Sunday 18 February 2007

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

Thursday was my last binge-eating therapy session. Friday – not 24 hours after randomly discussing at a cocktail party how ex-boyfriends can ruin certain London neighborhoods for you forever – I ran into the ex-boyfriend to whom I was referring, not, for the record, in his neighborhood. Later that night I suffered through a Marc Jacobs party with the always-bitchy Sofia Coppola (I’ve loathed her since a friend at Cannes asked her how she’d describe something, and La Coppola snapped back: "Isn’t that your job?"), a charming Selma Blair, and a totally adorable Rufus Wainwright, who dashed out at 11 p.m. to save his voice from the smoke and noise. (As they say here, bless.) And today I spent in the Paris atelier of Nina Ricci, writing a story about the making of two Oscar dresses for a certain Academy Award-winning Legally Blonde star.

It’s been a busy week.

* * *

So I’m cured.

Well, not exactly.

But I was discharged from binge eating therapy (technically, cognitive behavioral therapy) on Thursday after 16 sessions. As my therapist pointed out, I’ve met the goals I set at the beginning. Plus, I waited over a year for these 16 sessions on the NHS, so I imagine it’s time to let someone else have her turn.

I haven’t binged for more than 80 days now, but – as I pointed out to my therapist – I have gone this long before. (Six months is the longest I have gone without a binge.) So I spent my last session working out a relapse prevention plan. It was meant to be helpful, but instead I found it terrifying to see on paper the sheer number of binge triggers – and my still-woefully-small list of ways to cope.

I read somewhere that it takes an average of eight years to recover from binge eating, and I certainly have done my part to push up the average. I can’t pinpoint my first binge the way some people can, but I know it’s been going on – with varying degrees of intensity – for more than 16 years, or over half my life.

Thursday I felt at a point I’ve also been at before – where you can’t imagine bingeing, either the physical act of doing it, or why you would even want to do it. I then spent much of Saturday fighting (successfully) the urge to binge. But it was a struggle.

* * *

I ran into F. – the ex – while standing outside Claridges, waiting to get into the Marc Jacobs fashion show that preceded the party. I have never once in four years run into F. accidentally, and haven’t seen him at all for two years. I blurted his name out involuntarily as he dashed by, then felt ridiculous. F. has (not surprisingly) never heard of Marc Jacobs, and couldn't understand why anyone would wait to see his show. (Privately I sort of agree, though if you're female, chances are MJ has infiltrated your wardrobe whether you know who he is or not. Big buttons? Quilting? Military jacket? Chain-handled bag? Cute pointy flats? They're all Marc's influence.) Anyway, F. and I chatted awkwardly for less than two minutes, until the police (thankfully) shooed him off the sidewalk – it was for people waiting to get into the show only.

When I told my fashionista Greek Vogue acquaintance standing next to me that F. was somebody I’d dated, she asked in her usual blunt way: "Was he really good at something?"

Me: "Um, no. Why?"

GV: "He’s really unattractive."

Actually, I’d noticed while I was speaking to him that he’s not aging well, but…

2 comments:

  1. How did you find a binge therapist?

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  2. I didn't have any choice in who it was. In England there is national health care, so I found out binge eating therapy was offered on the NHS, got a referral from my doctor, waited over a year for a diagnostic appointment, then another seven months for a space to open up, and finally was assigned a therapist.

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