Healthy Weight Loss

The weight I am right now is just about a healthy weight, but lately I've been eating a bit too much junk food, and have just gone up by a few more pounds than I would like to be. Of course, the second I decide that I'll lose a few pounds, in a healthy way, my old habits begin creeping in, and suddenly I find myself teetering between full on relapse and just about holding it together. THIS is ridiculous isn't it? Lots of people lose weight in a totally healthy way for lots of different reasons, why do I feel like such a failure when I try and just stick to a diet plan?

This isn't really a post, I just really wanted to know if anybody had had a similar thing, and found a way of overcoming it without allowing the ED mindset to return? Diet plans? Calorie limitation? Anything like that?
Thank you!

Control

I don’t even know what this word means anymore.

Once, it meant less than 200calories a day. 

Once, it meant losing 5llbs in a week.

Once, it meant illness and pain and hatred.

Then, it meant realisation.

Then, it meant anorexia had taken it.

Then, it meant being lost in a spiral into this illness, becoming sicker and sicker.

Now, I don’t know how to gain control.

I’m so lost.

Rescue me?

Escape

***TRIGGER WARNING***
It's weird.
My hope, my interminable faith in humanity and in the people in my life, is fading.
I feel so trapped, but at the same time lost in the wilderness of my mind. It seems so impossible to explain; how every move I make feels constricted, and yet at the same time to feel as if I'm floating with no particular direction or path to follow.

I want to run away.
I want someone to recognise that the "I'm fine" "I'm just tired" "I'm not hungry" "I was just coughing, not being sick" bollocks that I dole out every fucking day is just that; a pile of bullshit. I don't think I am okay. I can't admit that, but I really am scared that this time everything won't be okay.
I want to escape, even if it's just for a while.
I want one of the people who claim to love me, who say they'll always be there, to scoop me up in their arms, and hold me tight, and tell me they love me.
I need someone to recognise how much I'm hurting because it's killing me, it really is.

This Friday was the date I'd planned to kill myself, after deciding if I was going to, I wanted to be level headed, to have thought it through, to make sure there was no chance of not dying. I won't go into details about method, but tomorrow was the date.
I realised this was a stupid idea, made plans to have my friend over. She ditched me. I asked my other mate to go to the movies with me. He can't because of "transport".

I need someone to want me enough to take me away for a few hours, to make me smile, to make me laugh.

This pain is too much and not enough.

I don't even know who I am anymore.
Truth is, if I don't find a way of escaping this awfulness in my mind, suicide will be my only escape.
I mustn't let that happen.

The Wake Up Call

When did you guys all SEE yourself for the first time?
I think it's so easy to allow anorexia to cloud your vision when you see yourself. I would look in the mirror and think I looked like a fatass, that my face looked chubby, that you could barely even see my bones. The inspiration from this post came from reading another blog, about a girl whose wake up call was unbelievable. Some of you may have seen the pro-Ana slogan "I want to be so light, I don't leave footprints in the snow"? This girl was walking in the snow when she suddenly realised she was barely leaving a mark.
This resonated with me in two ways.

Firstly, it shows that with anorexia, you think you really want something, but actually when the time comes, you realise it wasn't worth the sorrow and the heartache to get.
The second is the symbolism within this realisation. You're no longer leaving a mark on the world, you're becoming less of a person; you're becoming invisible. This image reflects the way in which anorexia takes away who you are, you don't have as much impact. You are barely even there anymore.

I saw another story of a girl who just looked in the mirror one day, and actually SAW herself. She suddenly saw the ribs, the bones sticking out horrendously, how ugly her skeletal body looked in the harsh light of reality. She realised she looked nothing more than a corpse; no femenine curves; gaunt pale face; bow legged;... unattractive. Anorexia is not beautiful.

My realisation could have come at a  lot of times:
I was in the shower, and as i put conditioner in, I took my hand away from my head, and a huge clump of hair was left in my hands. I sobbed; my hair is the one thing I have ever liked myself. THis was very symbolic too, in that it highlighted anorexia was taking away everything that mattered to me.
The second time I could have had my wake up call was giving my friend a hug at school. "Holy shit, K, I can feel your ribs through your blazer, that's disgusting". My thought process? How stupid, she obviously can't, she's lying.
The third time could have been a picture taken of me, smiling. I thought I would look pretty in it; I'd got dolled up to go out, I felt reasonably okayish. I looked at the photo and I look drained, exhausted, gaunt, sunken eyes.. the lot.
The fourth time? Sat in my psychiatrist's office, he had just weighed me. "K, if you lose any more weight, you WILL be put in inpatient treatment. You now are severely underweight." ... He's lying?

