To love freely...

I am incredibly tired today so I am a bit off but decided I had better blog anyway so as not to let this writer’s muscle of mine wither too much.  I have probably already passed that mark but here we go anyway…

It is a pretty amazing time for my family, and I am still a little overwhelmed to be a part of it.  My sister returned home from China a few weeks ago where she was adopting her third child, my new nephew.  An elaborate babysitting schedule was laid out by my sister and bro-in-law before she left, as my niece and nephew had to stay back in the states with working dad.  I took on a few days of babysitting, and my husband and I got to cook some meals for the gang.  I was filled with such a powerful sense of purpose that I really loved every bit.  My bro-in-law did a great job keeping mom and kids connected via Skype and even wrote a daily blog to loop in the extended family.  My new nephew is home now, and he’s a total rockstar!  There’s absolutely no question that he knows mom and dad and siblings are his.  It just blows me away, like it was meant to be and his heart just knows. 

I cannot even begin to understand what my nephew is thinking and feeling inside that little body of his.  I do like to guess at it though. :)   He seems a bit confused as to who I am and what’s going on sometimes, but that’s to be expected since he’s two years old and EVERYTHING JUST CHANGED.  He maintains a pretty fierce look for the most part with occasions of tears and more of brilliantly joyful smiles.  He has the coolest smile.  His whole face lights up!  Overall, I imagine a crazy amount of determination working inside him.  I project that his efforts are to focus, to understand, to communicate, to get fed (he really loves food!), to connect with mom and dad, and to explore his siblings.  I also wonder what he is feeling, aside from what he’s thinking, and simply have no clue.  I hope to spend more and more time knowing and loving him, but for now the mystery that is him is more than magnificent.

JUST FOR TODAY, 
I will love abundantly.

My reflections today really started, and end now, with my wanting to fix my relationship with a particular someone.  Let’s call this person Amanda.  I want control over what she thinks AND feels about me.  I want her to love me and trust me and confide in me the way she did a decade ago.  The wreckage of my past just slaps me right in the face some days, usually on the days I least expect it!!!  The thing is that I just don’t know what’s going on inside Amanda’s head and heart.  Unlike my new little nephew, I have a history with her and have decided some things based on that history.  She should forgive me.  She should believe I have changed.  She should know I love her and want her in my life.  She should reciprocate all my feelings.  As I write that I realize that what throws me is not that Amanda doesn’t meet all the ‘shoulds’, but that I just don’t know.  I feel lonely and scared- very different from the love and joy and hope I feel when watching my nephew without knowing.  I check myself with other people on this, and I find support in their feedback and find a greater love for Amanda in all her stubbornness and quirkiness.  The hurt remains of course, but hope is gained.  I believe and know I am taken care of and surrounded by the love of friends, family and God.  I would like some answers to emerge, and I would like even more for those answers to include Amanda and I becoming as close as we once were.  For now, I don’t have any answers so what can I do?  Probably nothing...  sitting still stinks.  Haha!  I hope to one day let go of my desire to control how other people think and feel towards me and to just love.  To love freely and without expectations is a practice that often eludes me.  Great thing is that sober experience and hope are on my side today.  And so, just for today, I will love abundantly!

Attitude Makeover - HFC Day 17

Think about what you feel pessimistic about, frustrated about or are struggling with, either now or at some point in the past. What were/are those issues? What stops/stopped you from making changes? What do you need/ did you need to confront those issues? Can you make plans to take steps to change? If you have done this, were you able to make changes? What challenges can you set yourself for the future? (Remember to make them realistic and achievable!)

Okay so this is kind of interesting.  I spend so many of my days and moments trying not to be pessimistic and to put a hopeful spin on every one of my experiences.  Truth is that I can throw the meanest pity party on the block.  My default is self pity and it leads me into depressive episodes and sideways anger.  My self pity used to keep me from even trying to recover from ED.  I was so stuck to my pity pot that I really believed that no one even cared if I got healthy.  I can see the faulty thinking there and the disease twisting my truths, so today I stay on the lookout for that voice in me.  I’m not perfect at it though and my entire recovery has been filled with frustration and pessimism over a severe neck injury I suffered in my third month of sober abstinence. 

I herniated a disc in my neck while I was showing off diving for some young kiddos at a community pool.  My husband was with me and we had been dating for only about a week.  Six months later the doctors decided surgery was necessary and performed a spinal fusion.  A year later, I was closing in on my wedding day and my pain remained so severe that I feared I wouldn’t be able to enjoy our celebration.  Three years since the injury and I am still in pain.  I did get some good news just last week that the fusion is complete but received the bad news that arthritis is developing at the injury site. 

