The Difference a Year Makes

It’s really hard to believe that it’s already October. It’s also really hard to believe that the year of my life that was one of the most eventful went by so incredibly fast. Now last year in treatment definitely wasn’t my first rodeo, but the circumstances were definitely different. It had honestly felt like light years since the previous stay in treatment. I had a solid two years of living “normally.” I had maintained my weight and I didn’t have to go to appointments every week (which was not a good decision).

For the first two years of Tim and I’s relationship I felt like I was in a really good place. I was on track food wasn’t my enemy, I had a few rough spots, but for the most part I was good. Falling in love, real love was all kind of a whirl wind. I guess I’ve always been a romantic believing in true love and managed to always get involved with guys who used and abused. Finally for the first time and only time I found the man that God had for me. I believe he is the only man who knows how to love me the way that I need to be loved. He knows how to support me and he always does.

After we got married and real life started to set in a lot of my old trauma started to resurface. My anxiety and depression got worse and so did the nightmares. I worked in a job where nothing was ever, ever good enough, and if you have an eating disorder I’m sure you would understand how that would be. I tried so hard to tell myself that it was a little slip and I could get back on track but I was fooling myself, its grip on me was almost as tight as it was before. So in a matter of months I was sitting by myself on a plane to Oregon.

It was my first residential experience and I was terrified. It was one of the best and worst experiences of my life. I was away from my husband which made me miserable, but I was also amongst some of the most amazing women that I have ever met in my life. It was hard I cried almost every day but also had some of the best moments of my life. I made friends that I believe are lifetime friends. I miss it everyday and never wanna go back all at the same time.

I know now that without a doubt I want to get my degree in social work and work with people with eating disorders. I want to do whatever possible to raise awareness and help get rid of the stigma of those with eating disorders. I’ve seen too much and lived through too much to not. I know its going to take a long time since my eating disorder took college away from me but I will get there.

Now that it is a year later it seems like a lifetime ago that I went through all of that. With the season everything reminds me of Oregon. Pumpkin spice coming out and getting a SHORT size on Sunday coffee outings, and only letting myself drink half of it. All the pumpkin things at the grocery store in the turnberry house, and watching breaking dawn at the midnight showing. The aweful thanksgiving meal, going to a Christmas tree farm and actually cutting down your own tree and taking it home, and sitting in front of the fireplace and taking naps.

With all of this nostalgia also comes the realization of how much better it would have been if I could have shared it with my amazing husband. I don’t ever want to be in that position again to be apart. Now I want to make the most of this fall and holiday season with my hubby. My eating disorder is still a very real thing in my life every single day, but it no longer makes all of the decisions. Now when I struggle I think of the good support I had at rainrock, but also remember that I don’t ever want to be back there again. I am truly blessed to have the supportive few in my life that I do and an amazing loving husband who is there to act like a ninja after a hard day of trauma therapy. <3

Don't worry about a thing

            So Monday was our first small group for the 40 days in the word series. With my social anxiety I went it already feeling super anxious. I was eased when everyone was so warm and welcoming. Ironically the first verse we went over was Colossians 3:15, “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.” The question came up of which word stood out the most and to me it was “Let.” I started thinking about the phrase “let go and let God” and I thought how completely terrible I am at that!

            I always feel like if I’m not in control of something then it will completely fall apart. Yes it completely drives Tim insane because he’s Mr. Positivity and always says everything’s gonna be fine don’t worry. I know I have so much evidence that it will be ok. Last year when I left for Oregon I was like nope cant go, I’ve got to work, I’ve got to make money. What happened? I left and the world didn’t fall apart. We didn’t get evicted and we didn’t end up on the streets.

            So the next day I was watching 90210 (I know I know a guilty pleasure!) and one of the girls was talking about being worried and down and certain song coming on and making everything alright. Now I’m a huge believer in musical therapy I have all sorts of playlists for different moods and Tim knows if im sad I like to lay on the floor and listen to my Tegan and Sara vinyl’s. As she was talking about this they turned on Bob Marley’s “Don’t worry about a thing, cause every little thing is gonna be alright.”

            It never ceases to amaze me the way that God used music in my life to reach me. It seems like always at the right time the right song that I needed comes on. Whether its to cheer me up, or to really just allow me to feel my emotions (which I’m terrible at) and break down and cry for an hour until I feel better, and most of all to bring hope. Tim now says that, that Bob Marley song is my song. I now know that God is continually there even when I don’t think that he is. That he wants to comfort me if I let him.

            Now for those who suffer from anxiety the way that I do you know how it feels. The actual physical symptoms can be unbearable. I think a lot of times people do take anxiety in the sense of worrying about a certain thing or event, which a lot of times it is. There is also the physical that is not very fun at all. The heart racing, sweaty palm, heart palpitations sometimes don’t go away without medication and I personally don’t see anything wrong with this (a lot of people will and that’s ok). I don’t personally love being on medication but with the mental illnesses I have I feel like I have to pick my battles. My anxiety can and often times does lead me to restrict. I have a chemical imbalance in my brain on many different levels and medication helps to put them back in balance. If there are other ways to calm myself then I do. All of the years of treatment that I have had have taught me a lot of different techniques and they work with different degrees of anxiety. For me turning to God does in fact seem to be the most comforting.

