Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie...

Sooooo.... I think I'm going to take a break from the blog posting- just for a little while. I need to get back on my feet, I need to crawl out of the rut of depression and ED behaviors, I need to study for my mid term next week, and I've been feeling guilty for not writing as much as I would want to. I can't stand the way my words sound anymore. They make me sick. Trying to flesh out my feelings and thoughts and put them into words is making me sick even at this very moment so I'll make it a short one.

I want to keep reading all YOUR blogs out there, so it's not like I'm just abandoning ship. I am always curious to know how everyone is doing, so I'm gonna keep commenting and stuff.

I'll be back soon. I just need to gather some strength, but I'll be back soon.

Just gotta get right out of here

I took the title for this post from a Queen song because that's what I'm listening to right now.

I'm officially in a slump, I'd say. I'm depressed, I still haven't gotten back on track with my meds so I'm bingeing round the clock and wanting to cry my eyes out at the drop of a fucking hat anytime I think about what I must look like now. I refuse to wear anything besides pajamas or sweats, my room looks like what Japan probably looks like right about now, and tomorrow I have an appointment with Dr. Gordon and I'll have to tell her all this and oh my god I just want to die die die die die die.

I'm never going to get better. Forget the eating disorder, I've completely lost my mind and there is absolutely no hope. Think about it. How many times have I claimed to be "doing better" or "getting back on track" and then something horrible happens and it all falls to pieces? Too many times to count.

The weird part is, I'm outwardly calm and pleasant right now. I was laughing and joking with Mina at the ice cream store, being polite to customers, and totally keeping it together despite the fact that I've lost the ability to form coherent thoughts or feelings. My chest is tight and a part of me wants to cry and scream but I just can't seem to even muster the strength to do those. I literally live this little snow globe existence of a life- settled and normal one day, then shaken up and thrown around the next. And the worst part is, I'm the one shaking the snow globe around!!! Ugh. I realize that sounds ridiculous but in my head it's how I picture it.

I'm totally at a loss for what to do. I think I might start training for the next Boston marathon. Not the NEXT one, but maybe the next next one. I feel like I need something to commit to besides weight loss and recovery and all that other horse shit I'm always yammering on about. I think I could commit to becoming a runner and maybe I'll become really good someday. Plus, running is fun and I need more good wholesome fun. I should probably sort some of the more pressing issues out first though (like the insanity and my overdue parking tickets), before embarking on any new game plans for life.

I hate spring

This afternoon I'm driving up to Maine with my sister. I'm doing that thing again this year where I provide childcare for the Quakers on their spiritual retreat. This year's theme is stewardship and simplicity. It's a good thing I'm just going to be watching the kids because I'm pretty sure I would have nothing to offer to those topics. I'm a terrible steward and I don't live very simply. God, I'm a terrible Quaker! Anyways, I'm sort of nervous about the drive up. It's only three hours or something like that but the longest leg I've ever driven is an hour out into central Massachusetts for my riding lessons last fall, and even that felt like a lot. At least Rachel will be with me.

I can't believe the first week of April is in exactly two weeks.

My brother's girlfriend is an absolute idiot. I always told him he would be a magnet for airheads and bimbos but he was all like oh Eliza I think I have better judgement than that. Ummmm, NO. She's too peppy and over familiar with people, she hardly even greeted me when we met, and she's too skinny. Okay, I know that's not a valid reason for disliking somebody and maybe I'm a little jealous but there you have it. I can't wait for the end of the school year when they'll inevitably have to break up and go off to college.

Hmmmm.... I don't have a lot to write about today so I'm sort of just trying to come up with things to fill this post with.

In Dr. Gordon's office she has these catalogs called The Gurze 2011 Eating Disorders Resources Catalogue. Come to think of it, Marci has them all over her waiting too. Anyways, they're actually pretty cool. They're filled with books you can order, and tips for how to avoid bingeing and purgeing and stuff. Then at the back they list practically every single treatment center in the U.S. I was actually surprised to find out that there are only three credible centers in Massachusetts. McLean Hospital (the one that the institution in Girl, Interrupted was based off of), Laurel Hill Inn (the one I went to), and then CEDC (Cambridge Eating Disorders Center).

