My friends Mia and Ana

So, I made a new friend, but Mia and Ana are very jealous. In fact not only them. Also other “real life” friends dislike my new friend. And it is not fair, it made me lie and it made me feel bad about myself so that Ana and Mia tried to take care of me. Mia especially on Friday and Saturday and then Ana took over. I have fought them though tonight. I had dinner. A good, healthy dinner.
Anyway, so I am glad I made this new friend. She is great. We have a lot in common and we don’t judge each other. I even asked her if she is anorexic and that I was worried about her, because she is really skinny, but she reassured that she is fine. That she actually tries to gain weight, but that her mother is also really tiny… so I believe her, although it is hard to believe. she is a pretty, but dangerously skinny girl. And also my other friends commented on that and said pejoratively that she was sick and anorexic. And they just looked at me like I was stupid when I said, that’s he may be, but that this was nothing to judge someone by and that she may have some problems because of that and that Anorexia and eating disorders in general are mental illnesses. They really looked as me as if I was talking crap. They don’t understand. And because of that it is making me angry that they judge her. They don’t know her. They talked to her a couple of hours-that’s it. Frustrating. So now I realized I would feel bad if i would tell them I was going to hang out with her. And since I do they kind of distanced themselves from me. I hate that. Talk to me but don’t treat me like that.

Anyway, I also saw this guy again this weekend. He was in town for a night and he came with his cousin to meet me at a bar where me and my new friend hang out. I went home with him and we got home at like 3am, staying at a Hard Rock Bar or something that late. It was good, fun and interesting people. And M. and I talked a lot, too, I did not tell him everything I talked about with my therapist but mentioned a couple of things, especially my problem with men and the way my brother treated me when I was younger. I also said that I had bad experience with men sexually but I did not say what happened. He asked me if I ever mentioned it to my therapist… and that I should. It’s difficult though and again, I have said that before – ye more I think about my past ye weirder it feels. There is so much I don’t even remember. I always thought I will never forget my life, but I have. I wonder what my life was like when I was little? It must not have been as great as I have always wanted it to be. I wasted my youth and there must be a reason why I did that.
It’s painful to think about it because I do not have an answer at this very moment, but I can sense the evil as strange as it may sound.

I want to start living again. I want to be whole with my soul and body.
I am working hard to get there but I am stumbling, there are too many rocks on the path and it’s sometimes too dark to see them before it’s too late.

Running from life…

I feel miserable. I am frustrated, sad, stupid and me being here does not seem right. I fell in a deep swallowing hole today. I had a bad meeting with my professor. I failed. I got a C- on my midterm. Seriously? I don’t understand it. I felt great all last week, I got so much done, I did not go to the gym at all, because i was sick and felt like I needed the time to study. So I did. I really studied. A lot. Not enough as it seems. It is ridiculous, because for the first test I did not study at all and got an A. Ridiculous. I have no idea how I will get a A in that class now. And he criticizes everything I do. I am not used to that usually everything I did was without putting effort in it and without being criticized and now I am receiving all this bad feedback and I really don’t know why… I know I am not on an A level right now, because I am sick. and I do not want to use that as an excuse, but me even accepting or saying that I am sick is a big deal and this recovery is not not not easy. And people who think so are wrong. It’s not like you take some pills, go see a therapist and dietitian once a week and that’s it. There is so much emotional, physical and certainly psychiatric stress that is exhausting me. But I have to deal with these in order to get over them.
For me it is just that EVERYTHING is crashing down on me at once.
This is no self-pity and I try to not let it get me. But it does. It gets me. Everytime a bit harder.
I have no clue how to get through life. I am just so scared. I am scared of life so much that I just want to flee from it.

Clinic

So, I called my insurance company in Germany and do not feel very good about it, because I am scared the person I talked to knows my family. Also, I am very upset with our system. No, not with the system but the inhuman bureaucracy connected to this whole issue. Here is the problem, and that is really upsetting for someone who has been struggling for more than half of her life, for someone who might health-condition wise even be worse off than someone who experience a period of anorexia in their youth (which does not mean, I would call that less bad, it is ALL bad, that is what I want to point out): So, the insurance ONLY covers inpatient treatment if I am an dangerously under- or dangerously overweight.
Ridiculous.
This is so behind.
This is so wrong.

