"Every day is exactly the same"

I don't see an end to this. I haven't been updating because my life is so boring and so pointless. It becomes a really sad existence when the only things that stand out are your hospital admissions. I have started referencing my life in relation to hospitalizations rather dates. Ex. Between hospitalization 3 and 4, I did such and such. The deeper I get, the stupider I feel for still chasing this path and the harder it gets to put a stop to it. I actually feel relieved amidst the fear when I'm nearing a hospital admission. The relief comes from the respite I get from myself. Save me from me. Even if it's just for a couple of weeks.

Yes, it's really hard suddenly being faced with a meal plan in the hospital, but at the same time I finally get to hand the reigns over to someone else and "allow" myself to eat because the decision is no longer on my shoulders alone. But I can't live the rest of my life with someone watching over my every meal in order for me to eat it... it just doesn't work that way, yet the way things are going, those are the only times my mind lets go a little of the control, because the control is literally taken away from you.

I'm keeping down 1 Boost a day (yay!) but no food. Even a food that is the same number of calories as the Boost is too scary. Logic has completely lost its place in my ED'd mind. Weight is slowly dropping, nothing drastic, but enough to keep my ed happy. as long as it's not the same or higher, i'm OK with a slow weight loss right now. My body needs the rest.

These lyrics by Nine Inch Nails speak volumes about where I'm at right now:

"I believe I can see the future
Cause I repeat the same routine
I think I used to have a purpose
But then again
That might have been a dream
I think I used to have a voice
Now I never make a sound
I just do what I've been told
I really don't want them to come around

Every day is exactly the same
There is no love here and there is no pain
Every day is exactly the same"
-NIN

Anonymous Comments

This is a comment I just received on my baking blog a few minutes ago. My blog is Buttercreambarbie and the comment was made on my post from yesterday found here:
Panna Cotta & Florentines.

"You're an anorectic.. you actually eat the shit you bake? LOL what a fat ass."

Of course the person commenting was Anonymous. I thought I would be more upset, but the only thing running through my mind is this: Some people are so stupid!

The Early ED Days

When this ED first started, years and years ago, the comments I got (about how thin, how frail, how tiny) used to give me such a high. I lived for those comments and they fuelled my obsession with dieting and weight loss. Urging me to go further, to see what they would say. Even the negative comments like the classic, "You're so thin, go eat a sandwich!", made me feel proud and accomplished.

Fast forward 17 years to today. Yes, a small part of me does still feel that pride when I hear any such comment, but not to the extent as it did previously. It mostly just reminds me of how trapped I am in this identity that maybe that's all people see when they look at me. I've lost my personality, my passion, and consequently, most of my friends.

I ran out of sick time from work and I still have to pay for daycare and other expenses, so ... here I am back at work. I want to do some kind of long-term treatment program at some point, but today I'm actually doing OK. I'm trying so hard to stick to drinking [diabetic, lower calorie] Boost. Food is way too scary. Boost is a nice, neat package, pre-measured and consistenly portioned. I'm avoiding real food for the meantime, trying to find that line between eating enough to keep going but not so much that i cross the "must purge now" line. I feel really hopeful. Genuinely hopeful this time. :)

Freedom = Trouble

I had honest-to-god 100% good intentions to stay on track with my meal plan during my long (4hr) pass on the weekend. Then the moment I got out of the hospital, I fucked up. I purged. It was as though my brain clicked into "habit" mode and it was a train-wreck heading for disaster. I thought I could do this. I really believed in myself.

On the ward I was doing so well. Under controlled, supervised conditions, I can do this. With freedom comes fear. Everything slipped through my fingers like sand all within moments.

In the middle

I am ambivalent in every aspect of my life. I equally desire two polar opposite things with the same amount of passion. And therefore, I stay stuck in one place - this terrible middle ground. In this place you don't know where you're going and the time seem to repeat itself year after year.

My mind can come up with strong arguments for both sides of an issue. So strong that I end up not knowing what I really want because I can rationalize and justify anything but there is none of my feeling/intuition behind those arguments. I don't know how to connect logic with emotion.

This time in the hospital I feel a slight mental shift. I have a small grain of sensation that I *could* do this. Maybe, just maybe I want it enough to TRY.

But I'm as afraid to succeed as I am to fail.

Weigh Day

It was weigh day.
Let's just say there were a lot of unhappy campers.
I'm kinda 50-50 on it. My weight went up quite a bit (FREAKING OUT ABOUT THIS) but my meal plan is not going to be increased from the basic/intro meal plan because my weight went up ie. my metabolism is shot to hell (RELIEVED NOT TO HAVE TO DEAL WITH MORE FOOD).

It makes me wonder if I ever do recover, if I'll never be able to eat a normal amt of food because of the damage to my metabolism.

It was extremely difficult to get through meals yesterday with the weight gain in the back of my mind as well as witnessing the other people struggling so hard at the table as a result of the weigh in. Some people who had been eating almost all their meals began replacing 100% of the meal, not taking a single bite off their tray. It was so hard to watch, but I do not fault anyone. Every person has their own struggle and their own timeline. I just feel guilty for eating 50% of my meal when someone else is eating 0%. Even if they are replacing with Boost.

