Eat the F****** marshmallow!

“Never take someone for granted. Hold every person close to your heart, because you might wake up one day and realise that you’ve lost a diamond while you were too busy collecting stones.”

I have been a little quiet of late. I guess I should begin with how things are going across the pond. I’ve been here in the transition house for three weeks now. I’ve been doing well, and by that I mean I’ve followed my food and exercise plan, which as I was told the other day is nothing short of remarkable! I was not the most solid of clients and even my dietician expected me to slip up somewhere, so I am proud to say I have eaten all my food. What I am still struggling with is ‘balancing on the pin’. I have become a little too afraid to eat outside of my meal plan, and that is bugging the hell out of me. I’m glad it’s frustrating me, as it means I am willing to change it. As my therapist and I discussed, it could be so easy to live a life as I am now… following my food plan and maintaining my weight. Whilst I have significantly improved from when I arrived in August, it doesn’t seem enough – I want more. If I’m going to put all my time and energy, and my family’s money into this recovery nonsense, then I want it all, not some half-hearted attempt at it.A situation came up on Saturday that illustrates my rigidity. I was having my dinner when a couple of girls came over to see one of my housemates. She offered them hot chocolate and marshmallows. As I finished my dinner, I sat there and had a dialogue in my head that went as follows.

Eating Disorder: Do you want a hot choc? I think you do, but you have just had your dinner and you have to have snack in a bit. Don’t have one.
Healthy Self: What difference would one hot choc make? Maybe you could be brave and have it – you want to be a part of the experience with everyone else don’t you?
Eating Disorder: If you have extra outside of your plan then you are probably going to gain weight, and you are already worried about your weight going over it’s maintain band.
Healthy Self: You don’t even know your weight, so why does it matter. This is not how you want your life to look like – too afraid to have a bit extra. What happens if you go out with your friends back home and they go out for a hot choc – what you going to say? Oh sorry I can’t I have already had dinner. At least you could eat a marshmallow.
Eating Disorder: This chat in my head is driving me crazy – it is best to be safe and not have anything. Stick to your plan and what you were already going to have.Alas I ended my dialogue with the eating disorder shouting at me and didn’t have the hot chocolate or the marshmallow. Since Saturday I have been beating myself up and questioning my progress. You might think that after five months of treatment I could of been a bit braver. I can hear you all now, saying “what difference would a marshmallow of made?” The truth is, it would of made no difference whatsoever to my weight, but it was my head that was in control. I talked about it last night in our group session and explained to the girls the crazy banter that went on in my head. It was good to get it out and it was also reassuring to hear that two of the other girls who have been here for six months also had the same thoughts, they just were able to put their foot in and do it anyway. I have decided to cut myself some slack. The reason it frustrated me was not so much that I wanted the hot chocolate or marshmallows, it was that I wanted to be part of the shared experience with my friends. Food is so much about sharing and that is something I have denied myself incessantly over my twelve year career as an anorexic. There is nothing I can do about Saturday now, all I can do is appreciate just how much it annoyed me and do something different next time – eat the f****** marshmallow!

Aside from this, life on the outside is pretty good. I now wonder how I spent so long in 24 hour care. I guess at the time it was what I needed, but my work from here on in, is practicing all that I learnt in treatment. I am back in the saddle which feels really good. I am so lucky in that I have become friends with a lady with two horses – Bodhi and Oria who have become my Californian companions. We go for rides through the hills and it feels wonderful to be free again. Another positive is being more social. Last week I went out with a group of girls for pizza which was really nice. Marshmallows aside – this was an area that I had progressed in. I would never of done that before I arrived here, but again it wasn’t about the food, it was about the company and experience. It is something I look forward to doing with my friends when I get home.

Today in group we had a past client come talk to us about her recovery. It was so wonderful to hear someone who is doing well. It gave me hope. She is happy and healthy and living her life without her eating disorder. She said that her recovery has been a journey and not something that happened overnight. She said that it’s not like the flu, in that you get better in a few days, she said it has taken her a couple of years to get to where she is now and that her work is still continuing. I have had my eating disorder for twelve years and have had six months of treatment, I need to be patient. My head wants to be cured, but my actions are not quite there yet. I realised today that the only way to get them working on a parallel is to do the action. If I wait until the day I wake up without an eating disorder, I maybe waiting a long long time. As the weeks to my return edge closer, I have been increasingly concerned about the expectation for me to land on home soil cured and eating disorder free. I don’t want to use this as an excuse for me to keep hold of my eating disorder, but I also hope that I can be accepted as I am, wherever that may be on my path. I see my recovery as similar to building a house. You start of with nothing, you then lay the foundation and build it up brick by brick until it is secure and air tight. I have laid the foundation and am now building it up brick by brick. So my mantra for the weeks ahead is to be more care-free, less rigid and more of a risk-taker.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain

Graduation!