I guess I need to talk to Amanda about that.
But for now, it makes me feel like a fat cow, who is not considered ill.
hahaha

That Girl

So it’s Sunday and another week is ahead. Let me review the last week. Actually it’s been pretty good. With some slip-ups. But it is ok. It really is. I talked to a friend yesterday and one thing keeps soaring around in my head since: Passion does not necessarily have to be there first, sometimes or probably even most times, passion develops – it comes along while engaging yourself. And she is right. The problem is not really that I have lost my passion it is, that I have lost my motivation to start things. I can easily fascinate myself for things. Just like it is with the research I am doing on eating disorders. Ok, sometimes, if it is more relevant for one’s own life, the research goes along way easier, and is in fact more interesting, because of the degree to which one can relate to it, but my friend is right, passion does not have to be there first.
So, I will be able to develop – if not passion – at least excitement about the things I have to do for class and I will not let myself be influenced by others, like my professors. It does not matter how they treat me, as long as I believe in myself and the way I am working on the tasks. I just need to be diligent and prescribed to it in a way that does not hurt me and is somewhat natural. I mean, I cannot escape society, in fact I have to live in it and I need to accept it and try to take the best out of it. It is not all bad. It is difficult, for sure, but I can do it. Everyone can follow their dreams and everyone can fulfill them. But no one ever said it will be easy.

Oh, I did something… stupid yesterday…
I went to the gym and I checked my weight… I was frustrated and worked out for 3 hours. After that I was back on where I wanted to see my weight to be. I mean, although I understand Amanda and the logic of not obsessing with the numbers it is just incredibly hard and I just could not put up with not knowing anymore… The only thing I am scared of is that now I will be torn to weigh myself more often again and actually I don’t want to care anymore. However, I am also a bit scared, because I have not been eating much in the last weeks but did not lose weight. Which is fine, but Amanda said I still don’t eat enough. There we get to the point. Ok, I am not eating enough right now but am not losing weight. What would happen if I would eat enough? Gaining. And I do not want to gain ever in my life again.
It’s so frustrating.

Oh, and I did something else… something stupid again…
At the gym was this girl. she was seriously sick. She could barely lift her legs to get on the spinning bike. I saw her first on the eliptical for an hour (while I was on the eliptical), I heard people talking about her like “look how skinny she is”, “anorexic”, “sick”. So, I mean it was obvious. She did not stand up straight nor sit up straight, always leaned forward, her bones sticking out, her T-shirt way too big on her. When she moved her arms, you could see every bone, and muscle. Her eyes big and somewhat like they were coming out of her face. Her hair thin, dull and straight. I watched her. After the eliptical she was on the spinning bike. Very slowly. Very weak it seemed. So, I felt so bad, I felt like I needed to help her. But how do you talk to someone like her? I mean, I always wished someone would have approached me, in times that were really bad, but I was never “unhealthy looking” enough. I always looked healthy, or at least not like I had an eating disorder. And I remembered how in High School in Germany you were just labeled as an attention seeker if you were anorexic. So, I felt like I really needed to talk to her, offer her help, because no one would, right? I mean, who would approach someone and tell that person “Look, I am concerned about you. Let me help you.”. The only thing peopel would do is stare and say “OMG, she is so skinny”. But although I know that she has to want the help from within and for herself, I felt like just by confronting her I might be able to start her thinking process.
I was not courageous enough to just walk up to her and talk to her, but I went to my locker, wrote a small note and went back. In fact she was not on the spinning bike anymore (after an hour) but on the treadmill.
Her eyes, when I gave her the note told me that she thought I was crazy. I left. But I could not have went home without at least offering help to her.
I don’t know if it was wrong or right, but I had to do it.
Anyway, maybe I see her at the gym today again.
she hasn’t emailed me yet and I don’t think she will.
I hope she will be fine.
She really looked sick.

But I guess, now I need to take care of myself.

Men hinder recovery, do they?!

