Calmer

I met with my adviser today, and discussed some of my concerns about how my training/research interests don't fit in here. He was very understanding, and managed to assuage some of my anxiety about it while also treating my concerns as valid. He introduced me to a prof from a different but related department that seems like he will be a big help with my thesis research, so that helped to turn my mood around quite a bit. Sorry for the random distraught post earlier.

Tonight is Movie Night with Match, and G. gets to go also. That means eating is a little off today, adjusting for the change of routine this evening, but am trying (really, really am trying) to clear my head so I can have a good time tonight.

Title?

I just had to excuse myself from class because all of the sudden I couldn't hold back tears.

For pretty much no reason whatsoever.

I haven't cried at school since I was six years old.

I have a meeting with my adviser in 30 minutes and I need to get my shit together, and quickly.

Cloudy

Living with anorexia over the past 10 years has made me, at various times, frustrated, angry, desperate, regretful, and confused. It has frequently cost me literal blood, sweat, and tears on a daily basis. At times it has absolutely eroded my will/desire to live. But I don't know that I have ever really been truly depressed. As in apathetic, gloomy, doubtful that anything I do matters, will ever matter, and is probably not even worth the oxygen that I metabolize in the process of going through the motions every day. Maybe focusing on the "purpose" of anorexia distracted me and kept me just outside the edge of that abyss. But I think I feel it creeping in now, and I am really, really struggling.

I'm not happy here. Yes, I'm dating Match. Yes, I am doing well in graduate school. But for many reasons, which are too complicated to really list, I am just not happy here. I feel out of lace. I am lonely. I don't feel like my research fits in with most of the rest of the people in my program, and it is frustrating that I don't have anyone that knows/cares about my area of focus to trade ideas with. I am lonely. My classes are not that stimulating, the prof in my favorite subject is a complete asshole. I worked from home instead of the office every day last week, and it made not one crumb of difference, I know for a fact that not a single soul noticed. I could be here, there, or in my car driving to Canada, and it makes not a difference in the world.

I miss H. I take a while to open up, and I miss going in and having someone that knows my history and understands how I think, so the new therapist is definitely not filling H's shoes yet. I miss my old friends, my old profs.

It's not that I feel like no one here likes me: I get along fine with the other people in my program. But I just, I don't know...I'm lonely. You can be liked and yet still not that significant. It's a small pool of people, and no one I see myself connecting with. Match is great, but we're not close enough for me to really want to open up about my problems (even if I know he would be supportive). We're still building our relationship, and I don't want it to be based on him counseling me. And I know better than to base my entire social life on a guy, no matter how promising the relationship seems.

I loved my new apartment at first, but I have the Neighbors from Hell, and I feel like I have no safe zone.

I was involved in tons of organizations at my old university, but the new one is smaller and doesn't really offer any of the programs that I used to love participating in. I think this is a big contributor.

I am tired of pretending. I go out with Match, go to departmental events, discuss plans with my adviser, etc etc, and play Happy Date, Efficient Student, Friendly Labmate, Assiduous Professional, etc, as if it did not take unimaginable effort just to haul myself out of bed that morning. As if I would have even gotten out of bed at all if I didn't have an exercise routine to stick to. I used to have friends that at least knew the things I struggle with, and even though we didn't talk about them often, it makes a different just knowing someone understands. Here, people have no fucking idea. And honestly I don't really want them to know the ins and outs of my pathologies. So what do I want? Honestly, I don't know. Honestly, sometimes, to just not be me.

My favorite thing in life is learning, and I'm even starting to feel apathetic about that. I read for several hours a day, acquire tons of new facts, and what the hell is the point? I'm not going to have anyone to discuss them with, they're just sitting in my skull gathering neurodust.

I am so sorry for the whinefest. I realize that a lot of this sounds silly and trivial, I am purposefully not explaining the situation all the way, partly for identity/privacy reasons. The gist of it is, I feel really down, insignificant. And that is slipping into ED thoughts. I have so few ties/contacts here. It is easy for those thoughts to sneak back in, telling me that the ED will relieve my anxiety, and no one else knows one way or the other how much I eat/exercise in a given day, so if it serves a purpose for me then why resist it?

Of course, deep down I know that is wrong. I am starting field research in a few months, and I can't let myself become sick/weak right before I take off to live in a 3rd world country for several months. I know that I have already eroded my body in many ways that will last long after weight restoration, and cannot afford to continue the trend. I know that caving to the ED will not help me make friends, will not help me feel more connected. I know those things. It will not make me feel more significant.

But I just wish I could find something that would.

Special Delivery

I appreciate the Domino's employee that was either oblivious or devious enough to hang a flyer/coupon sheet on the doorknob of the ED treatment clinic. At times, my friends, irony is what gets me through the day.

Miscellaneous Clarifications

Hi all, just wanted to do some blogkeeping and clarify some things that I may have been fuzzy about in recent posts.

