be able to diagnose someone from reading a book written about (and not even by) them. Disclaimer complete.

Since his death, there has been some press coverage about how Jobs delayed surgery to remove his cancerous pancreas, instead spending 9 months trying out "alternative therapies." And so he's painted as just another crunchy Californian, playing hippie. The linked article opens with the question, "Was Steve Jobs a smart guy who made a stupid decision when it came to his health?" But in reality he had been an extremely ascetic and extreme eater ever since he was a teenager, and the real issue appears to be not that he was implementing weird diets to treat the cancer, but that he was just refusing to give up long-ingrained patterns.

If you read some of the details in this book (which is pretty honest, neither specifically vilifying nor lionizing him), it's clear that a big handicap in his cancer fight was his absolutely inflexibility about food and eating. He directly disregarded the advice from doctors about special nutrition measures to take after having part of his pancreas removed--which can affect how your body processes protein, in addition to affecting other aspects of digestion. Some of the people interviewed for the book remember his wife cooking him elaborate meals and giving up her own veganism to encourage him to eat the variety of foods he needed to recover and maintain his health, while he just sat at the table with his wife and kids, not eating anything at all rather than break his personal dietary "rules."

(By the way, it's well-known that chemo and other cancer treatments can cause loss of appetite, but from the chronology and episodes related by friends and family that are featured in the book, it appears that when he finally did start chemo, it just exacerbated an ongoing problem with his unwillingness to eat).

Pancreatic cancer is serious (although he had one of the less acute forms), and I'm not at all claiming that he would have survived it if he'd just eaten a damn steak or trying to accuse him of anything. I can't say for sure if he was bulimic or anorexic or orthorexic or anything else, but watching the pattern of his seemingly unshakeable behaviors--which eventually did telescope into a life-threatening situation-- whatever you define them as, is interesting to contemplate.

---> The point I'm trying to make is that it's fascinating to me that what seems to have highly possibly been such a blatant eating disorder was never addressed as such. Instead his asceticism is painted--almost admiringly--as a result of his uber-Type-A personality. I can't help but wonder how it would have been recognized/discussed/spun differently if he were a woman. Or an athlete. Or if he weren't so rich and easily passed off as indulging in eccentric, overprivileged fads. Or if he had lived long enough for the long-term effects of eating only apples or carrots for weeks at a time to become apparently on an otherwise cared-for body. We'll never know, and I'm just musing now.

Anyway, just something I have been thinking about, thought just bring it up. I think it hits home for me because I have made so many "stupid decisions" regarding my own health in relation to my ED, and it's really thought-provoking to try to imagine what would happen if I had to have a major surgery for a major disease that would majorly overhaul all of the routines and rules I still cling to. Even at the depths of my ED, to be honest, my diet wasn't as extreme as what Steve Jobs seems to have subjected himself to for years, and I'm not even a vegetarian now. So honestly think I'd do whatever it took. But the very fact that I'd have to even wonder about that sort of twinges my conscience.

By the age of 21 I had pretty much destroyed my knees and had to give up running for life, after never taking a day off for years despite stress fractures and other problems. It didn't make any more sense at the time than it does in retrospect, but I did it nevertheless. Maybe that was what it was like for Jobs, who knows.

Lucky 7

2011-11-29T16:16:00.000-08:00

Hey there, I hope everyone had a great holiday! I was looking forward to it, and was not disappointed. It was the most time Match has spent with my family (I've spent a lot more time around his), and everyone got along great. He and my oldest younger brother especially hit it off, which was nice. The weather was beautiful, which means we got to play football and go for hikes, which was awesome.

I know Thanksgiving is officially past, but since this whole holiday season (yes NOW it is legitimate to have Christmas decorations and music and food! It annoyed me back in October, though) is about appreciating people and life etc, I have a random "lucky 7" list of things that the holiday reminded me to be grateful for:

1) My boyfriend's family, who treat me as one of their own, except possibly even more special. They have always just had boys (Match is one of three brothers, one of which doesn't seem to date and the other of which has an Evil girlfriend no one can stand), and so they are pretty thrilled at the novelty of having girl around. Thus, I get indulged at every opportunity. For example, M.'s dad made a big deal about winterizing my car for me, installing some new gadgets, treating the windshield and tires, etc etc. He also cranked his thermostat up about 8 degrees for the days that I was there because he knows I get cold, and he stocked his fridge FULL of fresh fruit (as a single man he almost never buys produce for himself) because he knows I like it. As if M. didn't spoil me enough all by himself...

2) My family, for being smart and fun and friendly and affectionate and awesome in general.

3) This wonderful region that I live in, which is extremely beautiful in the fall.

4) One word: Zinfandel.

5) My dog, who is incredibly well-behaved and the best personality fit that I ever could have found for myself. His age is starting to show more and more, and I find myself contemplating his mortality more often these days.

6) I promise that I will never TMI y'all with details about my sex life, but indulge me some Girl Talk for a second, because I think there is something about recovery (for adults) that is not discussed enough: the fact that being physically healthy enough to have a libido again is not the same as being mentally "together" enough to really appreciate your body as something that is sexy and attractive and strong and just plain fun sometimes. I think it's easy to not even realize/remember what you're missing from intimacy until you get to that point...honestly, is there any bigger of a mood killer than stressing about whether a certain position makes your belly pooch? Or anything more rewarding than realizing you've just spent an entire evening having fun and being admired and pleased and not giving a shit about any of the other stuff? Anyway, I guess that's the main thing I wanted to say about that. Now that I've used the word "sex" and "libido" in a post, my search string stats should get a lot more interesting this week.

7) My first thesis draft is turned in, my qualifying exams are done, my PhD applications are all submitted...I be wrapping this up, yo. Just 6 months left in this town (which I hate) and at this school (which I HATE) until I get a couple more letters behind my name and move on to the next era of my life. I can't wait.

I won't say I was entirely relaxed about food the entire holiday, but I think I handled that part well all things considered. Especially since on holidays my family tends to eat the main meal as sort of a lunch and dinner combined in the mid-afternoon, which always throws me off. One thing Match does that helps me a ton is that if I let him know I'm hungry and need to eat, he will get a snack too because he knows I can't stand to be the only one eating. One small but significant new victory for me is actually telling him when I'm hungry between meals, instead of either sucking it up til the next meal or finding a way to escape by myself for a few minutes to eat a granola bar without anyone seeing.

Thankful for Thanksgiving

2011-11-21T11:52:00.000-08:00

Hey! I am in such a ridiculously good mood today, and it has had me thinking about some things.

A few years ago, I think I would have never believed it if you told me that I'd be looking so forward to a week-long trip (read: removal from all of my routines and rituals and general comfort zone and empty-air foods) for a holiday revolving around food. But here it be, in 2011, I can't wait for Thanksgiving.

And not because of the food, which I haven't even really thought about. I know there will be something there I can eat, and so that's fine. And that's that, I guess. And I think it took me til today to register how little I had registered the food part, which feels HUGELY satisfying to me, because it used to be that I would stress over every bite I consumed for the week leading up to the holiday to "save up" for the family meal (and then usually end up restricting on the holiday anyway). This year, it just doesn't seem like a big deal, and the only thing I plan to micromanage is to make sure that we have varieties of red wine on hand that don't remind me of taking communion as kid.

Obviously I'm not looking forward to going so many days without my normal exercise routines. I won't pretend it will be an issue-free week. But ever since M. and I have been long-distance, I've gotten better and better at coping with that on visits, and he has learned ways to make it easier for me too. Again, in previous years I would have added to my daily routines days before and after the holiday to compensate, and now there is none of that.

I am SO looking forward to time with my family and my Boy, and on being more a part of his family too (we're seeing both my parents and his over the course of a few days). I have been pretty much giddy knowing that I get to fall asleep in his arms tomorrow night. Okay I will spare you further mushy stuff, sorry.

When I rewind my tape of Thanksivings Past, there were so many in middle and high school where I was nothing but a bundle of anxiety, so drained and depleted and anxious that the holiday felt like a rite of torture more than anything else. Then in college I just plain never came home for it ("free at last!"), spending the holiday studying and weighing my grapes and logging treadmill miles instead of with the people I loved. So, this year, my "I am thankful for" item has got to be: I am thankful for Thanksgiving and for having the chance to make up for all the years that I wasted it in the past.

Anyway, I'm in supergreat mood right now and just felt like sharing, since I'm trying more and more to avoid using this blog disproportionately for negative venting.

Random: My youngest brother called me while I was in the middle of writing this post, just to chat and ask some advice about college. I fucking love being a big sister, especially since my brothers are actually very awesome young men.

Random: I'm sort of a sucker for "limited edition" holiday foods, which is why it was impossible for me to leave Target today without mint M&Ms, pumpkin spice waffles, and Christmas tree shaped Reese's cups (which, if you've been reading for any amount of time, you will be aware are my long time bestfavoriteeveninthedepthsofEDsnack).

Random: I have been ghetto in driving my car around with the bumper dented in even though I've already gotten the appraisal and check to pay for the damages--but I had to have *my* vehicle to transport G. home for Thanksgiving, so it will have to wait. It's really not that bad looking, though, and nothing is at risk of falling off.

Random: I've checked off another milestone towards getting my Master's degree, and it is SO nice to feel like I'm making it farther towards the light at the end of that tunnel so I can gth out of this town and on to a school that's a better fit.

Random: I am totally obsessed with this song right now:

Random: Love y'all, happy thanksgiving, safe travels, good times, you are all something to be thankful for. <3

Positive Snowballs

2011-11-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

It's been a while (again). I was traveling (again). And busy with grad studenting (always). But here I be, for better or worse...

So the trip last week was interesting. In some ways I did poorly with food--I was at a relatively high elevation, which always seems to absolutely evaporate any hunger or appetite cues. One of my most severe relapses ever came when I spent a summer in a high elevation city, because I just never felt the need to eat and was ~~accidentally~~ apathetically blasé about taking care of myself.

BUT there was some success on this latest trip--on more than one occasion I handled eating events much more "normally" than I would have been able to even a short while ago. I ate at dish at a restaurant that was very hard to estimate calories for, had dinner very late one night (what equated to past midnight for my body clock if you take jet lag into account), and when I was struck with a case of ravenous-itis after getting back, I tried to honor those cues, and loosened my rules on meal times and such as a result. And felt surprisingly comfortable and low-anxiety with ALL of that. Kinda blows my mind?

I don't want to shirk responsibility on the appetite and intake issue, btw, but I did want to mention that the friend I was visiting offhandedly mentioned she has lost a significant amount of weight since living there, because she's just never hungry, and the guy behind us in line at Starbucks overheard and spoke up to say that he'd had the same experience. So my point here is that I think that my body's response to the environment was fairly normal, although I acknowledge that I am conscious (and overconscious) enough about my food intake that I should have been more on top of it.

Still, I felt really happy that I was able to function like a pretty normal person in the group eating sessions. The eating issue I struggled with the most the entire weekend was my lack of skill with chopsticks...

yes, I still have to eat sushi with a fork if I don't want to make a fool of myself. And asking for a fork for sushi involves making a fool out of myself anyway. Sigh.

But overall I felt like I handled things pretty well. And I was a little easier on my body for a couple days after I was back, because I knew it was a bit depleted after being sick for a week and then being fairly deprived for a couple of days. I guess I know I didn't handle things perfectly but I know I handled them way better than I would have in recent memory.

I'm not sure if you readers have picked up on this, but I'm feeling like more and more often I am coming away from challenges feeling a sense of success or at least progress--and it feels like it's getting easier and easier. I have used the "snowball effect" metaphor at times to describe relapse, where small habits and rules and obsessions add up over time and build on one another to result in a rapid descent into the depths of EDdom. But I think I'm learning that the snowball can move the other direction to--it seems like breaking little barriers here and there, in a positive direction, really is making the whole thing more and more manageable and rewarding over time.

Cue Blind

2011-11-08T12:24:00.000-08:00

Text exchange from this morning:

Cammy: I have no idea if my stomach hurts because it is sick or because I am insanely hungry.
Match: That is a problem, love...

Indeed. Glad his two psychology degrees are serving us well here...*

It is a problem. I've had this stupid stomach virus since Saturday, and it is really, really frustrating me. I've been really good about getting my calories in, but it seems like instead of being rewarded for that I've been punished. I could really use a little bit of this both to and from my body:

I think the main issue is that my hunger cues are whacked out even in the best of circumstances, so when my body is also a bit (or a lot more than a bit, as it has been the past few days) off I have no fucking clue how to read it. Does it hurt because it is hungry and needs a big meal after being sick for a few days? WHOOPS no wrong move, it hurts because it was still sick and now I've done gone and pumped the wrong kinds of food into it. Or later when it's quiescent but uncomfortable, I don't know if it needs fed or if that will make it worse again. I may as well be trying to read instructions with a blindfold on. Commence the agony here.

And here I will also cease the whining. Sorry y'all.

*that is a JOKE, and probably a bad one that I may delete. I am super-careful about never treating M. as my personal therapist or making him feel like it's his job to help. He encourages me to let him know when I'm having a hard time, with the understanding that I neither need nor want him to fix it for me.

Blogging and Weight

2011-11-06T03:41:00.000-08:00

So I lately I have barely been doing two posts a week, and here I am posting two in one day. I really hope the swamping effect doesn't discourage people from reading. But I got a very, very important question on Formspring that I wanted to address right away, because it's an issue I've spent a lot of time worrying about:

Do you ever think your blog can be triggering? You mention your low weight a lot. While you don't mention numbers, you do mention how you're thin, too thin, etc. What if you didn't mention that?

The short answer is Yes. I am often conscious of whether I can say X or Y without it being seen as triggering or striking someone in an unhealthy way. I actually deleted a fairly long paragraph from the last post because I decided I didn't want to chance it. I absolutely don't use numbers, and I wouldn't post photos even if I weren't pseudonymous.

What if I never mentioned my weight at all? To be honest, I never thought that alluding to the fact that I'm not fully weight restored was very big news. I figure it is not surprising that a person in recovery from a serious eating disorder is probably at least a bit under the average for weight. I often see other people mention that their treatment team wants them to put on a last set of pounds, and have always thought it was just part of the process that is taken for granted. From what I've observed/experienced, it seems like that last few pounds to a mandated "goal weight" is a pretty long hard slog sometimes, because you look relatively normal and feel way better than you did before weight restoration, so it's hard to push yourself the last leg. I was a little worried that the person that asked this question (and THANK YOU for asking the question because if it's a concern I want to know about it) mentioned that I mention being a low weight "a lot." I scrolled through my posts from the last month and didn't see mention of it, but I know I have mentioned it occasionally and will be extra-conscious of it in the future.

If I were writing this blog claiming to be fully recovered, now, I think that would be different and it would indeed be inappropriate to say that yes I'm under X BMI and it's all cool. But I think I've been pretty open about the fact that I'm a work in progress, and I know it's not all cool--but that I've made worlds of progress from when I was very sick and am on the ascent at this point.

And the truth is, I'm not extremely thin. I hope I have not made it seem as if the situation were currently otherwise. This is going by my own perceptions of course, but I am pretty sure that if you saw me on the street or scrolled through photos on Facebook (not that I would EVER post ultrathin photos there), your first thought would not be "I bet she has an eating disorder." I'm not always the skinniest person in the room, can't wear half the jeans in my closet, and actually have a real butt and boobs now (woot!), modest as they may be. (Not that I think any of those factors mean that a person is not thin/slender at all, I just meant not gaunt or abnormal thin. Walking on eggshells a bit here, really don't want to be triggering!). Like I mentioned in my last post, I think most of my remaining progress in recovery needs to be cognitive/behavioral, even though I do actually want to work up to adding the final batch of pounds, even though I probably look/feel healthy as I am now.

And the other truth is, I don't think it's desirable at all to be very thin. I didn't really think that even when I was at much lower points in my ED. It was more of a compulsion than anything else, and I didn't necessarily think it was attractive. It was just a process of progressive entrenchment more than anything else.

I have always really, really tried to make this blog an honest but non-triggering and absolutely non-competitive forum to air concerns, challenges, woes and successes, both to reach out for a bit of support for myself and to reach out to let people know that they're not alone in what they're going through. But at the same time, the issue of being triggering is very worrisome to me, because I know you can never predict what will be triggering for everyone. If someone ever sees something in a post that they think was in poor taste to mention, PLEASE leave a comment and tell me. I moderate comments, so if you want to just send me the question without it being posted publicly, just mention that and I won't publish it but will heed your feedback.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (and the Consolation)

2011-11-06T03:15:00.000-08:00

Written last night, and then I couldn't publish it because the internet went down:

Well hello there. This weekend has been sort of a mixed bag so far.

Good: I had my big qualifying exam on Friday, and it was challenging but I got great feedback from my committee and they passed me, which is Mega Good news as it would screw over my degree plan if they didn't. The exam is basically sitting in a conference room with 4 professors asking me questions about whatever they feel like for 3 hours. Some of the questions are just designed to be curveballs and to get you to show your critical thinking skills rather than to know the answer off the top of your head. There was one that I talked through for about 20 minutes before conceding I didn't know the answer, and the professor just said "Yeah no one really knows why X is like that." Doh. I came away feeling good about the experience, though.

Bad: I had a fender bender on my way out to celebrate with friends that evening. I actually surprised myself with how calm I stayed, but 1) my car was not at all disabled and 2) there was no way I could be faulted with accident, as I was stopped at a red light when the person hit me. It was mainly inconvenient in that it took up an hour of my evening to get the police out there and do the report, and that at some point I'll have to relinquish my car to the shop to repair the bumper.

Ugly: Stomach virus. I felt a little nauseous for most of the day, ate normally anyway (good Cammy), and then by this evening I was certifiably sicker than I've been since the last time I was in the tropics. Lovely.

Consolation: I had a super hectic day yesterday, with two meetings in addition to my exam, having a traffic collision, making an appearance at a grad student gathering and going out to dinner with my lab later on. I had no meals that were 'in routine', and didn't get my full exercise in. And yet I did not restrict and was pretty calm throughout everything. I can definitely see myself making some progress, and I have to say it feels pretty empowering.

If I could put one message out there about EDs, it would be to make people see that there is not always a linear relationship between external and internal progress with recovery. You can put all your weight back on but still be an obsessive anxiety monster with rigid and disordered routines. For me, the cognitive work (loosening routines, still calculating everything, general anxiety and fear of more weight gain, EXERCISE, etc) has been way harder. For me, the behavioral/mind aspects have been way more of an issue than physical infirmity/discomfort for the past couple of years.

My therapist from college (who I non-hyperbolically credit with pretty much saving my life) dropped me an e-mail the other day just checking to see how I was doing, which was a huge booster for me. I like the new person, but still really miss H.

Okay that's the state of things at the moment, hope everyone is having a good weekend.

Hi there

2011-11-03T08:27:00.000-07:00

I promise that I have not died, I've just been studying like a mofo for my oral qualifying exams tomorrow. Been a little frustrated with myself for my lack of focus/efficiency, but this probably was NOT the wisest week to choose to detox from caffeine.

Anyway, therapy this afternoon and updates to come soon. As a consolation for being a crappy blogger, here's something cute to look at:

(Source)

And yes, if you actually click the link you will find that it is a very depressing site to have such a cute picture, but I suppose a healthy dose of irony never hurt anyone.

Success is Sweet

2011-10-23T13:55:00.000-07:00

I have done so fucking fantastic with food and everything else this weekend. It gives me hope that it may indeed be possible for the future to be more livable and lovable than the past 12+ years.

My mom was visiting, and we had a lot of fun, I didn't stress over exercise (granted, this is mostly because we did a lot of active things), and I was both spontaneous and a bit adventurous with food. I don't really want to give details, for the sake of anonymity, but I wish I could because it just felt so incredibly good. I wasn't perfectly free and unworried with everything, but did really damn well, all things considered. Example: they didn't have something we ordered at lunch yesterday, so they tossed in cookies for free....and I ATE one. White chocolate macadamia nut thank you very much. And not a little one. Unplanned and uncompensated for. Stop the presses--I honestly can't tell you when something like that last happened.

One over-riding source of guilt for me is that I have been a much, much less fun daughter than I would have liked to be. I have an incredibly fun, cool, and all around awesome mom. I can't count the number of visits, holidays, outings, etc where we had opportunities for great Girl Bonding Time that were ruined because I was too anxious, nervous, depleted, exhausted, or some combination of all of those and more. Being at a point where I can loosen up, eat a free cookie, have a filling meal in a restaurant and come home to have wine and watch a movie, AND be present, pleasant, and engaged the whole time...something I never thought I could do but is so worth it. Like I mentioned in my post about the last Match visit, it's not the food that makes it worth it, but just feeling and functioning like a normal person and not always being on the edge of a panic attack when I just want to enjoy the people I love.

I hope everyone else has had a good weekend, love y'all. And for those of you that have sent me messages on Facebook this weekend, I'll reply to you all of course but just fyi you girls are the BEST and inspire me daily.

Ask Me!

2011-10-20T10:14:00.000-07:00

I feel like I've sort of let this blog slide a bit, with too much venting/whining and not enough thematic discussion. I'm a bit buried with school/work right now but really want to try to keep 4B going strong. As such, I really appreciate reader feedback, questions, and topic ideas. I want to remind everyone that I'm on Formspring (haven't used it in FOREVER but it's still there) and want to get more active again with that. So if you have any questions you want to see answered in a future post, hit me up! (Click here for my Formspring profile).

Had a PhD interview this week; it was a good option but one that I think I can safely rule out as being "not for me" without too much mental turmoil. If only I could be so sure about some of my other options. This one had some definite pluses, but the project just doesn't excite me and I have enough other options on the table that I don't think I really need it as a backup. Always good to get interview experience, though.

I had also planned a workout when I got home (about 10 pm), but I had not eaten well and was EXHAUSTED from an early morning and a lot of driving, so I skipped it. Unheard of, right? And haven't compensated by cutting any food the next day. Probably seems small to some people but for me skipping a planned workout on a day my exercise had already been reduced is HUGE.

Therapy this afternoon. I appreciate the fact that T. lets me talk about whatever's on my mind, but I feel like I'm really not making any progress with exercise overall (last night's victory aside; wouldn't have been able to do that if my food hadn't been drastically down that day) and little if any with food, so I think I'm going to tell her today that I need our sessions to start focusing on that a little bit more.

I hope everyone has had a great week, looking forward to any questions I get via Formspring, love y'all.

Communication Conundrum

2011-10-16T12:04:00.000-07:00

Why is is that sometimes when we need to talk the most, we're the least able to figure out how to do it?

I've really had a hard time the past few days. I'm conflicted about what I want for my future on several fronts. Career direction, goals, decisions, etc. And I'm having Relationship Issues right now and don't really know what to feel about it. Nothing awful or dramatic, no fights, just . . . I don't know. "It's complicated."

Par for the course when I'm stressed, my appetite has shriveled up and died and my nervous energy has shot through the roof. I've been around the block enough times to recognize that's what's happening and stay on top of things anyway. Sometimes I really think that being so schedule- and routine-obsessed is a blessing in disguise, because that rigidity keeps me from going off the rails when my body/mind are in a rough patch.

It's been such a beautiful weekend, sometimes I wish I could just bottle the feeling of sun on my skin and spray it on whenever I needed comfort.

Observational Miscellany

2011-10-12T07:57:00.000-07:00

Randoms:

-Apparently CVS, Target, and other stores are trying to dress up as Christmas for Halloween. Premature holiday hype ruins the specialness of the season!

-I am amused by the fact that nearly ZERO of the news coverage of the iPhone 4S has mentioned price, beyond the fact that the 3 and 4 versions have been discounted. It seems like Apple has passed the threshold of being a consumer decision and is just considered an assumed necessity. And yes I want a 4S BADLY.

-In case you didn't know, Breaking Bad is on Netflix streaming now. It's one of the few shows I actually have the urge to watch all over again from the beginning.

-I've had this sudden crazy idea about a way to expand my career horizons a bit, and am currently obsessed by exploring the options...it would involve doing another degree in parallel with my PhD in science, but I bet that if I could get enough tuition money and caffeine from somewhere I could pull it off...we'll see.

