So Many Possible Titles...

I could call this entry many many things:

I Now Belong to Two Gyms

Why Jobs Suck

Why Teaching Sucks

Why Having a Large Belly Sucks

Why I Hate Food

Why I Only Appear to Associate with Food

Why is it that I continue to shovel food in my mouth when I'm already in physical pain and have a hard time breathing?

Why? Why? Why?

Where did Monday go?

How the hell am I going to have parent conferences tomorrow when I barely know these kids?

What the fuck 'suit' am I going to put on this swollen gut that won't send me into panic attacks?

How the fuck am I going to get rid of this weight?

But instead, I will say, tomorrow is another day.

Right?

I need a change. My behaviors right now are repetitive and destructive. I seem to only have one good day a week.

I don't quite know what the next best move is. I just don't know.

I want to find a DBT Skills group here in DC. I will have good health insurance that starts Dec 1. So maybe then...

Here's to you guys!

love ya,
A

Itchy

I finally had a good day yesterday-- a day with clean eating.

Schools were closed so I bagged up 5 contractor trash bags full of baby girl clothes and set out for good will. Dumping those bags was so incredibly liberating! Next I went to vote. Then I got to exercise. If it hadn't been raining, it would have been a perfect day.

I had tickets to see Bad Brains last night. I was going with an old friend who I hadn't seen in a long time. I knew the show was going to suck but I have had feelings for this guy for almost 15 years. Now, the man is married and has children and I would NEVER act on these feelings, but it was pretty fun to see a show and sit in a bar and drink while watching election returns.

I live in DC and the whole city EXPLODED with the news of Obama's victory. I am still teary-eyed and I cry at NOTHING.

I feel hope. I feel hope for so many things and somewhere, in the bottom of that pile, I feel hope for me.

I have a job. I almost have benefits. I sort of have a new band. I have some very high paying tutoring clients. I am running my life just a little more, how I want to run my life. I have had two hellish weeks of binging but I think I am ready to stop now. I'll see my ED doctor tomorrow afternoon to discuss the medications that I do NOT want to take. I'm hardly on anything at the moment. We stopped almost everything else I was taking-- three meds prescribed very specifically to reduce urges to binge. But I thought they were no longer effective. So we decided to start fresh. The med weaning period didn't go very well. I don't like the new/old med he chose for me. He wants me to take a tricyclic and I think he couldn't be more wrong. Tricyclics tend to be weight gainers but he wants me to take it at night ( I have night eating syndrome) and it is also good for people with OCD. But why take a drug that is VERY likely to cause weight gain when that is the greatest source of my anxiety??

I'll report back tomorrow.

Good Brain, Bad Brain

Brains are neither all good, nor all bad. However, it is the tendency of one with an eating disorder to engage in "black and white" thinking. Sometimes, I engage in black and white thinking.

I haven't posted anything in a very long time.

I got a job-- a real job. I signed a teaching contract with a middle school. My hours are 7:35 am to noon, M to F. My sleep schedule is pretty messed up and my eating has been disastrous.

My ED doctor decided to yank all my meds over the course of a few weeks and then start something new.

I think he picked the wrong new drug. I haven't started it yet- an old tricyclic- but I think he is way off on the this one.

I'm glad to have a job but I'm stressed beyond belief.

And the real reason I'm writing- I just binged like fucking crazy and I'm off to band practice. There is a new band because we aren't working with our crazy singer anymore. But that doesn't change the dynamic of the bandmates with whom I will continue to work.

Today is not lost. I am not lost. I am just very tired, very stressed, and very very full.

I miss you guys and I hope everyone is ok.

I might try to start posting again.

love,
Amalia

Just Back from Baltimore and It's Off to the Tracks!

I went to see my ED shrink at Hopkins Hospital today. I wasn't supposed to see him until October but I emailed earlier in the week. I needed help. I needed to throw a wrench in the habits and the obsessions before I lost control completely. Exercise seems to have become the most important force in my life again since I can't seem to quit food (Duh, you aren't supposed to quit food).

