Listening to my Body

Since I began this recovery process, I've been trying to learn to listen to my body and take care of it.  I became aware that I rarely payed any heed to my feelings of fullness, and was completely incapable of even recognizing hunger.  So many years of trying not to eat and intentionally deluding myself into thinking that I didn't get hungary, and I didn't need food made me lose touch with the feeling.  I've been practicing paying attention to both of these things, and can actually stop eating when or before I'm full at least 1/3 of the time.  I also became aware that I was ignoring my body's exhaustion.  Determined to rise above humanity, I insisted that I could run on empty, workout 8 hrs/day, leave no time for rest or recovery, and still perform super-human feats.  Part of this process has been acknowledging when I feel tired, and taking the rest when I need it.  I'm getting better at that too...a lot better.  Today I realized another side of this.  I've been recovering from about 7 different injuries that I accumulated over 4-5 months while compulsively overexercising before beginning my current recovery program.  I'm doing a lot of physical therapy now, and only one is lingering, but I am constantly reminded by my coach not to go too hard or too fast, and if ANYTHING hurts, to stop.  "I can't feel it!", I tell him.  My pain tolerance is so high, that I could be doing all kinds of damage, and wouldn't feel a thing...or so I think.  Last night, I went a little harder, and became aware of a little grinding feeling in the joint, but said nothing, and continued the exercise.  Why would I hurt my body like that?  Why wouldn't I tell my coach?  Shouldn't I have celebrated the fact that I could feel, and taken care of my body?  yes!  but I didn't!  I think I have a lot of pride in my toughness, and the fact that I don't feel pain like other people do.  I didn't want to admit that I wasn't invincible, and I wanted to keep exercising.  The disease won that round, but I learned from it.  I've been finding that the more I listen to my body, and abide by what it tells me, the more aware and reasonable I become.  The cleaner I eat, the more clearly I can discern what foods make me feel good and which don't.  The more I listen to my hunger and fullness, the more I can feel them, and the more willing I am to listen to them.  If I rest when I'm tired, I am more energetic, efficient, and eager to return to my activities.  It's always hard at first, but it keeps getting better.

New Priorities

1. Connection to my Higher Power

I think this always has to come first if I am ever going to be happy and secure.  When I am in constant contact, I have such a calm confidence because I know that I'm always going to be taken care of.  There's always someone with me on my side who can do absolutely anything.  It helps me to accept whatever is going on, because I know that there's a reason for it.  If I can just stay open and available during times of crisis, I will find that there is an amazing and worthwhile lesson made just for me at that exact moment.  This is how I get a life beyond my wildest dreams.  (this was previously not even on the list of priorities)

2. Human Connection

Somehow, this just makes everything better.  I can't even explain how it works yet, but knowing and caring about other people, and being known and loved...everything is just better.  Looking back at all of the goals and projects I have embarked on and infused with meaning: the ones where I worked with a team are the ones that stuck with me.  The things I did for "us", where I knew someone else cared as much as I did, and we were in it together...those are the things that mattered.  And not because of what we did, but because we were connected.  (when I was feeling particularly sentimental, this used to squeeze its way up to number 4 or 5 on the big list of priorities, but usually it was the first thing to be sacrificed for athletics, school, job, weight...)

3. Being true to myself

I've always had a pretty clear sense of who I am and what I want.  This used to be my highest priority (actually it was consistently #1-4 and 6-10 on the list!) in the form of pursuing my dreams.  I pursued my dreams to a fault, forcing and manipulating them...determining exactly what I had to do to be the best, and shunning everything that got in my way.  I was unflexible, and couldn't allow my dreams to change or adapt.  I lost part of myself in the unreasonable adherence to a game plan I had written in the past.  Now I understand that my dreams are only a part of who I am.  I am also my values and ideas.  I have other likes and interests which should not be denied.  There are so many parts of me that I have neglected for so long, and discovering them makes me so much more authentic, interesting, and even efficient.  I actually make more progress towards my goals if I allow other more important things to be balanced in my life.  Focusing on nothing but my dreams cuts my legs out from under me.  