Now, this whole thing has really sucked in so many ways.  I have lost a lot of my strength and muscle since my injury and building it back up now is super slow going.  I don’t have the same body shape at all anymore.  I have always been pretty ‘gymnast shaped’.  I never had hips or big boobs.  That’s changed.  I do have hips and I have bigger boobs.  I have had to accept a whole new body.  Man, it was hard enough accepting it the first time!!!   I’ve been angry at myself and at people that just don’t understand.  I’ve been jealous of people that get to workout as hard as they want to and feel that good ache in their muscles from a job well done.  I have yelled at my husband for being attracted to me when I’m in super exhausted from fighting the constant hurting.  I have cursed God for giving me recovery just to give me a serious injury. 

All this is self pity.  What is more is that it is self pity that to me seems justified.  It seems logical and normal to feel down about something like this.  It feels like I should have permission to feel sorry for myself, and the truth is I don’t have much control over what thoughts and emotions hit me at what time but I do need to look for positive outlets for them.  I know from my history that I can’t afford to get sucked into the morose thinking and a defeatist attitude for too long.  So, I have made a commitment to share my frustrations with other people and to find a positive in everything.  Sometimes this can be challenging but for the most part it isn’t so difficult.  Without my injury I would not have had to look so deep within; I would not have had to ask for so much help; I would not have had to pray so often; I would not have had to sit still and just be.  In these ways my injury has given me the quality of recovery I have today.  I have to remember that I don’t know what the big plan is for me and that even the seemingly terrible can bring beautiful gifts.    

Fat is NOT a feeling! - HFC Day 16

Eating disorders are not about weight. But so often people express that they feel ‘fat’. What feelings have you really been experiencing when you have said you feel fat? Or what do you think lie beneath the surface of others who express this. You can write directly in response to this blog prompt or why not alter it and look at your emotional experience of eating disorders – what did you feel? How did you know which emotion you felt? Why is it important to be aware of your emotions?

It is perfect that this was yesterday’s challenge, because yesterday I decided I was willing to weigh myself.  I very rarely weigh myself and sometimes I have to force myself to get on the scale just to ensure I’m not letting ED get away with anything ‘under the hood’ so to speak.  So I checked in with the scale yesterday, did not like what I saw and actually laid on the floor for a few moments before I could collect myself enough to carry on with my day.  It’s incredibly strange, even to a bulimic like me, how just a number can take hold of my emotions and feel so threatening and damning.  Two minutes before I weighed, I talked to my husband about needing to do it.  I gave myself a whole bunch of affirmations, felt great about my fitness level and body overall, and BAM! the number shot it all away.  The cool part is that I did NOT have to have a horrible day yesterday.  In fact, I was able to feel pretty darn confident and even like my reflection in the mirror.  What!!!!????  Nothing short of a miracle. 

For as long as I can remember, ‘that number’ directed my mood and my ability to walk through a day.  If the number wasn’t lower, I felt fat.  If I felt fat, that meant a whole bunch of bad.  It meant I wasn’t pretty, likeable, friend worthy, capable, intelligent, talented, lovable, forgivable, ugh - all goodness gone.  Feeling fat was my blanket holding and covering all my fears, insecurities, brokenness and anger.  I think I was challenged by every single one of my treatment providers with “Fat is not a feeling.  What are you feeling?  What’s inside?”  This was always frustrating to me.  I’m not sure what triggered me to decide that the feelings I had were not okay, but I decided it.  I couldn’t find a neat spot for the mess of emotions I had before ED, and they were too embarrassing to tell those I trusted the most.  I needed a hiding place for my feelings and that place became my eating disorder.  Once I hid my feelings there and found it to be an extremely effective safe zone, I became comfortable with it.  Saying “I feel fat” was completely okay with me.  I didn’t have to go any deeper and find unwanted truths or share hidden secrets from my past.  “I feel fat” was enough to keep the topic right there on the surface.  Of course, the time came when this was crippling to me, and it began to kill me.  I didn’t know how to go deeper.  I was so alone and I couldn’t find any number on the scale that would take away the fat feeling.   I know the reason I couldn’t shake it was because it wasn’t about fat at all.  It was about what was going on in my head, heart and soul. 