-Just made an appointment to go skydiving for my upcoming 25th birthday. Not sure if I've mentioned this but I am a TOTAL adrenaline junkie (I have been known to ride vicious roller coasters 3-4 times in a row) and I'm super excited.

-I am glad Chris Christie is off of the GOP nomination radar now just because I was sick to death of hearing all the fat jokes being batted around. I wouldn't be surprised if he shows up as VP on the ticket in the general election, but I hope at that point people will be more focused on actual substance versus surface. Pipe dream, I know.

-My adviser is beyond useless this semester, to the point that he jokes about it but doesn't really seem to do anything to reverse the trend. Just 8 months til I blow out of this place.

-Applying to grad school is EXPENSIVE, yo. At $23 per GRE score report, about $10 per transcript (I have to request those from 4 different schools), and a $60-120 application fee for each institution, I feel like I need student loans just to get in.

-I always seem to have a sort of self-confidence afterglow following a visit with M., and have been feeling really good this week.

-The week is halfway over! Happy Wednesday. Love y'all.

A Weekend in Two Acts

2011-10-10T21:07:00.000-07:00

Well I started a post over the weekend and didn't have time to finish/post it, so you get a time series here.

Written on Saturday afternoon:

I'm at Match's right now (actually sitting in his office, where he's trying to blast through grading the avalanche of tests his adviser dumped into his lap at the last minute on Friday), and the visit is going well, although we're getting less time together than on a usual trip, partly because of his work and partly because I flew in on a Thursday instead of a Wednesday.

To be completely honest, his workload has benefited us to some degree because it means I can go get some exercise in at the campus rec center and come back de-anxiefied without feeling guilty for ditching him for the gym.

That also means that eating has been easier, although not completely as easy as I'd like, which frustrates me. For example, I got a pretty lengthy workout in yesterday and so *should* have been able to have a very normal lunch out, but when it came to ordering I just got overwhelmed and defaulted to the fucking grilled chicken salad, which I loathe but nearly inevitably turn to anyway. Stockholm syndrome, I suppose. Going to try harder to branch out tonight and tomorrow.

....cut to today:
Well I flew home this morning. Back to real life. :( I had a great weekend with Match. It was probably the best I've done with my eating on any trip with him, although I have to admit that's almost entirely due to the gym time I got in while he was working. He felt awful about having to spend some time in the office every morning, but in all honesty I was really glad for the chance to get my workout anxiety out so I could just focus on enjoying him for the rest of the day. Having that leeway also gave me a taste (no pun intended) of how nice it is to just feel normal sometimes. To let my boyfriend treat me to a Frappuccino on a sunny afternoon (run, do not walk, to get a Salted Caramel Mocha Frappuccino, most perfect Starbucks drink EVER in my humble opinion), take a picnic to the zoo, have a movie night that involves pizza and getting tipsy on too much wine. I know everything is not about food, and honestly for me the meaningful thing is just enjoying my best friend, but not being so painfully uptight about everything that goes into my mouth is just such.a.fucking.relief.

If I could just get to the point where I didn't have to slave at the gym for part of the day to reach that state. Oh well. I do think I'm handling it better and better each go-round.

In other news, we tried to start watching Boardwalk Empire, because it's gotten so much good hype. I actually got terrible nightmares from it, though, because there are so many domestic violence scenes with screaming kids in the background, and basically most of my earliest memories are of being that screaming kid. Probably won't be watching any more of it.

Oh and I managed to slightly mangle my finger in a kitchen mishap. Oops. Apples are not designed to be cut with steak knives, especially if your hands are slippery! I don't if I'd ever seen true terror until I saw Match's face when he walked in and saw me bleeding all over his kitchen. Oops.

So I guess that's the trip recap. Despite the nightmares and finger casualties, it was a great weekend, LOL. All joking aside, I had a great time. It was a shorter visit for us than usual and we have a longer than usual gap before our next one (over 40 days; I swear we do the equivalent of Lent like 5 times a year). That makes me kind of nervous, but I'm sure it'll be fine...I was really worried about the Us issue last week, and I think the visit assuaged a lot of that, fortunately.

Realities Setting In

2011-10-04T09:06:00.000-07:00

When I last left you, I was getting ready to fly out for a PhD interview/tour. I was a bit nervous, but I ended up LOVING the place, being very impressed with the facilities and opportunities involved in the position, and getting along really well with all of the lab members. All in all, I think that that one is probably my #1 pick at the moment, although decision time is a long way off and I have several other interviews/visits scheduled.

One of the realities of that choice is that it is the one on my list that is the most geographically distant from all of Match's options, meaning we'd be a minimum of 7-8 hours apart. An improvement on our current 12 hour separation, but still pretty much a day's travel. Both of us have pretty specific research interests, so neither of us have the luxury of choosing programs based on location at this stage. Plus, I plan to be out of the country doing fieldwork for 6-9 months at least 2 or 3 years in a row. (I'll have internet in the field this time around, though!). Plus there's the fact that we've been lucky so far, in that since we've been apart I haven't been in classes and haven't had to teach, so I've have been able to afford a long weekend every month. I'll actually take a pay cut going to my PhD, and will be starting from scratch with classes, plus probably teaching on top of that, as will he. That plus being on another continent half the year is . . . not likely to be easy.

Anyway, we're not pressuring each other or ourselves to choose for proximity, but the realities of what this could mean for Us are sort of weighing on us right now. It's been kind of a hard week, stuff going on in relationship world that has me a bit uncertain about what I want, but none of that is concretely formed enough to discuss on this forum, even though I feel like I desperately need to talk about it. Usually my mom is the go-to person in situations like that, but I want her to like M. and so I find myself hesitant to bring up less than positive things about the relationship to her. I really wish I had a therapy appointment this week, but I'm actually flying out to see Match on Thursday, so I'm missing my session for the second week in a row. We'll see, I guess. Our October visit is this weekend, I and really just want it to be a happy one.

In other news, I had another fitness assessment with my trainer today, and felt really good about it. I increased my ability on everything, and hadn't lost weight or body fat percentage (that actually went up a little, still lower than when I started, and I'm forcing myself to accept that's fine and not hyperanalyze causal factors).

By the way, Natalie Angier (of whom I happen to be a fan) brought up eating disorders twice in this article on pathological selflessness. I could see both valid and invalid aspects to that angle of presentation. I was also intrigued by this article on addiction vaccines, hoping it could be used to treat addictive behaviors in general, but so far it's targeted towards narcotics and cigarettes. Still cool. Discuss?

Behind on Balance

2011-09-28T12:21:00.000-07:00

I haven't been posting all that frequently lately, partly because I've been hella busy (but busy in a Good Fulfilling Gets a Thumbs Up from My Therapist way) and partly because I haven't really known what to say. At my last session with T I mostly dissected the argument I'd had with Match earlier in the week and we had a relationship-themed session. (M. and I are fine now, very much so, by the way. T-minus 8 days til I see him!)

Random fact d'jour: despite food issues (or maybe perhaps because of them to some degree, have fun psychologizing that), I really like seasonal foods. And because I really have never had a junk food aversion over the course of my ED, some have stayed staunch traditions. So fall brings the advent of the Fall Fab Four: Little Debbie's Pumpkin Flips, Count Chocula cereal, salted caramel Starbucks lattes, and, of course, Reese's peanut butter pumpkins. Go ahead, judge me, and while you're doing that pass me the Reese's if you don't want yours. ;p

I'm hitting the PhD interview circuit again tomorrow, flying to Far Away State for a couple of days to visit the campus, meet the prof and other students, and generally do a lot of evaluating and being evaluated. Pressure? No... *gulp*

I honestly get more nervous about meeting the other (all female, in this lab) grad students than the professor, since I know I'll actually spend more time with them than him. Girls are hard, man. I have plenty of close girlfriends, but honestly when it comes to new introductions and trying to know where you stand with people in a professional situation, I prefer dealing with men ten times over. I've already Facebook spied on them (this lab of grad students) and everyone seems pretty down-to-earth, but you never know. One thing I like about my field is that by this point in the career path you've weeded out most of the un-down-to-earth people, just due to the nature of the work.

Okay that's the work news. EDwise, the main issue that I'm really struggling with right now, and don't know how to begin to fix, is just feeling so incredibly off balance. I've started rearranging my food to allow for bigger breakfasts more often, and more afternoon snacks, have worked at making sure to have fats and proteins, but I feel like nothing I do really matters and my body is just never satisfied. Not in a "I want to keep eating and binge" way but in a "I'm so fucking tired of eating and my body is still hungry/weak/generally whiney." I think I've noticed I've been hungrier more often since I've been doing strength training over the past few months. I haven't lost weight, but I know my body has changed (discussed previously). I thought just jacking up the protein intake would take care of it (you would be AMAZED at the things I've managed to slip protein powder into), but I don't know.

I really wish I could still afford to see that dietitian that I liked so much, but not only am I flat broke, she works in the same office as the therapist that I had a hard time with and eventually dumped in an avoidant and, in retrospect, less than professional way. #Awkward. Before I started with that dietician I always sort of scorned the idea of nutritional counseling--I have a fucking eating disorder AND a biology degree (almost 2 now!): I know nutrition facts and recommendations and calculations and don't need to pay someone $XX an hour to give me guidelines I probably won't follow anyway. But anyway, to make a short story long, I am not good at taking whatever facts (no I don't presume to know them all, ego check) and applying them to myself and processing my thoughts about them, and finally having a good experience with a dietician definitely shifted my opinion about the whole deal and now I want mine back. :(

So anyway, jetting off tomorrow, I'll report back this weekend. Love y'all!

Dancing and Deception and Discount Music, Among Other Things

2011-09-21T07:35:00.000-07:00

So the past 3 days or so have been a total emotional roller coaster. I ranged from being jumping-around ecstatic about good feedback from PhD search to a hugely tense day of bickering with Match that left me wondering if the salt from tears will damage the touch screen on my phone.

Anyway after all that I'm really tired of talking about emotions and serious stuff and so I won't analyze any of it. You get this miscellany instead:

-As my Twitter followers are probably tired of hearing about, I have a total girlcrush on Hope Solo, and that has resulted in me finally breaking down and watching Dancing with the Stars. I actually only watch the segments she's in, because the only people on that show that don't trigger me are Nancy Grace and Chaz Bono, but oh well.

-I just discovered the online music store Legal Sounds, and am in awe. I have no idea how they can afford to sell new releases and top hits for $0.09 each, but I am happy to reap the benefits of whatever exploitative strategy they use to pull it off.

-Although $ 0.09 may still be too steep...I checked my bank account the other day and saw I had more money than I expected, attributed it to a refund from my school account, and proceeded to buy some books and music, splurge at grocery store, etc...only to realize that in my overwhelmed fog of school and work stuff I had forgotten to pay my rent this month and actually have extremely little available money. If I want to keep a roof over my head, at least. Oops.

-I have been on a writing binge for the past few days and have added 7000 words to my thesis since Saturday. I have been a thesising beast, yo.

-I have two new PhD interviews scheduled. And just got feedback from someone who is the ULTIMATE ROCKSTAR in my field and they seem very interested as well, but with a couple of logistical caveats...I'm already dreading the choices I'm going to have to make in a few months.

-I saw this article on pushing athletes past their limits (if they wanted to know how to deplete all of your energy and push yourself beyond where you should, they should have just interviewed some ED people. Is than an okay half-joke to make?), and it really made me contemplate how similar strategies might be applied cognitively to help people push past plateaus or stumbling points in ED recovery. Discuss?

-I will never understand why so many people stop their cars next to me when I'm walking my dog to ask how old he is. He's been self conscious enough about his growing graybeard ever since he stopped getting carded. ;p

Okay I am now going go reapply my nose to the thesis grindstone. I hope everyone's having a better week. Love y'all.

Welcome to Pubertopause

2011-09-18T14:54:00.000-07:00

I am having such a ravenous day; it's driving me insane. I shuffled my menus to allow for a breakfast double the size of what I have on a typical day, and was starving less than an hour afterwards. This does not mean I didn't want to quit eating; it was definitely not an appetite issue. I'm one of those annoying I'm Not a Breakfast Person people and have to force myself not to skip it. I have been like that since birth. But once I do have something in the morning, my metabolism resurrects itself and some days (like today) I'm hungrier than before I ate even though I don't feel like eating.

If that seems like it doesn't make sense, I agree. Well, in reality I know all about the metabolism-boosting virtues of breakfast and that I should be glad I haven't buried my metabo for good after over a decade of torturing it. I am at least at the stage at which I can tell appetite from hunger. Baby steps.

Same with lunch: if anything, hungrier 30 minutes afterward than right before I ate. I even allowed myself an extra(! gold star?), non-compensated for snack, which helped me to not spontaneously implode before dinner, an allowance I only ever so rarely grant myself. It's something I told T. I would do better this week. Somewhere deep down I know that if my body is that insistent I should probably listen to it. Because you know how much love my body and I have for each other.... :/

This is nothing I've never been through before, but it's still annoying and distracting as hell.I apparently am also having hot flashes this afternoon.

I swear some days recovery feels like a sadistic hybrid of puberty and menopause.

Weekend Wins

2011-09-17T17:13:00.000-07:00

Believe it or not, I was not only social but spontaneously social yesterday [gasp]. I had only halfway planned on going to a guest lecture on campus in the afternoon, and I ended up doing not only that but also going out to the weekly grad student happy hour later in the evening. I planned to stay an hour and ended up not leaving for 2.5 hours because I was having such a good time (because of the conversation, not heavy drinking type of good time). It was an incredible morale booster.

I was initially stressed as hell that it messed up my routine and I ended up not getting 100% of my exercise time in for the day, but I was so glad I did it. It was good to have a reminder that I'm actually really good with people and enjoy being in social settings once I get over the hurdle of gritting my teeth and making myself go. I have a high social activation energy even if the product is worth it, special love to all of my nerdfriends that got the science allusion without needing the link. ;)

And I did not restrict my food at all even though my schedule was shot to hell. [insert imaginary gold star sticker here].

So here is where I contradict what I said in my last post. I was griping about how there isn't really anyone in my department that I like or care to see. That was a bit of an exaggeration: there are a few people that I'm friendly with and are good friend-potential, they just work in a different building so I never seem them when I'm on campus, unless it's at a department-wide event. And we all do fieldwork and never seem to be in town on the same weekends. Thus it's easy to feel isolated even though there are incipient friends around in theory.

I also learned that I'm not the only one that is super-frustrated by my labmate; apparently there's a broad consensus that he's pretty much the village idiot of the department, but the only person that doesn't see that is our adviser, who exists in a stereotypical absent-minded professor fog. So that has absolutely no relevance on this blog, but it was a big relief to know that I'm not alone in having a hard time with the guy; I literally lose sleep from frustration over the dynamics in our lab sometimes. At least I'm on the home stretch here.

Therapy last week: was pretty great. My therapist, T., is great; she probably has the most similar personality to mine of any therapist I've seen. It's nice; she really, really seems to "get" me on a lot of issues, both big and small. I mentioned my hypothesis about body fat-anxiety link to her, and we spent most of the time talking about my eating habits and food stuff to see how it can be adjust to help me start building a bit of weight without freaking out. I've been seeing T for a couplefew months now and it was the first time we'd really discussed food. Anyway, left very glad that I stuck with her despite some initial doubts.

Just 3 weeks from Match visit. Not that I'm counting or anything; if that were the case I'd know it's exactly 19 days away. . . oops. I hate these gaps but am glad that we're good at staying connected, I think the weeks of flirting from a distance really make the reunions that much more satisfying and definitely keep us from taking each other for granted.

Anyway, I have actually been in a fantabulous mood today, despite it being a chilly, gray day outside. I wish I could bottle this feeling.

I hope everyone's having a great weekend, love y'all!

Anticipating Changes

2011-09-13T17:31:00.000-07:00

So I had an interesting conversation with Match the other night about my weight. I know I've mentioned in the past that I get worried sometimes when he compliments my body, because I know at some point I need to/should/will (let's be optimistic) put a significant amount back on. Significant to me at least. It's all relative. Anyway.

But there is also the fact that I was at a *lifetime* high weight for a big chunk of our first year together, when I somehow first attracted him, we first became intimate, etc. So obviously an extra XX pounds isn't going to send him running to the hills. I know that intellectually, just hard to shake that visceral fear about it.

The other night he asked me pretty pointedly when I thought I would be ready to start putting weight on. And then, being the psychology-trained person that he is, he wouldn't let me get away with an "um yeah I'll work on it" and asked me specifically how I would work on it, what I would change. That brought up the exercise stuff, and I think talking through it made me realize once again how much it completely controls my life.

A big concern is that I'm starting my PhD program in less than a year, and my work schedule will probably change dramatically. My current adviser lets me work from home, and I only make an appearance on campus for an hour or two at a time a couple of days a week. Honestly there is no one in my department I really want to see, and my labmate is a chauvinistic ass. Moving on...

Anyway when I start at a new school I'll probably have to be much more present around campus, and after a year or so I'll be spending 6-9 months at a time in Third World country, probably one that will be a lot less safe than where I've previously worked, which means no long solo hikes to let off pent up exercise anxiety. Plus exposure to a lot more diseases and other things itching to take advantage of a weakened immune system. So in anticipation of all of this, I have got to get a fucking grip before that point.

So yes, freeing up time, and really just freeing up my peace of mind, is something I really need to do, and cutting exercise is the way to make it happen. Easier said than done, but I think some fires have been lit under me recently.

Match also made sure to point out that he loved my body XX pounds ago and even if I got way heavier than that I'd be the same Cammy to him. [awww]. BUT Fat Days really don't depend much on the image perceived by the people around you or even what's actually in the mirror. Images in the mirror are tricky and not to be trusted, in my experience at least.

So now I'm scrambling for some profound denouement to this post. I guess the main thing is that I realize at some point I need to just make this happen, and sometimes talking about it with someone who is a part of my life but outside of the disorder is a big help. Not a substitute for therapy by any means, but a nice complement.

I hope everyone is having a great week so far, love y'all.

[EDIT: I know the part about me never going to campus because there isn't anyone I want to see makes me sound like an antisocial misanthrope, but I *swear* I am actually pretty sociable and good at making friends. I've always had a really good group of strong friends, even though I switched schools all the time when I was younger. I don't know what it is about the cohort/department here, but I've failed to make any connections whatsoever, and it really, really gets to me. I do wish it were different.]

CRT?

2011-09-09T15:00:00.000-07:00

Today has been a lot calmer and quieter inside my head. Or maybe just more exhausted. Whatever works.

I really, *really* wish I knew what makes my brain feel like it's about to explode one day and then be stressed but manageable the next.

I went to therapy yesterday afternoon. The first time crying in front of a given therapist is always rather awkward. I really have gotten to like T, though, even though I wasn't sure about her at first.

I had a training session today, and added an extra snack afterwards (note that's not a "eat something now and subtract the calories from lunch" snack, it's actually--gasp--extra food). I'm still not sure if I'm right about the fat-anxiety link, but it seems strongly possible to me, and even if that's not the issue... I know I need to be careful about at least maintaining and probably putting on some weight and, yes, fat. I really did go into the training thing wanting to get stronger and probably add a bit of weight, so I'm trying hard to make sure it stays positive and healthy.

T. scored major points today by e-mailing me a few journal articles to read and see if I'm interested in trying out the approaches they used with people recovering from anorexia. She's getting to know and appreciate the research nerd that I am, and it made me feel legitimized that she sent me primary literature to consider instead of trying a Mickey Mouse explanation of the therapy approach.

They're about Cognitive Remediation Therapy--which, from what I gather, seems to be a way to ground people that are too freaked out and anxious to focus on doing CBT initially. It basically just looks like a lot of little cognitive drills to help increase flexibility and set-shifting skills. I guess I just gave you the Mickey Mouse explanation, apologies. :/

Has anyone ever done CRT, did it seem to be useful?

Just as a side note, it bothered me that one of the papers is a case study that did 2- and 6-month followups with the patient, and the data table clearly showed that she gained a good bit of weight from baseline to 2-month point, but then lost significant weight between the 2- and 6-month followups, enough to drag her below healthy BMI again--and no mention of that weight loss was made in the paper. It seemed significant to me.

Also, I'm going to mush for a minute and say I really love my boyfriend. He seems to be able to pull smiles out of me when nothing else can. I hate that I worry him so much sometimes.

Still a lot to stress about, but my brain feels less like a hurricane today. Thanks for all the supportive comments; really hope everyone has a good weekend.

Love y'all.

Less Fat = More Freak?

2011-09-08T15:56:00.000-07:00

My anxiety has been sky-high again today. I had a therapy session this afternoon. I really like my new therapist and was glad I got to talk to someone, but I still feel really jittery and unsatisfied and stressed. I have really felt like I had ADD while trying to work on my thesis, and have even had a hard time focusing on pleasure reading, which is rare for me.

I had a light-bulb moment a few minutes ago, though: I recently wrote about the results of my strength-training regimen, which hasn't caused me to lose any weight but *has* dropped my body fat percentage, which was already really too low. I am wondering if that drop could have precipitated the recent spate of high-anxiety days; I know that body composition and weight can indeed affect moods and thought patterns. Just a hypothesis, but something I'll have to think about and maybe bring up in therapy next week.

Wishing for a Re-do

2011-09-07T08:50:00.000-07:00

Match was here for Labor Day weekend, and it turned out to be a really hard visit. Usually I'm on Cloud 9 after a weekend with my boy, but this time I was left just feeling kind of exhausted and wishing so badly I was anyone except for me.

He and I are okay, just for the record, we started and ended strongly and the relationship is fine right now.

The issue all weekend was my anxiety. It was just through the roof, and I got so frustrated and upset about that, which of course just compounded the entire problem.

I don't think the anxiety had much to do with Match. He was treating me like a princess as usual, we were here at my house, with my usual surroundings: my dog, my food, my gym, etc. We didn't fight, nothing catastrophic happened. I just have so, so much running through my head right now with PhD planning and thesis writing, and my background level of anxiety, which is always humming, is at a full on blare this semester.

That was going on the first day and a half, and then on Saturday it reached a new level when we went to spend the day with some of his extended family that lives near here. That meant my only exercise that day was one morning gym session (not going into specifics but it was a fraction of my norm, and less than even the reduced amount I usually get in on visit weekends), and the food at their house was absolutely un-doable for me. Hence, I was a basketcase internally, and it leaked out a bit. Or a lot. Yes, quite a lot.

I held it together while we were around his family, but as soon as we left I had a bit of a meltdown. We headed home by 8:30 so we'd have time to stop and eat on the way back, since I couldn't have any of what they had for dinner there. I couldn't decide what I wanted and he ended up pulling into a McDonald's for me to quit crying and tell him where to go. I couldn't decide, so we just stayed there because it was getting late.

Note: Once I've got this recovery thing nailed, I am NEVER going to eat another grilled chicken salad in my entire life. It is a perfectly fine meal for most people, but to me it just represents a lot of unhealthy periods. I have eaten them as a a default "just get something in me with protein but as few calories as possible" choice so many times that the sight/taste makes my stomach turn at this point.

Another issue is that Match and I have entirely different sleep schedules/requirements. He doesn't sleep very very late, but likes to lay in bed til about 9 or so on weekends. I am physically incapable of sleeping past 6:30, and after about 7:00 or 7:15 my anxiety is shooting through the roof if my day hasn't started yet. Thus, poor Match wakes up at 8:00 on a Sunday morning and finds his fucking girlfriend sobbing into her pillow because she conjured herself a panic attack in his arms while he was sleeping. Who the hell puts up with that???

Anyway, there were other of incidents like that, and some periods where the noise in my head was just so overwhelming that I had a hard time being present. I had a hard time choosing what to eat and even picking out what to wear, which happens even in normal circumstances but is way worse when I'm in anxiety mode.

It may not seem like a huge deal, but when you only get 4-5 nights a month with someone, every hour counts.