I lost my food obsession...how the heck did that happen!?

My friend and I both took 90 day chips tonight, and I am soooo proud of us.  It is such a miracle that we've come this far.  She was sharing about how hard it is to deal with the feelings now that our coping/numbing mechanism is gone.  yeah.  Dude.  It sucks.  2 days ago, I got a text message from a friend asking a casual question about a person who kinda broke my heart 6 months ago, and I burst into tears.  I've done so much talking and writing about this already, and I keep thinking I'm over it-that I've thoroughly dealt with it, and have moved on.  Wrong!  awwww.  I went outside, curled up in a ball, and cried until I could breath enough to speak.  Then I called a few friends to seek comfort.  The feelings are hard.  That's why we've spent so long trying to avoid them.  We do it instinctively any way we can.  And that's part of why my urge to compulsively overeat has diminished so dramatically.  This is totally the work of God, because I never could have guessed that it would have happened this way.  I just did what people told me to do.  I followed the steps, and used the tools.  Here's how it worked:

I had a food plan that told me when to eat, and limited me to primarily healthy foods in reasonable quantities, but at the same time, ensured that I could not restrict.  It guaranteed that all of my bodily needs were met.  Therefore, any time I had an urge to deviate from the plan, I could recognize that it was not because of a deficit of some nutrient.  It was not my body telling my I actually needed something, rather it was my own subconscious mind trying to fill some kind of void that could never be filled by food.  It was me instinctively trying to distract myself with food-numb myself out or obsess over it-so that I don't have to face whatever it is that I don't want to feel.  That was my pattern for so long, that I didn't even recognize the feeling.  I would numb myself by immediately preoccupying my mind with thoughts of food: what would be the perfect most delicious thing I could fill myself with?  or what can I eat a mass quantity of and satisfy my hunger, but not feel bad about?  or how can I maneuver my activities today so that I can avoid eating all together?  As long as I was distracted by thoughts of food, I couldn't feel.  Mission: accomplished.  But then it never got dealt with.  It all built up inside.  We all know how well that plan goes.  So the strategy I adopted was simple.  If I had a craving outside of my food plan, I sat down and wrote.  How much?  How long?  It didn't matter.  But I had to keep going until I found the answer-the thing I didn't want to find.  Sometimes it was hard, because I didn't think anything was wrong, but I just went through a list of random questions.  'Did anyone hurt you today?' ...no...'Are you upset about work?  money? a relationship?'...no...'Is it the thing your therapist asked you today about what it's going to take for you to forgive yourself?  and the fact that you have this undefined list of impossible tasks which you must complete to repair the horrible damage you've done to yourself-the heinous crimes resulting in unthinkable loss...sob...sniffle...hysterical crying..."  It wasn't always that obvious, but it was usually pretty easy to tell when I hit on something.  Through this process, I learned to acknowledge what I was feeling.  That suddenly became way more interesting that whatever food I had been obsessing over before, and as hard as it was, it felt like a miracle at the time.  

But things changed in a way I never would have expected!  My subconscious mind-that part of me that didn't want to acknowledge my feelings-figured out pretty quickly that any time I obsessed over food, I would immediately devote all of my attention to examining my feelings.  That was the last thing I wanted to do!  So now, that same disordered voice that used to drive my every thought to food, now avoids it completely.  I sometimes have so much sanity around food, it completely blows my mind.  I do things like notice that I'm full and stop eating; saving leftovers; take a few bites of a meal, and forget about it because I'm more intrigued by a conversation/activity, then return to it later; allow someone else to be in control of my food; or take care of it myself...the possibilities are endless, and it just doesn't seem hard most of the time.  It's the weirdest thing, and at the same time so normal.  It freaks me out that it could get so amazingly good without me making it happen.  God just amazes me.  I can't even grasp it.  I pray before every meal now for the awareness to know when I'm full, and the willingness to stop at that point, and slowly, but surely, it has started to work.  

Big Bear Retreat Oct 3-5th

I'm going!  Are yoooooou?    I'm really excited about spending some quality time in nature working on some intense recovery, and it would mean so much to me if my closest friends (yes.  that means you!) were there.  Please come!

