tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-47438709413204734652024-03-06T08:11:37.031+00:00A Sense of Scale, AgainUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger587125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-49224200137848558892021-04-23T12:51:00.001+01:002021-04-23T12:51:24.231+01:00Waiting<p>Waiting for spring (it's supposed to snow tonight), waiting for the vaccine, waiting for the end of lockdown, waiting for more clothes to fit, waiting for this period of difficulty between J and me to pass, waiting, waiting waiting.</p><p>And yet as much as I want lockdown -- and winter -- to end, I will miss the safety of it and my enormous winter coat. For nearly six weeks now, I've known exactly what's in everything I've eaten. I can hide out sweatpants and the red fleece I bought my junior year of college. (Yes, there have been many more weeks of lockdown than six, but I've eaten my way through a lot of it.)</p><p>I'm in that stage of a diet where nothing has changed enough. Forty days and the jeans I hate aren't big enough to throw out (though at least I no longer have to fear holes wearing in the inner thighs and my not being able to replace them in this land of size zeroes.) The ones a size down (which I hate marginally less, in part because they're black) fit but don't look that great. Both were desperation purchases. My old ones didn't fit and I couldn't face spending a ton of time and money on ones I hoped would be temporary. (Will I ever learn? I guess not.)</p><p>Sometimes my iPhone coughs up a picture of me from a couple of years ago and I am shocked by it -- by how slim I was. Did I ever really look like that? Will I ever look like that again? Do I even want to do the things it takes to look like that again? What is it going to cost me, not in money but in time and emotional energy? That endless planning and plotting and motivating...</p><p>I wonder sometimes if this will end J and me. Not that it will be a direct cause, but some of our problems could no longer be ignored (at least by me) once I stopped overeating and drinking. There was nothing to take the edge off what was going on, no shared conspiracy of a drink too many. Plus taking charge of my food has always made me more proactive in other areas of my life; less willing to settle. Little wonder, then, that J and I do not agree about whether this recent eating experiment makes me happier. (Not that he has been unsupportive. He is unfailingly upbeat about being served salmon, roasted broccoli and brown rice for dinner for the umpteenth time, and says it's inspired him to eat healthier lunches. Though what a 49-year-old man's idea of healthy is is... a subject for another blog post.)</p><p>Once or twice over the past year -- as I have hidden out in his sweatpants and his dad's old beige toggle coat and my own bought-out-of-urgency-not-love clothes -- it has come up how much he liked it when I used to get dressed up. He doesn't say it like a criticism, and I try not to hear it that way. I know he doesn't understand how much is wrapped up in whether and how my clothes fit, and honestly, I don't want him to. "<i>I</i> like it when I used to get dressed up," I reply, and then I change the subject before I say too much.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-69022441858822471572021-03-27T22:03:00.002+00:002021-03-27T22:03:47.030+00:00Caviar Dreams A couple of years ago, when I was looking for a therapist when I got back to New York, one of the tings that made me dread the process the most was the idea of having to spend hours explaining myself. I worried that for weeks therapy would be a wash because it would just be me constantly having to fill in backstory. <div><br /></div><div>I went to a few appointments so dismal they made me feel beyond help, and then -- just when I was about to give up -- I went to a therapist who said: "Start where you are and you can give me context when you need to."</div><div><br /></div><div>That's a long way of saying: After -- checks notes -- nearly three years' absence, the thought of trying to catch anyone up all at once is daunting. (That's making the gigantic assumption there <i>is </i>anyone after all this time. I also can't help thinking I should be switching to a newsletter or yelling into the void on Clubhouse, except neither of those is semi-anonymous.)</div><div><br /></div><div>Anyway.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Tere </i>from Tallinn, Estonia, where I downloaded a healthy recipes app and speak just enough Estonian to understand that one of the acceptable meat substitutes is 65g of caviar (red or black.) </div><div><br /></div><div>Why, you may wonder, can't I just use British or Australian or US recipes? </div><div><br /></div><div>Because they call for all manner of ingredients I can't get here, never mind that these days the grocery stores here feel almost Soviet. Tomatoes galore one day; nothing the next. Ditto Brussels sprouts, which appeared once and I haven't seen them since. And zucchini (which, somewhat adorably, the Estonians call "summer pumpkin.") Forget about ground turkey or chicken sausage or any kind of "lighter" staple -- though there are moose sausages galore... And despite knowing all the Estonian words for chicken, beef, pork, etc, I still cannot decipher the cuts of meat either by label or by sight.