Day 12

Post 1 thing you've aten today

This was my lunch. Two toasts. One with butter (!), ham(!), cheese (!) and cucumberslices. The other one with Prime (Norwegian spread that is made of milkproducts) and my daily glass of milk on the side :)
Fearfood Friday? huh, nope, not for me. For me, everyday is a fearfood day!

-M

P.S. this is my Instagram account if you are interested (hint, hint ;) )

Day 11

List 10 PHYSICAL features you like about yourself.

 Omg, this is so hard! I don’t really like anything about myself at the moment, I dislike almost everything and I don’t like looking at my body because it triggers me because it’s “too fat and disgusting”. That is at least what the demon on my shoulder keeps telling me. I don’t think this list is going to be long but here it goes:

1. I have a birthmark right besides my left eye that I actually like

2. I have a light birthmark below my right eye that I like. I and birthmarks have a weirdly good relationship.

3. My ears, weirdly enough, but I like them :P I guess that’s because they are similar to my grandma’s ears.

4. My eye-color, it’s light blue, just like my grandma’s

5. I like my hair, even though it’s really thin and keeps falling out. I like how long it has gotten J 

6. I think that’s it. Because I don’t want to trigger anyone I won’t mention the anorexic things I like about my body. 

Day 10

Does anyone in your close family have an eating disorder? If so, do you think it had an impact on you developing one?

 Yes, my fathers mother has Anorexia as well. And yes I think that had a huge impact on me, especially because when she was at her sickest she kept reminding me that thin was better and when I started losing weight in 5^th grade, she gave me a huge compliment and told me that I had been fat and stuff… But she has helped me a lot and this summer she said that we should fight together and the first one to get to 65 kg would get a price hehe. But I don’t know how that is going since she doesn’t really contact me when I’m not visiting her.

Day 9

 Create a list of all the negative things your eating disorder has given you.

·         Constipation

·         Worse sight and a lazy eye

·         Worse hearing

·         Thin hair

·         Dry skin

·         Lactose intolerance (gotten better)

·         Gluten intolerance (gotten better)

·         Joint pain

·         Chest pain

·         A lot of anxiety against food

·         People are actually scared of talking to me and look and stare a lot

·         Bad concentration

·         Paranoia over small things that don’t really matter

·         I’m too addicted to routines.

·         Exercise addiction

·         Extreme fear of nutrition and water consumption

And I keep counting for a long long time!

What if I had succeeded?

The thought of that if I hadn't gotten help and met all those incredible people through the process, I would be in this place, permanently, in the graveyard. One of many bodies buried in this ground. One of many souls wandering around, lost and terrified.

Instead, I'm here, alive. I am walking on the surface, laughing and having fun.
Seeing how thankful and proud my mom is, that I am still among us, is immeasurable. Nothing, and by that I mean NOTHING can be compared to the smile on her face seeing me with hope in my eyes again and fighting my way through life.

But what if I wasn't here?

She would have lost her only daughter, her first born, her baby. How would she carry on knowing that her own daughter took her own life? Knowing that I suffered and gave up. Tried to fight, but gave up. If I hadn't already been dead, it would kill me seeing her suffering that much.

All those times I almost succeeded, I thought I would be doing everyone a favor by leaving, by giving up and swallowing 24 sleeping pills. I wouldn't be "in the way" of everyone anymore, I wouldn't be disturbing anyone, I wouldn't be making the teachers job harder, I wouldn't be irritating my fellow classmates by my presence anymore and most of all, I would have got rid of those demons in my head.

I thought that I would never be able to be happy again. That I wouldn't be able to enjoy life again. I thought I wasn't worthy of life.

But now, 4 months after my last attempt, I am smiling, I am laughing and I am learning to love life again, and am I thankful? YES. I couldn't be more thankful for everyone that has been there for me, that cared, listened and gave me a shoulder to cry on when I needed.

I thought I couldn't fight those demons, but what am I doing every single day now? I am fighting. I am fighting like a true soldier, and I'm proving to everyone, included myself, that I am more than my illnesses. That I ain't the illness, but the person behind it. Yes, I have an illness, but I aint the illness. There's a huge difference.
For the first time in my whole and entire life, I am thankful for being alive, even though it's hard.

