The LIVE (+Recover) Leg

Something is happening at the moment. I've gathered some pace. Something has clicked which is helping me let go and push on through these final stages of this journey. Let me fill you in, probably easiest by using the very title of my blog. 

Firstly, I DREAM of fully recovering from anorexia, I always have. I dream of trusting myself and others, I dream of having confidence in myself (and in my failures), I dream of being at peace with my body and life. I dream of winning. I still dream of all this, and more. 

Then if we look at RECOVER. That's been the aim since August 2011, the goal of the past three years. I've learnt to RECOVER in my own way, with my own team and at my own pace. It's still the goal. To recover, means to be a healthy adult BMI. To recover is to menstruate and have a fully-functioning liver. The latter two are still work in progress. To recover is to eat mindfully, normally and with out anxiety. I will come back to this one. I also want to TALK about recovery less, and speak to fewer people with EDs or recovering. 

and to LIVE. I think this is what I've been doing recently. And having spent the past three years in the RECOVER zone, this move to LIVE (+recover) makes me feel uncomfortable at times. Unsettled and uneasy too. It's like my new found ability to NOT have a meal plan, to NOT feel the need to write my food down, my ability to EAT OUT without as much anxiety. The reduction in dependence on my EDU team, the fewer hours spent thinking about anorexia or recovery. Or just my ability to COPE with being more social, working or talking - and living- is making me feel on edge. 

It's a strange sensation after such a tunnel-vision life for so long - you know, to be living not existing. It doesn't feel like me. But more than once in recent weeks I've been alone and thought - 'What the FUCK am I doing holding on to anorexia?' - out of nowhere thought, hell, Sarah. get out of this RECOVER trap and LIVE. Now. 

As you can imagine if you also have anorexia, these bursts of positivity towards recovering (and yes, I mean towards full weight restoration too) scare the hell out of me as well. I pull on the brakes and shout WAIT. There is a lot of doubt, why, how, why now, is this okay? What am I going on too?

I can't say I trust myself, I can't say I like or accept my body. I don't really feel good enough. Everyone else seems that little bit better than me. I am not sure where I stand with exercise or the drive to win/achieve/burn or race - or who (and what) drives those urges. I am still unsure and doubtful of my future 'peace prospects' and I am skill struggling to 'think' and act' out of some of my comfort zones. I really do need to work on some of the underlying layers some more. 

But one thing I do know, is I have shifted from RECOVER (+ Live) to the final leg of this journey and I am safely in the LIVE (+Recover) zone and I am not looking back. As I pour a cocktail of life, I think I'll take a slice of recovery to  add to this living beverage, thank you.

Where do we go from here?

So, today it is 2 years, 5 months, and 24 days since I started treatment at my current eating disorders service. That's 904 days scattered with therapy, dietician appointments, meal plans, blood tests, weigh-ins and apparently that's around 21,816 hours filled up fighting anorexia. 

In that time I've eaten, I've cried, I've lost weight, I gained LOTS of weight and in the words of my dietician I 'have worked really hard' to beat my eating disorder. I've switched therapists, banned my family from ever coming to another FT session. I've let people into my life, my recovery journey. I've pushed others - some very unhelpful people - away. I've regained nuggets of life, I'm rebuilding my career, I hope I've helped others' in recovery and I'm getting to know ME again. 

But REALLY where am I now? Where do I go from here? How can I keep going? How can I fully recover and be FREE of this? They were the big questions at my review last week and honestly?

I have no idea.

Recently it's been said I've slipped into a 'false sense of recovery' with life ticking along, with tough days and challenges yes, but generally plodding on.

My team have concerns this is dangerous place for me, because it leaves anorexia unchallenged on a day-to-day basis. I get caught up in a whirlwind of life going well, but it exposes me to the dangers of crashing if something goes even slightly wrong. 

I never wanted to be the skeletal wreak of a woman I was 2 years ago, it scared the hell out of me, I knew it wasn't right to look the way I did. Nine hundred days ago my body was shutting down, my health deteriorating by the day and I was terrifying my loved ones with the worst case scenario if I didn't take action.