First, I'm afraid that my last post didn't come off quite as I had hoped. I want to emphasize that I intended for it to show that I'm learning not only to acknowledge that negative side effects of ED slippage but to refuse to settle for them. I lived with hair-clogged drains for years, hated it, but felt too trapped to do anything about it. I feel like I'm moving beyond that, I think I have at least caught some glimpses of how much better life is post ED, even if it is just for the sake of better hair days. ;p Kidding, there are way more benefits than that. Anywho, I didn't mean for the last post to be a call for attention/sympathy, I wanted it to just be a reminder of some of the fringe benefits (better hair, etc) that come from taking care of yourself.

Second, therapy. I have switched to a new therapist at the same clinic, and everyone involved was extremely graceful, professional, and understanding about my decision. I have gotten many comments about the fact that some non-ED therapists can be just as helpful as specialists, depending on the dynamic, and I would have considered someone else if changing my medical approval were not such an excruciating ordeal. I know I have some readers not from the U.S., so in a nutshell the system (at least with my insurance company) works like this:

• I have to get a referral from my primary care physician to see a psychologist
• If the psychologist is "out of network," meaning not on a list of providers that have signed on to work with my particular insurance company, my physician must submit a detailed letter with the referral explaining exactly why I have to see the out of network provider.
• The insurance company takes its sweet time processing the referral (four weeks, in my case).
• The insurance company commonly rejects the referral immediately, because no one bothered to look at the justification letter.
• If the insurance company finds anyone else in the city within their network of subscribers that claims to treat eating disorders, they reject my referral and tell me I must see Dr. Network instead of someone of my own choosing, or I receive no coverage.
• If I have any appointments before the date that the insurance company recieved the referral, they are not eligible for coverage.

Thus, if I want to change psychologists, I must get a new referral, new justification from physician, and wait several more weeks for it to process, leaving me in the lurch as far as therapy if I want to wait and make sure the referral is approved before going to any sessions. If the claim is rejected, I have to pay out of pocket for the therapy sessions.
This entire process is a huge ordeal and pain in the ass, which makes it very difficult to shop around and try different psychologists to find one that fits my needs. Seeing someone in the same practice is perfect for me at this point. Anywho, I just wanted to acknowledge that I appreciated everyone sharing their experiences with a variety of treatment styles, and that is definitely something I will keep in mind in the future!

Ok, off to bed., morning comes early these days. I was over at Match's place most of the evening, and am in that weird state where my body knows it's bedtime but it also jazzed up on caffeine from earlier in the day.

Prideful Incentive

After about a year and a half of slowly but surely adding weight and restoring more normal body function, my hair was just starting to achieve its former gloss and thickness around the time I graduated last May.

Now, after a couple months of slippage, it's starting to shed in prodigious quantities again, and I'm having the major dry skin issues. SO frustrated. I'm at my lowest weight in a while but nowhere NEAR as low as I was before starting therapy, just proof that your various organs/parts still suffer whether you are at a rock-bottom weight or not.

So, just my rather prideful and shallow recovery incentive for the day: health = beauty, and both suffer when ED creeps back in.

Up, Down, All Around

I have gotten way behind on updating, and there have been so many ups and downs recently that it's hard to write a coherent summary of my status. Things are going great in some ways, frustrating in others. I'm essentially stalled out with eating and exercise, and my weight this morning was the lowest it's been since before graduation last May. Also, my workload for grad school is piling up, and I am becoming more and more fed up with how damn much time I spend exercising every day when I could be accomplishing real things instead.

I have been doing really well with challenges involving going to social things, including food-oriented ones. I went out and did something almost every day last week, I think it may have been a record for me. I still hold back and do most of my eating at home, but just breaking routine to go to the events is a step forward.

I am really unhappy, actually, despite all of that. I'm frustrated because although I've been "good" about challenging myself, expanding my activities, trying to act more like a normal 20-something, I still don't really feel like I belong here. I have made friends, as in people I talk to and joke around with, but no one I feel like I might connect with the way that I did with my high school and undergrad friends. In grad school I have much, much less face time with people. I go to class for an hour first thing every morning, then for the rest of the day we disperse to our respective windowless offices to work until it's time to go home and continue working. Social events are really the only way to get to know anyone, and I'm trying with those...but somehow I still just feel extremely lonely and isolated.

And honestly, on the surface I don't have much reason to feel this way. Things are going well with Match. I wouldn't call him a boyfriend yet, but it seems to be progressing. But, I do know better than to base my entire emotional/social life on one guy. I have been challenging myself with not passing up events, trying to get myself "out there." Yet somehow I just feel like I am "outside." I miss my friends, I miss my old city, I miss H. One of my classes, the one I was most excited about taking, has turned out to be a dud that is leaving me intellectually frustrated and understimulated, and that tends to put a damper on my entire mood for the entire day.

I know that this is still a pretty new situation, and things will get better as time goes on. Trying to fake it til I make it.

By the way, some of you might have seen my post about a security issue earlier this weekend, in which I thought my identity was going to be blown. Everything is ok, the person and I talked and she is very nice and totally understanding about protecting my privacy. I'm really grateful that I don't have to go to private mode. Just wanted to clear up that situation, for anyone who had noticed something was amiss.

OK, back to work, will try to update more frequently this week so that my posts aren't just periodic muddles of accumulated day-to-day feelings and thoughts.