-M xoxo

A normal teenager for half a day

Yesterday I was going to restrict. I felt humongous and disgusting, but then I read my favourite blog that always helps me through tough times and motivates me to continue recovery, even when I am about to give up (www.living-with-anorexia.blogspot.com) You should really check out her blog, she's amazing!!
But yeah back to me. Like I said, I read the blog and it motivated me to fight, so what did I do? well, I went down the toughest, stressfulest, hardest stairs I've ever have gone down. It's the same stair as I always walk up and down at least once a day at school, but they've never been this tough to climb. I went to the cantine to buy something to eat. Some REAL food, not diet yoghurt or 0% fat products. REAL wholegrain baguette with a cut up meatball, pickle, onion and mustard dressing (!!) It was so good and I didn't let the guilt sneak up on me. No matter how hard it tried, I didn't let it get to me. And I'm proud!

Later that day, I went to the supermarket with my mom and guess who got her pre ed favourite icecream?! Yes, it was ME! Magnum whitechocolate strawberry icecream. It was DELICIOUS!
Did I restrict after that? Nope. I had dinner wich was wholegrain couscous with a soft egg and mini tomatoes. After that I went out to a party. The first one in over a year! Due to my struggles I haven't been able to party, and nope I don't drink. I don't want to. I don't see anything charming with underage youths drinking with the one mission: drink as much as they can in the shortest possible time. But yeah, I had fun with my friends and actually felt like a normal teenager for once :-D I danced like an idiot and laughed like one as well.

My classmates kept saying how glad they were to see me and asking me if I was having fun. They are amazing and so nice! (they know that I'm struggling)
Yesterday afternoon was really nice and I don't regret a thing!
Over and out
-M xoxo

Day 8

Create a list of all the positive things your eating disorder has given you. (This day should be short)

·         I’ve gotten to know myself a lot better and I’m A LOT stronger than before.

·         I’ve lost weight hehe (but not in a good healthy way)

·         I’ve gotten to know so many fantastic people both while inpatient and through the Internet.

·         Me and my mom have gotten a way better relationship. It was good before, but now nothing can top it!

·         I’ve seen how many people actually care about me J

·         It has made me feel like I have control in my life (when in fact I don’t have any control at all)

Way too long list….  I can actually come up with more positives, but I won’t because there is something negative with everything I list as "positive"

Day 7

 Sorry for continuing this 30days challenge so late hehe, buuut I will finish it sometime ;) 

Do you think the media contributes to the growing rate of girls developing eating disorders younger and younger?

Well, everything has its consequences and effects on PEOPLE (not only girls, but boys as well) that are sensitive for developing an ED and yes, I have to say that media contributes to the growing rates. They put the standards for “good enough” higher and higher. It’s always: “you’ll be prettier, better, hotter and etc, if you use this and that and these products.” Why can’t we just be enough, just the way we are? 

Lost. Again.

She’s sneaking up on me. Again.  I don’t know what to do. I don’t know if I want to fight, but at the same time I know that I’ve got to. I’ve been arguing a lot with myself lately, should I eat /can I eat / do I deserve to eat / am I allowed to? I want to, but I can’t. Food is on my mind ALL the time, I can’t seem to catch a break. I feel all alone. I feel left behind, hidden in my own soul while everyone else carries on. Why, I don’t know. I was fighting so hard and I was doing so well, but all of a sudden I take maaaaany steps back on the road to recovery. It wasn’t my intension, it was the disorder. I lose more and more control by every day, and I hate losing control. I lose control over my mind, my body and my strength, focus and thoughts.