That's why I have worked bloody hard to get to the weight I am, to be healthier, fitter. Some people NEVER get to here, halting at a much lower BMI. But this is the block now. I am really struggling to move from here. I can't bear to gain more weight, in fact I dread it. To lay it straight - I am 'borderline healthy', constantly fluctuating above and below the healthy range. And I don't seem to move from here. I can't see I need to. 

No, I am not menstruating, which I am constantly reminded is dangerous being a 28 year-old woman who wants children. Although my bones are okay at the moment. My bloods are pretty much there, but not quite. 

Food? It's safe. controlled and way too over-analysed. I've been empowered by Ms. F to be able to set my own meal plan, and don't feel trapped by my options but I'm not kidding myself either. I too often make 'No Big Deal' switches and happy to go off-plan if it means eating fewer calories. I still feel like I eat too much and get overwhelmed with guilt if I DARE eat too much 'junk', I'll eat out, sometimes and I still won't let people cook for me. This needs work, I know. 

I won't even get into the psychological progress; there is a hell of a lot of untangling still required. All I would say is through the amazing work of Mrs W. I'm so much more 'aware' of my illness, I have the tools to cope with and manage anorexia. With Dr B. I am getting to the roots of the problem, but it's taking time.

So, like I say, where do I go from here? Well, 

I am moving from weekly to monthly dietician appointments with Ms F. 

I will continue to set my own meal plans and fill out food diaries. 

I will be weighed monthly (like I have been for the last six months) 

I will continue having weekly therapy sessions with Dr. B.

I guess the POA is about weaning me off services. They believe 'I know what I need to do' and although it does confuse me, that they think I am 'fine' now, food wise and I no longer need to restore weight, I know they want to prove that I CAN DO THIS myself. I know what to do, I just need to do it. They're right, being propped up by services and supported can do more harm than good sometimes. 

But guess what? I still have anorexia.

I also only have 1 year, 1 month, 18 days until my self-set deadline for discharge. That's just 414 days to prove I can beat anorexia. 

Magic Bricks and Castles

However magical they look once completed, you can't build a complete castle with one, single magical brick...

It takes thousands of bricks, stacked up and secured with mortar to create a caste built to stand the test of time and remain standing through storms and wars.

It takes years of help from other skilled tradesmen and women to design and build a structure that fits my needs. It's a process that can't be rushed or dragged out for too long. Time is money in the building trade! 

It's also a process without any exact plans or designs. This stresses me out. I need a plan. Not just a rough sketch of my castle. I'm going to have accept the doodles and work with what I've got. 

The mistake I make time and time again is taking time out from the hard graft of building to look for the 'magic brick' that will complete my castle in one simple step. The cure.

In recovery the 'bricks' are challenges, experiences, positive things, achievements and even just surviving tough days. It's something I've been thinking a lot about recently, trying to understand why I brush off positive things, don't think achievements in recovery are anything 'special' and why I knock myself back. .

That single brick doesn't exist, it is ALWAYS going to require more than one. 

A full recovery, like a complete castle, is going to take hundreds if not thousands of these experiences or bricks to finish.

It's going to take a lot of hard work, whether we like it or not. 

Because I keep expecting one single, magical experience brick to complete my castle, I keep taking a step back to look at my construction and I'm constantly being disappointed that it's not complete.

Positive things happen, like feeling 'okay', sticking to my meal plan, working, talking about anorexia at the Trust AGM or completing the Color Run. I recognise they're essential bricks in my recovery, but I get frustrated that single experiences or moments of positivity haven't magically 'fixed me' or finished my recovery or completed my castle.

What's worse, is this disappointment usually ends in the bricks not being firmly secured in place with the mortar and the walls are continually crumbling back to the foundations.

I'm collecting bricks, stock piling them but not putting my effort into building SECURE walls to my castle. I'd seriously get sacked if I was an actual builder. I keep knocking my walls down. taking a tea-break or giving away my bricks to Ana.

Even though I'm always working on-site, clocking in. Some days I don't believe I'm even capable of building my castle, yet I keep trying to lay bricks. I still struggle to 'see' the completed castle, yet alone imagine LIVING in it. 

This obsession I have in looking for detailed architects plans distracts me. Comparing my building progress with other people's distracts me. The jealously of people already living in their castle, living their fairytale distracts me. As does helping other people put their bricks into use.

