I found the journal that I was writing in in 2007. There are entries from the spring and summer, from right before I went into treatment and a very few notes from during treatment. Some of them really struck me. These excerpts are from 15 May 2007.
I'm really happy to be buying clothes that fit, and I can accept that they're Ms instead of S or XS... but at the same time, seeing so many tiny thin, toned women walking around Boston is really difficult. Not just difficult -- anxiety-provoking, painful, panic-inducing, and jealous, too, of course. A lot, though, lately I've been feeling sad or just wistful -- kind of an "I-know-I-can't-be-that" feeling, which is something I've never even come close to accepting before. Sometimes it feels like weakness to accept it -- other times, strength. I don't know -- I guess I don't think either of those is a cop-out. It's weakness in that it's giving in to my body by eating and believing that's okay. It's strength in that it's difficult to fight what I've conditioned myself to believe is the only okay thing: starve or feel horribly guilty.
For a time, I was able to accept that I had to let go of those disordered desires. I shouldn't say that I was able to accept, I should say worked hard enough to accept. In treatment and Magnolia House, I worked very hard. I worked very hard for a long time after that, too. Are my struggles now because I'm no longer working hard? Did I give up at some point, or just get complacent?
Treatment will certainly be interesting. I had all these questions: Am I sick enough? - am I thin enough? - Will it be horrible? - Will the other women be horrible? - Will...? - but I don't have/get to ask them anymore, because going inpatient isn't an OPTION to consider anymore; it's my mom's mandate. I'm not fighting it anymore; in a lot of ways, that's freeing. I wish this could have happened in early high school. I feel like I was less aware of what was going on and why, and that an intervention then would have been a little simpler. Perhaps if it'd happened, I could have avoided some of the pain of senior year and the chaotic difficulty of freshman year at Macalester.
One thing I am sure of now is that I did go into treatment at the right time. Earlier in high school I don't think it would have stuck. I think the pressures of ballet and/or cross country & track, in addition to my obsessiveness about school and refusal to take anti-depressants, would have been too much to withstand a tenuous recovery (as adolescent recoveries so often are, unfortunately). At 19, my maturity level was finally (barely) in the right place to take it all in.
I'm not scared because I keep seeing treatment as "learning how to eat" -- recovery from the symptoms. But what will be so hard, I think, will be dealing with the "underlyingness," not just of the ED, but of me. The eating disorder permeates so much of my life, is so much of my life in all its manifestations and symptoms, and I lean on it so heavily. Sometimes it's a fallback/excuse/distraction from other things, yes. Other times, however, it has not functioned solely to fill a void, but rather as a huge entity of its own. . . I mean to say that it was taking up legitimate psychic space, not being used as a filler. Anyway, either way, it's a part of every relationship I have -- interpersonal, with my spaces, with my schoolwork -- and so letting go of my eating disorder would, I think, do two things. (1): Leave spaces to fill, and (2): Expose parts of me that I don't know yet. Re: the spaces it would leave, I'm actually looking forward to that in some ways; it would mean time and emotional /mental ability to dedicate to a vast number of things at Mac and in the world. About #2, though, I'm apprehensive; what are those things about myself that my eating disorder currently overshadows? Is there anything there, or is this it, me? Is there anything good there? Anything epiphanic, brilliant, revolutionary -- or is it just uninspired and bland in there? I don't really believe it's either. I hope for richness of personality, depth of love, openness of soul. I don't expect or need glory. I just worry that I can't live up to (. . .).
(I like the word "underlyingness" in there. I think JMW and I might have coined that one in high school. (Did we, J?))
It did permeate so much, didn't it? Those of you who have been there know it. People think it's food -- they're even surprised and sad when we say it's every meal, every snack, every fucking bite. But they don't understand that it's not just every meal that's taken over by the disordered thoughts and feelings; it's every minute. It reminds me of something that AEW wrote about being visibly queer, visibly butch: that she is "stared down in every grocery store, every mall, every public bathroom." A different topic and struggle, definitely, but the idea that the struggle itself penetrates every experience of every day. Your identity is, well, who you are, and when your identity has become an eating disorder, the eating disorder influences every aspect of your world.
