Thursday 14 April 2016

ED Recovery

I've typed this sentence countless times over the last two months, and then deleted it. I want to tell you that it's because everything has been going so well that I have nothing say. But that's not the case. The truth is that I have been struggling for the last few months, and I haven't wanted to admit it to anyone. More and more I have been hiding behind that familiar mask, the forced smile and throwaway words when someone asks how I am. That voice in my head, that darkness, convinced me that if I opened up to people they would turn away. That my friends and family are sick of my problems, sick of the burden of having me in their lives. Maybe that's true, I'd understand, but not talking about it isn't getting me anywhere.

I was discharged from an eating disorder unit last August, after 9 weeks of weight gain and various therapy groups aimed at breaking the hold my ED had on me. I gained 11kgs during my stay as a result of a high calorie diet and a largely sedentary lifestyle. The first few weeks at home were difficult and I lost a few kilos, but for the last four months I've maintained the same weight. Which is good for my body - I am healthier than I have been in years. Outwardly, I am doing great, at least that's what people keep telling me. Inside is a different story.

Recovery from an eating disorder is not just about gaining or loosing weight, in fact I would say the numbers on the scale are the easy part. Here I am, a healthy weight with everyone around me commenting on how great I look, and I feel like someone has taken my brain and shoved it inside the Stay Puft marshmallow man(Ghostbusters). In the eight months since my discharge I haven't been able to look at myself in the mirror. The most I can manage is focusing on one body part so I can check how fat it looks in whatever I'm wearing. Then more often than not I will go and change. I live in pajamas or tracksuit bottoms for most of the week - today for example, I walked my dogs in my pajama top and a pair of ugly grey tracksuit bottoms, that were inside out. And then I went to the shop, in the same outfit. This isn't a rare occurrence either, some days I just stay in my pajamas; I'll do the shopping, walk the dogs and even go to therapy in my pajamas. It's not that I'm lazy, or haven't done the laundry. It's because I am so deeply ashamed of my body that I can't stand to wear anything that might draw attention to just how fat and revolting I am. I would rather be seen in a pair of Harry Potter pajamas, than a pair of leggings. At least when it was colder I could hide myself under big jumpers and frumpy coats. What am I going to do when the summer arrives?

I wish I could like my body, or just accept it. I wish I didn't want to cry every time I shower or have panic attacks in changing rooms. I wish I could look at a magazine or watch TV without comparing myself to every female on it, berating myself for being lazy and weak. I wish I wasn't compulsively rubbing my collarbones as I type this and telling myself how much better it was when they were sharper and more defined.

When I was in hospital they told me recovery would take a long time, but I didn't really comprehend what that meant. I thought eating would be the hard part, that once I stopped crying over mashed potatoes I would be at the end of the process. In reality, that was just the beginning. This is the hard part, this is when you really have to work. It would be so much easier to fall back into the same pattern of restricting and purging than to try and accept myself the way I am now; to separate my self worth from the numbers. It seems like an insurmountable task to me, and I have no idea how to accomplish it. Perhaps wearing actual clothes to walk the dogs is a good place to start?

No comments:

Post a Comment