But when you are working out two hours a day, you don't have too much time to do other things. Or you are so out of it because you are severely anemic you can't think straight to even know what you should be working on.

I also called the surgeon who did my gastric bypass for help. He said I should of called him 6 years ago. He thinks that we just need to attack on issue at a time. He gave me a list of 4 years to do- new bloodwork, keep a food diary (for the night eating and the debilitating gas), get IV iron treatments, and I forget the last one.

Well, I have a PPO insurance plan now. So I'll be paying a deductible and then 20% of all of this. The spiral downward continues. Because addressing these health issues increases my pit of debt and the eating disorder has already put me so far into debt. But do I rationalize this expenditure by saying that this is for real health? I dunno.

My doctor in Baltimore told me to a) chill on exercise and b) increase the remeron (my night anxiety/anti depression pill.

Well, I had tried to quit remeron. Everyone knows remeron is a weight gainer and I have gained 12 pounds in the two years I have been taking. Granted, I have been night eating and bingeing. But Remeron doesn't seem to help my sleep anyway. But that is why he said to increase it. I'll know mighty quick if it makes me gain weight. BUT I DONT WANT TO TAKE ANY MEDICATION IF THERE IS EVEN ONCE OUNCE OF CHANCE THAT IT WILL INCREASE APPETITE AND PUT ON MORE FAT.

Spinning! My head is spinning!

I just want to go to the gym. Today I seem to look a little less puffy, but I was up 3 times last night eating massive quantities of food. And I haven't burned it all of yet. I actually did my resume today instead of working out. But the day isn't over and I have access to a 24 hour gym now and it is chilly in DC but I can still use that roof deck pool.

I should do this, I could do this-- shoulda coulda woulda.....

Dr. R. (he is such a great guy) told me that no one is putting a gun to my head about anything....so I don't need to put a gun to my head either.

My brother with the baby is about to cause his wife to divorce him. More about that later.

I still read blogs here and there. I miss you guys. Erin, I'm proud of you. Love you tons! Summer Jen, I'm thinking of you too! And Z! And Frida! And my other friends who I will keep anonymous.

Love, A

"I'm used to men adoring me!" (I didn't say that)

This past Friday night, I was visiting with friends. We were at the apartment of someone I do music work with. He lives with his girlfriend-- a sweet, adorable, Spanish national who grew up extremely wealthy and quite privileged. They love to talk about their relationship.

Tonight the girl was speaking about how things started.

"He dumped me! He was so busy with the music business that I asked him, 'do you just want to be friends?' and he said, 'yes'. I about died! My ego was destroyed! I was so used to men absolutely adoring me."

I guess that is how the world works. There are quite a few ladies all over the world who are used to men 'adoring' them. The people that are naturally physically "beautiful" do have a VERY different life than the ones who are "average to unattractive" looking. They just do. The world treats them very differently. I am not saying it is good. I am not saying it is bad. It just is.

I allowed myself to be triggered by that. The last two nights have been pretty intense. I have been self-injurious with food consumption. And today, I'm looking puffier than normal. So now I have something new to dwell on.

There are new records being made. There is a new job coming my way. There is progress. There is also stagnation. I joined a very popular commercial diet club against the advice of my ED shrink. The first week, even with over eating, I lost a few. But I was also working out twice a day. The second week I did not go weigh in. I weighed myself at my parent's house during the middle of the week and I was back at almost the starting weight (there wasn't a huge difference) but I haven't recovered. I WAS retaining water AND had not had a bowel movement in five days, so it might have not even been real weight.

The point is I haven't recovered from that. I haven't gone back to weigh in. And now I probably do have a real gain. It isn't like I haven't been through this before.

I like a real boy. I think he might be interested in me as well. But he doesn't know the me who has the nude body of a 75 year old woman who had 4 children. He doesn't know the body that emits foul odors (thank you bypass) almost all day.