Has anyone been before?  What's the difference between dorms and cottages?  Do you request roommates?  

oh no!  I really want to go to my favorite 7pm meeting tonight...well...I want to be there.  But I really really don't want to go.  It is such a long trip.  It's gonna take like an hour and a half to get there.   I'm gonna get in trouble with my coach for not going to the gym tonight, and I'm so exhausted right now.  this morning I felt like I was going to fall asleep on my bicycle...and that wasn't like at 6 am when I had just woken up.  It was 11am after breakfast, working out, stretching, snack, and taking notes.  I'm just sleep deprived.  and when i go to the meeting tonight, I won't get to sleep til like 12, and I have to be up by 6 again.  

One of the major things I am trying to learn in this program is time management, which seems really weird to me since I've been a master of utilizing time wisely since high school when I had to make sure no moment went to waste.  Between school and training, every hour was booked, and I had to get all of my homework done on the bus and in the car, and during lunch and dinner.  I definitely obsessed about it, and was extremely efficient until the predictable weekly nervous breakdown in which I concluded that there simply was not enough time to get everything done!  I would panic and cry about it for about 5 minutes, and then buckle down, and generally succeed at whatever impossible task I was trying to accomplish.  It was an extremely satisfying, but terribly stressful way of living, and it obviously took its toll.  I mean...that's a big part of my disorder: perfectionism-having to do everything, and do it beyond well, right?  

So when I say I'm working on time management, I'm learning how to make time for myself, so that I can live a more balanced life, not go berzerk!  and hopefully accomplish more in the end anyway, because I won't have to waste time recovering from the extensive abuse I've given myself.  But that's proving very hard.  I don't mind scheduling in time to hang out with friends.  I did a really good job of that last week.  I relaxed by the pool, played some music and sang with friends, dated, watched movies...those things are important too...but I still have to get things done.  And I've been doing that too.  It's just that I used to sacrifice social time to make sure I always got enough sleep, and I don't know how to do both.  And then I still have to have time for journaling, phone calls, and steps!?  I have plenty to work on.  that's for sure.  I think I have to talk to my coach about how to make our gym time more condensed and efficient.  He can be hard to compromise with sometimes, but it's gonna have to be done sooner or later.  ugh.  well obviously that's what I have to do since I TOTALLY DON'T WANT TO DO IT!!! (thanks Erin)  So you know I will.  It may be a few days....I have to strategize a little.  I'll let ya know how it goes.

Borderline Foods

When I went into my recovery house, I had very strong aversions to "unhealthy" foods.  I was pretty sure that I couldn't handle eating anything with sugar in it or a high concentration of carbohydrates.  Desserts, candy, breads, rice, noodles...anything starchy was a dangerous idea.  lol...I actually cried when they served healthy organic vegetarian pizza for lunch...and when they served lasagnia. ..and french toast.  It took a long time for me to see that I had an irrational fear of foods that weren't necessarily bad for me, and the pressure I was placing myself under to avoid them was actually the primary cause of the drastic binges I had experienced prior to checking myself into treatment.  I was shocked and horrified when the nutritionist suggested that I include at least one starchy item at every meal.  Yes-I think I cried then, too.  But I started doing it.  I realized how badly I had been wanting a slice of toast with my vegetable omlette every morning.  I had been staring at the bread basket, intensely wanting a slice, but swearing up and down that I hated bread, and that I would never have a slice again, but now I had to eat one every morning.  It was scary, because I knew it would eventually make me lose all discipline, eat whatever crap I wanted, and get fat, but it was also a relief to be able to eat something I'd been trying to deny I wanted. (that still scares me a little)

And here's the miracle...the bread stopped being exciting.  One morning, I forgot to put the slice on my plate, and sat down.  Then I remembered it.  "I can have bread if I want it!!!"  I instinctively lashed out in my head, but then a more calm and rational part of me said "yeah, I can...but I don't really need it right now."  I chose not to have bread that morning because I just didn't feel like having it.  That was a huge breakthrough.  The bread experiment was a total success.  I still believe that for me, vegetables and other low glycemic index carbohydrates are better choices most of the time, but sometimes, my body will need a higher concentration of carbs: before a morning workout for example.  And my body seems to be telling me when I need them.  If I can, I choose vegetable sources.  If I can't, well it's usually because my body needs a little more starch.  