It wasn't an entirely blown weekend. We had another special anniversary date--we weren't together on the actual day, so we celebrated it both before and after--and that one went really well. After the meltdowns Saturday night and Sunday morning, the rest of Sunday was pretty good, and we had half of Monday before he had to fly out. Although to be honest the main thing keeping my anxiety down on Monday was knowing he was leaving and I could resume my normal exercise/eating by lunchtime. I *hate* being that person.

So there was this unsettling mix of relief of going back to usual when he left combined with a really sharp regret for not making more of the weekend and wishing I could have him back to redo the whole thing as a normal person, and that I didn't have to give him back at all.

We have been doing these weekend visits for over a year now, and I have no idea why I was just such a freak on this one. There have been others where I actually got less exercise; I guess it's related to everything else going on in my life as well right now. But plenty of people deal with those things without becoming a snot-slinging bag of patheticness (patheticity? patheticitude? insert your favorite suffix here). I really can't stand being this way and wish I could just quit being me sometimes.

Progress Report

2011-09-01T14:59:00.000-07:00

***Disclaimer**** This post has mentions of changes in body fat/size/etc, but no specific numbers. I still wanted to mention it because I am terrified of posting anything that would trigger someone. I am always careful not to do specifics, but still worry. The only number in this one is a (normal) number of minutes in a strength training routine under supervision of a licensed trainer.

So, a couple of months ago I mentioned that I had started seeing a personal trainer a couple of times a month, mainly to get some strength on my frame, try to scale back on the obsessive cardio, and make myself more at peace with adding weight back. I've been away traveling for chunks of the summer, but I've done pretty well with keeping up the weight and strength training routines. I don't usually give details of exercise habits, but I think these are pretty normal so it's okay to mention that I've basically been doing it for about 30 minutes 2-3 times a week--although less frequently when I've been out of town, obviously. And I've been subbing it for cardio time, ie not adding that 30 minutes on top of what I was already doing.

I have always been told that weight/strength training can be as good of a workout as cardio, but never really wanted to believe it. I clung to my obsessive calorie tracking on the bike/elliptical/treadmill/whatever has moving parts and an LED display, convinced that the key was to go as fast, long, and steadily as possible to keep in good shape.

I think this experiment with the personal trainer has really opened my eyes, though. Even just the small amount of substitution I have done (the reason I mentioned the frequency/length above was to be sure it's obvious I haven't been doing this a ton) has *really* produced a change in my body, it's been fascinating to watch.

Yesterday was my 2 month fitness assessment to track my progress since I started with the trainer. I was amazed at how much better I was at pumping out the pull-ups, push-ups, etc, made me feel kind of sorry for the feeble me that started at the beginning of the summer.

And it felt *good*. It felt so nice to feel powerful and strong, instead of dragged out and empty after a long cardio push. It's the "grrrr" effect. I got tired, no doubt, but it's a very different kind of tired. There is quite a difference in being exhausted in a few areas of your body and having your entire system depleted of energy.

One part of the assessment was weighing and measuring. I know this sounds like a *bad* idea for someone in ED recovery, and I agree, actually, very much so. But, I figured there wouldn't be any big shockers from a weigh-in, though, since I weigh myself at home every day any way, and I might as well not bring attention to myself by explaining why I wanted to skip that part. It is a bit awkward that my trainer is a 23 year old female (I'm soon to be 25), but she's a lot shorter and a different body type than me, so I guess the comparison pressure isn't all that bad.

Anyway, the weigh/measure was a bit of a shocker but in a different way than expected. I *may* put on a bit of weight since I started (it's actually within daily flux range, and I know from my home weigh-ins that it might be a tiny bit but not really enough to merit much thought). That's fine with me, because I know I'm still below where I have been before and where I probably should be. But the surprise, and one that I don't really know how to feel about, was that I'd lost fat % and inches everywhere. Please keep in mind that that was *not* my goal. My goal was to be stronger and feel fitter and better about my body in a functional sense. I didn't really think I needed to lose inches and I knew I didn't need to lose fat (I want a bigger cup size! Please! Is a B too much to ask?).

I had actually expected my measurements to be *bigger* because I'd noticed more definition in my arms when I flexed, and I truly thought they looked bigger. Mirror tricks are nothing new, I guess. One reason I avoided lifting weights for so long was that I was afraid of "bulking up," but I guess I'm living proof that you can do the opposite without losing weight and maybe even while gaining it.

So anyway, I guess I don't know how to feel about that. I am happy to feel stronger and see that I can make improvements without having to get all obsessive about a routine. The nice thing about strength training is that it's very hard to over-do it; my muscles just won't lift any more after a certain point (doesn't take long to get there), and after that they need a couple of days to recoup if I want them to get stronger.

On the other hand, I didn't really need to lose that fat and don't want to lose any more. I might look "normal thin" to most people used to modern media images (I have no idea how I look in reality, honestly, just guessing here because I'm not emaciated or attention-getting thin but still technically underweight), but I know I'm still under where I need to be for best health. The obvious answer would be to cut back on the cardio that I'm doing, and I really think that needs to be my next goal. Since I've been doing the strength training I've been trying to get more protein and eat more frequently on those workout days (although without really adding any calories, just rearranging them). So another thing I could do is boost energy intake....but I feel like lifestyle-wise is is the exercise that really needs to be worked on. I eat enough that I can manage in most out-of-routine situations and can have pretty much whatever foods I want in "real person" portions or even larger. Or I could, gasp, try both at the same time, if it doesn't make my head explode.

This is long and rambly and I really hope that the talk of losing fat and inches isn't triggering. I've vacillated back and forth over whether to post this, actually, and have been sitting on it a couple of days. I just wanted to reiterate that I have NOT been increasing my exercise total, losing weight, or aiming to become one of those stringy scary muscle beast women that stalk around Gold's Gym twitching their quads at people (yes, I see them every day). So I was a bit unsure about posting, but I have been such a skeptic on the cardio vs non cardio exercise issue that I really felt like it deserved a testimonial.

I guess the gist in anecdotal form is: In spring 2010 I was working on reducing cardio, cut my cardio almost in half....and didn't really see a weight or body change...all that extra working out I'd been doing hadn't really affected my body size/shape except to wear it out. (Didn't keep me from reverting back to the higher level later that year, more as stress relief than anything else. Work in progress). So in a nutshell, X hours more of cardio really matter, but subbing in just a couple of short strength sessions a week has quantifiably changed my body and shown me that cardio all the way isn't really the best for making a person fit overall. Should've been a duh, I guess, but old habits die hard. I guess I just find that kind of thing fascinating, I like data. I am NOT writing this to convince everyone to go out and start lifting weights, of course, wouldn't advise anyone to start a routine without consulting at least their therapist and probably a doctor (yes, my therapist and doctor know I've been doing this). Okay I hope that is enough disclaimering and no one will hate me. *cringe*

Match will be here in 3 hours for our September weekend, woot!

Love y'all.

Irene Weekend

2011-08-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

Well, I spent the weekend being hurricaned and have a ton to catch up on, but fyi I had plenty of adventures to report to you soon, including but not exclusively: storm prepping and evacuating home, yelling at a hotel manager for accidentally making me accidentally call a sex chat line, having to have a maintenance man break into my room by coming through the AC vent, successfully smuggling G. into fitness room with me, getting locked out AGAIN this morning and G. making a spectacle of himself in lobby.

I don't think I've ever been glad for a weekend to be over before...but this one might set a precedent!

On This Day...

2011-08-24T12:03:00.000-07:00

On this day two years ago....

I met the best friend I've ever had.

And I'm glad that, despite my caveat in the original post, I got a best friend and a romance out of the whole dea. I really do think this relationship has helped me to grow in many ways, break down some barriers, and finally let myself "just live" more than I ever did before.

Just felt significant enough to mention.

Eve Ensler gives a TED Talk

2011-08-21T09:58:00.000-07:00

If any of you haven't read Eve Ensler's The Good Body, I found it to be pretty eye-opening and empowering. It offers acknowledgment/commiseration about all of the pressures on women for their bodies to conform to an impossible ideal, and offers encouragement about actually being able to accept and appreciate your body for what it is.

The video below really touches on how our dissatisfaction with our bodies can symbolize so much more than just ab envy. I especially liked this one because I have a high interest in international development issues, and the Congo crisis is discussed. Yes, she can be a bit dramatic, but considering her subject material...

Eve Ensler gives a TED talk:

Also, if you ever have a chance to see The Vagina Monologues on stage, I HIGHLY recommend it (Match actually saw it with me one time, he's a good sport). See it again and again; there are tons of skits to choose from for a given theater company to perform, so no two productions of it are the same. Again, very empowering.

Reality Jolt of the Week

2011-08-20T07:20:00.000-07:00

New addition to the archive of awkward conversations:

The other day Match mentioned he'd looked up some info on eating disorders and was disheartened about how prevalent they are, and mentioned how impossible it must be to be an actress or model without some degree of image/body issue.

It was the same day as my therapy appointment, so I figured maybe that was why he'd been looking up ED stuff. When I asked him later, though, he just said it was for background in a client at work. I asked if she was an ED patient, and he said no. He was being sort of uncharacteristically obtuse about the whole thing, so of course I pushed for more information.

He said that he had to look up anorexia as a "differential diagnosis" for the lady, which means you list every possible problem that could have caused someone's condition, and the go through process of elimination, based on the details of the case, to (hopefully) narrow it down to the correct diagnosis.

And what was this lady's condition? Dementia with associated brain atrophy.

It is definitely an eye-opener, or a guess reminder that when you're mistreating your body, you're not just starving your ass or your thighs or your belly, but your brain and organs and everything else as well, and the effects may last for a long time.

I guess he was reluctant to go into specifics because he didn't want me to be worried/sad/embarrassed.

But, as much worry and anxiety as I seem unable to shake much of the time (calorie counts, exercise times, perfectionist tics by the dozen), I probably have been a lot better off in the long run if I'd worried more the right things all along.

A Little Bit of Honesty Goes a Long Way

2011-08-19T07:06:00.000-07:00

So last night was my first therapy visit since early June. If you recall, the last session didn't go so well.

I was pretty ambivalent about seeing her yesterday, to be honest. I used to get stressed and tense when seeing someone who was still pretty new, but I think I'm over that at this point. I guess a lot of that therapy anxiety was over anticipation of facing huge overhauls of my routines and the disorder I was clinging to so tightly...but over the course of over a decade and several therapists, I have learned that it usually doesn't work like that, for better or (more likely) worse.

Anyway, I felt like there was a bit of a breakthrough in connecting with her last night. She actually volunteered the information that she had an ED in the past and talked a bit about some of the anxieties she'd had that were the same as mine (specifically the stomach consciousness and the compliment issue with boyfriends). It kind of surprised me that she offered that up without even being asked, but at the same time it made me feel a lot more at ease with her. I think knowing someone has gone through the same disease or hardship as you is an instant bonding mechanism (one of the factors that plays into the recovery blog community, or at least it seems so to me).

In the past, I've asked my therapists if they've had an ED, but only after at least 10 or so sessions. I never necessarily need to know details, I just want to know yes or no, because I do wonder. Although I would never really fault them for not answering. (Just for the record, the two I've asked before, H. said no but her mother had one, and the other, the MSW I saw my first year of grad school, said yes she had had one).

Now I'm not saying this disclosure is the best situation for everyone. Actually the last therapist I saw when I lived here, the one I broke up with last year, was a good example of handling the whole thing badly. After she'd confirmed she had an ED history, she was constantly injecting stories about her ED and treatment that sometimes weren't all that relevant and often seemed a bit competitive. It did not feel healthy and I didn't stick around.

But I felt like T. (the initial for the newest therapist) did it really well yesterday, and I appreciated it a lot. She looks super healthy (and I don't mean that in a skinny-but-not-quite-emaciated sense of healthy that is tempting to shoot for in recovery, I mean she has shape and it looks good on her and looks like she's probably smack in the middle of the healthy range for her height) and I really couldn't guess beforehand whether I thought she had one or not. I try not to speculate about people, but that's hard to resist sometimes.

So question d'jour: have you ever had a therapist bring up her (or his) own ED history, did you ask about it or did they volunteer, how did that make you feel and/or affect subsequent sessions? Again, I'm not at all saying it's right for all situations, and I'm curious to see what your thoughts are.

Anyway, the upshot of all of that is I think I'm starting to come out of my shell with T. at this point. I was pretty close to just not going back, since my mood has been a lot better lately and I've got the standard complacency about ED behaviors. But I know that even though I'm getting along and functioning, and even though my numbin depression from earlier this year seems to have lifted, my life is still pretty much dictated by my ED behaviors. Complacency is a hard nut to crack, and I know I'm very guilty of it, but I don't want to give up just yet.

Compliment Conundrum

2011-08-16T15:35:00.000-07:00

I'm back from August's Match weekend, a bit on Cloud 9 as usual after I get to spend time with my boy. We had been bickering and tense leading up to the trip, so I was a bit nervous, but we always end up reconnecting and bonding more closely than ever. I think that after we've gone for about a month without seeing each other, we both tend to just get a bit cranky with the world, but we get over it as soon as we're together. We celebrated our 2nd anniversary this month. It's hard to believe it's been that long now; time has flown! Usually when I'm around people I have a very specific amount of time set to spend with them and, even if I enjoy them, am glad to get back to my own space and routines. With him, no amount of time is ever enough. Okay I won't get too much into mushies on you, sorry.

I think I did okay with eating, not ideal some days but then really well others. Same ole same ole, I guess. I let myself splurge and had a nice dinner a couple of cocktails the night we had our anniversary outing. Earlier that day we did a nice long river hike and had a picnic lunch, and it just felt so, so wonderful to feel *normal.* I wish I could bottle that and spray it all over myself on difficult days.

I have one problem that may get some eye-rolls for not being a real problem, but hear me out. Match is very sweet and aware that I'm constantly body conscious/anxious, and so he tends to shower compliments on me: he'll tell me all the time that I'm pretty, I look nice in X, he loves X about my body, etc etc. All of this is nice, and I won't claim that the constant positive reinforcement doesn't boost my confidence a little bit.

But in other ways, it spikes my anxiety. The main line of thought is that if likes me as I am now, I'm screwed if anything changes. He likes this body that is a product of my current regimen, but if I relax that like I'm supposed to, then what happens? Intellectually, I know he's not shallow enough to care, but in practice it still freaks me out.

One thing that helps me out is to know that early in our relationship I was at my lifetime peak weight, and he did not seem in any way less attracted to me at that time. Quite the opposite in fact And he's told me that. And I know he was concerned when I slipped to my current weight range about a year ago, he did tell me he preferred my previous size. So I don't think he's got a thing for underweight girls, I think he's just got a thing for me and wants to try to make me more confident without realizing how anxiety-inducing compliments can be sometimes.

I've sort of addressed this with him. I've told him that it's really not helpful if he uses any kind of diminutive adjective (small, little, tiny, etc) to describe me, because that makes me very self-conscious, and he immediately ceased any of that (although he hadn't done that much to begin with).

Anyway, I guess the main point is that compliments can be mixed blessings sometimes. Anyone else have troubles with handling compliments and worrying about their implications?

I visited with my family on the way back from the Match trip, and spontaneously stayed an extra night, something that would have been UNTHINKABLE not too long ago. And I ate family dinner with them both nights, without fixing myself a special separate meal, also rare. Had a great time visiting with my parents and brothers, who, I have to say, are turning into pretty cool guys. And best of all, I HAVE MY DOG BACK! It's the longest I've ever had to leave him for, and I'm so glad now that he's back with me where he belongs.

Due to all of my traveling this summer, I haven't seen the new therapist in almost 2 months (I don't even remember what pseudonymous initial I assigned her, need to go back and check). I have my first fall appointment with her tomorrow night. I'm feeling a bit ambivalent. My mood has been really good lately and I am feeling strong about a lot of things in my life at the moment. At the same time, I've made really no progress on changing up my daily routines and rules (especially the exercise) or putting on weight, and I know I have a lot of work left to do.

I went from a dry spell of not getting feedback from PhD inquiries to being so swamped with professor correspondence that it's been putting me back on other writing projects. I think I have a job opportunity hovering that could be a great back up and possible foot in the door for the future, and some other professional good news has come in lately as well.

Anyway, speaking of all of that, I need to get back to real life and get some things done. I hope everyone is having a great week, love y'all.

(EDIT: I am still catching up on blogs from being out of town and just noticed that Leslie over at Health Breaks Loose also has a recent post on accepting compliments, see it here)

Volume Issues

2011-08-08T07:14:00.000-07:00

It was a fairly uneventful weekend, I guess. I've got tons, tons, tons of work to do now that summer traveling is over. This semester I'm writing my thesis, presenting research at a conference, applying to PhD programs, taking the GRE subject test for Biology, doing lab work and writing up a side project unrelated to my thesis, and studying for/taking oral exams to qualify for my degree. Should have plenty to keep me out of trouble, I guess. I only need to take one more class to complete my requirements, and I'm still on the fence about whether to take it in the fall or spring. There's one I really want this semester, but it'll probably keep me saner to wait until the spring and take a different one.

I've been way sleepy and am not sure why. I randomly took a nap from 4:30-6 yesterday, something UNHEARD of for me, and then was dozing off again by 10:00. And I had actually slept in almost an hour later than normal that morning. I did lift weights the day before, maybe my body is wanting a break to rebuild muscle or something; I always napped during growth spurts when I was a kid. I am 99.9% sure this will never happen to me, but has anyone that recovered in their mid-20s or later actually grown height-wise as a result? I am already taller than all the women on my mother's side of the family (a bit shorter than the women on my biological father's side), but I often wonder how my height was affected by going rock-bottom with anorexia during my final growth spurt at age 13.

I've been a good girl about getting back on track with eating since I've been here. One eye-opener for me about how much I'd actually been restricting was the first time I cooked a "typical for at home" lunch for myself, and less than halfway into it I was seriously afraid my stomach was about to burst open because it wasn't used to handling that volume of food anymore. I literally had to sit for over 30 minutes before doing anything because I was afraid if I moved too much I'd throw up. Kind of frustrating.

Given all of that, my weight had only dropped a bit on the trip, probably somewhat from dehydration also, and is already back to pre-trip norm. That's fine with me.

Back to the stomach-bursting issue, I sort of bring that on myself by still clinging to a couple of EDish behaviors: volumetric food choices and veggie-loading. I can fit ridiculous volumes of food into a "calorie budget," so that what seems like huge servings can actually still only marginally meet my requirements. Not something I'm proud of, but a habit I'm aware of the need to scale back on.

It's also expensive, have you been in a grocery store lately? My food budget would plummet if I wasn't eating pounds of produce every day. One caveat is that I've *always* been a fruit/veggie vacuum, as a kid, so I don't even always think of it disorderedly, even though I know that that is an underlying factor in my menu planning, of course.

I also still do things like picking up fat-free dairy products and light bread (although not always, have substantial bread and light stuff in my kitchen, the rules on what gets eaten when are too complex and inane/insane to really warrant explanation here). It's not because I don't want/need/allow as many calories as the full versions, it's just that I'm still in the deprived mindset of automatically choosing what gives me the most volume for a given amount of calories, so if I can eat 3 fat free yogurts for the calories of a full fat one, that's what I do, and something I need to change. It's not a "fat fear" issue, I know my body and brain need fat and that's not scary to me, it's more just a calorie tally game.

Of course I'm aware a lot of the serving sizes and nutrition facts are mind games and your stomach often isn't fooled by volume. If a piece of bread or bowl of cereal has half the calories of an alternative version, chances are it weighs a lot less too, and by the time your stomach breaks it down and gets rid of the air and whatever else, you're still only half as full. I've found the same thing with fruit: most fruits give me something to munch on but never actually fill me up, because my body is still always craving fat and protein. And when I do treat myself to something full-version, I am AMAZED at how much better it tastes and more satisfying it is overall. I <3 Ben & Jerry's, and I DON'T mean their fro-yo flavors. Other full version things I don't compromise on are things like peanut butter, avocados, dark chocolate, etc etc. Eden recently had a good post on that issue.

This got a bit rambly. My main point was that now I eat enough calories in a day that I can still have good portions with non-trimmed/skimmed/scammed products, and I need to kick myself in the ass and realize that. I hope this post isn't too behavior-y, I always worry about talking about specific habits, but I thought it might be an issue that a lot of people have but that may be more problematic than they sometimes realize.

It doesn't seem like a big deal when I'm by myself, but when I eat with other people it is pretty much impossible for me to get all the calories I need without eating way more food and taking several times as long for a meal as the people around me, which means I vastly undercut my energy intake in those situations. If I just had a sandwich instead of the chicken salad with various fruit/veggies sides, the whole thing would be easier, but things can never be easy, it seems. And I have nothing against sandwiches, I make them all the time at home, good substantial ones (my pumpkin/peanut butter waffle sandwiches will change your life), but I get self-conscious about eating things like that in front of others. Add it to the interminable List of Things to Work On, I guess.

Oh I was a bit off when I said summer traveling is over: I'm driving up for the August Match visit on Wednesday! Miss my boy a lot, we haven't seen each other since the first week of July. I'm also picking up my precious G., who has been staying with my parents since early June. We won't tell Match which one of them I'm most excited about seeing... ;p

I hope everyone's week is off to a great start, love y'all!

Back, Almost Intact

2011-08-05T08:11:00.000-07:00

Well hi there. I made it back to the US very late on Wednesday night. The trip went smoothly overall, and I've got a good deal of nostalgia about it being my last visit to my field site and research country, but I'm so, so glad to be home.

Eating and exercise stuff were about as usual there. I have NO idea why I feel obligated to restrict and overextend myself there. I guess it's just anxiety with being *sure* not to gain weight when I'm removed from my usual environment and routine, so I go to the opposite extreme. I lost some weight but not a ton, which is a testament to how efficient your body is at adjusting its efficiency to vastly reduced input and increased output, I guess. My metabolism always bounces back once I get back on track, but I'm always a bit worried that it won't.

I didn't get any jungle tummy sicknesses while I was there this time, so that was good. The main challenge was a hellacious hike that ended up making me look and feel like a mugging victim.

It was about 15 km a day going up and down a mountainside, which doesn't sound like much distance until you realize that it's all very steep slopes in mud up to your knees the entire entire way (about 8 hours a day), and the only breaks from that are river crossings, in downpours of rain more often than not. Keep in mind everyone had to carry 20-30 pounds of equipment the whole way.

By the time I got back, my shoulders were black, blue, and purple from the pack straps, and I had a 6 inch band of the same bruising across my lower back/hips from the pack belt. Apparently being soaked in repeated rainstorms decreases the efficacy of the cushioning, who woulda thunk it. I also took a few spills, resulting in some plate-sized bruises on my legs and ass. My quads felt like wooden boards (fyi/tmi, now I know why old people have the high chair setups on their potties), and I had massive subungual hematomas on my two big toes which made it pretty excruciating to wear shoes at all, much less walk in them. But because my shoulders, back, and hips were pulpified, it also meant that it also hurt to sit and lay down. Moral of this story is that rainy season is NOT optimal for major backpacking trips!

I had to go to the doctor yesterday to get holes melted in my toenails (technical term is trephination using a cautery) to drain out the buckets of blood that were collecting under them, which is awesome (not) for someone with a major phobia of being burned (bad childhood experience). I usually have a disturbingly high pain tolerance, but I cried in front of the nurse. :'(

But I conquered that volcano and was queen of the fucking mountain, roar! ;)

Anyway, back to real life now. My bruises and muscles are mending well, except the damn toes. Apparently the big ones are fairly important for participating in this whole bipedal fad. I'm glad to get back and jump into my work, although coming home also involves coming back to a ton of responsibilities, some more welcome than others.

My new labmate, who is continuing the research there, was distinctly unimpressive both in terms of maturity and intellectual agility, and I'm worried about the fate of the ongoing work, because I really love that place and the system I studied. I guess it's out of my control, but is still bothering me.

