3 Months Missing

Where have the last three months gone? I have hardly been about in the internet world at all. I havent blogged in ages and I have used twitter only minimally.
I suppose this can be seen as a good thing, because I really only used twitter to talk about feelings I didn't want to admit openly to friends.
But in a way it is also a bad thing. It has meant that really I have not had that space where I can explore what and why things are going on in my head and I haven't really been able to touch base and take stock of actually how far I have come.

So where am I?
Well since the summer, my life has changed quite abit. I have moved in with the Partner (I will name them L for the rest of this). We have moved into a 1 bed flat that is lovely. L has left uni and has now gotten work in London (an hour and half commute). So life and routine has changed dramatically.
The dynamic has also changed a lot too.
L has been a studennt ever since we have been together. I have always worked and had my own life. Now we have our lives together, but L has the better job and L is the "more successful" carreer person.
This was a abit of a shell shock and has been difficult for me to get over, but it is ok.

I think it was harder, because at the moment I hate my job. It has started to become so boring and so petty. I think maybe the hate was emphasised by the fact that my job is no longer that important.

The problem is that I also feel slightly stuck in my job too. L works in London and commutes back to the house so doesn't get in till 8pm ish. Me on the other hand have a 10minute walk into work. This means that I am able to get home do all the house stuff and get dinner ready for us when L gets in.
If I was to move jobs, I would have to work in London. This would mean us both getting in at 8pm ish, then having to cook and eat. It would mean we would have no life at all.

The other good thing about the set up is that it allows me to do all my charity work, un interrupted before L comes home from work.
It really is the best thing for us.

But is it the best thing for me?

The other thing that has been difficult for me has been weight.
It is not that I want to lose weight, it is not that I want to eat less, it is not that I hate how I look. But I don't seem to be able to keep any weight on at the moment.
I lost a bit of weight when I moved house - almost to be expected. But since then I have been completely unable to get it back on. Even when I have got some of it back on, it comes back off again quite quickly.

I just don't know what it is.
I am eating more than I used to, but I don't feel any overly active than I was before.
The routine is difficult. I used to eat as soon as I got in from work, but now I am not eating til 8pm.

It has been difficult, but i seem to have gotten myself into a routine, but I just can't seem to get into a routine that will allow me to gain and then maintain!

The tough thing is, that all of this just sort of happened. Not because I wanted to lose weight, just because I did lose weight.

Having spent two years not really having to worry about my weight, in the last three months it has come under the spotlight.
This has meant that my ED has put my weight into the spotlight too.

So that evil little childlike voice is back, it is shouting at me saying that I don't need to gain weight.... interestingly it is not telling me to lose weight..... but it aint exactly hot on the idea of gaining either.

Its not critical, but its slightly scary.

L and I have always been close and we have always spoken about things like this. But since we have moved in together, ED wise we are further apart. I feel more alone.

I am not sure how it happened, I am not sure why I have seemed to have clam up on it all. But I have.
I am also not very sure how I am actually going to clamber this back.

I just feel, which I think is a dangerous feeling, alone with my ED.

A weird week

As promised, I am blogging. I am also blogging because I need to and can finally get this off my chest. I haven’t been able to get this off my chest in a my normal life because it sort of opens up a lot of issues if I do.

Anyways. Life took a very unexpected and difficult turn for the worse this week.

After celebrating my birthday over a long weekend off of work, I returned home on Tuesday. While I was away I had been left a few voicemails from an unknown number, so I ignores them and decided to wait until I got back (knowing that no one normally leaves me voicemails if it is urgent).

On Tuesday night I sat at home and listened to three voice mails declaring that the leaver was going to kill me. In fact, if I was to quote. He was going to “poke my eyes out and shove them up my arse”.

I sort of felt a bit scared at this and didn’t really know what to do. Didn’t really know who to turn to either.

The person who left me the messages is the ex boyfriend of a girl I mentor and who I had helped make her decision to leave him. Although according to him, it is all my fault. So on Tuesday night, he came around the house and started Effing and Jeffing at the front door.