</div><div><br /></div><div>In the past when I was unhappy with my weight I could eat ready meals for days, not because they're so wonderful but because I have always found great safety in numbers printed on the back of a package. I could find whatever was the most filling (at least relatively speaking) and eat it again and again. Not anymore. I've got someone else to think about, and I can't imagine telling him we're going to eat, say, porridge for dinner because it's easy.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's been incredibly tough to let someone in on what I'm doing -- and to have to call attention to my weight (not, I'm sure, that he hasn't noticed I'm not the same size I was when we met.) Tonight I portioned out some leftovers for lunch tomorrow and there were about five new potatoes left in the pot.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Can't you just put these in your Tupperware?" he said.</div><div><br /></div><div>"No, because mine's a portion," I said.</div><div><br /></div><div>He looked at the potatoes, looked at me, looked back at the potatoes and started to say something. Then apparently he thought the better of it. </div><div><br /></div><div>Day 13. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-27114894396719988082018-06-07T22:24:00.003+01:002018-06-07T22:24:28.220+01:00Asia-Bound
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">And so I’m headed back
to Asia again in three weeks, barely having recovered from the last time. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I’m not complaining;
just trying to think about what I can do minimize the chances of a repeat of last time: How bad I felt about myself, how uncomfortable I was, and how quickly it all snowballed. As I think I
mentioned, there was constant low and medium-level overeating, and although I
could recognize it was making me feel bad, I felt powerless to stop it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">On the first trip of
the year (in January), I held things together reasonably for about a week – I
was still exercising (I think I managed something every third day) and eating
semi-appropriately -- and then things fell apart for about the last five days.
On the second trip, this last one, I did zero exercise and was overeating
basically from the start.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I’ve always been a
rule-based person – very black or white – and that has fueled the relentless
cycle of bingeing and restricting that has gone on for most of my life. So I’m
not going to make a lot of rules for myself – the minutes I break one, they all
start going out the window. There are only two things I’ve decided to do.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">One: I will do my
physio exercises (which I do nearly every morning in London, because they keep
me pain-free) within 24 hours of stepping off the plane. They aren’t really
exercise in the way most of us think about it, but they are – and I hate this
word, but it’s apt – self-care. I think if I can pause long enough to do them,
they’ll help me be more mindful in all the rest of my choices for the day. (I
didn’t do them at all on the second trip to Asia, and I could feel the
difference within days. Plus, every day I felt guilty for still not having done
them, and started worrying I’d never be able to get back into my routine again
when I got back to London. Frankly would have been simpler just to do them
once.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Two: I’m going to do
the one thing my grandmother nagged me to do at almost every single meal I ever
ate with her, which is to try to leave something over on my plate. I won’t
manage this every meal for sure, but I want to at least pause toward the end
and think whether I need to finish.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">* * *<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I’m not sure if it’s
progress that I have a lot less to say on the subject of weight loss / my body
/ recovery than I thought (than I used to?). I do know it doesn’t make me feel
very good to be putting words out into the world just for the sake of it, which
I’ve been doing for the past few days.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Thus ends perhaps the
world’s briefest experiment in daily posting. I am going to try to check in more
regularly, though. The support here – and the space to think and try out ideas –
has always meant a lot. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-59147858793158280172018-06-06T23:19:00.000+01:002018-06-06T23:19:04.397+01:00A Sense of Scale, for Once
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">A funny thing happened
today: Someone I hadn’t seen in about a month or so asked me if I had lost
weight and I felt… nothing. I didn’t thrill at the idea or even take it as a
compliment. It was just something someone said that frankly didn’t matter that
much.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I wondered if that was
because recovery has taught me that losing weight isn’t always a good thing.