So yesterday, I freaked for a minute, regrouped and got my program on.  I told myself a mantra (borrowed from a friend and program) just for times like this ‘Take care of the spiritual and the mind and body will follow.’  I went over this as I got ready for work and as I drove in.  I also gave my sister a ring to commiserate about our God given ‘heavy genes’.  Upon walking from my car to the office, I connected with gratitude.  I thought about how blessed I am in my life today, how much I love my husband and family and friends, how I have a wonderful ability to show up for life today and how my body allows me to do that.  By the time I sat down at my desk, I had a smile on my face and I felt beautiful.  


I know!  Recovery is cool. 

Crimes against Clients - HFC Day 14

Share your experiences about a professional or professionals (doctor, therapist, nurse etc.) that had a negative impact on your recovery. How did they make you feel? Did you speak with them about this? How did they respond? How did they impact you? How did you recover from that experience? How did you learn to seek help and trust professionals again?

This is a shaky one for me.  In my letter to medical professionals (Day 6) I expressed my frustration with my treatment over the years but also my gratitude for all the men and women who have treated me.  I believe that all my experiences, good and bad, have made me the recovery woman I am today.  I know that everyone I come in contact with is a teacher – some of what to do, some of what NOT to do.  Either way, I can learn from everyone.  Back in the throws of bulimia, I didn’t see it that way.  When a professional (aka role model) showed disease behavior, I took away bad habits and negative massages and fit them right onto me.  A lot of times I knew I was self-sabotaging and wanted to bring the pain.  Other times I was competitive or seeking attention.   Occasionally, that “I’ll show you how sick I am” mentality drove me.  In the most dangerous times, I just had no fight left and I was giving up. 

So, you may be wondering what made some folks such bad examples.  My perception may be off and my disease certainly filtered things said and done differently back then, but the number one reason I decided a professional was not worth my effort to recover was inconsistency.  If the message of the professional was inconsistent with their behavior, I was done.  The most obvious example I have is one therapist who owned a day treatment center and was my primary therapist.  This was an eight hour a day, five day a week deal, and I was a patient there for over two years.  I saw so much of this therapist that I could tell you what she would say next, if she was in a good or bad mood, and how she was doing with her food.  She was a recovery anorexic, or maybe just an anorexic.  Here was the inconsistency.  She spent all day, every day, telling us to embrace our bodies, sharing professional opinions, encouraging us to eat balanced and nourish ourselves while she did none of it herself. 

If I could go back now, I would ask her why she only ate 150 calories for lunch every day and how that made any sense to eat during our sessions.  I would show her that my meal of 500 calories, made no sense next to hers.  I would ask her why she got plastic surgery and showed off her cleavage at work while telling us we were perfect just as we were.  I would challenge her to explain her significant weight loss after her husband left against her claim that we did not have to use food to cope with any and all circumstances.  I would call to her attention that we were all competing with HER!  I would share my anger and confusion towards her and her behavior.  I would explain my pain in all its depth and tell her I wanted to be free.  I would walk away from two years of a dead end pursuit and look for help and hope in someone who had recovery.

I spent years being angry at this therapist.  I felt that I had lost so much time being sick because of her.  I don’t feel that way anymore.  I learned a lot from that experience.  Today, I interview my doctors and therapists.  They are working for me after all.  If I don’t find hope in their story, sense in their methods, or most important to me consistency in their words and actions, I find a new professional.  This has served me well and I am my own mental health advocate.  I tell a doctor or therapist when something doesn’t seem right or when I’m just not feeling comfortable with my progress.  I have learned what I don’t want in my treatment, so now I’m finding what I do.  

Dear Doctor - HFC Day 6

Write a letter to a medical professional (general or mental health) or write an advert for a medical professional. What do you need from them? What don’t you need from them? What matters to you? Use your own experiences if you feel able to do so.

Wow, I wish I had a few days to look at this one.  What a great topic.  I have seen so many professionals, and I believe all of them did the best they could to help me find health.  I am sad to say that I believe the majority, with few exceptions, did me more harm than good.  That sounds harsh and I admit that it is harsh, but it is my truth.  I also know in my gut that I would not be where I am today without each and every professional affecting my life in exactly the way they did at the time that they did.  Just thought I’d get that out of the way before I began.  Here we go….