I had no other option than to call the police.

As the sirens came around the corner, he ran and hid.

From Tuesday evening through till Friday I had police protection at the house. I continues to get even more scary messages via text and voicemail and it was all getting a little soap like to be honest.

Saturday morning, he was arrested and was given a restraining order. Saturday afternoon I was getting messages again.

Saturday evening he was re-arrested and is now in custody.

I have to say, the police have been amazing. They really have helped to put my mind at rest. They have generally supported me and I have been kind enough to give them top ups of coffee cups as often as I can.

There has been a little sense of lack of freedom and weirdness in my life.

I hate that feeling that although I had no plans to leave the house, I couldn’t easily leave.  I had a complete lack of control or freedom in my life.

Amazingly this has not affected my eating. Self harm has slightly been heightened.

I just feel and felt a bit helpless. The messages were scary and slightly reminiscent of events I have had before in my life.

So, my main problem now is that. I am generally good in a crisis, but after the crisis I am not so good. Now that I am no longer in danger, now that I don’t have a point to prove. I collapse! I then find it easier to justify my ED.

I think I made a rod for my own back by not really telling a lot of people, but I just didn’t really know how to tell people and I sort of didn’t want people to put anyone else in danger.

So, there we are. Weird week. I need to try and fight the feelings this week.

Birthday Blog

I am not writing this for anything other than to get it off my chest. I am not trying to draw attention to my birthday, nor am I looking for more “Happy Birthday, your amazing” messages.

I don’t really like birthdays.

I have never had a bad birthday, but I have never had a good birthday. I just never really bother with my birthday. I just don’t feel like I am worth it, I always feel uncomfortable.

I don’t, and have never, liked being centre of attention. I never feel comfortable when people do nice things for me. I always much prefer to be the person who does nice things for people. This doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it, even if sometimes I come across as I don’t. I do, I really do. I just always feel embarrassed and un-worthy.

I had a “Discussion” with the partner this weekend because they were adamant I should go out tonight and I should not stay in alone and make myself even lower than I am already. But I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

I hate putting people out, I just didn’t want to send out messages saying, hey come for a drink for my birthday. It feels like I’m demanding their company, like Im demanding they come and celebrate me. There’s no point, because I don’t feel like I can celebrate me. I just don’t feel worth it.

I know this coming to be a blog about how un worthy I feel, but I suppose this is the sort of feeling I have at the moment. I just feel totally unworthy and my birthday is only compounding it.

That being said… having my birthday today has actually sort of raised my mood (if you didn’t see my tweets yesterday, I basically got diagnosed with depression yesterday – i.e. more so than I usually am) so the constant happy messages have entered my subconscious and I do feel slightly better about myself and I do feel a lot happier than I did a couple of days ago.

Is this just temporary? Who knows…. I think I need to try and remember and focus on some of the nice things people have said today so that I can try and keep my mood happy and keep challenging my self-un-worth.

I’ll give it a go.

Nx

An Anorexic Restaurant Review

Probably not the sort of review the Chef would be expecting or would take much notice, but I thought it would be a fun thing to write a review of what I described as “The best meal I have ever had”.

Date: 13^th March 2011

Venue: The Maze Grill (Gordon Ramsey), Grosvenor Square, London

Entering through the automatic glass doors, you are welcomed at a reception where a member of staff takes your coats and checks your reservation. I felt that this area was a tad too small. The reception serves both The Maze and the Grill. We were a part of four and the space was filled and a bit cumbersome as we de-robed.

From here we were greeted by the matradee who took us to our seats.

There was a bit of wait before the menus arrived, which I felt was just that little bit too long. For someone who has had a difficult relationship with food, especially eating out, I found the wait a little bit too long and provided an awkward feel when really what was required was something to put me at ease.

Our waiter came over for the evening and provided the menus and offered us some water. After a short period of time, the theatrical experience truly began.