I binged yesterday and the day before :( The weird part is, I don't think it was because I'd restricted. The first binge on Wednesday was because I had to open the ice cream store at 10 a.m. and then stay all by myself until 6 p.m. It was raining and I was alone and there were no customers, and even though I had my little lunch or whatever, I just felt like I was going to be so bored and the only way to get through the day would be to binge eat. Then yesterday, I binged again, and not so much out of hunger as it was out of, I feel like eating a lot of ice cream. Also, Michelle was making herself a shake and it made me want a treat. Anywho, I had a big breakfast today so that I can be off on a good start to the weekend, and then I decided to take my meds also so maybe that will help. Hey, maybe I binged because I haven't been taking my meds! Hmmm. It's funny how things start to make sense when you think about them.

My life is a joke

I do not understand parking in Cambridge. I've been getting ticketed so much lately, so I decided to play it safe this time and park in one of the lots by Harvard, but once I finished my appointment with Marci (which is only like 45 minutes long) and drove out, the guy charged me fourteen dollars! I might as well have just parked illegally outside her office and taken the twenty dollar ticket! Well, that's what I get for driving instead of walking/taking the bus.

It was a good session today. I was sort of relieved because after taking a long hard look at the past week and a half, the restriction has not been as serious as I think I made it sound. Yes, I've been eating less than the meal plan calls for, and YES, restricting food intake to make yourself feel better or to relieve anxiety is eating disordered, BUT I really haven't been restricting all that much. I think maybe I wanted it to sound like I was but I'm not. I'm glad I was honest with Marci about it though. Now we can just forget about it and move on.

I'm watching Silence of Lambs with my brother (he claims it's for school. Ha!). I love this movie so much. It's like my fourth or fifth favorite film.

Last night I closed the ice cream store with the other new employee that we hired, Richard. He's a nice guy and a lot more helpful with cleaning and stuff than Michelle is. I'm telling you, I'm not sure how much more of this I can take. Working at the ice cream store I mean. I know I'm not obligated to stay there forever or anything, but it's just getting to be so much more work now that the warm weather is here and customers are coming in and out all day. I certainly can't get away with watching Netflix or bingeing on froyo while I'm working anymore :) I can't quit though. Apparently I owe a whopping 500 dollars in overdue parking tickets from months ago. I have the money, but it's just the most depressing situation ever because if I'd just paid them when they were due I wouldn't have this problem. Ugh, it sucks. So quitting would just make me feel even worse because I wouldn't be able to make any money to make up for it. Booooooooo.

Here are things I need to do this week: (just fyi this list is more for my own organizational purposes. I'm not trying to brag or show off how cool and conscientious I am, because I'm not)

-pay parking tickets
-call Beth Israel Hospital and give them worker's comp information about the accident
-call and set up an appointment with a psychiatrist about meds
-return Netflix DVD's
-get a smoothie from Fresh City at some point
-review statistics notes for class next week
-buy Easter cards to send out to people in a few weeks
-figure out when I'm going to England (before or after California? I don't know!!!)
-call CrazyHorse and give them credit card information so I can get a refund on riding boots that I returned months ago

Bad omens

Tomorrow my mom is having a colonoscopy so I have to get up super early to drive her there and then pick her up afterwards. Great. Mondays used to be my sleep-in days and now I'm a chauffeur for the decrepit.

I'm having second thoughts about the newest girl that we hired, Michelle. She is cool and fun to chat with, she's only been working at the store for a week and already her smoothies are the perfect consistency, but besides making the stuff and waiting on customers, she kind of does absolutely nothing. She sits by the counter and texts her boyfriend, she makes herself enormous milk shakes, and when it's time to close she never stays with me until I'm done cleaning the store. In fact tonight she actually asked if she could leave right at 10 p.m. and I didn't really know what to say so I was like, "Sure!" I'm SUCH a pushover :( The thing is (and I was talking about this with Dr. Gordon last week), I'm actually fine cleaning the store all by myself because it's a lot easier to do something myself than explain it to someone else who won't do it right. I just like having company during my shifts now.

I haven't taken my meds in almost a week. AAAAAaaah I'm falling off the wagon again, I know it. Technically nothing disastrous has happened yet like in terms of bingeing or sleeping all day but I really need to get consistent and STAY consistent with taking them. Otherwise something bad will certainly happen.