It's the end of this era of research, in terms of the fieldwork. It definitely always brought challenges for me, but I wouldn't have traded all those days/weeks/months of waking up to this for anything:

An Ending

2011-07-18T15:35:00.000-07:00

In exactly 24 hours I'll be boarding a plane to leave the country, and I've got the pre-travel crazies right now. I really think it might be healthier for me to put things off til the last minute so I had something to occupy myself with the day before a trip. As it is, I make sure to get things done ahead of time, and that means everything's together and ready by Travel Eve, but I can't turn off the buzz motivation, so it becomes the LONGEST DAY EVER with me piddling around doing a whole lot of nothing important.

Fortunately, most of my anxiety is about the travel itself, and I'm actually looking forward to the trip itself. Once I'm buckled in on the airplane and on my way, I relax by a factor of about 100. It's the gettingthereontime whatdidiforget willimakemyconnection wherethefuckisthestarbucksonthisconcourse chaos that really puts my mind in tremor mode.

As you've probably observed, I don't have the best track record with staying on top of my eating on these trips. This one will be both similar and different in its challenges, I think. Our accommodations will be a lot better, in terms of lodging and food (amazing how you get banished to the slave quarters on one trip, but put up in the hotel rooms when you bring a professor with clout that the owners of the place want to impress). I kid you not, some nights on a trip or two me and me two field assistants were left about 2 servings white rice for dinner to split between the three of us. Those conditions don't help much when you're in a situation where it's so easy/tempting to restrict. Anyway, hopefully there will be more edible/safe foods served this time. I've also got a small suitcase full of bars, tuna, dried fruit, oatmeal, etc.

Another thing is that the group will be much different. Before, it was usually me and 2 or 3 assistants just doing my work. This time, my work is done and I'm helping a labmate get started on his project, in addition to co-teaching an undergrad field course. So there is the double pressure of needing to look normal in front of both my superiors (the other professors) and subordinates (the undergrads). There is only one female student in the group (not uncommon in my field), and one of the 2 profs is female.

I actually do better around men in a lot of ways, for some reason they just seem easier to manage (sorry guys! if you're out there). Eating is obviously easier, because I don't feel like I'm being scrutinized for whatever goes onto my plate or into my mouth. Not that all girls scrutinize that, but it just feels more like they'll notice it and draw direct comparisons to themselves. Also, I think I find guys easier to read, and so I'm more comfortable around them when I'm still getting to know them. I don't want to use the word "simpler" because of the negative connotations, but I guess that's the first one that comes to mind. Not that I don't play nice with other girls, of course. Now I'm WAY off on a tangent, sorry. One thing that M. had to get used to in our relationship is that some of my best friends from college are guys, but he did learn that they're really like brothers to me, except I actually like them (I kid! I love my brothers). If I were to REALLY psychologize myself, maybe the fact that I grew up with 2 brothers has something to do with that trend in my life; I was comfortable being the only girl in the group without either sacrificing or exaggerating femininity. I actually do have a half sister somewhere, just never met her. My brothers are halfs technically too, but I never, ever think of them that way, and you'd never know by looking at us.

I have no idea how I got off talking about my tangled family tree instead of my upcoming trip, deepest apologies.

Anyway, another motivator on this trip is that there is the potential to get in some super badass multi-day backpacking trips, in terrain that's different than anything I've ever camped in before. I want so badly to do it, and I know that I can't take it on if I'm going to be a liability to the team because I'm not fueling myself properly. Also, I'm in a leadership role, and there's a certain responsibility to function that comes along with that, you know?

Match is beside himself worrying about me going on the camping trips, mostly because it's in an area where it can get cold at night and where bad storms can set in with little warning. He's convinced I'm going to hypothermiate or have a heart attack or fall and break one of my JiffyPop bones and have to be carried down the mountain by the undergrads who might accidentally drop me in a volcano or something.

I tried to tell him that if I do have a heart attack, the hypothermia could help to minimize organ damage and protect my cognitive function, but he didn't think it was funny. Actually, his reaction was something like this:

He was not amused, in other words.

I truly dreaded my last couple of trips down (part monotony, part travel burnout, part some other intangible emotions), and ended up having a good time while I was there despite the eating/exercise fails. This time I'm actually excited about what I'll get to do, so I'm hoping it all pans out. I'll be gone longer than I was the past few trips, but having a real building to stay in with (hopefully) no chiggers in the beds will do a lot to make that more bearable, and the backpacking trips away from our base lodging will break up the routine and make it go faster, I think.

I've also got a bit of a nostalgia thing going on. Despite the issues I bring to every trip, I really, really love that field site, and this is probably the last time I'll ever visit it. It's sort of an end to a chapter in my life, and I want to make it a good one.

I will have limited internet access Tuesday and Wednesday and then none after that til August 3rd. I hope all of you have a great two weeks, love y'all!

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PS I never know how many people go back and read comments on previous posts, so I often feel like I should just address them in the next post if I want to comment on them. Anyway, regarding the melancholy I got from finding my little Pandora's Box a couple of days ago, Sarah was very right (she's a wise one, that Sarah). I was a bit tense and distant with M. all day, then had a complete emotional meltdown during our goodnight phone call. And then I felt a lot better. Thanks for all your comments and support about that, I felt a bit whiny, but sometimes the past can be a bit overwhelming. All the more reason to focus on the present, I suppose.

A Different Kind of Self Pity

2011-07-16T15:08:00.000-07:00

I don't know if I've mentioned it yet, but my next trip to Tropical Field Site is coming up fast; I leave on Tuesday and will be gone until August 3. I've been finishing up my packing today, the last stage of which involved dredging through my closet looking for my box of hiking socks (yes, I own more pairs of wool hiking socks than high heeled shoes, and I like it that way).

At some point during that search effort, I pulled down a box that was still sealed from my last move (probably from my last 2 or 3 moves, actually). I knew it didn't have the socks, but opened it anyway just out of curiosity.

Then I realized why I'd left it sealed.

It was a collection of journals, letters, photos, scrawled poems, and other things basically chronicling my anorexia, anxiety, and angst from grades 7-12:

Agonized writings (poems, essays, journals, some printouts of an ED recovery forum I belonged to) about being depressed and hopeless and hopelessly in denial about my eating disorder.

Pictures (which will never, ever see the light of day on Facebook or anywhere else) of me looking like a marionette skeleton (and being completely oblivious to that fact).

My dog-eared and thoroughly highlighted copy of the book Wasted.

The prayer journal I kept for about a year, back when I was a super-devout church-goer, where I basically just chatted to God every night before I went to bed. I was so afraid I was "crazy" because I was being punished for something, or that if that wasn't the case, that I deserved to be punished for being so shallow (see Sarah's excellent post addressing this guilt/sinfulness issue).

The best graduation gift ever (sorry I had to photoshop the name out of the top star)...I know the person who gave this too me may be reading this, and if so, you know who you are and what was in this notebook: love you girl, you are a beautiful person and I hope you know how much you helped me get through those years.

Tracy Gold's autobiography and a few other very EDish books that I must have felt obliged to keep hidden at some point before I moved out on my own.

And a single artifact from college: a copy of the magazine with the article featuring me discussing anorexia (and the first use of my Cammy pseudonym) done for a local women's magazine.

Quote from journal, from my freshman year and first relapse since my initial bout of anorexia in the 7th grade:
My heart is freaky this week and I've only been sleeping a couple of hours a night. It feels like a sick bird in my chest, and sometimes I start to get light-headed before I realize I've been holding my breath waiting for it to calm down. I feel so hopeless, like every day is just a countdown of hours I have to endure, and then the whole thing replays itself the next day, and the next, and the thought of a whole life of that makes me want to throw myself off the nearest bridge, I feel like this is a black hole and nobody in the entire world will ever understand what it's like in my head. And if they did, they'd be disgusted. I feel like I'm in a glass box watching the world happen but unable to reach out and be a part of it.

Entries of this type were common for 4-5 years at least, basically 2005 until I went to college and got too busy to journal.

It has put me in a heavy mood all day, for reasons I don't even know if I can articulate. Just weird and sobering to have a box full of evidence of years and years of wasted life, I guess. Sat and had a good cry for the wraith-girl in the pictures that I treated so badly.

I guess it was a form of self pity? I feel so sorry and ashamed for what I did to the girl in those photos.

But maybe I needed that, because it also made me so glad for what I am and what I have now. Not a finished product by any stretch of the imagination, but a damn legitimate work in progress, and, for better or worse, I wouldn't be who I am today without that history.

Maybe it's a good time to put a link to the newest song on my Recovery playlist, because it just seems relevant to the whole "looking back at how far you've come" theme. I thought it was a bit hokey the first time I heard it, but the more I listen to it the more it gets to me.

Love y'all.

Placebo Pity Party (and Broader Recovery Tie-Ins)

2011-07-13T12:51:00.000-07:00

Warning, lots of girl talk! I don't know how many male readers I have these days (I love it when readers delurk, by the way!), but I felt the need to issue a disclaimer, even though I've tried to turn the girly issues into broader recovery lessons. Anyway, here we go.

I think these days birth control placebo weeks are one of the biggest triggers for me to struggle with staying on track with keeping ED behaviors at bay.

Long-time readers might remember that I had a ton of angst and anxiety leading up to starting my birth control pills. I was afraid they'd give me acne, make me emotional, and, most of all of course, make me gain weight.

Various treatment providers had been trying to get me on BC for years to help with my skimpy bone density, but I kept putting it off until I was in a serious relationship and the costs of being afraid of it had a growing potential to outweigh the benefits.

And the result? I LOVE the BC pills and like my body a lot better on them. I did not, in fact, gain any weight when I started taking them, and the hormone boost actually redistributed the weight I had in a more feminine way, which helped to make me feel at least a bit sexier and more confident than if I were still shaped like a rectangular milk carton.

Anyway, gist of it is that after all those years of fearing them, now I HATE the placebo week when I have to take a break from them, and count days til I start them again. 180 degree turnaround in opinion once I actually started them! Which may serve as another, more indirect recovery lesson: even if something is scary and unknown, it's often worth trying and you may be surprised at how positive the result turns out to be.

Anyway, I think the 3 main things about hormonal limbo that freak me out have some broader lessons/implications for recovery, so I thought they were worth discussing and REALLY hope that presenting them through the BC example isn't TMI. Sorry for all the lead-up, this part was the actual point of the post.

1) Water Weight:
On placebo week my weight always shoots up about 3 pounds overnight and stays that way for 3-4 days. I suppose I am retaining water. I'm not sure how this pattern compares to a natural period (never had one), but it sucks. Then again, flux in weight is natural, and this is where one has to cope by reverting to logic, a strong yet sometimes elusive tool in recovery. We know intellectually that an increase in the scale of 3 pounds (or 2 or 5 or 7 or whatever) cannot possibly be fat, as it's almost sure that you didn't consume the calories to produce that result that while you were sleeping. Thus, it must be something else, and does not mean you're flabbier or a failure or any of those things. The reason can be hormones, medication, salt intake; any number of factors. Our bodies are dynamic, and they're not going to be the same from day to day. Yes, bloat sucks, but it's temporary. Probably helpful to have in mind some outfits that you feel ok in on days when you're at the higher end of your weight range, so you don't have to go through the torture of trying on a bunch of things to don't fit "right." I guess the basic message here is to give yourself a break, be kind to your body and don't flip out over things that are out of your control.

2) Lack of appetite:
My appetite digs itself a burrow and dies during that week of the month (okay, I actually cheat and only do the placebo once every 2 or 3 months because I hate it so much, which my gyno says is fine). This is where you have to trade a bit of the intuitive signal strategy for conscienciousness about your intake. I think intuitive eating is GREAT and wish I were better at it, but if you're still sort of struggling with listening to and honoring your body cues, it's important to remember your signals may not always be accurate, especially when you've changed medications, have a hormone shift, etc. If it's the middle of the afternoon and you find yourself still not hungry for lunch, you need to suck it up and nourish yourself anyway. You'll thank yourself later, because taking advantage of that appetite drop to deprive yourself not only weakens your body, but it weakens your defense against future temptations to skip and cut and let the ED edge farther back into your habits.

3) Pain:
Cramps! Damn. I don't have an answer for this one. I have no idea why it was evolutionarily necessary for women to feel like their guts were being rung out like wet towels. I usually can't even sleep through the night for a couple of days. Surely all the mechanics in there could happen without pain receptors being involved. But they didn't ask Cammy how to build everything, obviously, so it is what it is. You can try to spin this positively, I suppose, by using it as a practice for taking care of yourself and giving yourself a break when you're not feeling good. Cuddle on the couch with a hot drink and a good book or tv show, take it easy, treat yourself like you would a best friend that was hurting. It's something that's hard for a lot of ED sufferers, but an important thing to practice.

Again, I hope none of that was too TMI, but I try to be fairly 'tell it like it is' and this is an issue I know everyone deals with. I just happen to have a blog and the inclination to whine about it right now. Wouldn't have brought it up if it didn't tie into the ED, but it also makes it incredibly hard for me to stay on track with eating when I feel both fat and distinctly un-hungry for most of the week.

BUT it always passes. Another good concept to keep in mind. So often we have things weighing on our minds (and at times, in our minds, weighing on our bodies) that drive us to distraction, stress us out, and generally make for a lot of time and energy and wellness wasted on worry and anxiety. But in general, things get worked out one way or another, and what is top on your stress list today may be entirely resolved and forgotten by this time next week, month, year, etc. That's not always the case, of course, but just try to keep in mind that nothing is the end of everything, and it's worth hanging in there.

By the way, I typed this while watching the Women's World Cup game. Even though Match lives and breathes soccer, it has taken this cup series to get me really interested in watching the games on TV. I have a girlcrush on Hope Solo and Abby Wambach is superhuman (see goal 2:39 into that video). Damn, girls! Anyone else watch?

Just Can't Say It

2011-07-10T07:26:00.000-07:00

Seriously, how many times have I thought this? (via PostSecret)

Really, really saddens me to think that other people have gone through it too. I have those mixed feelings a lot when I read PostSecret: something akin to relief that someone understands, but deep regret at the knowledge that so many people out there are suffering in so many ways.

It also makes me realize how good it feels this weekend to be blasting cheesy love pop songs on my radio instead of the same old "low" songs that I always listen to when I'm having one of those spontaenous crying drives during down times. Starting to feel a bit of a crunch about work/school etc, but still feeling pretty strong and positive for now.

Back to "Normal"

2011-07-08T20:43:00.000-07:00

Well after just two days back at home, and having jumped immediately back to my normal food/exercise patterns, I have an observation: god I feel like shit. I am eating more calories than I was on the trip, but I feel incredibly run down. I wasn't exactly restricting while I was away, either; I think I kept myself fairly balanced (hence no weight loss or gain), but even on increased calories now I feel WAY out of balance again. Pretty sure it's the workouts.

Actually, in retrospect I don't think it's all that different from how I usually feel at home on my typical routines, right now it's just juxtaposed with the different experimental treatment I was dealing with on my trip (yes I'm a scientist, sorry).

I guess the contrast between more relaxed on trip and back to the high exercise load here was just striking. I've traveled TONS over the past year, but usually I restrict pretty severely when I travel, so previously I didn't have the rested and fueled feeling upon my return to contrast with how my "normal" (ha) life feels.

Definitely something to think about, I guess.

Light at the End of the Tunnel

2011-07-07T09:18:00.000-07:00

Well hey there. I was at a conference for a few days and then took off to visit family and go vacationing with Match, so almost 2 weeks later I'm home and back in business.

I have to say, it was an AWESOME trip. I really struggled with the eating stuff at first, being out of my normal environment and routines. There were definitely some stressful moments and I wouldn't by any stretch of the imagination say I handled it the way a normal, non-EDer would have, but in retrospect I'm actually a bit impressed with myself.

It helped that we were able to stay very active. The weather was fantastic, so we did a lot of hiking, M. and I tossed a ball around most evenings, and we went on a lot of riverside walks. I think one of my favorite memories of this relationship so far is hiking to the top of a mountain and finding the most picturesque alpine lake, like our own private postcard (Facebook pics to come for those that know me).

With eating, I had a hard time regulating at first, but I did try to keep myself fueled and think I did it well. I loaded up on safe foods when they were available and stepped up to challenges with harder foods when needed. I actually ate a steak, wowza. Note that I'm not against beef for nutritional reasons; I just hate how it's processed and produced in our country and hadn't eaten any in at least 4 years. But I had the chance to try some at the very farm where the cow had been born, raised in a huge lush pasture, slaughtered and meticulously packaged on site by the farmer, with no antibiotics or hormones or other shit added. So I ate some, with no idea how lean the cut was or how many cals I was consuming. And you know what? It was damn good.

I had a full plate at the 4th of July bbq and an ice cream after a hike with Match. I had an unplanned glass of wine one evening. I got girly drinks at Starbucks instead of plain coffee. I used non-skim milk and (gasp) real sugar in my coffee at my family's house and didn't die from it. The family I was visiting was greatly amused by the volume of fruit I can consume, and I easily ate 2 or 3 pounds of strawberries a day because they bought a fresh half-flat of them every morning. I got non-salad entrees on almost every restaurant visit. We had a fitness room at one of the hotels we stayed at, and I ignored it in favor of going on walks and spending time with my boy.

So, given all of that, by the last couple of days I was UBER anxious and convinced I'd gained weight on the trip. I got in last night and was nearly in tears when I stepped on the scale this morning...

...and you know what? I weigh the same, down to the absolute ounce, that I was when I left almost two weeks ago. Huh.

Oh and remember the conference presentation I was so nervous about? I think I may actually have nailed it (not to pat myself on the back too much, but that was the feedback I got and I felt good after delivering the talk) and was approached by several profs with promising opportunities for my next degree program, so I am feeling tons better about PhD opportunities.

The family I was visiting was actually my biological dad's family (I don't talk to him and last saw him when I was 9, 15 years ago). I hadn't seen them since I was 2 years old, and was very nervous about going up there, especially since they have always had a poor opinion of my mom. They have been great to me via letters and email my whole life, though, and the trip went very well. I discovered that my grandmother and I are strikingly alike in many ways, and had a ton of fun getting to know her better and spending time with some cousins that I had never met before. I was really glad to have Match with me, since at this point he's really more like family to me than they are, and it was nice to know that I had my best friend and absolute ally for support the whole time.

And the visit with Match was possibly the best ever. I feel like I say that every time, but every time it feels true. I don't want to get mushy on you, but I really, really am grateful for this boy, and it's harder and harder to leave him every time; we still both cry ourselves to sleep the night before we have to part.

I finally, finally feel like I'm coming out of the funk I seem to have been under for 6+ months. Sometimes it really seems like the dark tunnel will never end, but I'm starting to think I may be reaching the light again.

Intuitivity is Hard

2011-06-26T13:22:00.000-07:00

So I'm currently at a conference, which brings all the challenges and stresses of travel and trying to appear sane around other professionals and potential advisers/employers.

The first day was hard, mainly because it was LONG (several time zone changes) and I spent a big chunk of it on airplanes. I ended up really dehydrated and was up for almost 23 hours straight. And at the social event that kicked off the conference that night, there was almost no food and lots of alcohol, which meant my intent to do well with dinner was shot, since I didn't want to venture out into the city after dark by myself looking for food.

BUT I've been trying to do better. I am sort of testing this intuitive eating thing, but really don't think my body/mind are ready for it. Basically, my body wants food ALWAYS and more of it, and my mind is not okay with that. It's weird, I don't really get hungry between my 3 standard meals at home, but I guess the time change plus being released from my normal environment has made my system think it can go haywire.

Anyway, I have faced down some challenges though. Have had bigger and earlier breakfasts than usual, snacks between meals (since my non-breakfast meals tend to be smaller when I'm not at home) and have had two (TWO) non-salad restaurant lunches in a row now. And yesterday's was from a street vendor with no nutrition info (estimating isn't hard, but still, it's a bit nerve-wracking). So those are WINS. But I just finished one of those lunches, plus a granola bar, and am still famished. My body and I are mutually antagonistic sometimes I suppose. "Intuitivity" is not my strong point, apparently.

Anyway have experiences/advice to share about getting stupid body signals balanced?

Anyway, that's that. The weather here is beautiful and I've had time to walk around exploring, so that helps with the exercise anxiety.

Getting some good leads on profs and am presenting some of my own research on Tuesday.

My lab/rommate is very obese, and I really don't know how to handle it when she makes cracks about her weight. She really doesn't even eat that much, she's just one of those people that got the slow metabo genes. Anyway, I'm glad she can joke about it but I never really know the right feedback to give in that situation. It's not like she doesn't know she's fat, but I'm not going to laugh at her for it even when she's the one that made the joke, you know?

Anyway, adios mis amores.

Bachman Treatment Home?

2011-06-23T18:19:00.000-07:00

Am I the only one that did a double-take at the offhand mention in this article that Michelle Bachman's house served as a "treatment home" for girls with EDs, in addition to other foster kids? One of those "who woulda thunk it" factoids I guess. I am NOT a fan of her by a longshot, but I won't get all political on you here.

Also, while you're over at NYT, I highly recommend this article:

Expert on Mental Illness Reveals Her Own Fight

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words?

2011-06-23T16:01:00.000-07:00

So the Kid Question post touched on relationshippy-ED issues, and there is another one that has been relevant recently that I thought worth mentioning.

Photos. Everyone loves to hate them; chances are that whether someone has an ED or not, they judge photos of themselves much more harshly than others do. It can be a MAJOR source of insecurity, especially with our image-heavy social networking communications.

As you know, M. and I live about 12 hours away from each other, and only see each other once a month (sometimes not even that, our current gap will last exactly 40 days...no fun). And although we have a good collection of photos of us together from our trips, and can look at tons of pictures of each other on Facebook, it's not the same as real-time.

Which means M. often asks me to snap a phone picture (not the kind that would cost me my job if I were in Congress, although I doubt he'd turn those down either. Forty days, man!), just a random one so he can see my real-time face, picture what I'm wearing that day, etc, so he can feel a bit more connected. It's nothing creepy, we've been dating almost 2 years now, and he just wants to see my smile sometimes when he's down, or missing me especially hard.

Which, when you are totally repulsed by your own image, is a damn hard thing to do. Sort of a no-win situation: I either send him a picture that I think is awful and fear disappointing him, or send him none at all and fear disappointing him. It's not like he doesn't know what I look like, of course, I'm just convinced I'm the most unphotogenic person in the world, so even on a day I'd be fine with him seeing me in real life, the pictures are awful.

Not to make him sound like a tyrant, he's anything but. I have never got anything but fantastic feedback on any photo that I've sent him, and he never gets angry if I don't send one when he asks. But I think sometimes in relationships people that are perfectionists get anxiety over doing everything as "right" as possible to the nth degree, and it sucks some of the fun out of the whole thing to be mired in overanalysis, much as I'm slipping into right now.

I guess my main point here is that the photo issue isn't exactly a point of contention, but it's a compromise. He gives in to being happy with getting fewer than he would like, and I give in to sending any at all.

Which brings us to the ultimate point/message of this post: I know all relationships involve compromises, but it seems an ED demands making even more than is typical. Plenty of things can require some patience and understanding from the partner, and some bravery and willing to step up to challenges for the ED sufferer: meal times, restaurant options, activity plans, sometimes intimacy. Hard line to walk sometimes, but in the end I think sometimes working through those things, and the honesty and love that requires, can help a couple to bond even more closely. Or it can cause a lot of strife, depends on the dynamics, of course.

What are some relationship compromises you've had to make, either ED-related or otherwise?

The Kid Question

2011-06-21T20:08:00.000-07:00

Katie left an insightful comment on the A-Z post about whether I'd discussed my complete absence of maternal desire with my boyfriend. Very good question, especially since we're approaching the 2 year mark and apparently are rather fond of one another.

The short answer is yes. The long answer is, as always, it's complicated.

I've told him that I don't have the desire for kids, and have given him much more reasoned and detailed reasons that I've gone into here. And actually, remember back last August when I was having a quarterlife crisis and tried really, reeeeally hard to break up with him? One of the things on my mind, which I told him at the time, was that if he wants to stay in for the long haul he'd be missing a chance to have a family.