The resident meat specialist came over to explain the different cuts of meat along with the different types. I think for me, this was a little bit odd, but then I suppose if you were really into fine dining you would appreciate it. However for me point out the “healthier meat” was appreciated.

The time given for us to decide was perfect. I did feel a little under pressure but this came from the company I was with, not from the service.

So, we then moved on to the food.

Starter: White onion soup, Parmesan and garlic crostini

This was brought to the table in a bowl with just the crostini and some herbs. This made me feel a little awkward at first as there seemed to be no soup and only some oiled carbohydrates. But the unexpected theatrics really made the dish special. Once everyone else’s dishes had been served, a waiter returned to my setting with a small jug of the soup and poured this over the crostini right to the brim of my bowl. It was a simple, but magical, experience that added something – I’m not sure what – to the dish.

The soup itself was a perfect blend of flavors. For someone who loves their cheese it was disappointingly not a very cheesy dish, but it wasn’t overly flavored of onion either. The consistency of the soup was superb as well.

Two criticisms of the dish; The temperature of the soup was nuclear which made it difficult to taste at first, also the fresh herbs were still on the stalks and, although making the dish look quite spectacular when served, once they were covered in the soup and had become wilted they became quite stringy and awkward to eat.

Other dishes had around the table included the soft shell crab and also the squid. Both were also beautifully presented and flavored. The soft shell crab dish was quite large for a starter.

Main Course: Hereford grass fed, aged 25 days Sirloin 10oz.

Sides: Stilton Fries, Braised Carrots, Spinach with gruyere.

It was served on a wooden chopping board with a bulb of roasted garlic and herbs for decoration. The dish looked just as I would have expected.

The taste of the dish was totally out of this world. The meat was obviously a very good cut of meat and a very good produce, but the seasoning and the execution of its preparation was perfect.

Normally, when I go out for a steak, I would be battling to cut the fat off the top of the cut and trying to make sure that it was on the other side of the plate. I do this, not because of the obvious anorexic tendencies but, because it is generally very chewy and tasteless. This time around I wouldn’t have even realised that the fat was there if it wasn’t for the added flavor it provided.

The sides were all cooked to perfection too. For people who don’t like cheese do not get put off by the Stilton fries. The fries themselves are seasoned a lot better than the normal fries and the cheese is only used as a dip, which incidentally for my cheese loving palette was not cheesy enough.

The spinach came as more cheese than it did spinach and was a little bit awkward to share between a few people as the spinach wasn’t very finely chopped before being baked within the pot of gruyere.

No one around our table had a sauce with their main and it was not missed. The meat was moist enough and had flavors that would only be lost by any of the sauces. By not having a sauce we did not only save £2.50 we saved a lot more because my opinion is that it would have wasted the meat too.

Blackberry and Bramley Apple Crumble with Anglaise

I am not a pudding person and I almost was just going to choose the cheese board, but I really did want to try and do a full and proper 3 course meal. So I chose the crumble and I am more than glad that I did. The fruit had been soaked and baked in a form of alcohol that I could not place but the flavours were perfect.

One of the highlights of this dish was the suggested desert wine from the resident sommelier. I feel I should point out that I am quite a wine snob, I like good wine and I like a good match. This sommelier got it spot on! She recommended a desert wine that was mid-priced and not something I would normally have chosen. The suggestion that something a bit sweeter and with more honey flavouring would really complement the fruit was something I really wasn’t sure about but I can say that I don’t think I have ever known a match work better than this. I was very pleased to be wrong on this occasion because she was more than right!

Closing thoughts.

Over the last two years I have started to have a better relationship with food and have really started to enjoy the process of cooking, serving and eating good food. Good food to me is not all about eating it. I would much prefer to prepare and experiment with it too. For this reason I did not massively think I was going to enjoy this experience.

I am also not always great in overly pretentious and expensive environments. I generally feel like I don’t deserve to be there and that everyone there knows that I am not happy and am feeling so uncomfortable inside that it is a waste to serve good food to me.

The experience last night was something completely different.