Ok, I think the date post needs some more explanation.
In fact I figured out why I had been binging and purging again last week after doing so well for a few days.
Those few days I only did well, because of the guy I lost. I wanted (and still want) him back. As I said, I miss everything about him and it hurts so much to have lost him. Not the fact that he does not like me the way I was hoping and actually thinking he did, but more about the fact how I have again been successful in manipulating situations so that I will not get hurt by others but by my own actions. I wished I could have seen that before I scared him away.
At any rate, after we talked the last time (he was sitting right over there in that chair… looking awfully good…) I start thinking, that I cannot get him back. My hope is in vain and also I got very frustrated about me thinking he just wanted to get some ideas on how girls are affected if the father leaves the family (for this is one of the reasons why I started b/p, well one cause, no reason, the reason lays deeper). Anyway, so I don’t know if I should fight for him. I think it would scare him again. And I think that I should forget about him. Which is so so so so hard. I don’t want to.
I miss the fact of knowing that he is there. That he is there for me (not physically but by knowing, that he cares).
So, after creating these strong thoughts about how I have lost him and that eventually I will not ever be able to get him back, I was so lost that I turned to Bulimia again last week. I have been so conscious about all these ridiculous b/p sessions that it is scary. I was aware of why I do it, that it is bad but still I could not control myself. That’s where the addiction of this disease sets in. Painful and destructive.
Then I actually started to push him aside ad to block out the feelings I have for him. I wished I could start crying right now, but I can’t. I am scared I could never stop and break down again.
So once I pushed him aside I would work more, and would be more affective for stress. So from there it went its way and that one night, I just could not handle my emotions. I did not want to think about how and why I lost him and Bulimia seemed so unreasonably reasonable for me in that moment. So i was back to it for a few days. And I regret. I regret being alive at times, for I am causing myself so much misery.
So, but after a down there is always an up, correct?
I guess. And I tried to distract myself from my very own world. I stopped purging now for 3 days. I feel good, although I feel like I am gaining lots of weight because of the structured eating.
But I don’t care as much at the moment.
I have something else to hold on to now and that is external.

Forgetting about Daniel.

But how? How do you do something painful like that without being torn into the cycle again? Exactly for now I guess finding another external factor to hold on to.
So I met with this guy, a friend’s friend I just recently got introduced to. A really nice and fun guy, but yesterday during the “date” (he insisted on paying for everything, and brought flowers (beautiful sunflowers), when he picked me up so I guess it was a date, although I just thought he wanted to hang out and show me that Honky Tonk Bar in town, I guess I am very naive, but anyway…)… well, I have been thinking about Daniel. I have been comparing them to one another (I know, something you don’t do because it leads to nothing but reminding you on who you lost…). I did enjoy the evening big time. We went to this Bar, lots of Cowboys, lots of country music, lots of beer and I learned how to dance. Well, a little. This big old cowboy (seriously, probably 6’3” tall, big, cowboy hat, mustach, plaid shirt, tight jeans, boots!! A real Texan I would say) came up to me and pretty much showed me I can dance. It was great and even my date tried to teach me some steps and we slow-danced, fast-danced, laughed and had a good time.
So, this thought pops up in my head… I was thinking, well, I am enjoying myself around him, I did not really care much about my appearance, and I guess my attempts on acting somewhat self-confident worked ok. It worked that evening.
We later went to his friend’s bday party. Even though I did not care much about the people there, who smoked weed and seemed a little off in their worlds, I did enjoy that as well – of course not smoking that joint, and I was glad my date passed, too. Although, when I asked him if he usually does he said “Yes, every now and then” (a big big minus point, but it’s his life, just like I decide to b/p every now and then, but maybe that is exactly why I disliked that fact about him. Maybe because it shows weakness? Maybe it shows, that he also needs to work on himself? So, is that bad? No. But he may not be aware of that…. oh wow, here I go again, expecting too much at a time, analyzing and interpreting situations and human beings… I should stop that. It gets me nowhere right now). Ok, anyways, he played the guitar and sang along. I enjoyed that. I really really did. I had a great time. So back to my thought, which is (now I try to put it into words): why not date this guy, to get some distraction, to have some fun, to learn how it is like to enjoy myself and go from there?
Maybe I can forget Daniel this way?
Maybe if I just tell myself.
Maybe if I just try hard enough.
Maybe. Maybe not.

Where the fuck do I find my Identity?

Ok, I guess it was good to let sink that meeting with my psychiatrist of this morning.

I realized, that I have to find out who I am, right, I said that already but the real question is: What is my identity??? And where the fuck do I find it?

Correct, I cannot find it in one of my memory boxes or picture albums. But that is part of the puzzle. However, I have to go deeper.
Who has made me?
Right mom and dad. Where do they come from? Who are they?
How have they influenced my life and how have they been influenced in the first place?? Bringing me all the way to my grandparents and perhaps even my great grandparents.

I have always wanted to be someone else. Always, as far as I can think back and when I was about 10 I always wanted to be 18. Being free. I have thought about that lately. I wondered if it would be best for me, personally, to live my very own life or would that mean, I would ignore my past and identity?

Oh, life is so difficult.

I found another great picture by Eduard Tomek. I don’t know for some reason I see myself in his beautiful art.

Parku - Eduard Tomek

I will write more details about the talk later or tomorrow. It is just so important and difficult for me to figure everything out.