Confession Time

 Hello my Long Lost Internet People!  Sorry for disappearing on all of you again, but these near death experiences of the last couple weeks have taken their toll on me, and just sitting upright is still a challenge.  In case anyone missed my announcement on Facebook last week (which is probably everybody, knowing how Facebook works), my whole family was struck down with a monster case of the flu (on the first day of Spring, of course!).  Luckily, I am married to Superman, so despite his own severe illness he managed to hold everything together and take care of everyone and everything, while I spent 7 days unable to remove myself from the palette I made for myself on the Bathroom floor.  And, of course, since catastrophes never seem to strike alone around here, our refrigerator died in the middle of all of this.  So, Mr. Superman also had to deal with replacing that, all by himself!

I think the absolute worst part of all of this (besides feeling like a terrible Mother for not being able to take care of my kids), is that I lost every single pound I had worked so hard to put on the past couple months!   That was not fucking nice!  But it has brought me to a new realization about myself.  I have an eating disorder.  Now, I kinda already knew that, but I didn't really understand it before.  And I am really still not sure how to go about fighting it.

I never did learn to eat correctly as a child, and as I got older it only got worse.  As a teenager, friends, teachers, and even complete strangers were always asking me if I was Anorexic, no one in my family ever suggested that of course, but everyone else did, including the doctors.  I never believed that I was.  I NEVER thought I was fat, I NEVER even cared one way or another about getting fat, there was no distortion in my body image whatsoever, so obviously I could not possibly be Anorexic.  Turns out, that in my case at least, there is a whole lot more to it than just that one part, and most of the rest of them are exactly what I have been dealing with for the last 32 years.

When I finally consented to the diagnosis last August, I still didn't really buy it, but, it got me my "green card" (nothing to do with the immigration one - this is a whole different kind of "green"), and that was all I was after at the time.  I have lots of other qualifying conditions, this one was just the easiest to prove.  My very first Psychiatrist had prescribed my medicine of choice to me when I was 16.  It wasn't legal at that time, not by any stretch of the imagination, and he was very clear about that, but he knew it would help me, and it always has. 
Now, to have a "legal" prescription, this is a dream come true for me.  

The only problem is that, while my medicine helps me manage my pain and other psychological issues, it doesn't make me hungry.  I spent three decades training my body to ignore the "munchies", and I did a damn good job of it.  I haven't eaten Breakfast in the morning for at least 25 years, and Lunch is not an everyday meal either.  I can ignore the most pitiful pains and pleas from my stomach, mostly without even really realizing I am doing it anymore.  I did some figuring yesterday, and granted my brain is still fuzzy, so my numbers may be off a little, but as near as I can tell, I have been surviving on a diet of under 500 calories a day in real food, and well over 2,000 calories of just plain sugar.  Sometimes it was corn syrup, or whatever, but just pointless empty fucking calories all the way around.

I do NOT want to go back to that!  But I have no idea how to replace all of those calories with real food!  I cannot possibly eat that much in one day!  I mean, yes, I very much hope to be able to work up to doing that everyday, but I am so far away from that idea right now it is not even visible with a telescope!  The problem is, I really can't wait.  I need to rebuild my strength from this damn flu, because I literally have none.  I cannot stand up straight, I can't even sit up for very long at a time with being dizzy.  And oh my Gawd, the fucking Bathroom moved a thousand feet further away than it used to be.  Well, it feels like that anyway, its so damn far!  Just typing a damn sentence feels like running a marathon!

(It is now Saturday, I passed out after writing that last sentence above on Thursday, and slept for 15 hours, and yesterday I actually had to do some laundry and that took all the energy I had for the day, so I never made it back here.  Rather than trying to rewrite everything to fit, I am just going to pick up where I left off and maybe I can actually finish this post sometime today.)

Of course the fact that EVERYTHING tastes like crap right now doesn't fucking help either.  But I am trying really hard to fight through this and just freakin eat stuff, mostly healthy stuff.  I looked at the idea of trying to set up a "food plan", but I don't think that is really going to be useful for me at this point, so I am going with a food journal instead.  Keeping track of everything I eat during the day forces me to be conscious of my choices, and more importantly, my non-choices.  If the list is too short at the end of the day, I'll know where I fucked up, and can figure out how to do better tomorrow.  The idea is to eat at least as much, preferably more, than I did the day before.   So far so good, unfortunately I am only halfway through day 3 here, so I am not getting too excited yet.

I will find my way past this, because I have to.  If I don't, I die, and I have way too much fucking shit left to do, I do not have time for dying.  Besides I promised my oldest son that I would be around to meet his Grandchildren, and since I still don't have any Grandchildren, it is looking like this is going to be a long term commitment.  If there is anyone out there who has any experience in coping, or helping others cope with eating disorders, I sure wouldn't mind hearing from you.  I have no medical insurance, and no money, so professional help just ain't gonna happen. I would be extremely and eternally grateful for any help or support that anyone might be able to offer.  I know I have a long road ahead of me, but for the first time, I think I am looking forward to journeying towards health.  Just make sure somebody slaps me if I start going all "health-food fanatic" at some point, that ain't where I want to go.  I just want to eat and have the energy to actually get off my ass and do something!

Thanks for listening, I do not know what I would do if I did not have this Blog to let this shit out.  And I wouldn't be letting it out at all if you all weren't here to read it.  So, Thank YOU, you are all appreciated and needed more than I could ever hope to express, please don't ever forget that.

Until Next Time ...