There has been a major drop in food consumption this week. Nowhere near full blown starvation but certainly less than my meal plan requires. I haven't been calorie counting but if I had to make a rough estimate I'd say I've been eating between 1,000 and 1,200 calories a day. So... not disastrous but Marci would call it restriction. Last week I was writing stuff in on my planner and I started making a weight loss schedule for myself, just like old times. I put in a weight for myself to be at by the end of the month and then afterwards I started figuring in how long it would take for me to get to my "skinny" weight if I lost 1-2 pounds a week after that. Taking into account how long it's taken me to lose weight in the past on the amount of food I've been eating, if I continue this way I will be "thin" by my birthday in May, and "skinny" by early summer. I don't know why exactly the urges to restrict have been so strong lately. All I know is that it is getting more and more frustrating having to live in this body and more than ever I need a change.

Too tired for a title

I was talking about blogs with my mom the other day. Whenever she sees me writing a post she asks if I've had a binge. "Did you have a binge?" I hate the way she makes it sound like I just took a shit on the carpet or something. I think she assumes that since I started this blog to help me make sense of the eating disorder, I ONLY write when I need to report or analyze a behavior. She asked what my therapist thought about blogging, since Dr. Gordon had mentioned something to her about how reading other people's can be triggering. I actually made a pretty strong case for the opposite. One thing I've noticed over the past year, just reading other people's ED blogs, is that MOST people are using it as a recovery tool in some way or other. I mean, of course everyone is going to have posts that talk about binge/purge episodes or not wanting to gain weight, but most people who are really entrenched in their behaviors sort of don't have the time or inclination to address or tackle their issues. I don't know. Surely this isn't true of everyone but it makes sense to me and even my mother admitted I might have a point.

I feel a little badly about not posting every day, or at least every other day. Sometimes it's because I'm waiting for comments and I like for people to read before I write a new one, and other times I want to write but I don't think the subject is worthy enough to have it's own post. This is kind of a ridiculous way of thinking since the point of An Unexpected Twist (ugh, hating the title all of a sudden btw) is to write WHAT I FEEL LIKE WRITING ABOUT.

This week has been... just average I suppose. I sort of restricted, which is new because I haven't felt like doing that in forever. I'm feeling apathetic. Apathetic and spiteful. I think the restriction is coming from the spiteful place. I just feel like spiting everybody, including myself, by not eating and losing lots of weight. Clearly that last one won't happen just from a few measly days of restriction, but it feels good in the moment. I'm just so tired of being heavy and at the same time not being able to do anything about it. I have GOT to stop complaining so much about it though! I just realized that this is like the third or fourth post in a row that I've written about wanting to lose weight. It must unbearable for you guys.

Spring is in the air and fat is everywhere

Well last night, instead of futzing around on the computer and munching on M&M's as usual, I spent the evening training a new employee named Michelle. She's pretty nice and all, and I am grateful to finally have someone else, ANYONE else, in the store with me, but training people is a lot of work. I showed her how to clean some of the machines, and how to mop the floors and stuff, but she kind of didn't do anything right and I didn't want to say anything or make her feel bad, especially since we seemed to be getting along, so I just let her leave early and stayed late to re-clean everything she'd tried to do. Plus her boyfriend came to pick her up at 10:00, and even though she said she didn't need to leave early, I felt really rushed with him waiting around in the store while we cleaned up so I figured I would save us all the trouble and told them they could both go. When I told Dr. Gordon this today she said, "Eliza!" and then went on to explain that by not correcting Michelle I'm not only not training her how to clean the store, but I'm also creating extra work for myself that I shouldn't have to do. I understand, but I don't actually feel like it's all that much extra work. From inside my head it would actually be more stressful to have to tell Michelle that she did a bunch of stuff wrong. Whatever. I'm working again tonight but I'm not sure if I'm training anybody. I kind of hope not...

Tomorrow I have Marci and my homework for this week was to track my hunger and fullness during certain meals. According to her, I should feel very proud because this is "advanced nutrition work" and people who are totally wrapped up in their eating disordered behaviors can't do hunger and fullness work since their bodies are all fucked up from restriction and purging or whatever. So I guess I'm supposed to feel good but I don't really. I'd rather lose weight and be pretty again. There are actually a couple of events coming up in the next few months that I know would be so much more enjoyable if I could be thin for them (yes, yes I know how EDed that sounds and yes, yes I'm working on addressing that sort of maladaptive thinking and blah blah shut up). You see, in April my family is going to California for a week to see the sights and visit some friends. My dad's cousin does the sound editing for Pixar studios so we'll get to see some of the behind the scenes stuff of Disney movies that haven't even come out yet! I've never been to California but from what I've heard it's lovely and warm and I'd very much like to not be obese there. ALSO, my birthday is on May 26th and I'll be turning 21 and my friends will be home from college for the summer and they want to take me out drinking and bar hopping to celebrate- another event I'd like to not be disgusting looking for. I'm also going to England with my dad some time in April because he has business to take of there and if I should meet the queen I'd like to look presentable and without stomach rolls. My bff from school is also spending a year abroad at Oxford, and if I go to England I can see her! And even though I know she wouldn't care all that much what I look like it still bothers me that I'd look this way when I see her. Heheh, she actually reads this blog so I feel funny writing about her as if she doesn't know any of this...