I believe in positive attitudes. I believe in joy. I believe in being met with the energy that you project. But my bass player and x boyfriend put it like this-- "You have a hard time looking at the world with rose colored glasses because you have been disappointed over and over and over again. I want to smile! I want to laugh! I want to feel what I see other people experiencing! Sometimes I can force myself....

I know these feelings are a combination of multiple things- hormone levels, neurotransmitters, adrenal activity, and your entire life experience.

When I started this blog, I wanted to document positives and recovery ( i hate the word recovery, it is a loaded word). I wanted to document growth.

Well there has been growth and there has been stagnation. That is what life is. I know that. I don't want to be a whiner. I just wish, like all of you, that I could wake up and have a very different brain, just for a day. But of course, I would need a very different body.

But the world says before I can quit this ED, I have to love myself UNCONDITIONALLY RIGHT NOW! ACCEPT AND EMBRACE AND CELEBRATE ME!

And the thoughts continue to swirl.

Selfish me- sad me- lonely me- me who wants to be loved- that me wishes that just once, I could know the feeling of real love and adoration.

reconnection

I really feel the need to re-connect with the culdy girls. I try to fight the urge to sit on the computer and get lost in other people's blogs because I am working on so many things in real life. That's not saying much.

Hope you guys are great.

I Took A Summer Vacation

I actually just got very lazy about writing. Many things have changed since my last post, and many things are very much the same.

I think a list would be the quickest and easiest way to highlight the changes:

1) My ED doctor finally gave me meds for ADD.
2) I realized that with a little effort, I can make a manageable salary tutoring.
3) I have a weight-lifting regimen constructed for me by a trainer.
4) I was given a key to the building where E's sister lives- she has the pool on the roof deck and the 24 hour gym in the basement.
5) I lost 4 pounds and then gained it back.
6) I am continuing to make efforts to hang out with men.
7) I am recognizing more and more, that it is nearly impossible to get decent medical care unless you are working for a posh organization or a government.
8) My insurance is refusing to pay for the ER visit for my broken ankle last spring. I should only be responsible for the 75 dollar co-pay. Here come the appeals packages!
9) I joined weight watchers today.

I think that many humans are under the impression that life is supposed to be wonderful, magical, enchanted, happy, full of love, full of material comforts, a constant adventure, and simply intoxicating.

It isn't. I am a huge fan of literature that tells stories of woman from other countries who have suffered the most insane monstrosities and take it with a grain of salt. Life is far worse in other parts of the world, my friends. I recently read a book called, "Aman, The Story of a Somali Girl." Aman tells her own true story in first person. She describes a childhood where she was born in the arid bush while her mom is leading the herds to find water. At age 9, she undergoes a clitorectomy. At 11, her white boyfriend is murdered because of the inter-racial dating. By age 13, she had been given away in an arranged marriage and had to run away to escape the insane husband. She is then forced to prostitute as she had no other way to support herself.

Do we really have it that bad?

Another favorite book is called, "The Good Women of China" by Xinran.

http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/xinran/home.htm

That is the most disturbing story I have ever read.

Somehow in the last 30 years, Americans have become a society of clinical depressives, anxiety-ridden, bi-polar'ed, ADD'd monkeys that must take pills everyday, just to survive. When did this happen? When did the pharmaceutical companies become the most powerful entity in our lives?

I'm not saying we shouldn't feel sadness. I'm not saying that many of us have not had horrendous horrible things done to us. I'm just saying that we need to keep it in perspective and look outside of our own misery to the real suffering of those in other lands. Have you ever read any books about women growing up in Iraq? Saudi Arabia?

I can't be a hypocrite here because half of my brain time is spent engaging phrases telling me I'm not good enough, not smart enough, not successful enough. But I also know that there are so many people that have it so much worse.

Read Xinran.

You won't be the same person.

My doctor would say that I have done a damn good job, yet once again, of avoiding any articulations about my needs and my feelings.

Must sleep.