The real realisation came when I was lying next to the guy I was with at the time. He had his hand resting on my stomach as we lay half asleep, and I suddenly became aware of how much my ribs and hips stuck out. I felt... embarassed. What I usually saw as achievements looked so ugly. I suddenly became aware of how much pain I was in, with my bony spine resting awkwardly on the floor. My bones protruding suddenly made me feel ashamed. I had no stomach there really. I tried pushing out my tummy to make myself look bigger, but I physically didn't have the energy.

This sudden feeling of embarassment threw my world into turmoil. What? Bones are how I judge if I'm doing okay?? Why do I suddenly wish I just had a regular non-concave stomach?

I hope you all receive a wake up call sometime soon.

There Are No Words

Fate

*TRIGGER WARNING*

I attempted suicide on the 7th of September 2011.
If I had succeeded, I wouldn't even be here. I'd have been dead for over four months.
That's a fucking weird thought. The idea that my parents might have forgotten the sound of my voice by now has really shaken me up.

My best friend might have gotten over the fact that I'd be dead.
My sister might just think of me late at night when she has nothing else to think about.
My school would have moved on, the teachers already forgetting the name of "the girl who killed herself".

Have I left anything of value behind? I don't know.
But maybe I'm here because of fate. Maybe I wasn't meant to die on the 7th September. Maybe I am destined to be sat here right now, writing all about it.

Partly, it gives me hope that there is a reason I'm here. Partly it makes me sad to think how easily I could have  been forgotten. And then another part of me wonders whether I really am meant to be here, or if I should have stayed in that bath, let myself bleed to death, let my parents find me...

Mind is fucked right now, I don't know anything at the moment.

Early Beginnings

Now, I know it isn't the same with everyone, but I have for a long age had problems with food, and body image. I think these began very young, around 3 or 4, because I was a classic chubby child while my sister was a skinny waif-like 2 year old. This feeling of being bigger, the need to compare myself to everyone, was made worse when I started school. There, I became very close with a girl who was again, super skinny. We would play dress up, and she could always wear the nicest fairy costume or look the cutest.

However, I did not starve myself or blame food for a while after that. I hated how I looked, believed with all my heart and soul I was ugly, and often would eat too much and feel guilty afterwards. Aged 5 I switched to skimmed milk from semi-skimmed, aged 6 I started eating Special K after hearing it would magically help me lose weight. I would steal diet books from my mum, I would hide while my mum did excercise videos, doing the excercises behind the sofa or in another room. My body issues consumed me.

Aged 7, I tried to make myself sick. I had never heard of bulemia, I didn't realise it was a problem or a medical disorder. All I knew was that I wanted that food out of me. Luckily, I didn't succeed, although I tried right the way through my first year of secondary school. I began cutting out of frustration around the age of 11, because it was at this point I began taking on a lot of my friends' problems, including drug addiction, self harm and depression, which naturally had an adverse effect on me. Aged just 12, I succeeded, and through the next two years I made myself sick on a regular basis until June of the year I turned 14. This was triggered by unrest at home; Dad's job was in jeopardy and everything seemed to spiral out of control. Throwing myself fully into an eating disorder (although I did not acknowledge I had a problem until years later) helped me establish some control, or so I thought.

At this point, I finally faced up to the fact that I had a real problem. I gained about 6llbs, but didn't care because I was happy. That all fell apart the summer of that year - I won't go into it - which caused a very quick decline into anorexia. My weight plunged, everything began to spiral out of control. I quickly lost 9llbs in just 2 weeks, I barely ate, I passed out regularly, my parents and friends and even teachers were very worried. I began seeing a psych every month, a therapist weekly, and going for weekly weigh ins. I was threatened with inpatient treatment, which triggered a desire to break free.

So, having problems with food from such a young age must mean something?

Increasingly, we see stories of 9 year old anorexics on life support, or 8 year old bullemics being sent to clinics to recover; isn't it horrific? That our society has reached the point where children this young feel such a self-destructive impulse?

One argument might be that those who struggle with mental health issues have different neurological patterns in their brains. This scientific theory is highly disputed and countless studies disprove and prove it. Another might be exposure to the media brainwashed me, even at a young age, which is potentially true, although I always felt something a little deeper. I haven't suffered terrible losses, or been abused. My parents told me I was beautiful, Mum didn't obsessively diet, my Dad is a little overweight but never dangerously so; nurture seems to be out. That leaves nature..

I don't know exactly what it means, but it is proving to make recovery even harder to manage; overcoming habits and mindsets which have been deeply embedded all my life. Maybe self-destruction and self-hatred are part of the make-up of my mind. These thoughts get inside every second of my life, constricting it, suffocating it, leaving me feeling worthless. I'm tired of it.

Fuck nature vs nurture, I'm fighting back.