Yes; the service was fantastic, the décor and feel of the restaurant was perfect for any occasion. But was it this that made this meal such a land-mark memorable event in my life? Sadly it was not.

When I sat down to the table I was feeling very self conscious and I was feeling a disturbing amount of self loathing. For the first time I did not use alcohol to reduce this feeling and to relax myself. I managed to use positive self talk and also opening up to my companions over dinner about why and what I was feeling at that present time.

My perfect meal was created by the following:

                Fantastic Décor, Fantastic service, beautiful produce that was cooked incredibly well but also the company of family who have been so patient with me over the past three years and who now truly understand me and my illness and really just want me to be happy.

Thank you Gordon, but I would also like to thank my family too.

How do you help someone who doesn't want to be helped?

You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped. You can ease their pain and you can smooth some of the difficulties, but you can’t help them out of the rut that they may be in.

This does not mean that the person is a lost cause and they are doomed to a dented life. On the contrary, it just means that they are not ready to be helped.

It’s so hard to know how to deal with this type of person. In fact I was one of these people once. I never wanted to get better; I didn’t want what recovery entailed – even though I didn’t know what that might be,. The whole idea of living without my vice was so scary that I just didn’t even want to contemplate it.

Fast-forward 4 years.

I have been helped and people still help me. Something has changed.

During the time I didn’t want to be helped I was still being helped. I wasn’t being helped out of the mess I was in, in fact I was probably digging the hole deeper and deeper at the time, But I was being helped.

I was being helped to see that I did want help.

I was being helped to see that nothing would be as bad as the mess I was in.

I was being helped to see that I was worth fighting for.

And I think that is what you have to remember when you come across someone who doesn’t want to be helped. You can’t help them get better, but you can help them to want the help they need.

When does a Lapse become Replapse?

I've spent the last few days thinking and talking about this quite a bit and thought it a bit of an interesting subject that I thought I would open up to the world.

Yesterday, I had a Psychology appointment and also a meeting with a good friend of mine. They were both of the thinking that my latest blip, was a blip aka a lapse and not a re-lapse. However I have been of the thinking that it has been a relapse.

I should say, that I am probably going to talk as if this is present, but it is only because it is recent, but I am on the way out of it.

For me, the main distinction this time that defines the blip as a relapse was that I was, for the first time in two years, secretive about it. I shut myself away from the world, I didn't tell - due to shame and disgust in myself - anyone about what I was doing or how bad things had gotten.

You could say that this is part and parcel of the illness and I would agree with you, some people would also argue that this would just be part of a lapse and not a relapse and I would also agree with them too.

I suppose though, that for me and for where I am in my life and recovery it is something that signifies a relapse, even though in other people I wouldn't say and would agree that it doesn't mean a relapse for everyone else.

So why for me and not for everyone else?

I think really, deep down it is because the Illness tricked me again and that is probably what it is that signifies a relapse.

Getting pulled in and getting tricked by the illness to believe that no one likes me, that I am not worth it and that all i deserved was the illness and that also the illness is the only thing that would get me through the difficult time.

That is ultimately what caused me to not tell people and this I suppose is what has made this feel more like a relapse over a lapse.

Weirdly, through talking about this and discussing/debating the issue, it has sort of un-made this a relapse. Because I have now spoken about it, but I suppose at the time when I was in the grips I was isolated, I was filled with shame and I was very much in my illness.

What do people think? what causes a lapse to become a relapse? is it just the length of time, is it when the weight goes to a level?

Body Image Phenomenon

My Body Image is all over the place.

Despite having eaten more this week than I needed and generally in a way feel inside like I'm being fat and greedy, my body image is actually really good.

By that, I look in the mirror and I am like what I see, I actually look and feel like this week I have lost weight.

Is this normal?

When I am restricting, I hate what my body looks like and I want / think I need to lose weight.

When I am eating and gaining weight, I actually feel like I'm skinny and am happy with my body and possible even feeling like I am losing weight.

Weight.