His view on the child thing: I think he likes the idea of having a child that is a mixture of you and the person you love, sort of like a cute novelty pet, but he's had a lot of doubts about the parenting side as well. He is actually GREAT with kids, but he worries he wouldn't be patient enough. He used to work in a program for at-risk teenagers, and I think he likes the idea of continuing to do volunteer work like that, to be able to influence kids' lives without everything that raising one "from scratch" involves.

Another factor is that my EDing over the past 12 years has done a number on me in a few ways, and my heart really is not as strong as it should be. Or my liver. Or my kidneys. I told you 24 is old. So it's hard to tell how that would affect either me or a fetus during a pregnancy, but it could be very risky, since your body is absolutely dumping resources and energy into another human that is stacking-dolled inside you.

By the way, public service announcement to anyone out there with an ED that is amenorrhic: you CAN get pregnant even if you're not getting your period. Being that malnourished lowers the probability, sure, but it's still possible, and it does happen. Anorexia is a lot of things, but it's not birth control. Okay lecture is done now.

By the way, I seriously just contemplated what an awesome word amenorrhic would be to pull out during a Scrabble game. Nerd alert.

So the answer to the original question is that yes, it's something that has been discussed. And Match's response has been accommodating. His exact words when I brought it up in the breakup talk were "I want you, whatever the fuck else will work itself out." Granted, it was a statement given under duress.

Really we're not *there* yet to be talking about it seriously. He did mention that he would be terrified that I would do it for him (I think he overestimates my potential for altruism on that front, but oh well) and then have complications, and he'd never forgive himself.

He mentioned adoption, and that was sort of tenser, because I don't have as good of an excuse there. It doesn't put my body at risk, but I still just don't find myself wanting to be a mother. I am a maternal dead end, my friends, I apologize.

Major disclaimer: I hope this doesn't come off that I am anti-child or anti-parenting at all. I have boatloads of respect for anyone who raises a child. I look at the things my mom has done, and still does, for me, and it absolutely blows my mind that someone could be that selfless. A lot of people would/will make great parents, and we definitely need those people. More and more of my Facebook feed is becoming pictures of people's babies and toddlers growing up, and it really is amazing to observe how people are making such beautiful, healthy, smart little kids.

Anyway, I think the pregnancy/child-rearing issue is something pretty significant for a lot of people with EDs (thanks for giving me a good topic, Katie!). Obviously there are the body image factors, and health risks. Also, I've known people with EDs that were fantastic parents, but I think people with EDs are sort of predisposed to second-guess themselves often and doubt their abilities; I think it's pretty common for us to feel like we're not measuring up, even if we can do/are doing a way better job than the vast majority of people out there.

Okay, it seems like when I blog at night I get the rambles quite badly, sorry. Love y'all, hope you're having a good week.

Wrong Answer

2011-06-20T18:12:00.001-07:00

Apparently when your psychologist 1) insists on doing breathing exercises that make you feel like an idiot, 2) instructs you to focus on the feeling of the air going in and out of your nostrils, and 3) asks you what you're thinking, she neither expects nor wants the response "I was thinking about the difference in the structures of primate versus carnivore nasal turbinates."

Therapy fail.

Cammy A-Z

2011-06-19T15:31:00.000-07:00

Haven't posted for a while, but I'm supposed to be writing my thesis this afternoon, and after aout an hour needed decided to give myself a short blog break. Why am I only motivated to do some things when I'm supposed to be doing others? I saw this meme going around the blogosphere and invited myself to participate:

A- Age: 24. Officially in my mid-20s, yikes.

B- Bed size: Queen, although it might as well be a full when I'm alone in it because I sleep on the very edge for some reason.

C- Chore you hate: Folding/putting away laundry. I have two laundry baskets; one for dirty clothes and one for clean ones that I wear often enough that it's really just not an efficient use of time to put them in drawers, right?

D - Dad's name: Not tellin. But I call my step-then-adoptive dad "dad" and my biological dad by his first name, because there's a lot more to being a dad then having athletic sperm.

E - Essential start to your day: I check all my accounts (email, facebook, Twitter, blog, etc) on my phone before I get out of bed. I also always wake up hella dehydrated and down a 16 oz glass of Crystal Light before I do anything else.

F - Favorite actress and actor: I have total girlcrushes on Angelina Jolie and Charlize Theron. And as attraction goes George Clooney has me totally won over. I think Jon Hamm and Leonardo DiCaprio are incredibly talented actors, but I don't find either of them that attractive.

H - Height: 5' 7"

I - Instruments you play(ed): Piano, and clarinet for one year in middle school.

J - Job title: Graduate student (read: I will have no job title until I am at least 35 and I am okay with that or at least I pretend to be when I see everyone I grew up with settling down with careers, marriages, kids, paychecks, and other little things like that).

K - Kid(s): No.No. NO. And, by the way, no. I have a ton of respect for people that are parents, but I am terrified of passing along my dysfunctional genes, and feel like I am way too anxious/impatient/generally unfit to ever be in charge of raising another human being.

L - Living arrangements: Renting a duplex with my canine sidekick. He doesn't pitch in for rent, but he never drinks the last of my Crystal Light or uses all the hot water, so it balances out. My boyfriend lives 12(!) hours away, and I see him one long weekend (4-5 days) a month, which sort of extremely sucks but I think we handle it pretty well.

M - Mom's name: Not telling. But I will tell you she has an embarrassing holiday-themed first name and so has always gone by her middle name.

N - Nicknames: Well, despite the fact that y'all know me by a pseudonym, I am really, really not a fan of nicknames. M. has one for me that I think is adorable, and my mom and dad are allowed to use one from when I was a kid, but beyond that it is birth name only ifyouplease. Maybe because in real life my name is one that is easy to truncate, compress, or otherwise mess up, and so I've always been protective of it in full form.

O - Overnight hospital stays other than birth: None!

P - Pet Peeves: This would require an entire post. Or 50 entire posts. But the ones that top the list are dishonesty, inconsistency, hypocrites, and people who say "expresso" instead of "espresso."

Q - Quotes You Like: Way too many to list. I think one of the most practical is actually from my grandfather: "If you want it done, then do it and don't whine about it." Simple, to the point, and applicable to everything.

R - Right- or left-handed: Righty.

S - Siblings: Two younger brothers. They are actually half brothers but I don't think of them that way. Also, a half sister that I have never met, but I don't really think about her much. No offense to her, but in practice she's a random kid that probably shares the same unfortunate near-sightedness genes with me. I do feel a vaguely defined sense of guilt/pity that she had to be raised by her biological dad and I didn't.

T - Time you wake up: Between 5:45 and 6:15 every morning, sans alarm clock.

V - Vegetable you dislike: Radishes make me want to scrub my tongue with a washcloth.

W - Ways you run late: Getting caught up in reading the news over breakfast in the morning and losing track of time.

Y -Yummy food you make: I make a killer southwestern rice/chickpea dish. And my peanut butter/pumpkin waffle sandwiches will change your life, I kid you not.

X - X-Rays you've had: Routine dental scans, a few bone density scans, and a broken finger, fractured wrist, and strained back. I don't glow in the dark yet, but there's still time.

Z - Zodiac sign: Scorpio, although my birthday lies on the "border day" and occasionally I'm listed as Libra.

There you go. What about you, have responses to any of the above categories you feel like sharing?

love y'all, hope you've had a good weekend!

Challenges D'Jour

2011-06-16T15:18:00.000-07:00

Back at the parent's house; drove up today for my Baby Brother #1's high school graduation. A few challenges:

Challenge 1: Having substantial liquid calories on the road trip up.

Challenge 1A: Doing it on a day when I only got half my normal exercise in.

Challenge 1B: McDonald's smoothies are AWFUL.

Drank it anyway (in addition to real food of course).

Challenge 2: Mom sitting at table with family not eating at dinner b/c she swore she wasn't hungry. When really I know it's probably because she was worried about squeezing into her dress. :(

Ate my own dinner anyway. Even though I was worried about stomach pooch in my dress.

Off for commencement celebrations.

Recovery Wisdom from Ishmael

2011-06-15T07:03:00.000-07:00

As y'all have probably figured out by now, I'm a big book person, and I like to save quotes from books that seem pertinent to recovery. See previous posts here XXXX

I FINALLY got around to reading Ishmael by Daniel Quinn a week or two ago. I knew next to nothing about it, just that it was a short, very famous philosphy-ish novel that had come highly recommended to me by several people.

And I recommend it! If you didn't think you could learn anything significant about the history of our culture and the way our society works from a captive gorilla, think again. (Y'all intrigued yet?)

I also found it to be brimming with really insightful quote. So here we go:

Ones that reminded me of the confusion of being caught eating disorder:

"I have an impression of being a captive, but I can't explain why I have this impression...if you can't discover what's keeping you in, the will to get out soon becomes confused and ineffectual...how can you pretend not to be terrified?"

On getting stuck in a disordered rut and seeming to forget how to be undisordered:

Even if you privately thought the whole thing was madness, you had to play your part, you had to take your place in the story...to step out of this story is to fall off the edge of the world.

On how we can become so accustomed to disordered thoughts and behaviors that we fail to even register them anymore and just see them as our version of normal life:

...hearing it incessantly, you don't listen to it. There's no need to listen to it. It's always there humming away in the background...in fact, you'll find--at least initially--that it's hard to attend to it. It's like the humming of a distant motor that never stops; it becomes a sound that's no longer heard at all.

On how otherwise intelligent and successful people can get so sucked into a disordered vortex:

You know how to split atoms, how to send explorers to the moon, how to splice genes, but you don't know how people ought to live.

Knowing how to live would have to include knowing how to live as flawed being.

On taking therapy and recovery seriously:

What were you expecting to learn from me? An incantation? A magic word that would sweep all the nastiness away? You wanted...something to make you feel better as you watch the end approach.

First I say, 'no, no, it's impossible, completely and utterly impossible,' then I go ahead and do it.

On the challenges of the recovery process:

I think there are a lot of people out there who know the jig is up and are ready to hear something new--who want to hear something new.

You can't just stop being in a story. You have to find another story to be in.

You can't just root out a harmful complex of ideas and leave a void behind; you have to give people something that is as meaningful as what they've lost--something that makes better sense than the old horror.

There wasn't a single thing that was certain. All they could do was proceed by trial and error.

What's ahead isn't doom, it's just a little hump that we can clear if we just pedal a little harder...if the will is there, the method will be found.

It's the journey itself that's going to change you.

Money Whoas and Money Woes

2011-06-09T14:50:00.000-07:00

Money Whoa: Apparently my insurance is covering 75% of the cost for my sessions with this new counselor, which means I'm only paying $30 a week, a total steal compared to normal costs.

I was really surprised it was that easy. Of course when I lose my school insurance and have to buy my own, having this on my medical history will inflate my premiums enormously. Such is life.

Money Woe: I was supposed to be paid today, but the paycheck did not come by the usual time. I contacted Account Services at my university, and was informed there was some problem with the approval to release the funds to me (even though I get the same stipend every month, 12 months a year!), and I may or may not see any money this month.

*insert wailing and gnashing of teeth*

That's pretty much the only important things that have happened today. I've been working on my data for 7ish hours a day every day for the past week and really haven't made any progress at all. I am statistically retarded, apparently.

Ever have a certain type of problem (statistics, putting together a bookshelf, finding the gas cap release on a rental car [yes that's a story from experience]) that has just made you want to bang your head against the wall? Please share!

First Impressions

2011-06-08T18:21:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, thanks for all the support you sent about me starting the new therapist, that meant a ton to me.

So....I don't know. It's hard to tell anything from the first session; it's most a taking down of history, cast of characters in my life, etc.

Pluses: She doesn't do weigh-ins, she's friendly, she has legit ED experience. She asked if I had a picture of my dog. Which I do: in my wallet, as the wallpaper on my phone, and in a catalog of 200 photos stored on my iPod. M. often points out the disparity between that mobile G. museum and the one careworn picture of him that I have in my wallet...tucked behind the one of the dog of course. ;p

Minuses: She's a bit hippie-ish. I'm not sure if this is actually a minus, maybe I'm being too critical. I am very liberally minded, but the spaceyness is something I am not all that into. She also made a negative comment about the fact that I was brought up Catholic...thumbs down even though I am not religious at all anymore, I don't harbor resentment towards that church or any other, and don't like it when people seem to assume that I do. This is an odd follow up to that point, but I'm afraid she's too nice. I really need someone ready and willing to kick my ass if the need should arise.

She is younger than H, I'd put her in early 30's, maybe a bit younger than the last therapist I saw too.

I'm going to go back for at least 2 more sessions, really am giving this an honest try.

She told me that she's perfectly happy to talk about food/exercise/weight if I want to, but that she won't ask me directly every week about what I'm eating, how many hours I'm working out, etc, she wants to focus more on what's going on in my head behind all of that.

In one way I appreciate that; I really don't want to go in to a food lecture every week. I know what I *should* be doing, the issue is that I can't make myself pull it off, for whatever dysfunctional reason.

On the other hand, I can see it being easy to float through with her. Go in and talk for 45 minutes every week, vent and cry and do the feelings and introspection routine, and yet not make any significant behavioral changes. I think that's the scenario I fear the most. Granted, right now I REALLY do need someone to just talk to. But I also need someone that's not afraid to crack the whip on me when I need it.

Of course, she might be tougher than I think. As M. pointed out: "You can't expect a confrontation on the first day, she wants you to hire her!"

She asked what it was that made things work when I was seeing H. I really had a hard time pinning it down. I did mention that she didn't put up with my avoidant bullshit when it came to making changes. Also, H. made me feel respected, even when I was definitely not functioning well. And I just felt like she really had her shit together. I have a high degree of respect for people who know their stuff and still constantly work on learning more and more, I always felt like I was being investigated like a puzzle rather than studied like a petri dish. She told me a lot of things I didn't want to hear, of course, but she was always right.

Anyway, just some rambling impressions. I left feeling pretty ambivalent. Not really relieved or hopeful, it just was what it was I guess. I do think she's at least a better personality fit than the one I saw here last year. I have another appointment on Monday.

In the mean time, I've been really high anxiety this week over work stuff, I am so.so.so ready to be done with this lab, this school, everything. The end is in sight now, though, less than a year left to slog through and this place is going to be dust behind my wagon fo sho.

I hope everyone is having a great week, thanks again for everyone who offered support before the appointment and checked in afterwards. Love y'all.

New Character #2 (Maybe)

2011-06-05T20:58:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow is my first appointment with new therapist. I'll see how it goes before I assign her a pseudonymous letter designation. I'm kind of nervous, for reasons that aren't easy to pin down. I know that the first session is usually just a lot of history giving without much feedback. It takes a LONG time for me to warm up to therapists, too. With H., who was/is amazing, it took a good 6 months for her to really crack my shell. I was at a much more preliminary stage in recovery at that point, though.

Another big thing that is always running through my mind before starting to see someone new (this will be my 6th therapist intake session, although only 2 of those were both voluntary and lasted for a substantial length of time) is whether I'm ready for this. Yes, I can go in there and be talked at and give all the right responses and smile and nod and bullshit the whole thing, but am I going to be "into" the work enough for it to be worth the time and money of therapy again? I want to say yes, but I doubt myself regularly.

But: I've sucked it up and made changes in the past. I've gained a lot of weight in the past, and liked my body better as a result. I've loosened routines and rules in the past, and have found it freeing. I've reduced exercise in the past, and not ballooned over night, and it gave me time to put into way more important and fulfilling things. I *want* to be ready enough that I'm giving this thing a go, at least.

I think the therapy would be a benefit for me right now even apart from ED issues, although I'm 100% sure they intertwine with the other stuff going on. I haven't been able to shake this depression, and I'm just so fundamentally disappointed and dissatisfied with what I've built for myself and my options for the next stage of my life, both professionally and personally.

Anyway, big deep breath and I'll see how it goes tomorrow afternoon. :/

New Character: Trainer

2011-06-05T20:53:00.000-07:00

One thing I haven't mentioned before is that I've actually signed up to work with a personal trainer at the gym, although only twice a month, so now this blog gets a new addition to the cast of characters. We'll call her K. I know, I know HUGE RED FLAG for an overexerciser, right? I get that, and agree whole-heartedly. But hear me out.

I got a free training consultation with my membership, and did it just out of curiousity. I didn't explicitly tell them about the ED, but just that I do a lot of fieldwork and it's a ton of hiking in the middle of nowhere and I've lost weight over the past year and want to put XX pounds back on and also to get stronger. My overall endurance is way too high for my own good, but honestly when it comes to things like upper arm strength I am embarrassed by myself.

M. was really worried about me even going in for the complementary session that came with my gym membership; it caused a big spat that morning. I really wish he'd been a fly on the wall when, after 5 minutes of talking to me, the training coordinator said "Well I can tell you two things right away: You need to eat more often and do way less cardio." I actually lied to him and told him I do a lot less than I actually do every day (cringe, sorry) but that only underscored the point in my mind, obviously. After the session, which I had 100% intended to be a one-time thing, I actually thought it might be a healthy thing for me to do, and I used my crack negotiating skills to get a much reduced price. If my master's degree turns out to be good for nothing else, at least working in a developing country has helped me to hone my market haggling skills.

So what is the point of this trainer thing? I basically have no.fucking.clue. what a healthy exercise schedule is like. I can read guidelines in books, magazines, online, etc, but can't take the next step and apply it to myself. With this trainer setup, someone else, someone healthy and wanting to put weight on me, is designing my workouts, and having a legit opinion behind it makes it easy for me to swallow. They always ask me if I've eaten within a couple of hours before a workout, and emphasize that I need to go get protein right afterwards. When I try to be stoic and don't take offers for a water break, they make me do it anyway.

Of course I haven't overhauled my whole routine. The trainer only does the strength stuff with me and leaves the cardio for me to do on my own. But 3x a week I go in and do the routines she sets up for me, and on those days I do decrease the cardio that I do so at least the time stays consistent and I'm not doing the new workout on top of everything else I was doing before. I've only had 3 sessions, and the trainer is still fine-tuning the prescribed workout for me. We've just been doing about 1/3 of the eventual whole thing at each session so I can take my time on learning the right form for each move. But my goal is that when I have the whole thing laid out, I'll work on decreasing my cardio more. The nice thing about weight-training, from an exercise reduction standpoint, is that it's pretty much impossible for me to do it every day, because my muscles take a while to repair, which helps to keep me from obsessifying it.

The only glitch in the whole thing was that the training coordinator I first talked to was a guy, huge and burly but also super-knowledgeable, maybe late-20s (hot as hell if you must know, but that's neither here nor there), but then the specific trainer they assigned me to is a girl that's younger than I am. Doh. That bothered me a bit at first, but she's pretty professional and legit seeming, so it's fine, and she's not all hardcore and scary like some of the older female trainers there.

Final note, is that EDers apparently make trainers really happy. She was thrilled when I actually brought her in a food diary (I am NOT required to do that all the time, just for one week for us to look at how my eating patterns might need adjusted, with full acknowledgment that she's not a dietitian. And that I already write it down anyway. And that I didn't include calorie tallys or even serving sizes on it, because I didn't feel like giving her that much detail. Anyway the conclusion was that my main things to work on are to eat a bigger breakfast and to spread my protein through the day better. I'll end this monstrously long parenthetical aside...now). "Wow you're awesome, no one ever writes down their food when I ask them to!" I had a good internal laugh on that one. If she only knew... lol. She was similarly surprised that I came in and did the workout in between sessions with her. Isn't that the point of paying her to teach me what to do??? I know that's the idea, but apparently follow-through is a big issue with a lot of clients. I could draw parallels to my therapy history, but I think that is probably obvious enough that I don't have to hit you over the head with it.

Ok, I hope everyone had a GREAT weekend, love y'all.

Food and Mood

2011-05-31T16:48:00.000-07:00

I will start out with some positives: The first 2/3 or so of today was actually really good. I am aware that I really need to keep myself busy in order to keep from severing my last thread of sanity, so found a local community service group on Meetup.com. Today was my first time trying it out: I spent the afternoon volunteering at the food bank downtown (yes, maybe the food bank venue is a bit ironic, but it was the soonest available volunteer event).

I felt a little bit like the new kid, but I actually love meeting new people, and all of the other volunteers were very friendly. My job was to check people in at the front desk: pulling up their accounts on the computer, logging the services they were getting that day, checking for updates on their household status, food stamps, etc, and giving them passes for their food boxes. I REALLY loved that job because it meant I literally got to talk to everyone that came in for help. As reclusive and independent as I can be, I do like talking to people and know I'm fairly good at it.

Also, I liked the service aspect of it. There were some people that were obviously feeling very humbled and consipicuous coming in for food aid, and it was important to me that they be treated respectfully and professionally. I doubt some of those jobless and/or homeless men had been called Mr. X or "Sir" in a while, and you can see just a little bit of respect change someone's demeanor in a big way. Ditto if you complement a mother on how pretty her baby is, mention that you have the same birthday, commiserate about how hot it is outside, etc.

I guess maybe, from an opposite side of the spectrum (please don't think I'm comparing having an ED to being homeless!), I have a sense of what it feels like to be thought of as An Issue, and how pivotal it can be to be reminded that you're actually seen as a Person no matter what your circumstances or problems are.

So anyway, I left downtown feeling better than I have since Match left and I got back from visiting my family, I'm looking forward to doing more stuff with that group.

One downside to that whole thing was that it mean I had lunch almost 3 hours later than usual (my fault for choosing the postponed meal over eating an hour early, I don't claim to be logical, although I truly wasn't hungry before I left home). I had planned ahead what I would have when I got in this afternoon, but I still managed to freak out over a few small blips in that plan and to get frustrated and lose my cool unnecessarily over small things, sending poor G. scurrying under the kitchen table in bomb shelter mode. That hasn't happened to me in a while, because I've been so home-based with my work that it's been a long time since I got that off schedule with my eating. WOW does it do bad things to my emotional stability. I used to get like that often, this was just an unpleasant booster lesson on how it really is important to keep your blood sugar and all that up in order to avoid going nuclear sometimes.

I started on a good note but have to end on a sad one: my family's beloved dog of 14 years died today. He was a sweet, funny, incredibly loving pet, and he'll be very missed. The family had been talking about it and we knew it needed to be done very soon, but my dad took him in today without telling ANYONE it would be this morning. I know it was the kindest thing that could've been done for the dog, but I wish it had been handled in a way that was less traumatic for my brothers, who just had to come home from school and find him gone.

Less than one week til my first appointment with the new therapist. More on that later, starting to have mixed feelings but am not going to let myself back out before I even try her.

Indexed and Bikinis

2011-05-29T06:36:00.000-07:00

I'm a big fan of Jessica Hagy's blog, Indexed, and last week there were several in the span of just a couple days that struck me as being relevant to ED recovery:

In other relevant linkages, the New York Times had a piece about "bikini season" and the accompanying social pressures that had some good insights about how we use our appearance in swimsuits as a sort of index of self-worth, and it also has some good points about how body ideals have changed over time.

Laugh So It Isn't Sad!

2011-05-25T20:15:00.000-07:00

I know that diseases and disorders are no laughing matter, but sometimes you just have to choose to see the black humor in certain situations. You can either laugh or cry, so you might as well own the issue and laugh instead of letting it get you down even more (see here for a post with an example and links to others from this blog, this one is my personal favorite).

Example: My very dear grandmother is losing more and more of her memory. They've ruled out Alzheimer's with various scans and tests, but that leaves the big D word, dementia, dangling over everyone's heads. Still, if that's in the future it is still not a huge issue yet; she does really well relative to lots of other 78 year olds, but she is just getting forgetful more and more often.

Last week, a few days before I got to my grandparent's house, my grandmother listed what she was making for dinner and asked my mom if I would eat that. My mom said it sounded fine, but I wouldn't be there til the weekend. Grandma said oh, okay, she would save it for then. The next day, she did the same thing, and mom told her no, Cammy wouldn't be there for another 3 days. And then they were at the grocery store, and Grandma made 3 passes through the bread aisle and put a new loaf of the same bread in her basket each time, because she knew it was my favorite but didn't remember picking it up a few minutes before. And then they repeated the "Will Cammy eat this?"...."Yes but Cammy isn't coming tonight, she's coming on Saturday" exchange again that night.