Visit from parents

My parents came to visit me for the first time yesterday. I was extremely anxious about it the whole day before the visit and the morning of the visit. I don't want to interact with anybody from the outside world right now. It sounds so boring, but I really only want to talk to people who understand what it's really like, so I don't have to expend energy on explaining it only to get a superficial, trivial answer. People who don't know the depth and bredth of this disorder and who just want to help often say things like, "why don't you see a nutritionist and try following a meal plan?". Yes, I agree that would be helpful and I'm doing that, but there is so much more to all of this. To even BEGIN to explain it is a daunting task. So I only choose to go into detail with people who will truly be impactful in my life. For the others, I just smile, nod, and say thank you.

I was afraid the visit would involve fighting over some insignificant issue as is usually the case. But it was a really good visit. We stayed neutral and respectful of each other. Bonus: She snuck in 2 boxes of CRYSTAL LITE! My mom is hilarious. She brings me gum, crystal lite and other contraband.

Victory: I completed 1 grain (1 pc. ww toast) without replacing it at dinner last night. The volume of Boost I am needing to replace at my meals is decreasing.

Struggle: I cannot mentally focus enough to read. I haven't read a novel in >2 years. It puts me to sleep, no matter how interesting the topic. I need to 'relearn' how to read.

Goals: One of our goals was to think of our longterm or "bigger picture" goals. Then to drill down slowly to medium term, short term and immediate goals. Then to make the connection how the short term ones connect to the longterm and lifelong goals, so TODAY you might have to do something you don't want to do (ie. eat meal plan) in order to fulfill the overarching goals. This logic brought me a little more focus to my life. I want to move forward, but I need to undertake the challenge that is right in front of my face before I can tackle the bigger challenge. Starting with the little things.

Tension Rising

The tension in here is rising, especially around mealtimes. That nice, comfortable setting I talked about before, well that's rapidly being eroded.

I am triggering to people. I have been told this directly. Why?
1) I eat too slowly
2) My bite sizes are too small
3) I push food around my plate
4) I replace at every meal
5) I use a teaspoon to eat instead of a regular sized spoon.
6) I break my crackers into little bits

Mind you, the meal support person has not called me out on a single thing and I'm sitting right beside her. I'm not trying to disobey the rules here, maybe I'm just not 100% conscious of what I'm doing to be triggering. Everyone does furtive, eD shit here. I'm not the only one. So why do I feel like I'm being singled out?

I have also been told that one girl here does not like me and I should stay away from her. This came as a complete shock to me - I have barely had any interaction with this person - definitely no negative interactions that I know of, so how could she possibly dislike me? The person who told me said she doesn't know exactly why I'm disliked, but she knows for sure that this is the case. I'm taken aback... It bothers me. It shouldn't... I shouldn't care who likes or doesn't like me because I'm supposedly in here for ME but it still gets to me. ESPECIALLY since she doesn't know me at all and doesn't have any grounds for not liking me. Literally less that 5 mins of conversation have happened between us.

In such a confined space with only 8 girls I wish everyone could just get along.

Doing OK

This admission has been the best one so far. I'm really seeing this time all the benefits I can get from being here - besides the obvious one of medical stabilization and meal plan adherence - I see that I can get a lot of support around family therapy, occupational therapy, dealing with triggers and practical plans to help me stop the black and white thinking when i get out... ie. one slip doesn't mean that ALL is lost.

I think of it like a string of beads. When the string gets cut, all the beads fall to the floor. But if you put a little knot between each bead, then when the string snaps, they don't all come tumbling off because each one is held in place. It has felt like in the past, one slip = the end of any progress I had made. My goal this time is to put knots between the beads in recovery.

The other gals in here right now are a really nice mix of people. I know a couple from previous admissions and it's just a comfortable atmosphere... as comfortable as it can be given the circumstances I guess. I'm struggling with feeling sooo full after every meal and drinking 1.5 cups of Boost PLUS (ie. 360 calories for a 250 mL serving). The grossest part is that the Boost is at room temperature now - they don't refrigerate it because they don't have a fridge for it since they can't keep it with the meds in the med fridge. I didn't think Boost could possibly get any worse.... until now that I'm drinking it warm.

I'm sorta facing a bit of a dilemma right now - I got a call saying that I am shortlisted for an interview for a job I applied for before coming into the hospital. They want to schedule the interview for next week, but I will still be in the hospital! This is a job that I REALLY want and there I would not give up the opportunity to go to this interview if my life depended on it... so I have to either get a day-long pass to go to the interview or ask for early discharge. And I have to somehow plan for the interview and do a bunch of practice questions. I want this so badly. I'm afraid to get my hopes up, but I truly cannot remember the last time I have wanted something so much.

I'm ready

Some part of me is actually looking forward to being admitted tomorrow. I will finally be saved from myself. I will finally be stopped in my tracks. I feel a strange sense of calm that I have never felt before going in. I guess I'm ready for someone else to take control for a while and to stop the chaos.

I'm leaving the house in 20 mins... wish me luck!