In Limbo

Well at this present moment in time I feel in limbo. I have a rehab visit scheduled for the 24th May. Tuesday, in other words. I guess I am in two halves. I have a home, somebody who loves me and cares for me, a beautiful dog who is my world. I could just carry on regardless. I could accept my life and continue on benefits, continue to allow my 20s to disappear. And I suppose that really is the easy option. I know it's a private rehab and I know it will be the best care I could ask for, but I will not be able to run any more. I will have to face up to so many things that I have tried to avoid for so many years. So much that I don't want to say, that I don't even think matters any more.

Mostly, I don't want them to take away my eating disorder.

God that sounds stupid. Really, really stupid. I've lived with this now for practically forever, in many different forms. I have starved, binged, purged, abused diet pills, not been able to swallow...the list is endless.

At times I have been in hell with it. At times I would have given anything to be free of it. And at times I have fought very hard to free myself. When I was severely anorexic, near death, at 4st 10 (70lb), I did at least get help. Firstly to run to Australia and attempt to cure myself by run run running, then by spending two horrible years at an outpatient ED therapy clinic with a horrible woman for a therapist. Needless to say I put on weight and ended up bulimic. 'Recovered' in the eyes of everyone around me.

And that's how I've stayed ever since. I was 19 then. I'm 28 this year. The first time I remember being scared of food was when I was very young. And yet despite the grief it gives me, despite the huge amount of debilitating health problems that have put me on benefits and unable to live my life, I am still clinging to it.

So you can see why I don't want to go. I have given up all my other self-destructive behaviours. I have stopped cutting. The last time I hurt myself was October 2010. I have stopped drinking. I have stopped taking drugs. Yet I cannot, I cannot, I just can't let go of this one last part of me that keeps me in control, that I love to hate and yet I cherish. Of course when my weight is up I cannot cope, and when I'm bingeing and purging I despise myself with every pore of my body. I cannot stand myself, cannot stand being in my body, spend every waking moment desperately attempting to tolerate my flesh. Feeling the fat cling to my arse, my hips and thighs, my legs and breasts. I cannot explain in words how distressing this is. Generally it drives me to drink, which fuels the bingeing, which leads me to cut badly and end up in a massive crisis.

Lately I have averted this in two ways. Firstly, my partner has been strictly controlling my Antabuse so I have no opportunity to drink. And secondly, I am underweight and restricting.

Oh the calm after the storm. The wonderful, blissful calm of starvation. Existing in a static bubble where I am in control, where I can at least tolerate the level of self-hatred for my body. Of course I still spend every moment in the trap of my ED, I spend so much of my day criticising my body, looking in the mirror, counting calories, purging any food I do consume. Purging water and tea because it bloats me. Not taking my laxatives because being severely blocked up makes me feel full and not have to tolerate the hunger or the desperate need to eat.

I guess this is where I am today.

I will try to write more about other news. I will try later. Right now I am aware of an apple in my stomach that I feel I must get out. I know this must sound ridiculous but I am too anxious to care about the rational solution.

À Bient ôt