My mom told me all of this on the phone, and the first thing that came into my head to reply with was "So Grandma can't remember what day of the week it is or what she just put in her shopping cart, but apparently the fact that Cammy is a bitch about food is ingrained forever!" There was a pause, and then we both cracked up, because she couldn't honestly tell me it wasn't true. LMAO.

Anyway, I don't think either dementia or anorexia are funny and her condition concerns me greatly, but honestly sometimes you have to give the tears a break and just choose to be in control enough to see the humor.

Any examples from your own lives?

Travel Weary

2011-05-24T20:26:00.000-07:00

I'm back in town, 1450 miles, many Starbucks, and a couple of audiobooks later. I had a good visit with my grandparents and mom, and G. was a great road buddy, as always. It can be a bit weird to be back in the town where I went to high school, a lot of memories, some good and some not. I love that part of the country a lot more than where I currently live.

Eating always goes very poorly at my grandmother's house, she just tries so hard to make it easy that she makes it way hard, if that makes sense. She's very attuned to my pickiness and stresses herself out to make things that I'll eat, but often messes up and also watches me like a hawk to see everything I put in my mouth. Plus, a cousin that is staying with them is "on a diet" and is superobnoxious about food all the time. Fun stuff! My mom--who has nevernever had an ED and has a very healthy approach to food--even tries to avoid meals at their house because it's just so stressful.

So all of that made me pretty ready to come home to my own space and routines, but it was bittersweet because I am also coming home to being very alone.

I did get an appointment with a new therapist, although she couldn't fit me in for another two weeks. I have traded some messages with H., though. Mostly to request my treatment record for the new therapist, but just being in contact with her also been a nice reminder that I actually did tackle this, starting from a much weaker position, in the past, and I can do it the fuck again if I put my mind to it.

So the main goal for the rest of the week, I guess, is to get back in the saddle with eating, which deteriorates a lot when I'm traveling. According to my grandparent's scale this morning (the balance kind they use in doctor's offices, not a digital one) I'm the lowest weight I have been in a while, although some of that could've been dehydration. Not happy with that and truly am going to rev back up to meet meal plan tomorrow. I've also got some writing and work to catch up on, the usual. Really making an effort to keep myself busy in order to stave off the boredom/isolation/apathy until things pick back up again here for fall semester.

I am WAY behind on blogs but will be working on catching up, love y'all!

Away Visiting

2011-05-21T20:21:00.000-07:00

So just a quick update. Match Week was fantastic as usual. I was pretty antsy and insecure going into this one, but feel a ton better on that front now. He actually ended up staying an extra day, so we just parted ways this morning.

I told M. about looking in to starting therapy again, and he was really supportive and also relieved. I think it's been weighing on his mind that he's been the only person (in real life) that really knows how much I'm struggling right now (and I don't even get into all the details with him). He's also worried that the depression component is becoming more of an issue, which I tend to agree with. Anyway, he is in psychology as well, and he was pretty cute about checking out the therapist I picked out; he looked at where she went to school, who she studied with, what papers she's had published, etc etc. He wasn't being bossy or controlling about the choice of course, was just showing that he was interested in me having someone that's top notch.

I decided I needed some family time, since nothing is going on for me academically right now and I don't really have anyone in my city, so my G. and I got on the road and am visiting my grandparents for a couple of days. My mom is also visiting here this week, so there's even more bang for my buck on the visit.

I'll have way more in depth updates soon. I'm behind on blogs, of course, but am hoping to catch up soon. Hope everyone is having a good weekend, love y'all!

In Which Murphy's Law Tortures My Match

2011-05-15T20:10:00.000-07:00

So today was supposed to be Match Day, and I really, really needed a good dose of my bf/bff this month.....but his trip down quickly digressed into a comedy of errors.

9 AM: Match leaves his Mom's house (it's about 1/3 of the way between his house and mine, he made a stopover to visit family for a couple of nights on his way here). He is driving his dad's truck with a washer and dryer in the back, special delivery for yours truly, since my new place didn't come with a set.

10:30: Match notices oil pressure gauge is going haywire. He calls his dad, who tells him that the sensor is probably just loose.

11:30 Truck still acting up, he passes a little oil change/brakes shop that doesn't look busy and decides to stop in and get it checked out while he grabs something to eat.

12:30 News comes that the oil pump needs replaced. But the little shop won't do it and no place that can is open on a Sunday. He and his dad start calling every garage in the area, but no luck.

2:00 Mechanic tells him that it "could go another 10,000 miles, or just 3, dunno, it'll die at some point but no way to tell when." Match was about 450 miles from me, and decided to just test his luck and push on.

2:20 Match leaves garage in truck

2:45 Truck dies. Dead, kaput, not going another inch.

3:00 It is decided that Match's dad will drive (3 hours) Match's car to him, and a friend with a tow truck will follow and tow the broken truck (still laden with washer and dryer) back also.

4:30 Dad and friend finally depart, due to unspecified delays/inefficiencies.

6:00 Torrential downpour, Match gets soaked all the way through. I am still not clear on why he didn't just shelter in the cab of the truck; it did not seem a prudent time to criticize his poor survival instincts. It appears that Murphy's Law had zeroed in on poor Match today, the guy couldn't catch a break.

7:30 Dad and friend arrive, load broken truck onto tow trailer, take Match to gas station to change into something dry and get food, since he hasn't eaten since a candy bar at little car shop around 11:30.

8:00 Match finally on the road for another 6-7 hours of driving to get here. Oh and his iPod had died while he was waiting on the side of the interstate for almost 5 hours, so he has nothing to listen to during those 6-7 hours besides patchy country radio stations in all the Middle of Nowhere stretches of road he has to go through.

My poor Match!!! Will be so glad when he's finally here. Things have been tensing up again the past week or two, but I think it's mostly because he was in the drudge of finals and some other high-stress things. And I haven't exactly been on top of my game emotionally. Happens sometimes, but it really got to me this month, with everything else that's been going on. A little bit of reconnection time goes a long way, though, thinking it will be a good week.

Oh and I got an e-mail back from one of the psychologists I e-mailed (I found 3 that looked worth sending inquiries to), may have something set up with her within the next couple of weeks.

Thanks to everyone for the awesome support recently. I hope everyone has a great week, love y'all.

Courage

2011-05-13T14:11:00.000-07:00

As y'all know, I have a "recovery soundtrack" that I started as a therapy assignment years ago and have kept adding to ever since. As a quick Friday goody, I thought I'd share my latest addition:

Key lyrics:

Courage is when you're afraid,

But you keep on moving anyway

Courage is when you're in pain,
But you keep on living anyway
We all have excuses why
Living in fear something in us dies
Like a bird with broken wings
It's not how high he flies,

But the song he sings

I didn't feel very courageous today. I spent a good chunk of it crying, actually, trying to figure out how my life has started to feel so meaningless all the time. I have no idea why I feel so low or how to pull myself up. So I bit the bullet and found a local ED specialist through my insurance company's database, e-mailed her to see if she's taking new patients. If my insurance covers part of it, my family might be able to help me with the rest. I want this to stop.

Stuck for a Title, Sorry

2011-05-10T08:03:00.000-07:00

So, yet another longish break without an update. I've been working very hard to keep myself busy since I moved in down here, and honestly haven't had a ton to report.

Truth is, I feel myself slipping, mindset-wise. I am so incredibly unhappy here, this school was the biggest mistake of my life. And I just don't give a shit about anything right now. I had a week or two where I cried all the time, and now I'm just feeling more and more numb.

I remember one time, a little over a year ago, when I was doing a lot better with ED stuff, when I told my then-nutritionist (miss her, wish I could afford her now that I'm back) "I used to keep myself so thin because I was hurting, it was the only way I knew how to express it. Now I'm not hurting anymore, and I'm just trying to figure out how to get back up to speed without going crazy." Well honestly, I'm hurting now, and over the past few days I've had some thoughts that really scare me, that are sort of a reversal the progress I was describing in that exchange. I don't really know how to describe it. That transition from being afraid of pain and emptiness to craving it. I just don't give a fuck and losing weight is the only way I know how to pretty much flip off life at the moment

I really think I need to be seeing someone. I'm so ashamed to have to ask my parents for money, and honestly they don't have it right now; my mom quit her job to go back to law school a couple of years ago, my dad is about to retire, one brother is starting college in the fall and the other just started driving. I'm a fucking adult and need to handle things like a big girl. Plus my parents have sunk thousands of dollars into therapy for me already, just to end up back here...

A few people have suggested going to the campus counseling center, which is indeed a good idea, but typically those don't treat eating issues, because EDers are such a medical liability. When I reached out to campus services when I felt a relapse coming on as an undergrad, I was "referred to the community", which meant they told me to call my insurance company and see if they'd cover anyone in private practice because the campus counselors wouldn't touch my bony ass with a ten foot pole.

Right now I'm hanging in with eating, but exercise is way out of control, and I know that it is so, so easy for me to slash my food intake if I don't make a conscious effort to keep it up, and that's what my mind has been playing with lately, it would be especially easy with all the traveling I'm doing this summer. My weight isn't in a big danger zone right now, I've been much, much worse, but it's below healthy and down double digits from what it was a year ago (which still wasn't quite to healthy BMI at the peak) and I am scared by how easily I accept and almost like that.

Okay, a few random other updates:

--You know you have body issues when....the most uncomfortable part of a gyno appointment is when the doctor has her hands on your stomach. Lol...and yes that appointment was the highlight of my day yesterday because I actually got to talk to someone for about 45 minutes. :/

--A short while ago I mentioned M. and I were in a period of really awful bickering and spats, and that has, thank god, ended. We finally had a pow-wow on the phone one night, both got out a bit of pent-up emotion, and we've been back to sweet selves ever since then and all is well. He will be here in five daysssss!!!!

--One positive point I'll concede about this move is that my neighborhood is a lot more pleasant than the last time I lived here, much better for dog-walking and convenient to campus. Except for the kamikaze chihuahuas and poodles that for some reason think they can hunt down my 75 pound dog like little furry bullets. Seriously? If my dog had a mean bone in his body he could snap you in half in a heartbeat, yappers, so leave us alone! It really is a pet peeve of mine (no pun intended) that small dogs can get away with such awful behavior, being little is no excuse for bad manners.

--I won't/can't go into details, but my major professor has made a huge mess of the budget for the project that was my entire reason for moving back here in May instead of August, and I am pissed, frustrated, and increasingly jaded about academia.

--The campus gym is closed for the summer, so I got a membership to Gold's Gym. I just felt the need to issue a public review, because I've found the equipment to be very poorly maintained and unclean, I disinfect everything both before and after I use any machine. It's the chain's newest location in our city, but it looks like they got the equipment at a surplus sale or from another gym that was going out of business.

--One benefit to membership is that I get to do the classes free, so I think I'm going to start going to yoga sessions a couple of times a week. I have a DVD I do at home, but it's not the same, and I've never been able to afford group lessons.

--I think I'm going to get another tattoo soon, right after Match visit (he's not enthused about it, but oh well). For those of you that are newer readers, there is a post about and picture of my first tattoo, the ED recovery symbol. I'm really undecided about whether to get the next one (this one will be a four-word quote) on shoulder blade or upper arm part of shoulder (what you'd see if you saw me standing perpendicular to you). I'm not putting the decision to an official vote, but I'm interested to hear your opinions and stories of any of your tattoos! What do you have, where, why, if you feel like sharing?

Anyway, that's the state of things at the moment. I've been a bit behind on blog-reading since the move, but am trying to get caught up, apologies if you get tardy comments from me on week-old posts. Love y'all.

Back to School

2011-05-05T07:54:00.000-07:00

No, I have not actually dropped off the face of the earth, although I've wanted to a few times over the past week or so. I moved back to University town. Moving and unpacking has been INCREDIBLY time consuming. Why do I have so much STUFF???? I've filled 7 boxes of clothes to donate to the local domestic violence shelter, why didn't I do that before I packed up and moved everything? And don't even get me started on the books. I am realizing I will definitely need to downsize my library, which makes me feel like someone on an A&E hoarding intervention show.

On my first official day back in town, my professor conscripted me to grade a batch of term papers for him because he was so busy (mind you, he's had these papers since the first week of April and had yet to even open any of the files until 3 days before grades have to be logged!), so I've been spending 7 hours/day on that in order to get them done by the deadline tomorrow. As soon as I have that completed I plan to do a more detailed update post.

I have to admit that the busy work is probably good for me, I have never, ever felt so lonely and unhappy as I feel living in this damn place, that doesn't seem to have changed since the last time I lived here.

Someone Please Send a Memo to My S.A.D.

2011-04-27T10:06:00.000-07:00

I'm not updating as frequently these days, although not for any particular reason, I think I've just been in a bit of a doldrums and haven't quite known what to say.

Event hough Match and I definitely agreed the last visit was our best ever, for some reason we've been arguing at an unprecedented rate since then. Like, arguments that literally have us bickering for half the day. Part of the reason they're so prolonged is he almost refuses to talk on the phone when we're angry and we always have to resolve things via text. He says it helps that it gives us time to think out our answers, but really I think that discussions suffer a lot when you lack tone of voice and related measures of mood and intention and that he just needs to be a bit braver, but oh well. Like I said, it's not like I'm the faultless saint either. We always do work it out, but lately I've been left pretty shaken over the fact of the argument itself long after whatever the issue that started it has been resolved. It's just a bad time of semester: he's got a lot of stress on him with classes and some other issues, I've got a lot of stress with moving and thesis, we're both flat broke, etc etc.

Also, someone please needs to dial up my S.A.D. and inform it that spring is here.* I am used to stress and angst over ED stuff, but my depression lately has been scaring me. I've literally been spontaneously crying about 4 times a day, and I'm just so sick of feeling so resentful every morning that I have to get up and do another day. I know my life really, objectively, is not bad and is even great, and I just can't figure out what my problem is.

One factor I can identify, though is the ironic consequence that living with my family has made me pretty isolated. They're all gone during the day, and I don't have a network of any kind in this city. I've been traveling so much that I haven't had the chance to join anything or get very involved, and without school or work (terms of my research assistantship at my university, where I have been continuously enrolled even during this year away, are that I can't be employed externally). I'm moving back to University Town on Saturday, though. I won't be in classes til the fall, but I'll be around campus and the lab, and I'm hoping that having an actual peer group again will be a big help.

At the same time, as much as it stresses me having to share a house (most of the stress comes from sharing a kitchen) with 4 other people, I'm sad to be leaving them too. Mainly my mom (sorry, dad and brothers). She is in law school and typically pulls 12 hour days on campus, so I haven't had a chance to do much with her, and I'm leaving literally the day after her finals are over.

So very mixed feelings, and honestly I'm just so drained and hopeless feeling all the time. I need to be in therapy, but I have crappy insurance and less than zero disposable income. I'm hoping that the summer will bring better days, with Match being more relaxed, me having some social options again, a few trips planned, etc.

Okay, that was the latest round of lamentations. I hope everyone had a fantastic Easter, Passover or just a great last week or so in general. Love y'all.

*Abby, I swear I had drafted this post before I saw your comment on Facebook earlier today....lol great minds think alike, or at least hate bad weather alike?

Positive Trip Report, for Once!

2011-04-20T08:14:00.000-07:00

I'm back home and recovering from yesterday's road trip (coming back from a Match Weekend) that ended up hitting both morning and evening traffic in big cities. I'm a pretty good traveler and have done lots of long, solitary driving sessions, but 12 hours behind the wheel is still a wee bit much for my taste.

It was, of course, worth every hour and mile. I think that Match Visit was the best one EVER. I can't even pin down why. We actually did a lot less structured activity this time (going to museums, shopping, out to eat, etc). We did go to two plays (gotta love student rate tickets), but those were the only formal outings besides his morning class on Friday and Monday; we mostly just hung out with each other.

It was fantabulous.

I also did the best ever with my eating while I was there. The reasons for this are easier to identify, I think.

1) I did manage to get some workouts in. Match got me a guest pass for the university's rec center to use while he was in class. It seemed like a nice compromise, because it didn't take time away from Us, and it improved my mood and anxiety level by orders of magnitude for the rest of the day. I know some of you are thinking "he checked his EDer girlfriend into the gym?" I do feel bad that I put him in positions to potentially be enabling sometimes, but we specifically addressed that beforehand. The truth is that that gym time while he was in class was still less than half the working out I would have done on a typical day at home, but it gave me enough of an endorphin boost to be a lot more relaxed and confident the rest of the day. It vastly improved our quality of time together, because usually by the latter half of a visit I'm getting very cranky and anxious and am restricting my food quite a bit, which sucks for both of us and makes me feel interpersonally incompetent on top of everything else swirling in my mind.

2) The weather was nicer, so we got to do some nice long walks. Being out moving and talking in the sunshine is a major mood booster on top of helping with the exercise anxiety.

3) We ate in much more, instead of going to restaurants. We are both achingly broke at the moment, so the primary reason was money. But another benefit is there are some things I am way more comfortable eating if I prepare it as opposed to someone else. So eating in is both cheaper and tends to improve the quality/quantity of what I consume.

4) I think I'm just getting more and more at ease with eating "real foods" in better amounts around him. Long-term exposure therapy, I suppose. He still eats like a growing boy, so it's not as if he's going to judge me for putting away X amount of anything non-salad, you know?

Anyway, that's the run down of that. I still wasn't eating 100% of meal plan, but even with the gym sessions I was exercising much less than usual and I did consistently come closer to MP amounts than on previous visits, so at least my trajectory is positive, right?

I know it doesn't seem ideal that a big reason this trip went better was that I caved to exercise urges, and I know I need to keep working on that.

But getting in that bit of activity cleared my mind enough to really enjoy randomly laying down on the couch one afternoon and ending up staying there for over two hours, just talking about everything and anything with my boy; or on the spur of the moment to decide to make ourselves pancakes and Malibu screwdrivers for dinner, just as two examples.

And having that positive experience will make me a lot more likely, in the future, to realize those things are worth sacrificing a few days of routine.

My overall mood and outlook is a lot better now than it was a couple of weeks ago, too, I think this trip was a much-needed booster.

By the way, I really, really love that my boyfriend is the best friend I have ever had. I won't turn this mushy, but I didn't want to leave.

Post-Interview Jeebies, etc.

2011-04-14T14:03:00.000-07:00

I think the response to my last post was one of my favorite sets of comments on this blog, thanks a lot for the advice/support/sharing of your own experiences. I forgot to mention that this weekend is my monthly trip to visit M, so I'll be away for a few days. The timing could've been one reason things have been a bit tense over the past week or so. I think as the month wears on, both M and I get a bit lonely and grouchy, even though we text throughout the day and talk on the phone a few times a week, and that makes small things more likely to feel disproportionately upsetting.

I had an interview with a potential PhD adviser yesterday, and it kind of threw me for a loop. I think I performed fine. It was a dinner meeting, which always adds kind of another layer of stress to the situation but I think I handled it okay. What really bothered (and is still bothering me) is that I left not really sure that the position is what I want, for several reasons. I had really been building up the opportunity in my mind, and now I feel a bit adrift as far as what I'm aiming for or what I can plan for. Oh well, I still have some time to figure it out.

On the plus side, I got to hang out with my homegirl Amy, so it was worth the 8 hour drive! And now I'm at M's place for my monthly dose of being spoiled rotten. (By the way, his two older brothers are totally available, fyi...just kidding, of course, but I think his mama knew how to raise boys right! ;p ).

Alright, I hope everyone has a great weekend, love y'all.

Love and Other Drugs and Anorexia

2011-04-12T16:20:00.000-07:00

So my Netflix indulgence yesterday was 'Love and Other Drugs', with Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal (swoon). I expected it to be kind of a light romantic comedy (which I don't even usually watch, just wanted something to unwind with), and in some ways it was, but some parts of it hit me a lot deeper than others.

The basic gist of the story, without giving anything away, is that Anne Hathaway's character has early onset Parkinson's disease, and she and Gyllenhaal's character, a prescription drug salesman, meet at a doctor's office, are mean to each other at first, then become "just" bed buddies and then fall in love. Standard kitschy movie stuff, I know.

But one of the deeper currents it hits is the role of her disease in their relationship. She is really worried that it makes her unlovable, or at least undeserving of his love/attention when there are so many other, healthy women out there that are eager to throw themselves at him. I won't give away details of the plot, but this worry manifests itself in some challenging ways.

Obviously, an eating disorder is much different than Parkinson's, I'm not at all trying to say one experience is equivalent to the other. But still, that issue of feeling like there's something wrong or damaged about you, and knowing it will affect your relationship, is applicable to a lot of illnesses, including EDs. The movie struck a chord with me, to a much greater degree than expected.

So in a big coincidence, today Match initiated a painful conversation about how my ED affects "us." And even though he was not being mean or accusatory and emphasized he doesn't want to even think about letting it end things, it hit straight to the core of a lot of fears and doubts I've had myself. I know it has to be frustrating to be around someone that has rigid preferences for meal times/types, someone that gets anxious and irritable if we don't get enough activity/exercise in on a given day, someone that totally shuts down if you touch their stomach while you're cuddling, someone that does self-destructive things day in and day out.

I get that that has to be challenging, when there are so many other carefree and less complicated women out there, which is why I still have a hard time fathoming that I've found someone that knows about all my issues and still wants to be in a serious relationship with me. It makes it hard for me to be optimistic about the future. What happens when we're living closer to one another again? We lived a mile away from another in the first half of our relationship, but our relationship has progressed since then, so there would probably be more pressure for time commitments. Or what if it ever got to a question of whether to live together, which may very well happen if we go to the same school for our PhDs? What if he just wants someone that will share a pizza with him late at night, or will be up for random snack stops and celebratory desserts and things like that? What if he wants someone that will eat birthday cake if he buys one for her? (It would be bought, I know this man and Martha Stewart he is not, LOL). Most importantly, what happens when he realizes I'm not worth putting up with the bullshit?

The main things he was concerned about were just issues that affect how often and how we see each other and communicate, any constraints on how we interact. For example, even if our monthly visits weren't limited in duration by school/work schedules, I would have a hard time lasting more than a few days without my normal exercise routines, and during those times I don't have my normal food habits either. I'm not extremely body conscious around him, except that I really hate for him to touch my stomach. He's mostly compliant with that, but I know he doesn't like the constraint. He'd love to do webcam Skypes, but I don't like to because I'm self conscious about how I look (not that he doesn't know what I look like, but those cameras are super-unflattering and it makes me antsy). There are big chunks of the day when we can't talk/text because I'm doing some kind of workout.

Anyway, things like that. I really don't think he meant it to be an ominous discussion portending a relationship turning point thing, just something that had been on his mind. But it threw me for a serious loop, because of all the doubts I've had/do have on my own related to my doubts that I have any ability to let someone very close to me in the long term.

Not sure how coherent that explanation was. Anyway, really interested in your feedback on this one: In what ways has your ED affected your relationship(s), past or present, and how did you deal with it?

Losing a Child to Anorexia = Negligent Homicide?

2011-04-04T17:44:00.000-07:00

So I had an interesting exchange with my madre this morning. As I've mentioned before, she's in law school right now, and she told me she had to present a case the other day that she had a "very hard time with." Being the considerate listener that I am, I asked her what the case was about....and it turned out it was about a man who was convicted of negligent homicide when his 15 year-old son died of anorexia.

The basic story is that the man (employed by the U.S. Army, this comes in later) was divorced and his ex-wife had custody of the son. When the boy was 15, he came to stay with his dad and his dad's new wife, after years of estrangement. The mother had not warned the father about the eating disorder (this was the late 80's, and the kid was male, so there's a chance it hadn't even been diagnosed as such). The boy digressed while he was with the father, lost a third of his bodyweight (which was unhealthily low to begin with). The father took him to a doctor and tried to implement the doctor's suggestions for dealing with it at home, but the boy was totally uncooperative and "physically confrontational" when his dad tried to get him to eat or go to a counselor. He lied about food consumption, did whatever he could to conceal his weight loss, etc.. The boy lost about 40 pounds in three months, and went home to the mom.