            Now I don’t think that my anxiety is going to go away tomorrow (unless that’s what God wants to do with me) but it is a little helpful to know that I’m not alone. That I’m not crazy for going to the worst case scenario in a matter of seconds (ok maybe a little). I know that I have people in my life who understand and still love me. Now I have dealt with people not being so supportive and I have learned to distance myself from those people. Not because they are bad people, in most cases they are actually great people, they just don’t get it and that’s ok. I have so many people who do and people who don’t but try their very hardest. So please don’t get down on yourself. Your not crazy even though you may feel like you are 99% of the time. I have also realized that the people God has put in my life who do “get it” really are heaven sent and I couldn’t be more thankful for them!

            

For the love of a daughter.

          So mister EMDR and I have a love hate relationship. EMDR is a type of trauma therapy. Most people I know hate it but would agree that it in the end is very helpful. It’s always really hard to look at your problems and your fears in the face, but to me it is the only way to overcome them. I pushed them away and numbed them out with my eating disorder for a very long time. I was on pinterest and ran across this quote “Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it.”-Albus Dumbledore (yes you are a genius). This couldn’t be more true and I am learning it more and more as time goes on.

            After session I usually experience about a week of increased anxiety and depression, nightmares and flashbacks. So a couple of months ago after session my doctor asked if I wanted to make our next appointment now or later. I said later……later became two months. I was catching up with a friend and sharing experiences and I told her I hadn’t made my appointment yet because I was avoiding it. I agreed that it was helping it just felt crappy afterwards. So I agreed to make the appointment and even reward myself with a pair of earing’s, which I still haven’t collected on but don’t worry Tim I will!

            I may as well be transparent about the fact that the traumas I am working on include my dad and I am assuming that I am not the only one. With wearing the mask of my eating disorder for so many years I am actually quite good at acting like I am “fine”. I leave emotion out of conversations for the most part and just go by the facts. So when I finally sit down and release and talk about all the of the things that I myself had done a pretty good job at convincing myself that I was “fine” about, its overwhelming, its hard and its exhausting. Graduating from treatment in no way shape or form means that your done (which I will go over in another blog in the near future).  Its hard work everyday, and its impossible to resolve issues in a matter of months.

            So even here and now as I am writing this I am stalling with actually getting to the main issue and how my appointment went and the breakthrough I had. So I know I gave a bit of a back story in a previous blog about the abuse growing up from my father (its even hard for me to call him that as I am writing this). A lot went on even after the divorce and I finally came to the realization that I could never have a healthy functioning relationship with him no matter how much I wanted it or tried to convince myself otherwise. So about four years ago I ended that relationship. He was not at my wedding for the tearful father daughter dance and he will not be there for the birth of my children.

            Again with all of this I am very good at acting like I could care less because I am better off. I know all of these things logically that it is not healthy for him to be in my life and that I do not want him trying to contact me. Forgiveness and the un-hardening of my heart towards him is something that I am continually working on. For me it is easier to be mad or angry at someone than to admit that I am hurt or sad about something. Even with all of my years of therapy and knowing that anger is a secondary emotion this is what I often go to.

            For these past four years I have been terrified that he was going to eventually try to reach out to me. I have had flashbacks and anxiety and have been living in fear of someone who could no longer hurt me, physically at least. I see him across a restaurant, in my rearview mirror, my heart stops when I’m at work and a drink with his name on it is called out. It’s a terrible feeling that I would really like to overcome some day.

            So back to EMDR sitting on that stereotypical leather couch pouring my heart out and crying profusely, which if you know me or have been in treatment with me know what a feat this is, I have often had tissue privileges revoked for not allowing myself to cry. There was one of those awkward silences where a million things are going through my head all at once and I’m like come on for the love of all things please say something!! He said “you really love your dad”. Again my anger automatically kicked in again and I could feel my face feeling hot, but then something else happened completely I started sobbing even harder.

            He was right and I knew it. As much as I don’t want to admit that I love someone who has caused me so much pain and heartache I do. I have been holding onto so much anger and resentment that I haven’t allowed myself to grieve the fact that I have love for someone who wasn’t what I hoped they would be. That as Mr. Dumbledore so eloquently pointed out earlier numbing the pain does nothing for me. I now that the thoughts that I can love someone who hurt me and know that it is better for them to not be in my life, both can coexist as much as I don’t want them to. So this, my friends is why I have such a love hate relationship with EMDR.

            It’s some of the hardest things that I have done in my life, but I hold onto the hope that things will be better. That I will have more breakthroughs like this and the more and more that I have the closer I will be to full recovery. I am so blessed to have the amazing husband that I do that after I got home with my eyes swollen and puffy from crying my whole way home he tied a belt around his head and acted like a ninja to cheer me up! These moments are the moments that I hold onto in the dark parts of recovery that make it all worth while.

            So to those who avoid really looking at the scary stuff (I’m the first person on this list), try. Hold onto your supports and know who can support you in these situations. I promise you it’s going to hurt while your doing it and possibly even for some time after, but the rainbow that comes after the storm is amazing. So is finding a strength inside yourself that you never knew you possessed.