I'm not going to build my own recovery by laying other people's bricks for them. I might be given bricks from others or get ideas to put into use in my own construction, they're bonus bricks, but other people don't have a magic brick to give me either. 

Ultimately I need to get on using my own experience bricks to build my own castle.

Buildings are completed though, it might take more than one magic brick, but a final brick will be put into place one day, but not before hundreds are used to build high walls to protect us and keep us safe.

Not the sort of walls that keep life out, the sort that protect me from anorexia. The structures that are secure enough to survive the storms of life and the cold times. Anorexia tries to convince us that her design works, her methods are good enough, but they're not. 

Listening to anorexia's building tips will mean my castle NEVER gets built. She doesn't provide magic bricks either. She's a cowboy builder. 

Having her design my castle and provide the materials means I'd be left on a derelict building site, bankrupt of experience, trying to survive the cold, alone. Sat in a dust land, watching everyone else living their fairytale lives, wondering why I didn't get given the magic brick. 

Letting go of her as a site manager has allowed me to redesign the plans. 

I've already done that, but I really have to stop looking for the magic 'recovery' bricks, expecting to build a castle on a single piece of stone masonry. I need to stop taking tea breaks and get on with laying normal, solid bricks, one by one.

We can all build a castle, if we're willing to put in the hard work and stop wishing for one magic brick to turn up.

Time flies when you're not having fun

As much freedom as recovery brings, it's really NOT fun. 

This week marks two years since I was admitted to my EDU and 'officially' diagnosed with anorexia and it's been one hell of a whirlwind of change, calories, food, weight, therapy, bloods, scans, tears, smiles, giggles and pain. 

If I was an alcoholic who'd been dry for two years or a drug addict who'd been clean for 24 months, then I'd feel like singing it from the roof tops, but for some reason recovery from anorexia doesn't feel like that.

Strictly speaking I haven't been 'clean' for two years, my weight has been down, down, down, up, down, round and round and stayed still for a good chunk of it too. Restrictions, no big deals and walking a little further that I should have done have also happened a little too often too. 

But on the whole, two years in, I've not looked back. Yes, I have had my lapses, but they've not been relapses. I haven't run away, I haven't spent two years messing my team around. However slow it's been at times, I have kept on swimming in the right direction.

(When will I learn it'd been less tiring if I went in a straight line sometimes?)

I had already decided I was never going to live like this again when I 'came out' about my struggles with an eating disorder. I decided I wasn't going to BEHAVE like an anorexic and eventually I hoped and still hope I wont THINK like one. 

I wish I could sit here and honestly believe myself when I talk positively about recovery, how wonderful it is, how much better I feel, how I am learning to love me. But truthfully, I am still not sure. 

Of course, life is BETTER than it was back then. I am healthier. 
But it's not where I want it to be. I just don't know what it is I REALLY want or WHO I AM yet.

I've had constant reminders that whilst anorexia has controlled my life, other people's lives have moved on and this keeps me going too. Two years ago, I didn't have twin niece and nephew, some of my BEST friends have got married and are starting families. People I know have been discharged and recovered. Life goes on as I am still working on getting mine back. 

All I am certain of is I am NOT as unhappy, trapped, tortured or restricted by anorexia and her rules as I was back then. But I am still bothered, dragged down and twisted by rules and doubt. I KNOW life has grown with the gains, I know that I am a much nicer person and fuller 28-year-old than I was a 25, 26 and 27 year-old shadow of myself. I'm much more aware. 

I have coped with family fallouts, getting my own place, starting to pick up more work, new people, new places and new foods. I have not been broken by Forisips, weigh ins nor has my body given up on me. I have coped with a change of therapist. I am coping with hard-to-swallow therapy.

I just wish I was truly proud of that.

All these doubts, fat feelings and ambiguity are trademark anorexia, I know they are. I can't just admit that I've done well in 24 months of recovery, and honestly believe it. I'm not SURE I honestly FEEL better yet.

I'm just going to keep swimming. I am going to keep trying and maybe a year (or two) from now I will look back and HONESTLY mean it when I say....

...Well Done Sarah, you rock. 

(NB) I have not included ANY lowest weight images or any that people may find upsetting. Ana also 'says' I was never thin enough to shock you anyway. *bitch* huh?)