As far as the end of that excerpt goes -- the part questioning who I am and what's underneath my ED -- those questions have begun to return. In November 2007, when I was in Magnolia House, I wrote this:
. . . Anyway, it's kind of wondrous to read that. By that I mean both that it makes me feel admiration and wonder at how centered and healthy I was, and also that it makes me wonder how I've gotten far away from believing those things anymore. How do I get back there? How did I get there in the first place? I didn't write when I was in treatment, just before and afterward (in Mag). I didn't read books, either, though people kept sending them to me to distract me during my "free time." I just didn't have the mental energy to do so. I wish I had, though, because I feel like I need the resources that I had when I was in treatment but without going back inpatient.
I don't need inpatient care right now. I'm happy with a lot of things in my life, and I'm not fucking them up; if I were, that would be a major red flag. It's senior year and I want to graduate -- can't believe I'll be leaving college with two degrees soon and ending a long, important phase of my life. I can't wait, and I don't want to mess up my GPA/scholarship/pride in my work/etc. I'm really happy dating AEW, really happy, regardless of how things began and how many people tell me I've jumped into things. There's a Fiona Apple lyric from the song "Parting Gift," We ended bad / but I love where we started -- and I feel just the opposite about things with me and AEW.
It did permeate so much, didn't it? Those of you who have been there know it. People think it's food -- they're even surprised and sad when we say it's every meal, every snack, every fucking bite. But they don't understand that it's not just every meal that's taken over by the disordered thoughts and feelings; it's every minute. It reminds me of something that AEW wrote about being visibly queer, visibly butch: that she is "stared down in every grocery store, every mall, every public bathroom." A different topic and struggle, definitely, but the idea that the struggle itself penetrates every experience of every day. Your identity is, well, who you are, and when your identity has become an eating disorder, the eating disorder influences every aspect of your world.
As far as the end of that excerpt goes -- the part questioning who I am and what's underneath my ED -- those questions have begun to return. In November 2007, when I was in Magnolia House, I wrote this:
It's such a huge relief to feel like I can be who I am and really like that person. It's been such a subtle change -- I don't feel like I'm a completely different person from who I was when I was so full of self-hatred and illness, and I guess that's because I haven't changed as a person; rather, I began to see who was underneath the layers of pain and chaos and depression. I like that person. I like her self-reliance and her ability to ask for help. I like her compassion and her sense of humor. I like not feeling ashamed of "provocative" comments (because now I say them in appropriate settings). I like being rid of the stress that comes with chameleon-ism...I like seeing her remain evenly, groundedly, herself with different friends. And I like that she finds out that people like her, not her many facades.
. . . Anyway, it's kind of wondrous to read that. By that I mean both that it makes me feel admiration and wonder at how centered and healthy I was, and also that it makes me wonder how I've gotten far away from believing those things anymore. How do I get back there? How did I get there in the first place? I didn't write when I was in treatment, just before and afterward (in Mag). I didn't read books, either, though people kept sending them to me to distract me during my "free time." I just didn't have the mental energy to do so. I wish I had, though, because I feel like I need the resources that I had when I was in treatment but without going back inpatient.
I don't need inpatient care right now. I'm happy with a lot of things in my life, and I'm not fucking them up; if I were, that would be a major red flag. It's senior year and I want to graduate -- can't believe I'll be leaving college with two degrees soon and ending a long, important phase of my life. I can't wait, and I don't want to mess up my GPA/scholarship/pride in my work/etc. I'm really happy dating AEW, really happy, regardless of how things began and how many people tell me I've jumped into things. There's a Fiona Apple lyric from the song "Parting Gift," We ended bad / but I love where we started -- and I feel just the opposite about things with me and AEW.
"I want to stay in love with my sorrow / oh, but God, I want to let it go."
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