When she saw the state her son was in, she called and made an appointment for him to be seen by a doctor the next day...but the boy died that night.

And eventually charges were brought against the father for the death in United States versus Robertson, and the father (Robertson) was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for allowing the boy to starve under his care. He later turned to the Military Court of Appeals, and the conviction was reduced to negligent homicide.

Just fyi, the definition of "negligent homicide" is that a death was allowed to happen when someone failed to prevent it despite an implicit obligation. It's most often used when people make dumb mistakes with vehicles and end up killing passengers or passersby.

I could immediately see why my mom had a hard time with this case, and I tend to agree with her. When I was 13 (and again when I was 15, and 16, and 17, etc), I also basically got myself out of treatment by being a royally uncooperative brat, behaving pretty much exactly as is reported for the boy in this case. In retrospect, at my rock bottom I should have not only been in counseling but also hospitalized.

What if I had been just a little bit less lucky, and my heart had decided not to keep plugging painfully along one night, and boom, could my mom have faced a charge like this, even though she was aware of the issue, had taken me to doctors, had begged and pleaded and cried about the issue every day? Or my dad, who happens to be in the military like the defendant in this case. Or what if my biological dad, who never passes up an opportunity to terrorize my mom (years after their divorce, he used her social security number to rack up tens of thousands of dollars in credit card charges, just as one example) had brought charges against her out of spite for not making him aware of my disorder, as if he would have been able to magically fix everything if he'd only known.

It breaks my heart to think about it.

I have mentioned on this blog, multiple times, that I do wish my parents had pushed me harder, had been less easy to steamroll, had really kicked my bony ass when it came to being serious about beating the ED. And that's true. But I also have and do acknowledge that I made it extremely difficult on them, and I don't know that I could have done much better if the situation was reversed. And I would never, never put the blame on them for causing or exacerbating the issue, and wouldn't in my wildest dreams consider them to have been "homicidal" in their actions (or lack of action), as implied by the ruling in this case.

Both involuntary manslaughter and negligent homicide are most often used in vehicular accidents, when people make dumb mistakes driving and end up killing passengers or passersby, without malicious intent. I don't see this most common usage as applicable to losing a child to an eating disorder, though, especially when there is a record of taking the child to doctors, because it's not like he just averted his eyes for a second and boom, the kid had starved to death like a hummingbird or something. He obviously made an effort and had a lot of mental and emotional turmoil over the issue. I live with two teenage boys right now, and good god, try getting one of them to do something he doesn't feel like, even outside the terror and anxiety that motivates ED obsessions.

Okay, that is my verbal vomit on the issue. I am really interested to hear other opinions about it, though. What do you think, from your experiences with your parents or as a parent? What is your reaction to the ruling, do you think there's any merit, any commentary on why no charges were brought against the mother, who had been his primary caretaker for years? (Not that I think there should have been, just curious that the dad took the burden of the legal charges). Penny for your thoughts?

Musing and News-ing

2011-04-03T07:33:00.000-07:00

So I've been a little bit stumped, as far as this blog goes. I think I'm pretty much in a doldrums and just don't feel like I have a ton that is new or interesting to say.

I have been eating my mealplan, woo hoo, same amounts/types of things I've kept to (despite intermittent digressions while traveling, etc) for at least 2 years now.

I haven't really gained back much of the weight I've lost over the past 9 months, but I definitely haven't lost any more either.

Exercise is same as it has been since I've lived here.

I know I'm out of balance and do have some very fatigued days, but I sort of do the mental equivalent of shrugging it off, I guess.

Hence, the paucity of posts here, becuase there isn't much going on that y'all haven't heard me whine and moan about multiple times before.

Earlier this week, Carrie astutely pointed out that sometimes not being bothered by something is the most bothersome part of the whole equation, and that may be the best approximation of how I feel now. I'm relatively healthy compared to past periods, in terms of organ function and overall robustness. I can fit pretty much whatever food I want (fyi the new Ben and Jerry's Clusterfluff flavor is omigodgood, especially if you're into peanut butter) into my meal plan, so I don't really feel deprived there, although my body definitely does feel sort of out of whack not too infrequently (okay, frequently). I know I *could* make a lot of progress and hate the idea of being controlled by this forever. But when it comes to the boots-on-the-ground action to change things, I think I've just gotten complacent with the status quo. Not that I at all condone stagnancy, don't get me wrong, and I don't want to feel like I've sacrificed good for mediocre with regards to my life...it's complicated, I guess.

My lifestyle will change a bit after I move, which is dredging up some anxieties, but I'll save that for another post.

So anyway, enough the the musing and now for some news-ing. I OFFICIALLY got the duplex I applied for, lease is signed, I'm really happy about that! It is more private and in a better location than the condo I lived in my first year in that town, plus it's cheaper. It's just down the street from where M used to live...I actually saw his car on the Google Maps street-view when I was showing my mom the neighborhood, lol.

I have my taxes in, I've made progress on that medical bill dispute, I got my conference abstract in before the deadline (which they promptly extended by 2 weeks the day after I'd submitted mine, but oh well...).

So things are a lot more tranquil than they were a week or two ago. M. is crazy busy with an onslought of tests coming up next week, so I haven't been getting quite as much attention as usual (spoiled princess alert!). Of course I want him to do well and don't guilt him about that, you gotta do what you gotta do and I want him to be successful (although he feels guilty all on his own when we aren't talking as much). I think the only thing that bothers me is that he studies in groups way more than by himself, and the majority of the students in his cohort are female...but I trust him 100%, have met all those girls, and don't seriously feel threatened even if it does pick at my mind a bit. I am REALLY looking forward to moving so that I'll be more connected with my peer group. Countdown is at 27 days now.

I hope everyone is having a fantabulous weekend, love y'all.

Monday's Good, Bad, and Challenge Items

2011-03-28T06:03:00.000-07:00

The good news:
I think I found a place to live! Found a cute duplex just half a mile from campus, quiet neighborhood with fenced backyard for the G-ster. It is actually just 2 houses down from where M. used to live, before he moved to go to grad school (just to clarify, in case anyone was confused, I'm moving back to the *same* town I lived in last school year, before I moved up here to save money by staying with family in between field excursions). I know the neighborhood already, and it's way better for dog-walking than the place I lived before in that town. I still hate the city, but I think the better location this time will make it at least a bit more tolerable.

That isn't finalized yet, but they have it on hold for my while they process my application, so hopefully it'll be a done deal by the end of the week.

The bad news:
The cause of the tooth pain I mentioned in the last post was a lost filling. :( I had a routine cleaning last week, and am going to get the filling replaced tomorrow. They put a temporary sealant over it, so pain wasn't so bad over the weekend.

The challenge: M. has family just about 30 miles south of here, and his mom is in town for a visit. So I'm going over to meet her today, she wanted to show me around the family farm and visit for a while. We arranged for a mid-morning meeting, my suggestion to avoid awkward food situations, but then she sprang on me that she wanted to cook us lunch and already had a recipe in mind. It's vegetarian, but not all that Cammy-friendly for various reasons...so it will be a challenge to spin that situation without looking weird or offending her. If you recall the post from way back when, you'll remember she does know I have a history of anorexia, but I think is under the impression that it is pretty much a bygone and solved issue. Still, will definitely feel under the microscope....big deep breath. She's nice and funny and very enjoyable, so I really just want to focus on that and have a good time. M. has 2 older brothers (one is available, ladies! ;p) but no sisters, so she doesn't get "girl time" that often!

Ok, updatage later. Happy Monday everyone, love y'all!

Crushed

2011-03-23T08:10:00.000-07:00

Warning, epic ventage is forthcoming.

I am really, really stressed and overwhelmed right now. Just a ton on my plate, I haven't felt great, and I'm in that mode where I hate going to bed knowing that I have to get up and face another day in the morning. I just feel crushed by everything at the moment.

A few items on my mind:

-Finding a place to live when I move back to university town in May. Which is extremely hard when you have a large dog that excludes you from many complexes/rental companies. And when the town is shitty and most of the places you can afford are not safe.

-Planning summer trips, which include, in the course of 3 months, 2 international field expeditions, one cross-country trip to a conference, one trip to see my biological dad's family (they've only met me twice in my entire life), a trek home to visit my maternal grandparents, and trying to squeeze in visits with Match.

-Renewing my car registration and driver's license in a state that is a 10 hour drive away.

-Having major tooth pain issues, and zero dental coverage on my student insurance package.

-Apparently I owe the medical center in University Town $500, I have NO IDEA why but they reported me to a debt collector, so now it's on my credit score right before I'll be applying to rent places when I move back. The lawyer involved refuses to return my calls or answer written requests for an itemization of the charges.

-Taxes. They don't withhold it from my stipend through the school, so I have to set it aside every month and pay up a lump sum at the end of the year. I did that, but have stress over whether there will be any curveballs I hadn't budgeted for.

-A prospective PhD adviser that I was really excited about hasn't returned my last email for over a week.

-I am statistically incompetent, apparently, and am struggling to get my data together to make a coherent abstract for the talk I'm giving at a conference this summer.

-Another journal submission rejected by reviewers. FML. At this rate I need to make the new acronym FMC, Fuck My Career.

-I'm just sick of not having a peer group or friends here. I literally don't talk to ANYONE all day besides texts with Match when he's not in class/office and a few encounters with my family in the evenings. Less than 2 months now til I move back to University Town. I actually really hate that city and school, but at least I'll have someone to talk to during the day besides my geriatric gym buddy. Although I will indeed miss her.

-Major travel burnout. Dreading having to make the 11 hour drive (each way) to visit Match next month. Don't get me wrong, I'm dying to see him, but I am just so over being on the road right now. In May I'll be moving to University Town then gone half the month to another hemisphere. June I have to come back here for my brother's high school graduation, then fly 3000 miles for a meeting, and we're going a few days early because my adviser wants to take the lab sight-seeing/camping. Then directly after the 5 day conference I'll be spending almost a week with my estranged family I haven't seen since I was 2. Then just 2 weeks after that I'm back to the other hemisphere again for last field session. And again, have to squeeze Match Time in somewhere. I'm just really, really overwhelmed and unsure of how I'm going to handle that when it comes to food, exercise, and general sanity.

So all of this resulted in a 3 hour crying session yesterday evening. M. was also having a bad day and we were tense, and that kind of put me over the edge with feeling like an incompetent failure at EVERYTHING and wishing I could just turn the world off.

Although in the past I've mentioned that my mom can be disconnected sometimes when it comes to talking about hard stuff, she really is an awesome person. She didn't get home from school until almost 9:00, but noticed something as off with me (my slapstick brothers and dad are oblivious to cues) immediately and came up to my room for a pow-wow...okay, it was a meltdown. Much sobbing and snot slinging later, I did actually feel better. Was nice to just unload, and she is uber-smart and capable, she went over every issue with me and made me see how it can work out, without minimizing or dismissing my stress.

Interestingly, later when I'd calmed down and went to tell her good night, she also asked how my eating has been, said she worries about that when I'm stressed. I just nodded that it was ok. And she asked if I was sure, and I nodded. And that was that. Seeing how I display my fantastic powers of conversation and confession like that, I really can't blame her for not addressing it very often. In truth, my eating is ok, I'm doing the meal plan, which is designed for someone my age/height doing an hour of cardio a week....but that's a joke, and the exercise is still totally kicking my ass. I don't know how to explain that to her or what the hell I'd expect her to do about it anyway.

Ok, sorry to have made y'all a part of the unloading, thanks to anyone who read down this far. much love.

The Lonely Space

2011-03-18T20:09:00.000-07:00

So, I've lagged in updating about my recent pilgrimage up to Match's place. I drove instead of flying this time, since both of us are flat broke, and the trip really taxes me, especially since there was wintry weather on the way up.

We cooked at home a lot more this time (see the reference to us being Flat Broke Kids in last paragraph), which does make it easier for me to eat better, since I don't do the freakout-overcompensation cycle that I sometimes fall into if I don't know nutrition facts for my food. No, it's not the best way to be and I promise I am working on that. But for now, preparing my own food means I'm more likely to get better nutrition and to be more relaxed about it.

And I did challenge myself with eating more "real foods" around him. For a lot of our relationship, my eating habits around him have consisted of rabbity restaurant meals and maybe a granola or protein bar on the sly at some point during the day. Part of it is that I'm paranoid about bloat around him, part of it is that I feel almost obligated not to draw attention to my eating by doing something new and different. I know he wouldn't judge me and would actually probably be thrilled, but it's just complicated.

Case in point: we splurged and went out to a Hibachi place for his birthday on Monday night. I got the seafood special (lobster, scallops, shrimp...told you we splurged!) and ate every damn bit of seafood they put on my plate, even after watching them cook it in tons of butter and oil in front of us. M noticed this, and he made a small but appreciated comment that it was awesome and he appreciated me playing along on a special night out with him. Sort of similar to our awesome Valentine's Day dinner last month.

So anyway, there were indeed ups. There were also downs. I felt guilty about hibachi and definitely under-ate the next day, to the point that I felt fuzzy and headachey on our last evening together. The thing is, he is so blissfully oblivious to nutrition facts and calories that he honestly doesn't realize that I can make myself 3 meals a day while still consuming less than half my normal calories.

He said at one point that he was really glad I was doing so much better with food, and I was happy he was happy, but inside I really felt very lonely and sort of lost...in fact I was eating about the same calories as I have on previous trips there, it's just that I was hiding it better from him by cooking with my fat-free this and light version that and eating everything at meals instead of having surreptitious snacks later that he didn't see. Plus I am highly aware that he is very unaware of how many calories are in things. It often takes me longer to finish meals than him because my food is bulkier (he doesn't eat anything that might have contained chlorophyll at any stage of its life cycle), so it probably indeed seems like I'm getting plenty if you don't crunch the numbers.

I really did try to articulate something to explain what was going on, but I think he misread my hesitance for annoyance that he'd brought the issue up, and he quickly diverted to a different subject. Which brought both relief and a sort of pent-up disappointment for me.

And I hate ever feeling like there's something I can't tell him. Besides being my boyfriend, he's also the best friend I've ever had, and it's awfully strange and lonely to feel like something that affects me so much is something I can't explain to him.

So this discrepancy bothered me, and I kind of ruminated on it for a few days. I finally brought it up to him yesterday. We talked about it, and he did express a bit of surprise and said he was glad I opened up, because he didn't want to be kept in the dark about something that was such an issue for me. He said he wouldn't have guessed that the 3 meals I was making were so little calories, wasn't aware I was compensating for hibachi the day after, etc etc. He didn't get mad or freaked out when I told him, he was mainly concerned that I am not always open with him for fear of creating stress/tension. How the hell have I not scared this guy away yet?

And I hope it doesn't seem as though I have some need for him to see me as sick or having a special issue. I want him to know when I'm having a hard time because it's so lonely hiding it, but I don't want the ED issues to be my identity, either in this relationship or with the wider world.

So that was that. I really, really hate when the ED affects how I interact with the people I care about, I think one of my biggest motivators to recover fully is just to be able to be a fucking normal person to be around.

Been back on meal plan as normal since I've been home, by the way. Pretty burned out on travel at this point and really just need some recharge time.

love y'all

Out of Office

2011-03-14T15:51:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me that I didn't do a "I'm on hiatus" post before leaving for my most recent trip. I'm currently at M's, up here for almost a week to reconnect after my last research trip and celebrate his birthday. So anyway, I am gone but shall return later this week!

I'm working hard at eating more normally while I'm here this time. I've done a bit better, despite the fact that the cold weather is still really restricting our outdoor activities (who goes NORTH for spring break, I ask you? Someone who must love their northwards boy a lot, lol). It's been pretty challenging and I've had more body anxiety issues (even though I weigh exactly what I did the last time I saw him), but I think I am making progress . . . maybe not a ton with total intake of calories, but with being comfortable cooking and eating more "real foods" in front of him instead of just going the salad route in restaurants and having a granola bar or something on the down-low later. I don't think his perception of what this means quite matches my experience of it, but I'll get into more of a discussion on that in a post when I'm back home.

Ok, hope everyone had a great weekend, love y'all!

Heart Scarred by Over Exercise

2011-03-09T06:34:00.000-08:00

As someone who continues to struggle with overexercise problems, my (potentially scarred) heart sank a bit when I read this New York Times article about a study that shows that hard-core athletes have significantly higher levels of scar tissue on the heart than people of similar ages that were not rigorous athletes. Kind of disheartening (pun intended, I'll be honest), but something to be aware of, so I wanted to share.

There have been more than a few periods of my life where a turnaround in ED behaviors was motivated purely by fear because my heart palpitations had gotten so bad. I had to wear a Holter monitor once in high school, and I think if anything could have served as an eye-opener, it was that.

It also struck me that the study subjects were male marathoners (the authors do say that they predict the results would be consistent in women, although a female trial hasn't been conducted yet) and lab rats, most of whom probably kept themselves as well nourished and fueled as possible during the competition days, it would be interesting to see a study on the degree to which nutritional stress exacerbates this effect.

Inadvertent False Confession

2011-03-06T08:30:00.000-08:00

I don't get my mom. I love her, but I don't get her. Granted, it's probably mutual.

A couple of days ago, the morning after I got back from my trip, I was telling her about how the adventure had gone and mentioned the nights I was sick. I made the same comment I used in my post, the hyperbolic "I think I threw up everything I'd eaten for the last 6 months."

I guess she was only half-listening to me (she was Facebook-cruising on her laptop), because apparently she managed to tune out everything but that phrase. There was a pause, and she turned to me very solemnly and said, kinda shaky, "You have?"

I was quick to correct her perception and assure her, that no, I was just exaggerating about the prodigious volume of stuff my body managed to eject over the course of 48 hours. Purging is something I have never done, not once, in the 11+ years of my ED. I tried a couple of times early on, I won't lie, but just couldn't seem to do it and was too scared of side effects to really try.

So anyway, I'm not sure who was more surprised: my mom, at what she thought, albeit momentarily, was a confession to a new and prolonged ED behavior, or me, that 1) she would think I'd been doing that in her house unnoticed for 6 months and 2) that she actually seemed very concerned and willing to talk about it. You see, my mom's main way to deal with my ED has been to largely pretend it isn't there. Okay, not largely, almost completely. Even now that I'm living with them again, my eating/exercise habits are totally not discussed, it's just assumed I'll do my own thing. Which, to be honest, is how I prefer it, of course, right? Especially after living on my own for 5 years, and at this point I'm just 8 weeks from moving out again anyway.

I think her rationale has always been that she can't *make* me do anything, and sees it as kind of a futile power struggle to involve herself. I don't blame her for my ED at all or hold resentment in any way, but I think I have a lot of regrets that she wasn't more involved and forceful in the early stages of my ED, when it was less ingrained in my life and a bit of Tiger Mothering might have helped me to avoid still living with it over a decade later. Not that she could have "saved" me and refused to, of course. At the time I just wanted to be left the hell alone. I always just wonder how it would have been different.

Anyway, even now, usually if I bring up something about my ED she will brush it off or even blatantly blow it off. So this new shocking (yet false, although unintentional) confession that she thought she heard was sort of an interesting event. Not quite sure what else I wanted to say about it, it just seemed noteworthy.

Back (Relatively) Intact

2011-03-04T07:02:00.000-08:00

Well hello there. I am home, got in yesterday evening after an insanely long day of travel. Is always so surreal to me to wake up in one hemisphere/continent and go to bed that night in completely different ones.

The trip went well in many ways. Field assistants were great, weather cooperated, data was fanfuckingtastic. As much as I was kind of dreading going, due mostly to just plain travel burn-out, I think it was good for me to spend 10 days getting some serious UV (with sunscreen, of course, SPF 100!), definitely felt the Winter Blue Haze melting off of my mood. Seriously, how can one be unhappy when you wake up to this view every morning?

On the downside, I was violently ill for the first two days/nights at the field site. I mean, I felt like I threw up everything I'd eaten for the last six months. And my body was kind (NOT) enough to have those attacks only at night, and both nights were stormy, so I was basically staggering out into the wind and rain to puke every hour for two nights in a row, by the end I was just retching up blood. I ended up pretty weak and dehydrated as hell, and my esophagus felt ripped to shreds, obviously, but did bounce back pretty quickly. Lots of water and bananas to get my potassium back up, and a whole day (a rare rainless day too, it killed me) off of work. Getting sick is exactly the situation I always dread, because besides the physical stress, I always have volunteer field assistants that literally can't/don't know how to do the work without me, so if I'm down then the whole team is stalled.

Eating and overexercise went about as they normally do there. My body was definitely ready to go by the time the departure date came around. I tend to hit a major exhaustion point around Day 7 in the field, and that was exactly the number of days I was there, this was a relatively short jaunt down there. Weight had decreased a few pounds upon return, but expecting it to come back quickly as I get back to normal routine here. I'm still on Cipro (antibiotic commonly prescribed for tropical stomach ooglies), which is also messing up digestion somewhat.

And holy hell, I was in the tropics just 36 hours ago and woke up to it being 25 degrees here. ACK, my equatorial body doth protest!

Anyway, despite the rather miserable first two days, the trip went incredibly well. No problems with flights or transportation, weather was good enough for me to get work done in time despite sick day and it being rainy season. I'm superthrilled with my research results. And less than one week til I see Match again!

And G. was so happy to see me that he literally has refused to be more than 6 inches away from me since I walked in the door last night. He was even pressed right up against the tub while I was taking a shower, lmao. I am validated!

That's my updatage d'jour. I am WAY behind on blogs but am going to try to get caught up this weekend. Missed y'all!

Approaching Travel Burnout

2011-02-20T20:31:00.000-08:00

I'm exhausted and have to wake up to get ready for the airport in less than six hours, so this will be a brief farewell (for now) post. Shipping off in the morning, sort of mixed feelings.

I think I'm a bit burnt out on travel. I've had such a feeling of dread about this trip. Maybe after doing so poorly with self-care on my last few trips to this place, I am starting to get an inherent sense of aversion to going there, because it's become associated with feeling trapped in making myself feel like shit when I should actually be having the time of my life. So there's that. I have a lot of resentment for myself that I get to go to this awesome place and do such cool stuff, and the only things that really make me miserable there are almost entirely of my own doing.

The two assistants going with me this time are younger girls, maybe 3ish years my juniors. That brings up some additional ruminations. 1) I feel more responsible for them than I might have for some of my other field assistants. As usual, there is no professor on this trip and I am the Big Boss. It can bring some degree of pressure to be the one everyone always needs info/instructions from, and I feel sort of protective of this set since they are so young and it's their first time in the tropics. 2) I am also very aware that they will probably be very aware of my eating patterns. There is pretty much zero privacy in the field, so it's hard to hide anything while you're there. That stress could turn out to be positive, as it might make me more likely to eat more normally, to avoid making them uncomfortable or suspicious that I be nutso.

On the plus side, so far zero side effects from the Prednisone, don't even think I'm retaining water. I'd braced myself for the appetite boost, but if anything I've been less hungry than earlier in the week, on the same number of calories. Maybe a tad bit more thirsty than usual, but that's it. Again, major thanks to everyone who chimed in and made me feel better so that I changed my mind about shunning the Rx.

So I guess this is good-bye for now, but I shall return in about a week and a half, don't forget me while I'm gone! Love y'all.

Weight Calcs and Other Updates

2011-02-19T08:08:00.000-08:00

Wow, y'all are fantastic. Thanks so much to the feedback on my last post. I was about 99% sure I wasn't going to even get the prescription filled, but now I'm about 85% sure that I will take the Pred . . . with a lot less anxiety now. All of the feedback was very appreciated.

I thought I should explain a bit more about my anxiety over the weight gain, too. If it's just water weight and will go away, I can handle that. I'm slightly worried about discomfort while traveling, but I imagine I'll survive. It's not like the parrots and monkeys care if I'm a little bloated, right? And, as one person pointed out, having my appetite boosted a bit may not be a bad thing as I'm heading into an environment in which I slip into restrictive mode way too easily.

