My task this week, per my therapist
CCL (the Crazy Cat Lady- I'm one, too, so this is said with no judgement), is to get mad at the eating disorder.
I have no problems getting mad at myself- which, in fact, goes quite a long way in explaining why I have an eating disorder. I expect to much of myself blah blah blah, and then I feel bad because I can never fulfill these ridiculous expectations.
Unless, of course, it's about losing weight. Or eating less or exercising more- whatever. The problem is that if
achieving this weight loss was so easy, then it really wasn't an accomplishment. So I had to lose more weight.
Enter Ed, stage left.
Even after all of these years- going on year 8 right about now- I have never actually gotten pissed off at anorexia. Most of that time, I wasn't even aware of an entity known as "anorexia." It was ME. I was the problem. But once I realized that I had an illness, I still never got mad at the eating disorder. I feel helpless, much of the time. The voice seems bigger than life, and I struggle with doing recovery-oriented things when the voice kicks in big time.
I am mad that I have an eating disorder. Partly, I'm embarrassed. I feel dumb, I feel vain, I feel...well I don't know exactly how I feel. I'm mad I couldn't stop it, I'm mad that I sought treatment when I clearly could have lost more weight. All of these things.
But mad at the eating disorder itself? Not really.
CCL says to look at the things that I've lost because of the anorexia. Like any sort of semblance of normality. Money for treatment. Friends. Time- good God, the
time! I feel a little bit sad, but not one drop of anger. Mostly numbness.
What am I supposed to do about it?
I know the anger is supposed to help me fight Ed even harder, give him the total boot from my life.
I just can't feel that anger.
I think: maybe if I had something to compare it to. Like compare "now" to sometime before the eating disorder, to when a trip down the cereal aisle wouldn't leave me gibbering in fear. When a can of soup was a can of soup, and not a treacherous Nutrition Facts label with calories and
carbs , fat grams and sodium.
I remember that these things existed, these cans of soups and journeys down Aisle Nine, but I don't remember what they were. I don't remember that feeling. It has simply...vanished. Should I be mad that simple things like this are
fraught with difficulties? Probably. But I'm not. I just shrug my shoulders and try to get on with things.
Is this bad? I feel somehow defective that I can't get more emotionality behind my feelings about my eating disorder. I know I am still scared of it. I know that much.
I can almost totally cut myself off from my feelings, even when I'm not neck-deep in behaviors. I can function at a surface level. But it's almost as if I lock a part of myself away, insulate it from the almost certain deluge of feelings that will overtake me. This means that, almost inevitably, I lock away the happy feelings, but that hasn't been much of a big deal in the past, you know, decade or so.
My advisor said that if I hadn't told her about the eating disorder in the writing samples I submitted to the program, she never would have guessed. I know that's a good thing, but I still didn't know quite how to take it.
So. This getting-mad-at-the-eating-disorder-thing. How do I go about doing it? I can easily do it on the behalf of others, because their suffering is so
obviously greater than my own (I know, I know- this makes no sense, but it's true. So there.). I almost feel I've earned the pain and suffering. Kind of like "girls who play with fire are going to get burned." I've gotten burned, and it hurts, and I don't deny it. But I feel- just a little bit- like I kind of asked for it.
We'll see how long I let those last 3 or 4 sentences up.
Hitting publish.
I have no problems getting mad at myself- which, in fact, goes quite a long way in explaining why I have an eating disorder. I expect to much of myself blah blah blah, and then I feel bad because I can never fulfill these ridiculous expectations.
Unless, of course, it's about losing weight. Or eating less or exercising more- whatever. The problem is that if achieving this weight loss was so easy, then it really wasn't an accomplishment. So I had to lose more weight.
Enter Ed, stage left.
Even after all of these years- going on year 8 right about now- I have never actually gotten pissed off at anorexia. Most of that time, I wasn't even aware of an entity known as "anorexia." It was ME. I was the problem. But once I realized that I had an illness, I still never got mad at the eating disorder. I feel helpless, much of the time. The voice seems bigger than life, and I struggle with doing recovery-oriented things when the voice kicks in big time.
I am mad that I have an eating disorder. Partly, I'm embarrassed. I feel dumb, I feel vain, I feel...well I don't know exactly how I feel. I'm mad I couldn't stop it, I'm mad that I sought treatment when I clearly could have lost more weight. All of these things.
But mad at the eating disorder itself? Not really.
CCL says to look at the things that I've lost because of the anorexia. Like any sort of semblance of normality. Money for treatment. Friends. Time- good God, the time!
I feel a little bit sad, but not one drop of anger. Mostly numbness.
What am I supposed to do about it?
I know the anger is supposed to help me fight Ed even harder, give him the total boot from my life.
I just can't feel that anger.
I think: maybe if I had something to compare it to. Like compare "now" to sometime before the eating disorder, to when a trip down the cereal aisle wouldn't leave me gibbering in fear. When a can of soup was a can of soup, and not a treacherous Nutrition Facts label with calories and carbs , fat grams and sodium.
I remember that these things existed, these cans of soups and journeys down Aisle Nine, but I don't remember what they were. I don't remember that feeling. It has simply...vanished. Should I be mad that simple things like this are fraught with difficulties? Probably. But I'm not. I just shrug my shoulders and try to get on with things.
Is this bad? I feel somehow defective that I can't get more emotionality behind my feelings about my eating disorder. I know I am still scared of it. I know that much.
I can almost totally cut myself off from my feelings, even when I'm not neck-deep in behaviors. I can function at a surface level. But it's almost as if I lock a part of myself away, insulate it from the almost certain deluge of feelings that will overtake me. This means that, almost inevitably, I lock away the happy feelings, but that hasn't been much of a big deal in the past, you know, decade or so.
My advisor said that if I hadn't told her about the eating disorder in the writing samples I submitted to the program, she never would have guessed. I know that's a good thing, but I still didn't know quite how to take it.
So. This getting-mad-at-the-eating-disorder-thing. How do I go about doing it? I can easily do it on the behalf of others, because their suffering is so obviously greater than my own (I know, I know- this makes no sense, but it's true. So there.). I almost feel I've earned the pain and suffering. Kind of like "girls who play with fire are going to get burned." I've gotten burned, and it hurts, and I don't deny it. But I feel- just a little bit- like I kind of asked for it.
We'll see how long I let those last 3 or 4 sentences up.
Hitting publish.