So the day finally arrived. I graduated! Whatever level you leave on, you have a graduation – a sacred ceremony in recognition of far you have come. It’s a space that holds real meaning for the staff. We each write an ‘Eaters agreement’ that we read out during the ceremony. It’s a bit like a contract between my body and soul to abide by from this day forward.I would like to share mine….

I hearby from this day forward agree to accept my body and to love it for giving me back my life. I agree to inhabit this suitcase for my soul and to treat it with the utmost respect. As an eater I agree to hunger. I agree to live in this body that I have been given and to nourish it with the appropriate amount of food to help it function at full capacity. I recognise that as I feed my body and my soul – the benefits of my well-being will increase. I acknowledge that to ignore my natural appetite has monumental consequences in all areas of my life.

The essence of my participation in life is one of learning and exploration. I agree to to recognise that there are a variety of foods to choose from and to deny my natural needs and wants surrounding food is to deny myself pleasure. I deserve pleasure and agree to give it to myself in all aspects of my life and to allow myself to enjoy food and the memories that it can create. I am worthy of nourishment and joy. My relationship with food will be a learning process and I may make mistakes along the way. Those mistakes are not a reason to slip down the path into the dark, they are merely nuggets of information from which to learn from. I agree to accept my mistakes, my humanness, and learn as I go along.

I acknowledge that as my daily life changes, so may my eating process and diet. I must learn to recognise that no meal plan is rigid and that I must grow and adapt accordingly. I understand that my body may need and or call for different foods as the days, seasons and years progress. My dietary needs will also shift in accordance to my lifestyle and my environment and I agree to listen and adapt to fulfill my bodies needs and wants. I agree to let go of manipulating my body to look a certain shape, size or to weigh a specific number. My weight is none of my business, all I need to know and do is to feed it appropriately. I must let go of controlling it and trust that if I look after it, it will take care of me.

As a human being I accept pain. I recognise that life will be full of ups and downs, but it is the downs that make the ups worthwhile. I will no longer use restricting as a way to numb pain and block out my feelings. I will keep food in it’s rightful place – a tool for enjoyment and for creating memories. My days of using food as punishment are no more. I, as a human being on this earth give myself permission to enjoy food. I forgive myself. I further agree to accept a body that is imperfectly perfect and one that is vulnerable and naturally decays over time. I recognise that there may be times when I am incapable of caring for myself. I agree then to live in a body that may need the support of others. I therefore agree to be nourished by others if need be. Eating is an activity that binds me with all humanity.

I recognise that at its deepest level eating is an affirmation of life. Each time I eat I agree somewhere inside to continue to life on earth. I acknowledge that this choice to eat is a fundamental act of love and nourishment – a true celebration of my existence. As a human being, I agree to take up space, to love and be loved and above all else to be an eater. I choose life over and over.  I choose relationships. When I am in my eating disorder there is no room for anyone or anything. This is not how I want my life to be. I want to be a participant in life – a contributor. I will not merely exist or balance on the pin. I will breathe in life. Food is my tool to the outside world – I will not neglect it.

I then got to say a few words about each of the clients and staff before I received feedback from them. It was really very special and made me feel hopeful about the ending of this chapter and beginning of the next. I know that I still have a long way to go, but I have also come on leaps and bounds from the ‘homeless child’ that stepped off the plane many moons ago.I have moved to the transition house now and am loving my new found independence. It’s the small things that I am finding the most pleasure in… being able to get a glass of water when I want one! I have been here a week now and although I still go back to the treatment centre every day there is a lot more opportunity to cut corners if I so choose. I am pleased to say that so far so good. I have had lots of thoughts to restrict or skip something, but I have not acted on them. I think one of the biggest things I have learnt from my time here is that I always have a choice. When I was ‘starved stupid’ I felt as though that choice had been taken away from me, but now that I’ve been restored to humanity, I can see that I am responsible for choosing what action I take.

 

The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president, you realize you that you control your own destiny. Albert Ellis.