A few people brought up the fact that the general equation for weight gain is 3500 calories/pound. I know that, but I think my worry is that in my experience the rule doesn't really hold, for me at least. There have been some points in my weight restoration at which I was gaining weight exactly at the predicted rate, using that statistic. But bodies don't work in a uniform fashion. Interestingly, one study I found suggests it takes more calories for an "anorectic restrictor" to gain a pound than an "anorectic bulimic", during recovery...but what is the definition of an anorectic bulimic? Someone with exercise bulimia/anorexia athletica? If not, then how do those cases fit in? More research please! I didn't link to the study because of all the discussion of daily intake rates, wasn't sure if it would trigger some readers). Not to make this triggering or anxiety inducing for anyone, because just for the record, in my personal experience, for what that's worth, I have *never* gained weight faster (ie on less than the standard 3500 calorie rule) than I "should" have.

There have been plenty of times I gained it much more slowly, though. As evidenced by my recent post about constant hunger, my body seems to like to go into hypermetabolic mode when it is bouncing back. A few months ago I returned from a trip after not doing so well, foodwise, while away, and getting back on my meal plan essentially doubled my daily caloric intake. And....I lost weight the first week!

And as a rule during my weight restoration, I'll gain for a while, hit a plateau, and not budge above that (usually happens about every 5 pounds) until I make an additional significant change in intake or exercise. So much for the "X grapes adds up to Y pounds over the course of a year" theory: weight gain isn't infinite, bodies like balance! I know I've discussed this before, so I guess I'll stop rambling about it.

There have also been times when I haven't lost as much as might have been predicted by the book, which I would hypothesize was caused by some form of metabolic compensation.

So all of that should be comforting, but it has also made me distrust the rules about gain/loss being purely calorie in or calorie out. And I hate taking any medication, whether I suspect it will change my weight or not, just because I hate feeling like something is altering the way my body works in a way I can't control. Scary!

In other news, my Bottomless Pit Syndrome has abated somewhat over the past couple of days. I hate that stage where I am famished less than an hour after finishing a high-volume and calorically compliant meal. It is such a weird sensation to be physically uncomfortable because I am so full, and to really not have an appetite, but to still have hunger pains. Just haywire.

I am less than 48 hours from leaving for my trip! Hasn't sunk in yet. At this point it's pretty routine for me, though, the only thing that changes each time are my traveling companions.

Speaking of companions, this separation from Match (for those of you who don't know, he had to move 600 miles away last fall for grad school and I only see him one weekend a month) has been the hardest yet, on both of us. I am so glad that my boyfriend is also the best friend I've ever had, but it makes it doubly hard when I have to be away from him. I am fiercely independent and progressive and capable and all that, don't get me wrong. I know I don't need the boy, but I want him, damnit. I sad.

I hope everyone's weekend is off to a great start, love y'all.

Prescription Panic

2011-02-18T09:00:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I had a follow-up at the dermatologist about that skin infection today and am a little bit panicked about my newest prescription. My infection is gone but leftover inflammation is still irritating the nerve, so he wants me on Prednisone, which is an anti-inflammatory steroid. The side effects of this are, among a list of other things, weight gain. I have seen this for myself, we used to prescribe it to dogs all the time when I worked at a vet's office in high school.

I expressed concern to the doctor about the side effects, and he seemed to be that it was no big deal for a 5 day course. But he also mentioned he has me on a double dose daily. So I am basically terrified and pretty sure I don't want to screw with this, partly because of the effects of the drug and partly because I know it will make my ED anxiety increase to the n-th power right as I am starting my field work next week. If the weight gain is just from increased appetite, I can handle that. The past decade+ of my life would be way different if I weren't so adept at managing appetites. But if there is more of a physiological mechanism going on . . . that absolutely freaks me out, I hate the thought of putting something into my body that changes the way it works. Control issues, anyone???

Other side effects are excessive thirst and problems sleeping, plus a risk of hives and fever, things I really don't want to have to deal with while I'm getting settled into my jungle work. Starting a new drugs two days before disappearing into the tropical forest is probably not advisable even for Normal people, right?

So the point of this panicbabble is to ask: has anyone been on a short course of Pred like that, and if so did you notice any effects accumulate in the space of less than a week?

Body Getting on My Nerves

2011-02-16T19:46:00.000-08:00

So I have had the hunger pains from hell today. Ten times worse than when I was consuming way less food per day over the weekend. And yes, I have been assiduous about the meal plan since I got home from my trip. Why are bodies so damn much work?

=(

Back for a Pit Stop

2011-02-15T07:56:00.000-08:00

I'm back! Got in from my Match weekend yesterday, trying to hit the ground running with catching up and preparing for my next research trip. Fleeing to the tropics next Monday, I feel like my time at home is more of a pit stop than anything else.

The trip went well, except for some crazy flight hassles on the way there. Winter is mean. I did end up getting there on time, though. We did more of just hanging out at home than on previous visits, when we've hit museums, parks, etc, every day, mostly because it's too damn cold to do much outside, and we're broke as broke can get. We did have some fun outings though. Went to an aquarium, saw a play, were out with some of his friends on Saturday night, went to a pretty nice restaurant on Friday night and a VERY nice one on Sunday as our Valentine's Day date. So I say we spent more time at home, but it's not like we didn't go anywhere all weekend.

I did talk to him a bit about how depressed I've been lately. I always am this time of year, but, as he pointed out, this is the first time in 5 years that I haven't been in therapy in the winter/spring, which probably isn't helping anything. He was understanding and supportive, and later I caught him online looking at light boxes for me. So anyway, I addressed that more directly with him than ever before, and of course both of us know he can't fix it, but it still feels better to have shared.

Eating-wise, I did maybe about my usual up there. It's just so hard when it's too cold to do anything that involves a lot of walking, biking, etc. I did, however, rock the challenge at our V's day dinner. Ordered what I thought looked best (NOT a salad), had a full glass of wine (strongest wine I've ever had, by the way, it got me way more buzzed than the two cocktails and a shot I had when we went out with some of M's friends Saturday night), and, drumroll......DESSERT. I wish I could tell you how long it's been since I ordered dessert in a restaurant, but I honestly have no freaking clue. Sixth grade or before, to be sure. And I ate the whole thing, except for a bite that I gave to Match in exchange for a bite of his. It was a fairly light item, as desserts go, but it was completely unplanned and out of character for me.

It felt so good to feel so normal, albeit briefly.

I have to admit that one questionable move I made was that a few days I definitely used alcohol to chill myself out a bit. I am pretty blue and tense this time of year, and I didn't want to be a downer while hanging out with Match. Being buzzed from that curiously strong wine probably was a big factor in me letting my guard down enough for the dessert. On Saturday alcohol ended up making up a pretty substantial portion of the day's calories. I'm not necessarily worried about that becoming a daily trend, I only ever drink when I'm out with people (not all that often), and have honestly never been drunk in my life. I was aware, though, that I was using it as a tool to cope with anxiety.

Anyway, that's the main recap. Happy belated Valentine's Day to everyone! Whether you have a boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse/other miscellaneous significant other or not, I hope that you felt loved in some way yesterday, you deserve it. I hope everyone's week is off to a great start.

Tomorrow is Getting Close!

2011-02-09T08:12:00.000-08:00

So, today is automatically a good day...because it means tomorrow is tomorrow, and tomorrow I see Match! Flying up for my monthly long weekend with my homeboy, and I can't wait. And yes I realize the title of this post makes no sense. It will be the last time I see him before I'm out of the country for another research trip later this month. And in case you haven't noticed, I'm rather fond of him. :)

Thanks so much for the great comments and support last night, I did indeed survive and have felt a lot less anxious this morning. I indeed did not gain ten pounds overnight, or any pounds for that matter, despite feeling like a beached whale when I went to bed. Sometimes it's good to have a reminder that our perceptions can really play with our minds sometimes, and you can't always trust them.

Has been kind of a quiet few days. I have done as much as I can to my data, and so have a bit of a break until I bring the next batch back from my upcoming trip. So what have I been doing?

-I've started to tool around on the piano again. I was pretty good in high school, but have had almost zero time for it since I started college. I'm ultra-rusty, of course, but it's still incredibly calming for me, even when I'm going back to a lot more basic songs than I used to be able to play. Seems to be coming back to me fairly quickly, though.

-Remember a while back when I mentioned I was working on a new fiction project? I've been getting up early to write at about1000 words a day on it for almost two weeks, so it's building up pretty steadily. Have hit a few blocked days where I didn't get as much done, but am really trying to stick with it and not drop this one as soon as I start to get frustrated or doubt myself.

-I'm halfway through the third season of Mad Men. HOOKED. Actually the third season isn't quite as good as the first two, but it's enough to keep me coming back for more, and I am VERY picky about tv shows.

-I've been on a kick of reading memoirs/biographies. Really, really amazing to read about the things some people go through, not just surviving but thriving in the aftermath.

Like I said, kind of in a lull period for my work, obviously. Oh well, I'm about to be immersed in it hardcore again, so a bit of a break isn't the end of the world.

This will probably be my last post before my Match trip. I am going to try very hard to do well while I'm at his place, as far as food goes. I appreciate all y'all, hope everyone has a fantabulous week/weekend!

Challenges are....Challenging

2011-02-08T17:09:00.000-08:00

Believe it or not, I actually challenged myself both food and exercise-wise today. Maybe doing both in the same day was a mistake, I have a bad, bad case of the Bad Body ooglies tonight. Why does my mind make everything so damn difficult?

I am not going to gain ten pounds overnight, and even if I did put on weight after altering a couple of things--which feel major to me in the moment but admittedly minor in the grand energy balance of my week--that's what I'm *supposed* to be doing. Or at least that's what I've been trying to tell myself all afternoon/evening. Get a grip Cammy, and do it fast because feeling like this really sucks.

Circle Time Numero Dos

2011-02-06T09:30:00.000-08:00

So a while back I did a post with various quotes and how they hit home with me regarding the ED and recovery. Here is another round of that, with some lines that have struck me especially deep since then.

"If you believe it is impossible, then you will never find the secret, and you will always have to toil with iron in order to make it always less perfect than this."

-The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts by Louis de Bernieres

I think a big problem with not only taking on recovery, but dealing with plateaus in the process, is not being able to imagine that you'll actually win this game. It's too big, too hard, too far away. If you don't think you can do it, it's harder to justify pushing yourself. I think that's a big part of why I'm a bit stalled with progress at the moment. At a midway point, you're still treading water with recovery, but are still working for the ED in some areas, and it's just fucking exhausting, to put it simply, and all that energy is being put into holding yourself back.

Not that we should fool ourselves into thinking anyone ever achieves perfection, of course that would be discouraging:

Apparently, people didn't look at pictures anymore and ask if they were lifelike. They looked at their lives and compared them to images they'd seen somewhere.

~The Intimates by Ralph Sassone

So we can't be perfect, but how do we get where we're supposed to be?

Regardless of what the advertising campaigns may tell us, we can't have it all. Sacrifice is not an option, or an anachronism; it's a fact of life. We all cut off our own limbs to burn on some altar. The crucial thing is to choose an altar that's worth it and a limb you can accept losing. To go consenting to the sacrifice.
~The Likeness by Tana French

Way too true. Nothing comes for free. But freedom is worth the price, at the risk of sounding cliche. When we have to "cut off our own limbs to burn," we have a choice between the healthy limbs and the disordered parts of ourselves. The ED is a limb we can lose, if we can learn to consent and accept it.

Consenting and accepting is easier said than done, of course:

There is a gland in him that drips acid on his brain, distorting his perceptions until the world mirrors his own chaos and the monsters of his mind.
~The Prince by R. M. Koster

And the physical effects of ED behaviors can make it harder to find your way out of that chaos. And no, you don't have to be emaciated for those effects to set in. This sums up the ED dilemma pretty much as well as anything I've ever read:

She is aware of how extraordinary it is, what the body does to the mind, and what the mind does to the body, one convincing the other it is in control.
~The Dancer by Colum McCann

And gradually we don't know ourselves anymore. I think that's the scariest part for me, not only realizing how incorporated this has become into who I am, but the wonder of finally rebuilding an ED-free life, structured around something besides food and exercise. Can an entire scaffold be replaced like that?

Such a price the gods exact for song, to become what we sing.
~"The Strayed Reveller to Ulysses" by Matthew Arnold

When do you know when something is becoming something that changes you?
~Adverbs by Daniel Handler

Of course, we are not our diseases. So at some point we have to climb out enough to realize that, and not hate ourselves for lingering so long.

It's one thing to forgive yourself for a mistake. But if you knew it was a mistake at the time, how do you forgive yourself then?
~Handler again

I think that blaming yourself is really common with EDs (I'm definitely guilty). But you can't blame yourself for it any more than you could blame yourself for having a more "classic" physical illness, in my opinion. It's a disease. Sure there are things you can do to handle predispositions and triggers more or less well. But you didn't ask to be sick. People don't seek cancer, but a lot of our behaviors can exacerbate our chances. That doesn't mean we asked for a tumor.

So treat yourself kindly, don't hold a grudge towards yourself for being sick, and but do give yourself tons of credit for all the hard work you put in to overcome it. Think about what you'd say to an ill friend, and how happy you'd be that they were pulling out of it and reclaiming their healthy life. You deserve no less.

And as long as I'm totally just bumming off of other people's wisdom for the day, check out Arielle's latest video with some facts that are crucial to keep in mind, a short 2 minutes that packs a lot of punch.

Recovery Soundtrack: Update

2011-02-04T08:03:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time near the beginning of this blog, I posted my "Recovery Soundtrack", which I'd done as therapy homework. I've kept it around, adding to it gradually, so I thought I'd post the updated version. There are several different distinct types of songs. Some are about feeling a bit hopeless but acknowledging there's a problem. Some about starting to make changes, how it's tough but necessary. Some are just confidence boosters, some are about how much potential there is waiting for us out in the world when we are free of whatever holds us back. I'm sure all of them won't touch everyone (they're never all relevant to me at a given time, depends on mood and circumstances), but there's a pretty good variety and hopefully there's at least something here most people will connect with.

Changes -3 Doors Down
It's the Only One You've Got -3 Doors Down
Sober -P!nk
Girl America -Mat Kearney
Show Me Love -Robyn
Unwritten -Natasha Bedingfield
How Far We've Come -Matchbox 20
Wasted -Carrie Underwood
Jumper -Third Eye Blind
Bleed Like Me -Garbage
F**kin' Perfect -P!nk
The Voice Within -Christina Aguilera
Can't Break Her Fall -Mat Kearney
Change -Taylor Swift
Beautiful -Christina Aguilera
Baby Seat -Barenaked Ladies
Baby Got Back -Sir Mix A Lot
The Reckoning -Bryson VanCleve
Mirrow -BarlowGirl
Living in Pain -2Pac, Mary J. Blige
Change Your Mind -Sister Hazel
Courage -Superchick
Tied Together with a Smile -Taylor Swift (I read somewhere that she specifically wrote this song about a friend with an ED, by the way)
What a Scene -Goo Goo Dolls
Just Like a Pill -P!nk
Sympathy -Goo Goo Dolls
All in All -Lifehouse
Disturbia -Rihanna
We Are -Ana
Ordinary -Train
Sophie -Eleanor McEvoy
Feel -Matchbox Twenty
Beauty from Pain -Superchick
It's My Life -Bon Jovi
Somebody I Once New -Dead Celebrity Status
Unpretty -TLC
Dear Friend -Stacie Orrico

Also, pretty much the entire 'Away from the Sun' album by 3 Doors Down hits home every time for me. Has been the source of much Car Crying over the years.

I'm always adding and looking for more good songs, so anyone care to share? Do you have any favorites you listen to for motivation or just when you're having a hard time and need to feel like you're not alone and hopeless?

No Wonder....

2011-02-04T07:45:00.000-08:00

So no wonder those damn antibiotics haven't taken care of this pesky infection I've been dealing with on and off since last fall. Got a second opinion today, from someone who actually bothered to do labwork on it, and it's viral, not bacterial. So all those weeks of vice-like headaches and upset stomachs from the antibiotics were for naught.

That's good news, though, because it means I can stop the antibiotics, lose the headaches, and take drugs that he said should clear the problem up pretty quickly. The bad news is that the virus lives on a specific nerve under the skin and never really goes away, even when you can't see a flare-up. Apparently it's aggravated by UV, so I have to be extra careful when I'm working in the tropics, but I'm good about sunscreen anyway. He said it's also likely to break out if I'm stressed or immunocompromised. In other words, chill out and take care of your damn body, Cammy.

I do wish he could just tap it and make it go away forever, but feels good to have a solid answer and not to have to deal with chronic headaches from the antibiotic meds anymore. I hope this post didn't gross anyone out. I haven't talked about the infection much but it's REALLY been stressing me out.

What's the Point? Accountability in Recovery

2011-02-03T08:46:00.000-08:00

So, in a discussion with a friend recently, the issue of accountability came up. What keeps someone accountable to recovery? What's the point of trying to do better with behaviors? It's easy to just gain weight or change some behaviors to get people off your back, make you therapist, loved ones, etc happy, without really dealing with the issues. This invariably comes back to bite one in the ass, because recovery really has to be about *you* and your life in order for it to stick and open up the opportunities you deserve. Not that I don't think therapists, family, etc can be EXCELLENT for support and accountability, just pointing out that their support can be utilized in a variety of ways, some better and some worse.

The issue of personal accountability is interesting to me, because it differs so much between people. For me, I am very passionate about my research and work. I have to keep myself at least robust enough to go do pretty strenuous hiking and lifting while staying in very rustic conditions in the tropics for weeks at a time. My muscles, bones, immune system, etc need to be up to speed. Being able to perform as I need to on the next trip (I'm always planning the next excursion as soon as I return from the last one) is something that keeps my head on at least marginally straight. It doesn't make me try to regain weight as much as I know that I need to, but it definitely keeps me from allowing myself--or, the important part, even WANTING--to lose more weight. I don't handle the situation ideally, but it is something that lingers in my thinking when I'm having major ED temptation.

Along the same lines, one thing I HATE about my overexercise is how much time it takes out of my day that I could spend working. I do great with productivity, have always gotten top grades, etc, but I know I'm not maximizing what I actually *could* do if I didn't waste X hours every day burning calories that don't need gotten rid of.

Another career-related accountability factor: I go to a few conferences every year, and later this year will be interviewing for PhD positions. I need to look reasonably healthy, I need to be on top of my mental game, I need to have enough of a handle on food to appear comfortable in public eating situations. I need to look like someone that is up to the job of managing and executing a project involving tens of thousands of dollars and heavy travel. I remember one time, early in my recovery, when H., my therapist at the time, was talking to me about an upcoming conference I was attending. She said "People are going to look at you and know you have some problem, what are you going to do to handle that?" Kind of a blunt, Tiger Mother comment (see Hiker RD's great post on Tigering in therapy), but it has stuck with me and it did definitely influence my subsequent behavior.

I'm afraid I risk sounding shallow with this one: I want my boyfriend to find me attractive. M. has told me outright that he liked my figure better when I weighed more (he didn't say this critically or to make me feel bad about myself now, by the way, we were just having an honest conversation about image issues). Now that he has moved 600 miles away for grad school, I only see him for one long weekend (4-5 days) a month. Wanting to be healthy enough to be happy and engaged (NOT in the marital sense, don't get the wrong idea!) with him, and, to be very honest, wanting to have a little bit of junk in my trunk for him, has definitely been a way for me to handle sticking to my meal plan every day and adding back some of the weight I have dropped on recent research trips. Now I don't mean to sound unfeminist. I don't typically make decisions based on what men think, and am almost pathologically independent. And M. is not appearance focused or shallow, it's not that I'm afraid of losing him if my figure isn't pleasing. But with all honestly, it feels good to feel hott sometimes.

I'm afraid I risk sounding silly with this one, but I'm being honest here: being a good owner to my dog. I would imagine this is a microcosm of what it's like for people with children. He is ultra-attached to me.. He was abused before I adopted him, and has major abandonment issues. Also, when I'm not doing well with the ED, I am grumpy, temperamental, and constantly occupied, stressed, and rushing. Much less time for pre-bedtime belly rubs, much more likely slam things, get frustrated, etc, which stress him out even if they're not aimed at him. Not to mention that he would get much less enrichment if I wasn't healthy enough to walk him enough, or if I was so withdrawn and antisocial that he didn't get to go on outings with me or meet as many people. I'm not one of those people that totally personifies/infantilizes their pets, but G. is indeed very important to me.

So, share with me: What keeps you accountable? Either inside or outside therapy. I'm really interested to hear about other people's motivators and raisons d'etre of recovery.

A few updates from this week:

I got an out-of-the blue e-mail from someone I worked for when I was in high school, and it meant a lot to me. She recently joined Facebook and was just commenting on the things I've done over the past few years. I did discuss my ED a bit with her while I worked for her, and she has never dealt with the issue but was definitely supportive and tried to be understanding. It touched me that she thought to look me up after over 5 years have passed.

Yesterday, for various reasons, I missed a workout that representing 25% of my total daily exercise time. I partially compensated by doing a bit of yoga later, but for less than half of the time that workout would have been. And I did nothing else, foodwise or exercisewise, to compensate. Score?

I am so ready for winter to be over. Anyone else want to stage a protest? Or stow away to the equator with me in a couple of weeks? ;p

Love y'all!

Post Secret Strikes Again

2011-01-30T08:04:00.000-08:00

Another quick-media-link-weekend-type post. I don't know if y'all keep up with Post Secret, but one of the ones today sort of hit home for me. I honestly have never really wanted kids. Any relictual maternal instinct in my brain is totally satisfied by feeding G. twice a day, and the lifestyle of my chosen profession is not at all conducive to raising offspring. But there is a part in the back of my mind that won't even let me consider changing my opinion, because of this:

Not just genetically, but I'm so scared that I'll never have the behaviors enough under control to not trigger whatever hereditary misfortune I did happen to pass on. I know it's complicated, and I do NOT JUDGE anyone with an ED that does choose to have a child, again there is no disapproval here of that at all (don't be mad at me, I'm too much a people-pleaser to handle that!). No two cases are the same and I know people with EDs that are fantabulous mothers with amazing, healthy kids. Any statements made on this blog reflect upon my personal neuroses alone, I assure you. My mom had never been on a diet in her life when I developed anorexia, but I have a strong family history of that and other depressive/obsessive/addictive disorders. Some people with no family history will develop it. Some people with actively disordered parents turn out just fine, others don't. There is no rule. Just sharing my personal gut fear about the issue. Slight tie in to my last post about P!nk's new single: I think I heard she's pregnant, I got the feeling the song was conceived with a message to her child in mind, as we see at the end of the video.

And another one in today's hit parade was this:

Not because I was abused (my biological dad was an abusive alcoholic, but my mom took the brunt and got us out of there before my third birthday, for which I owe her a lifetime of gratitude), but because I am pretty much 100% sure that my best friend in the 4th grade was being sexually abused by her father, but my realization was completely after-the-fact. We are friends in Facebook, and I often want to tell her how much I hate what she went through and how much better she deserved.

F**ckin Tears

2011-01-30T07:45:00.000-08:00

So, I'm weird about crying. I have a really hard time creating ocular precipitation when I'm sad, almost never do it when I'm hurt, and usually only spill tears when I'm frustrated or mad at myself. But for some reason, songs in particular and music videos in extraparticular really tend to break through and bring on the Sad Waterworks. Maybe that's why I am mostly likely to cry in my car, when I have on a song that really hits home. Major eye leakage over P!nk's new video, F**kin Perfect (no I'm not a prude about language usually, but that's how it's spelled for marketing if you try to search for it).

This is one of those that--after I composed myself from watching it--I went immediately to iTunes to buy for my Recovery Soundtrack that I started for H. waaaay back when. I first mentioned it very early in this blog's history, but need to put an updated list up soon. It's interesting to me to see how the tone/theme of the songs changes depending on when in my recovery I added them. Probably worth a post of its own, I suppose.

(And I guess I should put a disclaimer, if you're squeamish about seeing a man's upper back while he's in coitus, skip the first nine seconds of the video).