I still can't believe it worked that well, but here's the theory as to why it did:  As long as I'm restricting, I am working hard under constant, almost unbearable pressure to maintain perfect adherance to my food plan.  It is absolutely exhausting.  With such black-and-white thinking, one step across the line-just one bite of a forbidden food-means ultimate failure-disaster-devastation-demoralization...with that kind of pressure and consequence, why would I ever cross the line?  Because of the pressure!  Some part of me (as much as I hated to admit it) was dying to relax and release the pressure-to stop fighting-to not care anymore, and I knew that if I put one toe over that line-just made one little mistake, I could do whatever I wanted.  I could relax.  I wouldn't have to try-to fight.  Taking away that clear line has made it more difficult to cross it.  It's much harder to define things, and much harder to beat myself up for one little food choice when I don't have a clear rule against it.  A lot of people say that no matter how many years of abstinance you have, you're only one bite away from compulsive overeating, but I've revised the phrase.  If it only takes one bite to get off track, I only have to make a sudden decision once before I give up and eat whatever I want.  It makes bingeing an easy one-step choice.  I don't want that to be easy.  Instead, I remember that although it may not be wise for me to eat certain foods, it is physically to overeat in one bite.  Therefore, I am always at least 20 bites away from compulsive overeating.  I can't make the decision to binge, take a bite, and then relax and do whatever I want.  If I take that compulsive bite, and know that I haven't broken my abstinance, then the 2nd bite is still up for debate.  I have to choose again.  I have to think through each bite, and make the choice to be self destructive 20 times before I can relax.  Talk about stress and pressure.  Who wants to choose to kill themselves 20 times in a matter of minutes?  That's painful.  So that's worked for me so far.

So what the heck!?  No rules?  No good foods?  No bad foods?  How do I keep myself inline, because I'm a freakin' compulsive overeater!  I can't just trust that I'll do the right thing!  Sure, in theory, if I learn to listen to my body and follow intuitive eating, I'll be great, but if I knew how to intuitively eat, I wouldn't be in this mess!  So what do I do?  

I'm still not sure.  I feel like the best case scenario is that I know which foods my body reacts badly to (these being candy, ice cream...high sugar foods), and I simply choose not to have them.  It's really scary not to have a concrete rule against them, but so far I have not chosen to have them.  A lot of that may still have to do with my intense fear of what may happen if I do.  Will I lose my mind and spiral out of control after one bite?  I can't be sure, so I stay away from them.  I have a feeling that some would advise me to try to get over that fear, and be able to have a little ice cream.  That still freaks me out.  I'm ok with saying I can have ice cream, but only as long as I choose not to have it.  That's dangerously close to having a rule against ice cream.  Either way, I'm pretty sure that I couldn't handle it today, and I'm doing this one day at a time.  So today, I'm not having ice cream, or candy, dessert, anything deep fried, greasy, or unbalanced.  I mostly stick with foods that make me feel safe, rational, and confident in my food choices.

