Day 27

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

Dear Ana

I’ve known you for quite some time now, and you’ve gotten way too involved in my life. Our paths need to be separated. They crossed a long time ago and have kept on crossing ever since, but now it is time for that to stop. Everything gets born and everything dies, our relationship included.

I thought you were nice. I thought the things you said were true, but things are changed now. I’ve realised what you’ve done and have been doing. You’ve messed with my head, making me belief all this bullshit of yours. “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” you say? Well I know what tastes better! LIFE! Life tastes better than striving towards perfection.

I am so irritated, frustrated and desperate because of you that I don’t know where to start expressing my real, true feelings. But I am also thankful. I am thankful for the kilos you’ve made me lose. But then again, that might be you messing with my head again. Get out, get out, GET OUT!

You came because I lacked control. Because I lost control, you decided to pop up again and save the day. Except all you did was making it tough, in another way than before, but tough. You saved my life. You saved me from killing myself. You made me feel a bit better with every kilo I lost, but it was never good enough. 17 kg. You took 17 kilos away from me, but I still didn’t get me to the underweight category measured by BMI. You got me to 18,7. And I know that frustrates you as it was SO close! Half a kilo more and we would be UNDERWEIGHT again. A little over three years ago, you got me to BMI 17,7 and of course that wasn’t low enough for you, but back then I fought against you. I had the energy and will, but you never really left. I didn’t get professional help later on as I was way too fat to be suffering from such a demon like you in my head. And whenever I brought you up with anyone, they just looked the other way. I tried to tell them about my experience with you in the past and how the thoughts still hunted me, but they wouldn’t listen. They wouldn’t take it seriously. You hid in the back of my head, getting ready for a backfire, which eventually came.

You don’t want me to talk. You don’t want me to tell anyone as it is “our little secret”. It is embarrassing to tell anyone that you actually are a voice, because I feel that by admitting that I am admitting that I am crazy. Hearing voices isn’t normal, it is the opposite of normal.
I get super nervous when I talk about you because you are there, in my head, screaming at every word I say. I want you to get lost. I want you to leave me alone, for once.

I want my period back (surprisingly). 3 years of irregular or none menstruation is a long time. Now it has been… I don’t remember how long, since I got my last monthly menstruation.  But to illustrate it a bit: After I started recovery (July 2013) I should have gotten my period 5 times. I’ve had it 2, each one for not even a day. I don’t even know if it can be counted as menstruation. 

You’ve taken so much away from me: my womanhood (haha), my ability to socialize without being super awkward, my few friends I had, the spark in my eyes, my happiness, so much excitement towards things like Christmas, birthdays etc. You’ve taken away so many possible good memories and replaced them by memories of tears, desperation, head hanging on the toilet seat, exhausted after stuffing my fingers literally down to the larynx and pressing my stomach up to my lungs.

But you’ve given me so much as well. You’ve given me people who care. You’ve given me so many really good friends, two that I can define as best friends. You’ve brought my family closer to me, supporting me and showing me that they care. You’ve made me and my grandma have a better relationship, and showed me that she and I are really much alike, more than I could ever imagine. You’ve made my other grandma and I so much closer and I can proudly define my grandma as one of my very close friends.

Inside my head, you’ve made my life miserable. But outside, in the real world, you’ve made me realise that I’ve got people around me that love me (or well, you’ve made them show me that they care).  And that messes really with my head because I start questioning if I get healthy, people will stop caring. They will stop noticing me. Stop loving me. I don’t want that. But I don’t want you either. I am afraid that I will lose my support and end in the same black hole as I was in 6 months ago. I want to thrive, but I also want to survive. That’s the problem. 

I do not need

I do not need
empty stomachs,
shrinking skin,
children’s clothing,
or dropping numbers;

I do not need
icy hands,
sunken eyes,
falling hair,
or jutting bones;

I do not need
distant thoughts,
blacked out vision,
hospital beds,
or a dying pulse.

I do not need validation:

I do not need
to die again
to be deserving of
coming back to life.

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 a mental disorder takes over your life

When a mental disorder takes over your life, you just simply got to fight to get it back, because eventually it will take your life away. Maybe in the moment you are depressed that sounds pretty great. The thought of something taking your life away seems relieving. But in the moment you are NOT depressed, you can´t think of not being alive. Depression is like most other mental disorders, a disorder which you can recover from.  If you try hard enough, you will recover and learn to love life again. And when you’re recovered you will be thankful for being alive, I can promise you that.

When I was at my worst, I had pre-heart attack symptoms. I had chest pains and felt like there was a ton lying on my chest. I had constant back pain in my upper back, toothache and pain in my left arm, which are all known as pre-heart attack symptoms. I got help in time. Thankfully! I can‘t believe if I had gotten a heart attack, only 17 years old! 17 year old and a heart attack don‘t simply fit with each other.

An eating disorder CAN take your life away. No, you are not allowed to think that „nope, that won‘t happen to me, I‘m not sick enough“ because that´s bullshit. If you don‘t fight back, it WILL take your life away! And once it does, you can‘t get it back because, well, you´re dead. Everyone has their own struggles and have to fight through the day. If you want to live, you have got to fight twice as hard as them, because here we are talking about life or death.

 If you restrict, you can lose your life, even though you are categorized as “normal weighted”. If your body lacks nutrients and food in general over a long time, you can get serious complications which can lead to a tragic death. Reports of the 1981 hunger strike by political prisoners against the British presence in Northeast Ireland indicate that 10 individuals died after periods of between 46 and 73 days without food. Think! 46-73 days, that’s a pretty short time! You won’t survive much longer than that, and chances are that you won’t even survive that long!

My mom told me about a woman who worked out at her gym. She was there 24/7, usually on the skiing machine or the treadmill. She was thin, but not as thin as the pictures that come up on Google when you search for Anorexia (apropos, very few people who suffer from anorexia look that way). Nobody was fascinated or admired her of her stamina for running for hours. They looked at her and thought “poor lady”. Eventually they had to ban her from the gym. She was forced into several treatments, but once she was “better”, she came to the gym and was back to where she began, running or skiing for hours. Few months later, she died. She wasn't as thin as the anorexia pictures on the internet, but her body couldn't bare the restriction and over exercise any more. It gave up.  

That could be you. Think about it. Is this disorder gonna win, or are YOU going to win this fight? I bet on you.

Stay strong little warrior. Better days lie ahead!

Since it's suicide prevention day today, 10th of September, I just want to tell you that you're beautiful and I believe in you! You can do this! You are stronger than you think and I love you! Hugs and kisses are on their way to you in the mail! ♥

I love you, no matter who you are, and I care!