Missing You

Dear ED 

I miss you today.

 I miss the strength and resolve I felt when your arms were wrapped around me. I miss melting into that deep, all consuming exhaustion. I miss always having a rock to cling to, always have an escape plan, always having you. 

I can, however, no longer ignore the pain you bring. 

I don't understand why I miss you, ED. You took (and are still taking) so much from me. Faith, hope, health, money, trust, relationships... It didn't matter what it meant to me, you flushed it down the drain. You left me with a shell of a life, ED. A shell only you could fill.

 Sometimes, I wonder why you stopped. You could have taken it all. Why leave me empty and begging? 

 I want to be that special again. I want to have that secret no one can touch. I want to know I am strong, untouchable, and glamorously fragile.  The problem is that I can now see how much it cost. I can see that no matter how amazing all of that is, the price is too high. I have so much more now than I ever did when I was with you. So much more. 

Oh ED... I wish I had never met you. I wish I didn't know of your strange comforts. I wish I wasn't tempted by your pain. I am going to learn how to stand on my own now. 

I have to: You and I don't work. 

Groceries

Lets talk about grocery shopping... 

It is really not rocket science. Every adult on the planet has to do it. It should be simple, easy, hell, even interesting at times. 

However... I find it to be a sick form of torture: I am forced to think about all the future meals I will eat. Also, I am forced to spend money-- what little I have-- on something I would still rather avoid.  Then half the time, when I get home, I stare at my stocked fridge and cabinets only to pull out the yogurt and a box of cereal and avoid the rest.  

All that to say: I still have some serious food issues. Since I have entered this wild world of Recovery, I have fallen into the belief that I should be long past all of my ED related fears. As I cried in the parking lot of the grocery store yesterday, I realized that I am not normal.

 My avoidance of food only to later eat junk = not healthy. My ritualistic eating of the same foods for weeks on end = not recovered. All the foods I don't eat = fear foods.

 I still have an eating disorder. 

I still have work to do. 

I still have a long way to go on this journey. 

Hang on

There are days I am barely hanging on. 

I must maintain recovery. 

I have to. 

There are no choices here. 

I cannot slip. 

I cannot slip. 

I will not fall. 

I am stronger than this. 

I am stronger... 

I am worthy. 

Remember

This Thursday marks nine weeks without self-harm. 

This Thursday marks two and a half weeks without purging. 

I am proud of how well I am doing.  Yet, I feel wobbly and scared.  Some days I want so badly to slip back into my disorder.  I have come so far and yet I don't fully know who I am. I know I am standing on the edge of something potentially amazing. This life I am living could become something fabulous. I worry, however, that I am going to slip into the abyss of the disorder again. I know I can't function in this job, living on my own (and in the fall, going to school) if I let ED take over. I have to be strong. I have to remember that life is more than being perfect and being thin. I have to remember. 

Being me

 I ache for my ED sometimes: I knew how to handle life when I was sick. I look back at my old journals and am astounded by the things I did... and as proud as I am to have overcome most of that:, I miss it. I felt "special" when I was sick. The truth, however, is when I was sick, being sick was all I had. Everything I did was defined by my ED. Everything I said was inspired by ED. Every breath I took was controlled by ED. I was ED. Now, as flawed and imperfect as I am, I am me. I may not love who I am, but I know being me is better than being ED.