Dear MP,

First, I would like to say thank you.  Thank you to all of you who took my case, who fought for me when I could not fight for myself, who pushed me to look within, who told me I was good enough, who encouraged me to continue living, who locked me up when I was not safe, who welcomed me back after I strayed, who wanted me to live more than I willed to live myself.   Without you there would be no me.  Thank you.

Secondly, I have some feedback to offer you after all these years.  I know as professionals you know that this is only my experience but perhaps you see cases like me more often than once a lifetime.  I’m willing to bet you see cases like me quite a bit actually.  So maybe, just maybe, you’ll find some use in my feedback.  I had such a loud head when I came to you for help.  It seemed like most of your exercises made those noises louder.  I guess I don’t really understand why you looked so hard and dug so deep to find the reasons.  I mean I was in pain and instead of finding something to help me out of that pain, you encouraged me to find more so that I could find where all that pain started.  I must say it was wonderful to think that I could find a fall guy or thing or whatever.  I’m sure you’re not surprised to hear this elusive fault entity was never found.  What you might not guess is that a lot of people and a lot of me was hurt trying to find it.  We, you and me MP, pointed fingers trying to catch targets.  Well, I have news for you-  My parents didn’t abuse me.  My siblings didn’t leave me out.  I was not bullied.  My coaches were tough and I appreciated that.  My talents were treated as gifts, and I was no dog and pony show.  People didn’t call me stupid nor did/do I feel stupid.  I was and always will be loved.  I AM NOT A VICTIM!!!  I get it.  I get that these things could have been big deals for a girl showing my symptoms, but they just weren’t for me.  So, at some point I implore you to stop digging!  I mean sure, I had some skeletons in the closet and I had to look at some of those.  Great.  So what?  I had uncovered all of them within probably the first couple months of therapy and over a decade later nothing new had surfaced, nothing from my past anyway.  Plenty of new demoralizing, painful, tragic moments had come from my behavior and my obsession with disease, addiction and death.   I was also now a bona fide Axis II Borderline Personality Disorder.  One diagnosis I can absolutely see as accurate.  I had learned it all in the groups, the institutions and the rehabs that were supposed to help me.  I knew how to stay sick, to play sick, to welcome sick, to love sick.  Why in the world did you keep digging into my first 10 years of life at this point?  I mean where was the hope?  Where was the celebration of the life I was living in the moment you were sharing it with me?  Where was the direction for some contrary action?  Pity was what I felt from you in my last five years of ED.  Pity.  Does that ever help anyone break free of emotional, physical and spiritual bondage?  Really?  I mean you’re not even joining me in the conversation at that point.  You’re just nodding, writing prescriptions, agreeing with the crap hole that was my life, and the impossibility of me finding recovery.  This was supposed to move me towards health?!!!  I’m sorry, I just don’t see it.  

Thirdly, I will admit that I was never fair to you.  I never told you the whole truth.  I wanted to be taken care of and becoming healthy meant independence and independence was utterly terrifying to me because it meant you wouldn’t take care of me.  I was so afraid to live my life that I didn’t allow you to help me begin to re-enter it.  I allowed you to help me stay sick.  I purposefully served you plate-fulls of misery so you would lock me in psych wards and care for me 24 hours a day.  I shattered myself into tiny pieces so that I would remain forever broken, and so you would forever attempt to repair me.  Thank you for being my support for so long.  Without you, I would have had to use more desperate, louder methods to attract help, and I probably would have died in the process.

Finally, I will tell you what I hope you will do with the next ‘me’ that comes your way.  Challenge me.  Tell me to stop thinking about myself and my problems so much and to go and help other women the way I keep telling you I’m called to do.  Contradict me.  Tell me I am wrong when I call myself ugly.  Tell me you see me differently than I see me and that you believe someday I will agree with you too.  Tell me to stop the pity party and start using my gifts, my voice, my light.  Cry with me please.  Cry with me because crying heals and when you cry with me you allow me to go out from you refreshed, energized and understood.  Celebrate my family and my talents.  Tell me to spend time with them and to help them at those family parties.  To show up for life by giving some life to those I love.  Tell me to dance and sing and craft and laugh with my family.  Tell me to celebrate me and to allow my family to do the same.  Teach me to give compliments and to accept them with honesty and grace.  Oh, and one more thing, hug me when I leave your office (That’s for Rita and Lou Ann – thank you).

Again, thank you all who saw me to this place I am today.  Make no mistake, without you there would be no me.  Keep therapising, doctoring, and dieticianing.  You do save lives!!

Love from, Fran