Where does it end this time? Does it end with a being hospitalized again? Does it end with death or can I be saved (aka. Get help to save myself)? I am definitely not getting the help to help myself at the moment. My therapist doesn’t know a thing, he says weird things that only trigger me, he doesn’t really want to help me and he seems to not see the seriousness in my case, even though I came straight out of the hospital to him WITH my primary contact. The second appointment he was asking me about my diagnosis and what happened this summer and etc. and when I told him that I had been diagnosed with anorexia nervosa earlier this summer his response was : “well, you don’t look like it.” I was really struggling with the weight I had put on during being inpatient for a month eating breakfast (slice of bread with a lot of butter / big bowl of yogurt with cereal/ big bowl of oatmeal with sugar), snack(a fruit and orange/apple juice), BIG warm lunch (just like dinner)+ big desert, afternoon meal (biscuit/cake and a slice of bread with topping), BIG dinner + a big desert and then the same snack as evening snack + I was wearing three layers of clothing since I was freezing my ass off even though it was 20+ degrees outside (Celsius). You could say that I was “slightly” triggered by this. He has said so many stupid, triggering things to me and I so badly want to get rid of him. I can’t have him as my therapist anymore, I won’t survive it.

I need help. I need help soon. I don’t have any control myself anymore and I don’t want to get worse. I can’t do this anymore. I don’t have the energy to fight. If I hadn’t had my mom supporting me on every step of the way, I wouldn’t even want help. I wouldn’t want to fight and I would just give up.

I have to be able to fight this by myself, others can’t fight the things in my head for me, but they can be my armor and help me to protect myself from myself, and that’s what I need. 

When will I learn to love myself?

When my dad was here 3 weeks ago I lost weight. A lot of weight considering he only was here for 5 days. I lost whole 3 kg!! Since then, I've lost 2 more kg. A part of me is proud, really proud! But have I been working towards this the last 3 months? No, not at all. I haven't been striving towards recovery to let Ana take control. I've been working towards happiness, but I've ended up pretty miserable.

I want to have a normal relationship with food. That's all I wish for. I don't get hungry, and worst of all, I don't get full. I don't know those two feelings anymore and I'm terrified of binging. I've only binged once, luckily enough, because the guilt that came afterwards almost killed me.

I want to be healthy, I want to feel normal, I want to be happy, I want to feel comfortable in my own body and be confident, but I don't know how to anymore. Or have I ever known how that feels?

I've never been comfortable in my own body. Never. Not even as a child. You could say I've had a kind of an ed since, well, forever. I always thought "no, I can't eat that, I'll get fatter." Not only fat, but fatter because I felt unbelievably huge.

And am I just gonna learn to love myself now at age 17? Almost 18?! I guess I'll just have to. That's what recovery is for, right?

School school school

School is mentally tiring. It's not that I don't enjoy being around people or learning stuff. I just get overly self-concious, insecure and all the stress is killing me. Luckily I have a reduced time schedule so I really hope I won't get a nervous breakdown again like last year. Though when teachers are telling us how the plan for the next couple of weeks are, I breakdown crying. Fun, very fun indeed...

I have chemistry test on Monday and I feel ready. I feel like I could as well take the test right now, even though I haven't read much. Chemistry is something I'm good at, something that makes me feel like I really accomplish something and I like that :) My teachers ask me how my preparations for the test are going and when I say it's going very well because it's easy, they all get very surprised. I guess they're not used to students thinking that chemistry is easy :p

After a chill day at school with some biology, chemistry, internet surfing and filming for a school project (I was an "actress"! Scary stuff) I got home and immediatly changed into my favourite outfit; sportsbra, huge t-shirt and tights. I read some chemistry and drank hot cocoa. Well, to be honest there wasn't much reading, mainly instagram surfing hehe. You have to make it seem like you are "perfect" on a blog, right? That's at least a trend atm ;)

You got any questions? You are more than welcome to ask me anything you like!

-M

Update

I haven't blogged in a while since, well, to say it mildly: I was being eaten up by the universe, as you probably noticed by the last post. I'm doing better now though, and it has been that way for the past 2-3 days. But atm I feel like I am slowly drowning again.
School is taking every small amount of energy and motivation to get better away from me. I'm at breaking point and getting a nervous breakdown (again!) isn't unlikely atm. But I hold on to positivity as hard as I can. I know I can't get away from the dailylife and that's not what I want either. I just want to get better :)

I had a biology test earlier today that went fantastic! I have way too high standards for myself, so the last days have been biology reading, biology reading and some more biology reading. Eucaryote cells is actually not as bad as I thought it would be, but it's A LOT of memorizing!

I will try to write posts more often, but I have a lot of tests, essays and crap to do, but I will do my best :)

Btw, what do you want me to blog more about? eg. food updates, more daily life, articles, inspiration etc?

