5:15 p.m. - 04/17/02
just more questions...different kind.
I don't know where I've been. Elsewhere, I suppose. I've had a minor breakdown, or setback, or whatever the term should be. I don't know how to say it because it's so incredibly nebulous - it's not something I can catch hold of, though I am doing a little better with understanding now; I talked to Dr. R this morning and that helped.
I think, in many dimensions, my life right now is parallel to what it was when I first began to get sick, and later, when things really began to escalate. It's made even a day-to-day perspective really difficult to maintain. I'm in a geometry chapter in my otherwise-algebra class right now (*technically* it applies algebraic functions to geometric problems, but it's still geometry) and it has me completely terrified. I'm right back in my old geometry class, and I don't know how I can take a test over this material, and (of course) do poorly...(I have some understanding of it, but I never get a geometry problem correct the first time. It's literally impossible.) Obviously, geometry reappearing into my life isn't a factor so major as say, my parents complete lack of availability at the moment, but it does complicate things. It makes it more difficult to deal with my parents' problems because where as normally I could just separate myself a little, and focus on my own life, at the moment my own life is so chaotic, it's not at all a retreat.
I was in spitting distance of purging this morning, and I don't even know how I managed to abstain. I guess at one point in my head's continuous repetition of "I would give almost anything to throw up right now" somebody buried deep yelled up "Does that include a year-and-a-half of progress?" and I realized it didn't. The migraines have me under seige and that always brings up purging urges; I feel like if I throw up the nausea will go away...I tell myself, it would just get worse, and since I haven't tested the theory I get to believe myself. Huzzah.
In 4 days, I will be 8 months abstinent, which is really great. And I must have spent quite some time not restricting because thinking about it (quite a bit) these past few days has felt foreign and greatly criminal. It wouldn't feel that way if it hadn't been at least a couple of months. Which is pretty amazing. I think I might be eating less right now, but it isn't about restricting - it's just all the stress and migraines and survival skills coming up. It reminds me a little of the way I ate right after I found out about Tracy, before it became conscious restricting - obviously I have to be careful not to restrict, but I'm really not *too* worried it will go back into that. I mean, I'm always worried it will, but I don't see any evidence that I'm headed in that direction. I'm just in a bit of agony at the moment...
I barely made it through the weekend and the first part of this week. Dr. R kept talking about it, and my 'heroic' effort, and I couldn't even comprehend the idea. I'm completely oblivous to what I'm doing right now; I'm just marking time in between the moments when I can push myself to work. Otherwise, I throw myself into projects (like creating web pages that don't need to exist) and sleep too much. It's painful to think about becaus I'm so overwhelmed and (also similarly to when things began, escalated) there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of reason behind the feeling. My parents are struggling, Jenna is gone, geometry has returned and triggers memories, Harriet screwed with me and I don't have a therapist, I'm slightly overwhelmed by doing a term paper (kind of) on eating disorders, I really miss all my friends, not to mention RED, and I feel inadequate because they are all capable of going to school and taking several classes and doing their homework and being in shows, and I sit here pretty much 24/7 hanging on by my fingernails. That's isn't right. But when you look at those things, even the sum of them, it isn't *a lot.* It isn't "my roommate just killed herself" (even though that is still weighing somewhat heavily) or "I'm having nightmares about the abuse" or anything like that. I don't understand why all of this is so overwhelming, though I guess if it is a virtual replication of my old life, that would make sense. I don't know many people who would like to be in junior high or early high school again, and I certainly know I don't. But then, I have reasons beyond the buildings. I guess we all do.
I don't think I'm making any sense, which goes along with how I've been for days.
Dr. R said, without prompting, that the time will come when I'm able to do all the things my friends so...when I'm able to handle the world, and schoolwork, and tests in classes that remind of rough times. I asked him how on earth he knew that, and he said it was because my inability to do so right now had nothing to do with me. It wasn't something "inherent in" me; it was because of the tidal wave emotional environment I was in. He said he wouldn't want to take a geometry test in an earthquake, either, and I told him he was the only person I knew who used as many metaphors as I do, and I liked that.
My main hopes are that I can survive starting school up again (I put it on hold on Monday because things were Very Very Bad), get over this nausea, and find my voice enough to call RED. It's been about three weeks, and I would like to hear the voice of friends.
That is the closest I can come to English at this point.
chord
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