9:55 p.m. - 03/04/03
the seas will part before you.:)
Ring plug; ring plug! More people are pro-recovery. Join or suffer the wrath of my pouting.
mwa.
How I am is better than how I was yesterday, if not exactly stellar. Stellar remains a bit out of my reach. At the moment, I feel mushy because I just read a really funny e-mail from my really funny friend, Heather, which ended on an uncharacteristically sweet note. It's not that she's characteristically anything other than sweet, but we're very rarely serious enough for that. She told me that she really enjoyed the EDAW e-mails and that she's glad I'm doing so much better. I needed to hear that (again). I needed to hear that I'm doing better and not feel compelled to disclaim it. And it's nice to have someone affirm what a good friend they are. I tend to love really lovely people.
Yeah, nice gift after a difficult day. Still, I might as well go into some of the details of that difficult day rather than just abandoning the point of this journal entirely. (On a sidenote, I think I've ended up narrowly defining the point of this journal. I need to make it more all-purpose. I need to quit caring what the people who find me by searches on blue hair dye care about the way I view and live my life.)
I've stayed away from sf, though been tempted to not do so. Each time, I pulled myself back by realizing that although my intentions were good (I wanted to post to help myself through the somewhat uncharacteristic difficulty right now with ed symptoms)- I would end up reading the replies to the message that triggered me, which would trigger me further, and I already explained to the doctor once today that I haven't learned quite enough tricks to face what I'm up against this time. Not to imply that I know what I'm up against this time. I don't. I do, however, know that a psych chapter devoted entirely to (I do not kid) hunger, sex, and eating disorders is not helpful. And normally I love my psych book. It has many darling quotes and Peanuts cartoons. I have been feeling more spiritually grounded (or rather, lifted) which is rare and probably leading to spiritual difficulty. I don't mean that to sound pessimistic. Simply that as I feel myself coming into some answers, I expect to find new questions. Difficult questions. Ah, life.
Is it just me who gets the feeling sometimes that what I did as a kid- spinning in circles really fast just to feel the dizziness- never really ended? Like it somehow caught on and became the pattern of my life? I keep trying to make my life into a straight line, but it wants to be cyclical. It wants me to not believe that I'm experiencing the first steps of a relapse. I wonder if there are any studies that show how similar the first steps of a relapse and the first steps of new wisdom seem. I'm trying to be the difference, the x factor, the necessary resistence. I can't tell yet if it's working. It's so hard to choose your tools when you don't know what you're up against, and I do think this is a mission for which I'm not yet equipped. I've learned to fight on the front lines before; it's just a little unnerving to feel that naive this far into the game...
It's not that I considered myself anywhere near health, secure and true. It's just that I have so much of this behind me. Even if it takes ten years, I've learned a lot in (under) two. I guess it's scary how little that can mean. But. I ate three meals today. (And digested them.) I talked quickly with a doc to give him an idea of what we need to discuss tomorrow. I wrote two history papers and did a bit of prepping for an evil physics quiz. I talked myself off a ledge about school. I crawled the distance from hearing "self-kindness" as something negative, something that should never be applied to *me*- and something I should be proud of...If I have to, I will stroke myself safe.
And I have to, a little. My parents lost track of me somewhat the past few days, as my brother Joe was having some pretty frightening eye trouble. It looks like it's ok now, but for awhile there was talk of blindness, and he's been going into the hospital everyday to have it checked; it's kind of madness. And John is struggling also, and even though I want to believe parents are not supposed to prioritize, I tend to justify being lost in the shuffle. I wouldn't even mind it much (perhaps) if it didn't leave me so angry on behalf of myself-as-a-kid. I don't mind it so much (because actually I do mind) now, but I really couldn't handle being left to my own devices then. And there's a difference between not answering your parents with any detail when they ask how you're doing and not wanting them to ask. There's a difference between a growl from an adolescent and a restraining order. I love them; I don't generally trust them with my life. That doesn't mean I don't want them in it.
So. The doctor called, around one. I was busy with something...papers or drawing or some other pastime. He asked how I was, I told him better but not ok, and how difficult yesterday was. I explained what I know of the situation: that whatever these issues are we're starting to bring up (Rogers, identity, unknowns, etc) I don't feel like I know how to handle them in healthy ways. So my compulsion to handle them in unhealthy ways increases, becoming a rather difficult, disconcerting problem in itself. I don't like feeling like there's a thin scrim between who I am now and who I was at the beginning of Rogers. I need to see myself eating. I need to feel myself being healthy.
Tomorrow, we strategize. I need to remember that a large part of this is me not knowing how to deal with anger. I have great anger over, well, everything. Considering I so rarely express it, I assume I have anger over everything. But this business with my parents, school, illness, and relationshittiness....I think part of my confusion is not knowing how to feel it. I had a tiny abandonment trigger tonight, and the raw little sadness was almost comforting, in its familiarity. Sad, but I can do sad- somewhat.
Only 51 weeks until the next EDAW. You know I'm glad about what I did, mostly? It's nice to be glad. I'm also talking with Laura about contributing to a piece she could create with the drama troupes she trains. I can't explain what it would mean to me to give back to that program- the sole activity that broke through my wall in middle school, the purpose that helped keep me alive in high school. My oh-so-rare expressive outlet. It might be hard to contribute from a distance, to not be able to see it come together (harder, actually, than it is with RMM, and without any eventual viewing) but I think it would be worth it. We will wait and see.
In the meantime, I continue to feed myself even when I mistake the content of the food, and I'm planning a short list of groceries, which will help me stay nourished. I could go into how I won't progress if I only eat "safe" foods, but right now, I need the option of them. That's such a misnomer anyway. I think for me, the term is "clean" foods. That's how my poison-dirt-metaphoric-bulllshitting ed works. At least, I've gotten to a point where I can cover all the necessary nutritional bases with clean foods if need be. I just also have to keep it from becoming rigid because it doesn't take long for a smaller step toward recovery to become smaller steps away from it.
Eyes on the prize, chordling. Eyes inside...
chord
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