-M

Falling whole into a black hole

I’m falling. I am falling fast and deep into the unknown. Not exactly the unknown though, because I know it way too well. The kind of well no one should know. I need help. I desperately need help, and that fast. I don’t like asking for help, but I don’t have any choice. Not now. If I don’t ask for help, it will get worse. Way worse. I need someone to catch me, because I’m not able to do so myself. I have tried. I know it all comes down to me, but at this moment, I’ve tried everything. Literally everything and I am exhausted. I am exhausted of trying, but I don’t want to give up. I don’t have the energy to fight against those demons by myself much longer, and it hurts. It hurts that I am not doing well. It hurts because I feel like I am disappointing everyone around me. I am supposed to be better now, but I am not. I can’t take care of myself anymore because I simply don’t have the energy. I don’t know what is going on and it scares me. It scares the hell out of me. I try to put on a smile though because I feel like I am failing and I don’t want to bring everyone else around me down with me. I just want to be normal, the kind of normal where I don’t have to fight off big scary monsters every day to survive. Where those thoughts and voices leave me alone and I get to be myself fully and truly.

Everyday, there are tears running down my chins while all I want to do is to scream. My head is screaming. It is loud and it’s hurtful. I’m constantly battling the shame, guilt, disappointment and evilness in my mind. I am mad, I am furious and I am frustrated at the world and most of all, at myself. Everything around me, included myself, swirls into a black hole. Especially in the evenings when I know I’ll be alone for a long time, too many hours. Hours where I can’t distract my thoughts by surfing the internet, talking to people that make me feel better, looking for advices to fight even harder through the day or watch something fun. I will be alone for a long long time, all by myself.  All I want to do is to curl up beside my mom, feel her comfortable smell and fall asleep where I know I am safe. Where I know that if anything happens she is there to safe me. Even it is in my nightmares, she will be there by my side holding my hand, helping me battling off the monsters that attack me because she is the best mom in the whole entire world. 

Is it too much to ask for?

Like I've said before: I haven't been feeling very well. I was at home from school yesterday and today and the plan was to do some schoolwork, but I just couldn't get myself to do it. I couldn't consentrate. I haven't even been able to to a sudoku or watch TV for more than 3 minutes. I am totally constipated (again!) and it hurts! I am cold, and I am really struggling with eating my meals. So staying at home, trying to get my mental and physical self back on track is probably the best choice I've taken in a while. I don't like being home from school, but when the situation is like this, then I have to put my health before anything else.

I just want to get better and be healthy again. Is that too much to ask for?

I've walked around with a piratepatch all day, due to I've gotten a lazy eye thanks to lack of nutrition and vitamins over quite some time. Gotta love it. When I bought the pack, I got some "tattoos" to put on the patches and I thought: "Ok, If I'm gonna do it, I might as well take it all the way and have cute animal pics on them as well?" so yes, that's what I did :-) 

Sorry for my swollen face, recovery is really paying it's toll...

Yeah, I had a photoshoot with myself earlier today hehe, always as much fun hehe. Ehm, no. Much more entertaining to take pictures of others... and that doesn't kill the little self-esteem I have left. I feel really stupid to post these, but I feel like I have to express myself in someway so here it goes:

It's like I am "Ana" in this pic. It shows how dark, creepy and terrifying the disorder is.

I'm really really constipated, like you can see....

Please, no hate. I'm sorry if it's triggering. That was not the purpose of this post!!! 

-M

Day 6

 What was your favorite meal before your ED? What is your favorite meal now?

It was bacon wrapped chicken with pepper cream cheese sauce made by my mom. Now it is steamed vegetables… I know it’s not a meal, but I can’t come up with anything at the moment.

Puzzle pieces

Woke up, 5:30 am, more than ready to start the day of. I lay in bed till 5:45 and then decided to get out of bed and make myself a delicious breakfast a.k.a. porridge with mango and cocos. I ate and felt kind of motivated. I actually looked forward to school, but all of a sudden everything changed. It went from a good day, to a terrible one in 0.01 seconds. Everything came razing down. I was in the middle of math class, actually only half an hour in to it and still had 2 hours left. I just sat there, staring in to nothing and I was senseless at that moment and felt everything around me racing down like a waterfall.

