What if I can’t stop?

The first thing to do today is say: if you are at all vulnerable about food, weight, body image and other such things might be best if you skip over this one…..

I think there must be something in the air at the moment – because a couple of other bloggers have posted about similar things this week. Perhaps it’s National Former Eating Disorders Bite You On The Bum Week or something…..

I am recovering from an eating disorder. I say recovering rather than recovered because I don’t think disordered thinking about food ever truly goes away. It hangs around in the background and you have to work very hard to keep it there.

Nonsense thinking about food has been in the background of my brain for more than 10 years. During that time I’ve maintained my weight at an acceptable level with only one exception – when Mr Friendly and I split up. I lost an awful lot of weight at that point, dipped below ‘healthy’ and had a smallish battle to get back to where I needed to be. The point is, I did get back. The other point is that I have more or less maintained my weight for more than ten years. That other point is REALLY BIG NEWS by the way.

I still have a funny relationship with food. I eat because I have to. I rarely eat because I’m hungry and I hardly ever eat because I want to. The notion of ‘comfort eating’ makes no sense to me at all because I don’t ‘enjoy’ food. It’s just a necessity – like air.

My thoughts about weight are a little bit difficult too. I don’t know how much I weigh because I can’t know. If I knew it would bother me – I’d try to round the number down to something nice and even and then I’d get obsessed with it being even and I’d try to get it down as low as possible in an attempt to have the best chance at keeping it even…. If that doesn’t make any sense to you should count your lucky stars at this point.

Understanding of eating disorders has moved on a lot since I was poorly and I think most people know that eating disorders have absolutely nothing to do with being thin. What I don’t think many people realise is that eating disorders often have EVERYTHING to do with not being fat. It’s a subtle difference and one that still governs my life to a certain small extent.

I’m ashamed to say that I think unpleasant things about being fat. I have a morbid fear of being overweight and even if I could cure my fear I wouldn’t want to because it terrifies me too much to even think about it. This fear has nothing to do with vanity although it has a lot to do with outward projections and the space I occupy in the world.

Reading that back it must appear to you that I still have a very unhealthy relationship with food and weight. I know that it isn’t ideal but I do know that it is managed. I’m aware, I have insight and that means I can keep myself in check. It makes for a miserable existence at times, but the process of keeping a well body when you have a broken brain is actually like heaven on earth when you compare it to the horror that is an eating disorder in full flow. Forget the times when my brain wants to jump off a building, or eat three packets of painkillers, or write ‘POINTLESS’ on my arm with a razor blade. Those things are a walk in the park compared to what an eating disorder does to your brain, your body and your life.

I’m terrified of being fat, but going back to the dark days of the starvation diet terrifies me so very much more. It is genuinely my biggest fear in the world because I don’t think it’s the kind of thing you manage to beat twice in your life.

I suppose I should let you know why I’m telling you all of this (I’ve been putting it off). The thing is I’ve put a little bit of weight on recently. I know I have because I can see it, and because I can feel it. I know that I’m not anything approaching fat – in fact I look healthy at the moment. My backside has made a re-appearance and I can wear a WonderBra and look like I might have some kind of a bust going on. My skin is healthy, and there are two nice apple type things where my cheekbones used to live. My ribs are in retreat.

This is all great – it’s nice to look in the mirror and see a healthy human being looking back. But at the back of my mind there’s a scary, scary thought that won’t go away: what if I can’t stop.

It’s spinning round and round and round.

It’s screaming at me: WHAT IF I CAN’T STOP? It’s scary because I know exactly what the answer is.

The answer is JUST STOP. Just like that. Don’t just stop, make up for it – you don’t want to run the risk of being fat after all and the best way to avoid ever weighing too much is by weighing as little as possible. It’s like an insurance policy.

I know this is all ridiculous and disordered and not at all rational. But it doesn’t have to make sense for it to be scary. I am on guard at the moment. It seems I’m destined always to be on guard against something. If broken brain isn’t terrorising itself thinking about how pointless everything is it manages to find something else to keep me in a state of absolute terror.

Curse my broken brain.

Lots of love from WeeGee