Detox

Three days.

That’s how many days of regular exercise and reasonably decent eating it took for me to feel better. That’s how long it usually takes, and yet at the bottom of a binge I forget that. It seems like everything will always be gray and hopeless, and then somehow, somewhere, I get the willingness to get up and try again.

It seemed dicey this time on Day 2, as it often does. Yesterday I did the first exercise class double I have done in maybe a year (more of which, shortly) and then the friend I met for SoulCycle (which I do rarely) suggested a drink after. Friend chose the Trump Plaza (cue comments about its namesake) because it was quiet and around the corner, and what do you know? They gave us – for free – a beet and goat cheese salad and some kind of salmon carpaccio.

Reader, this is usually a disaster for me. I hate pick-at-it kind of dinners (I call them pick-y dinners), and it was kinda early for dinner, and I hate thinking, too early in the evening, that my next meal isn’t until breakfast, and I knew I was going to be up late, anxious about a looming deadline which had suddenly been foisted on me about 20 minutes before I left for SoulCycle. On the way home I thought about what else I could eat. And then got home and got so busy that I didn’t. (Until 2 am, when my stomach was growling and I had some almond butter.)

The exercise definitely is helping. It’s been several months, between travel and injury, since I’ve been able to do any regular exercise besides Pilates. Which is good, of course, but is just not the same, in my book, as getting your heart rate up and sweating. Monday I ran. Yesterday I was on the battle ropes and the kettlebells and the SoulCycle. Today was another (short) run. It’s frustrating how out of shape I am, but it’s also an inspiration. I can get back there. I will get back there.

As for the eating disorder treatment: It’s still ticking along as something I may really do, though it’s looking, for a couple of logistical reasons, more like July than May. Which is terrifying. When you think someone is going to take something from you – like bingeing – it becomes worse. I feel like this has been happening to me the past couple of weeks, as I’ve tried to decide what to do about this, but knowing it’s a very real possibility that I will. Of course I have to wonder what would happen if I commit to this thing and then I get until July without a binge. I think it’s unlikely, but even if I did – I’ve gone 100 days without bingeing before and it has always come back. My hope is that whatever this is will do a better job of pulling this thing out by the roots.