I am tired, so extremely tired of seeing things that aren’t real. No I’m not schizophrenic, I am talking about fat. I see fat everywhere, even my toes are fat. I see a belly that is way too huge and makes a “beautiful” muffin top over my pant line.  I see thighs that literally jiggle in the wind. I see calves that could be real calves, that’s how huge they are. I see a double chin bigger than Mount Everest. I see arms that look like arms on an obese person and at last but not least, I see cheeks that are blown up like balloons.

I know that these things aren’t true. I know how Ana is disturbing my thoughts, but seeing this 24/7, every time I look in the mirror and every time I look at myself, makes it too real to not believe it. At times it gets too much, way too much. That’s what happened today at school. I began crying, in the middle of class, over my breakfast that I btw ate two HOURS earlier! The regret, the shame, the disappointment was enormous. My head was weird. I couldn’t concentrate, I couldn’t think, I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t listen. The only thing I could do was look in the mirror and cry while feeling my rib, chest, collar and hip bones. Nothing sexual, only Ana being Ana. I wasn’t me anymore. I was Ana.

More and more of me is constantly getting washed away, but at the same moment I am always finding new pieces that I didn’t know existed. It’s like a puzzle and I’ve finally understood that some of those pieces that I’ve been struggling puzzling together simply do not fit. And all this time I have been desperately forcing them together and didn’t understand why they always fell apart again.

I haven’t found all the pieces yet, and I am still forcing pieces together to feel and look more “whole”. But even though I want them to fit, they don’t. I just have to accept the fact that this process takes time and in the end, I will have all my pieces in the right place. Even though it is on my death-bed, they will all fit together sometime. 

Day 5

What actions do you believe could be taken in the future to help prevent your child(ren) or close friends from ever developing an eating disorder?

·         We have to positively encourage people around us, and reassure them that they are beautiful and fantastic just the way they are. That way increases their self-esteem and makes them believe that they are good enough, ALWAYS good enough.

·         The community has to stop being so obsessed with appearances, calories and weight loss.

·         Assure that they are good taken care of, by themselves and by others. Be there for them when they need and help them to think more positively, see something positive in every situation. That is important. We need to be more like Pollyanna 

There are so many other actions to be taken to help prevent our close ones to develope

an eating disorder. We have to remember that our actions have consequences. What you

say to another person might not matter much to you, but to that person it can turn their

life upside down. 

Why continue?

Why exactly am I doing this? Why am I pushing myself so hard everyday when I can just lay around and show my middle finger to the rest of the world? When I can experience my dream, my dream weight and dream life. Why don't I just give up on this eating, eating, eating, when that's all I want to do at times?

I have an answer for that.

Today was a shitty day, well the days before that were that also, but today was even worse. It has come to that point that I don't cry anymore. When I get sad, I get so extremely sad that all I do is stare into an empty wall and completely fade out. At that moment I ain't myself, I ain't anyone. I've disappeared, mentally, but physically I'm still there. I haven't cried in a long long time, or well, since July this year when I was inpatient and my mom came to visit me after we've been 6 weeks apart. Today that changed.

You should probably know some background details:
My dad doesn't understand how routines around mealtimes are for me to be able to fight this demon. He has been staying with us since Monday and I've dropped many meals since then, eaten less than 1000 kcal in one day when I'm really supposed to have 2500. And yes, I'm in a relapse.

Back to why my period of no crying took an end today:
I felt really guilty, miserable and ashamed both because I hadn't eaten and because I'm having a really bad body-image day today and I knew I had to eat but I didn't want to. I didn't know what to do, so I decided to call my ultimate favourite person in the whole world: my grandma. I needed to ventile to someone I knew would support me, incourage me and make me feel a lot better. Also I hadn't talked to her in a while and I really missed her.
At the exact moment I heard her voice, I felt the "crying feeling". The feeling of your throat closing up, your eyes getting wet and actually a feeling of relief by finally getting it all out.  It felt SO good! She always makes me feel better, no matter what. She has always been there for me and she is my rolemodel.
She incouraged me to get up and make me dinner (even though it was 21:30) and told me how great and strong I am. I love her.