My first 2 weeks in recovery, I stuck rigidly to my own strict, perfect food plan, but my mentors in program all felt that I was being too restrictive and closed minded.  Somewhat reluctantly, I began experimenting with borderline foods.  In my head, that sounded sooooo soooooooo counter-intuitive.  Isn't that asking for trouble?  In a way, yes, but because I was taking direction and talking about it- really processing my thoughts and feelings about it- it was somewhat safe, and a crucial learning experience.  One of the next foods I experimented with was protein bars.  They have a lot of good nutrients, some of them are really well balanced, and they're sooooo convenient for a snack on the go, plus - they're prepackaged into perfect little serving sizes.  Simple: no thought, right?  Well, they used to be a binge food for me, and the high concentration of sugar or sugar substitutes concerns me.  That makes it pretty borderline, but I felt restrictive not allowing them.  So I tried allowing only one per day as a snack.  As long as I knew that no matter what, I could only have one, I had a little safety, but I was controlling it.   I had to fight.  It was hard.  I usually wanted more, but I stuck to my rule for 2-3 weeks.  Gradually, I came to accept that I was OK with protein bars too.  I moved home, and as my schedule got busier, I found more reasons to allow extra protein bars.  No time to make something else- have to eat on the way.  I moved to 2/day, or 3/day.  All of my snacks were protein bars, but I'd only have one at a time.  Then I wanted them for breakfast, but one wasn't enough, so I'd have 2 for breakfast, one for my next snack...I was missing out on real meals, because all I ever wanted was protein bars.  This was getting worrisome.

Around that time, I realized the need for alternative snacks, and a lot of my friends had been suggesting that I try frozen yogurt.  There was A LOT of fear around this since it's soooo similar to ice cream.  I was really scared, but when I broke it down nutritionally, if I went with all natural plain frozen yogurt with some nuts on top, it's not a bad alternative to protein bars.  So I tried a small cup at a resturaunt with a supportive friend.  It went really well...almost too well...could I trust myself.  A few days later, I tried again with the same friend.  This time the place we went to had self serve with all flavors and toppings.  Now that seemed like a disaster waiting to happen, but we were there, and I really wanted it.  (does that sound like a warning sign to you too?)  Anyway, after sampling a little too compulsively, serving myself a little more than I really needed, and eating all of it, I concluded that although I hadn't eaten anything unhealthy or really excessive, it was probably not a good place for me to get frozen yogurt.  I would stick to places that measured for me...but a few days later, I wanted frozen yogurt, and I was pretty sure that no one would know how to prepare it right, and that I had to go back there to do it myself.  Besides, I don't want to restrict!  I would just have a small, be reasonable, and move on.  This time, I went by myself.  Again, I had a little too much.  No disaster, but worrisome.  Again, I made the choice not to eat there anymore.  The next day I went back.

Do I need to quit?  Am I bingeing or restricting?  Do I make a rule?  I talked about it a lot, and everyone had an opinion, and I was freaking out debating in my head, until someone asked me if I could hand it over to my higher power.  Woah-I hadn't thought about it in that context.  I ask God for the awareness to know when I'm full, and the willingness to stop at that point, but it hadn't occurred to me to let God decide whether I should eat frozen yogurt and protein bars.  How would I know his will?  I started praying for the answer, and willingness to follow it.

That didn't mean I stopped thinking about it.  Perhaps 2 times/week wasn't enough?  Maybe it would be like the bread.  if I allowed one serving every day, maybe the obsession would disappear?  I tried it, and found that as soon as I had my one serving, all I could think about was the next time I could have it again.  The more I had it, the greater the obsession.  All I could think about was protein bars and frozen yogurt.  I wasn't bingeing on either, but I sure was obsessing over them.  And suddenly, I had my answer.  I knew with certainty at that moment that protein bars and frozen yogurt were interfering with my ability to function as a person and connect with ...well...anything.  So I chose not to eat them that day.  It was hard.  I prayed to be able to make the same choice tomorrow, and I did.  It got easier, and I stopped thinking about them.  I don't really miss them anymore.  I feel happier and more connected.

"perfect" blog,

haha-I'm funny.  So I got really excited about how I was going to start at the beginning and go through all of my old journals, making a complete and accurate record of how this whole thing evolved, because, if it's not perfect, what's the point of doing it at all?  LOL.  I am such a perfectionistic black and white thinker.  As much as I'd like to change the world and save millions of lives with my brilliant insight (haha), the best I can do right now is to start using it to express what I'm feeling right now.  For me, one of the biggest values to this project is that I can always be talking about what I'm going through right now-in the moment, rather than summarizing things that happened before.  It's supposed to keep me connected and self aware...not stuck in the past.  So rather than preoccupy myself with laying out an organized representation of my history, I'm starting with now.