Anywho, maybe one of these days something magical will happen like a good angel will fly down from Weight Loss Heaven and take thirty pounds off my ass for me.

I'm better now

I take back that last post I wrote. I was in a super bad mood but that doesn't mean anything, really. I say/write a lot of things I don't mean.

You know what all you guys should do right now? Go out and rent 127 Hours. The movie that James Franco was nominated as best actor for this year. It's based on a true story about this guy named Aron Ralston who goes out hiking on Blue John Canyon in Utah one day and he falls into a slot canyon and gets his arm pinned by a boulder. He stays stuck this way for 5 days before finally doing the unthinkable to save his life. It's just... the most inspiring film I've ever seen in my life. I really need for you guys to see it so you'll know what I'm talking about. It's a little gruesome at one point, so if you don't have a strong stomach for blood and stuff you might want to prepare yourself a bit. I'm serious. I used to pride myself on how well I could tolerate scenes with blood but this one scene had me absolutely cringeing and heaving. Now that I've warned you though, I will honestly proclaim that Ralston is my new hero. He makes me want to be a better person.

Anyway though, like I was beginning to say, I feel bad for being so negative and antagonistic a few hours ago. I won't give up on recovery or whatever, but I am rather sick of the weekly shit sessions with Marci and Dr. Gordon. I hate that they're both so much skinnier than I am.

Screw this

I'm so bored with my life right now. I've had nothing of consequence to write about this week and the only reason I'm writing right now is because my last post was on Wednesday and I feel obligated to report something.

I'm super angry that the warm weather seems to be settling in. I'm not prepared for spring and certainly not prepared for the clothing it calls for. I need to start losing weight I think. I'm so sick of all this following a meal plan shit. I don't need a meal plan. What I need is to cut back on calories because I'm enormous. The worst part is that I'm not even exaggerating about being fat anymore. Even Marci admits that my weight is higher than it needs to be because of how long I've kept myself in the binge/restrict cycle. I think she was trying to make me feel better by telling me this but honestly all it does is make me feel like shit. Then she tries to force a 2,500 calorie-a-day meal plan on me? This is bull shit and I am not going to stand for it any longer. I'm sure some people DO need that much, but those people are probably at healthy normal weights and don't have any weight to lose. I am unfortunately not one of those people. I think Marci is under the impression that I have no control over what or how much I eat so she just has me eat a shit ton amount every day thinking that maybe it'll keep me from bingeing. HORSE SHIT I SAY.

What's wrong with Charlie Sheen, btw? "Depression is a choice, and today I choose not to be depressed." What the fuck?! Is he aware of the words he is saying?

I want to lose twenty pounds by my birthday in May. I do get sad when I hear myself think these types of thoughts, not just because it's anti-recovery, but also because I've tried to lose weight soooooooooooo many times but I just get too hungry to stick with it. I just wish I could find some sort of medium between crash dieting and healthy dieting. I mean who knows? I haven't tried to stick to a realistic, non-restrictive diet in a really long time. Maybe I've changed and I can handle it now?

Where's Eliza?

I am so out of it lately. It's like my brain has been somewhere else for weeks. First there was that epic mistake I made last week where I let someone down and ended up disappointing myself and my family, then last night I had a statistics exam and had I taken a shit on the test itself I probably would have done better. And TODAY, I totally forgot that I was supposed to open the ice cream store at 10:00 so Selim had to come down and open it and I came an hour late. The worst part is that everyone has been being so goddamn nice to me. Selim looked disappointed at first but then he told me it was all okay and to take a deep breath. My stats professor told us not to worry about how we do on the test because probability is the hardest unit in statistics and even third year calculus students struggle with understanding it.

And now I'm bingeing. Well, I'm eating ice cream. I'm not really sure if that counts as a full blown binge.