She is the one that got me into recovery. She cried while begging me to get better. She was terrified of losing me and she had already lost me into the disorder. Seeing her crying because of me made me want to try recovery just for her, because she deserves so much better. So much better than having a grandchild wich worries her that much.
If I would give up on recovery now, I won't be disappointing her. I would be disappointing myself. I would make my grandma even more worried than she already is, and that would literally kill me. I can't do that to her.
That is why I will do my ultimate best to recover. For my grandma because she deserves so much more.

-M ♥

Day 4

What are factors that contributed in your choice to recover?

I hated seeing my greatgrandma and grandpa cry and pray for me. I don't want them to worrie about me, and the only way to do that is to get better. They love me and they will always care. I didn't want to hurt them by pushing them away like everybody else; believe me, sick me tried to...and I'm so not proud of that!

My grandma was so worried and cried while begging me to get better. That had a HUGE impact on me. She's my favorite person in the whole world and I love her soooooo much! She loves me more than anything, and saying no to her when she definitely was dying of worries, felt cruel. She was so worried of losing me. She had already lost me into the disorder, and was terrified of losing me completely. 

I want to recover for them. My grandma, great grandma and great grandpa do not deserve this.

I recover for the people around me, but first of all do I recover for myself.

So much more

An eating disorder isn’t only about wanting to be thinner and weigh as little as possible, it is so much more than that. It is about control, about getting hold of something in your life again. You feel like everything is slipping away from you, and you search for control. Unfortunately, food becomes a scapegoat.

 All of a sudden, like a thunder from a clear sky, it turns into an intense fear of food, to be more specific: calories. Calories become monsters, monsters that will hunt you every minute of every hour of every day, when in fact they are just a measurement of energy. Energy that is necessary for every living thing on the planet. No energy = no life. What will keep our bodies going if we don’t get any energy?

We humans do not photosynthesize, so the only way to get energy is through food. But when having an ED, you do not care about that. You don’t care if you are dead or alive. You feel dead, and you wouldn’t care if you were in fact dead. You don’t see any point in living, you do not have any energy, you do not have any social life because well, the ED took that away as well, and your health is shitty, because guess what! The lack of nourishment is eating you up, inside out. It is a slow process to suicide.

But what happens when you’ve been stuck in this pattern for a long long time and you’ve decided to want to change it? Maybe it is too late. Maybe your body is about to give up. Even though you mentally are ready to fight off those demons, your body might be worn out. The earlier you decide to fight, the better.

1 in every 5 of those suffering from Anorexia Nervosa dies. That is 20%. There is a bigger possibility to survive cancer than Anorexia; that is unbelievable, right? To me it isn’t. I, like other anorexics, know how powerful and destructive this disorder can be. The thoughts that hunt you down and drag you down with them. That drown you and mentally kill you. People, who haven’t experienced it, don’t know. They don’t understand.  And I guess they never will. And that is probably for the best. 

No good posts lately

Sorry for no good posts lately, I just don't feel like blogging about how well I'm doing in recovery because then I would be lying. I'm hanging on though, but it is hard.
Yesterday I only ate about 1000 kcal and that's WAY to little considering I walked/ran almost 10 km in an hour and well, I have to gain to get my period back. But I'm afraid of gaining. I don't want to get fatter than I already am... I know that's my ed talking, but it's hard to not believe it when it's constantly on repeat in my head.
Now I'm laying here, blogging on my mobile, about to go in the shower, and then go outside to show my dad around (he's on a visit from Iceland)
Hope you're doing better than I am. Love you and stay strong!

Day 3

List 10 NON physical things you like about you.

This is going to be hard...

1. I'm caring

2. I'm smart, not as smart as I was before Ana, but I'm still smarter than average.

3. I'm usually on time and I HATE being late.

4. I'm kind of a Pollyanna, I get it from my greatgrandma.

5. I always put others feelings before mine (that is sometimes negative...)

6. I love my family more than anything in this world. They are the reason why I'm still here and struggling through recovery.

7. I can't lie, it is literally impossible for me. Well sick me lied more than telling the truth, but it always ended with me telling the truth because I couldn't bare the guilt (there is when me, real me, came to senses)

8. I love animals, they've helped me through some really tough times. Just having someone to cuddle with, talk to and care for really helps.

9. I can't sleep much (if I'm not really depressed). I like it because that way I won't miss out of great days.

10. I actually like a bit of my disorders, they've shaped me to the person I've turned out to be AND they've made me into one hell of a warrior. :)

I'm not used to counting up things I like about myself, my thoughts usually go the other way. But I did it!

P.s. follow me on IG (margrets_recovery)

My food

Recently I started to upload photos of my meals on instagram (margrets_recovery). Here are some of them:

Day 2

What does recovery mean to you?
Late winter nights, fudgie brownies, warm cocoa while it's snowing outside.
Late summernights, barbeque, baked potato with cream cheese, soda, icecream and not be freezing in 20 degrees Celsius.

That is what recovery means to me. I want to get my life back, be able to enjoy every moment like it is my last, without thinking and worrying about food and calories. I want to be able to go out on a Friday night with friends and get whatever I want, no matter how many calories. I want to live a normal teenage life where overdosing on chocolate won't kill me and drinking to much soda won't mentally drown me.
I want to get my health back, mental and physical. I want to get rid of chestpains, stomach cramps and hurting joints.

In short terms: I want to feel alive again!

Day 1

Ok….. this is going to be tough. I don’t even know if I want to, it’s too embarrassing and the number is way too high…… but I guess to challenge myself and my ED, I have to… ok, here it goes: I’m 176 cm (5”9) and 63 kg (138 lbs). I am struggling with Anorexia and I have struggled with it since 2009, with periods of EDNOS with anorexic tendencies.  I’ve been in recovery for 2 and ½ months now.

30 day eatingdisorder recovery challenge

I am going to begin on this 30 day ED-recovery challenge and see how that goes. I'm not feeling particularly good and recovery isn't going as well as I would like it to be. Hopefully this will help me :) 

1. List your stats (height/weight). What eating disorder are/have you struggled with?

2. What does recovery mean to YOU?

3. List 10 NON physical things you like about yourself.

4. What are factors that contributed in your choice to recover? 

5. What actions do you believe could be taken in the future to help prevent your child(ren) or close friends from ever developing an eating disorder?

6. What was your favorite meal before your ED? What is your favorite meal now?

7. Do you think the media contributes to the growing rate of girls developing eating disorders younger and younger?

8. Create a list of all the positive things your eating disorder has given you. (This day should be short haha.)

9. Create a list of all the negative things your eating disorder has given you.

10. Does anyone in your close family have an eating disorder? If so, do you think it had an impact on you developing one?

11. List 10 PHYSICAL features you like about yourself.

12. Post a picture of 1 thing you ate today. 

13. Do you believe you can ever fully recover from an eating disorder? Explain.

14. How do your friends and family feel about your eating disorder?

15. Post a picture of you before you ever developed an eating disorder. What emotions were you feeling in this picture? Describe your picture.

16. How would you help a close friend or family member if they developed an eating disorder?

17. What does being fat TRULY mean to you?

18. Here’s a challenge. Come up with a hobby you’ve never done or haven’t done in awhile that has NOTHING to do with eating or exercising or cooking. Totally non eating disorder related. What is your hobby? Why did you chose it?

19. Has your eating disorder ever held you back from something? If so, explain.

20. I feel eating disorders have somehow been glamorized. Explain your opinion on this.

21. Who has been the biggest contributor of your recovery in your life? Explain.

22. Describe your goals for your future. 

23. List 2 positive things that happened to you today.

24. Where were you in terms of your eating disorder 6 months ago? Describe how you’ve changed.

25. What are your ‘fear foods’? I CHALLENGE you to eat one today. Dare you. Do it.

26. Eating disorders often come hand in hand with social anxiety and or depression. Start 1 conversation today with someone you don’t normally speak to. How did it go?

27. Create a letter of everything you would write to your eating disorder as if it were a real life person.

28. What do you need to improve on in order to advance mentally and or physically towards recovery? Explain how you plan on actually moving forward with these goals!

29. Challenge yourself again in some way today. Whether it be being more social, eating more, eating another fear food, etc. Explain.

30. List your stats again. Did this help you at all?