That saying it just <i>isn’t</i> the compliment I used to think it was. And
because I don’t get on scales so I can’t really say for sure. But mostly I
think I don’t care that much because I’m feeling pretty good about the way that
I’m eating, and I’m not actively trying to do anything besides feel comfortable
in my own skin. (And no amount of weight loss will magically do that.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">It’s been a very busy
day and I’m exhausted. I haven’t been sleeping very well, and then I was up to
go to a gym class (I rarely go to classes these days, partly because the
timings don’t generally work, partly because they’re too crowded, and partly
because some days I just don’t feel like <i>learning</i> anything, which the
best classes usually require.) It was a fairly brutal metabolic conditioning
class and I staggered out of there. I rarely get sore any more, but I think I
might be tomorrow.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Then racing to get a couple
of pitches out (the window for them was shutting within hours) and deal with
some other potential work, and finally on to meet friends for drinks. Which
became dinner that involved triple fried chips (in my as-yet-unwritten-book,
one of the few kinds that are a “must order”) and sourdough bread with garlic
butter. I was so hungry by the time our food arrived (north of 9 pm) that it
was a struggle not to just finish everything because it was there. I’m pleased
I didn’t, though, and – although this restaurant serves one of my favourite
desserts in the world – I actually didn’t mind that our waitress never offered
us dessert menus and we could just get the bill and go. I was (and am)
exhausted. Bought a single salted caramel profiterole in a tiny amount of
chocolate sauce (love whoever came up with that) on the way home that I feared might send me over the edge (it's never great when I buy spur-of-the-moment desserts), but it hasn't. Going
to get to bed before I get my sometimes annoying, sometimes fantastic midnight
second wind. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-87827032603929867952018-06-05T23:09:00.001+01:002018-06-05T23:09:40.924+01:00Back in the Skinny Jeans
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Can’t fall down on the posting on Day 2 already, so this is
just a super-quick check in a I’ve been working since 9 am (and it’s now nearly
11 pm.)<o:p></o:p></div>
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It’s been more than a week of on-plan eating and exercise,
and I felt sufficiently good to try on a black faux fur jacket offered to me,
rather randomly, by the tiny Chinese girl who lives downstairs. She’s moving
and doesn’t need it. Somewhat unbelievably, it fit -- and my super-stylist friend even approved of it -- though I will have to
pretend it’s bracelet-sleeved, as technically the sleeves are a little too short. I’m not sure I’ve ever inherited clothing from anyone that I actually wanted
(as opposed to fat-type clothes I would take because I couldn’t face the shops
in my size – or didn’t want to spend money at a size I hoped I wouldn’t stay
at.) It's a nice feeling.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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The coat episode then made me sufficiently bold (ha!) to
bring my skinniest of skinny jeans to the gym without a backup pair, and I’m
pleased I was able to work in them all day. Part of my recovery over these past
two years – along with the not weighing myself -- has been not hiding out in
gym clothes, meaning stretchy things. (And I get dressed in proper clothes
every single day, even if all I’m doing is sitting around my flat writing.) <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Today was a hungry day, meaning things I eat on other days
(and they work fine) feel like they barely touch the sides. If I can guess in
the morning that it’s going to be a hungry day – and I can’t always tell – I do
stick to what I know works. It often keeps me from spending ages trying to
decide if I’ve had enough / what extra I should eat, which can be a disaster
when I’m hungry anyway. Today I had an extra piece of fruit after my afternoon
snack (porridge with maple syrup). Still hungry. Luckily I managed to distract
myself for a bit, got engrossed in the work, and when I looked up it was time
for dinner.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-4679139610991499302018-06-04T23:14:00.002+01:002018-06-04T23:14:18.598+01:00Calm with a Horizon of Anxiety
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Returning to blogging
after a long absence feels a lot like trying to return to <s>dieting </s><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>eating according to plan after a long
absence/putting on a lot of weight: The task can seem unmanageable, and even
with the best and firmest of intentions, days and weeks go by. And really,
what’s one more day at that point?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">For the record, I
haven’t put on a lot of weight that I’m aware of – I haven’t gotten on a scale
for two years now. But what I wanted to type was: I haven’t put on a lot of
weight <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">yet</i>. Because I’ve gotten
pretty messy with my food lately, and while at one point that looked like
recovery, it no longer does.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Come again?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I know, it sounds
crazy. (But when have I ever not sounded that way?) Being rigid and strict with
my diet (not a word I use any more, actually) led straight to bingeing, so the
ability to be a bit messy was good at the start. Not so much any more. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">In April I went to
Thailand and Vietnam and overate every day (it didn’t help that my travel
companion was basically the restaurant whisperer, incapable of picking a bad
place or a dud entrée.) I felt more and more uncomfortable, things felt tighter
and tighter, and yet I kept overeating. I did zero exercise. The number of
items in my suitcase I wanted to wear shrank. All the feelings I used to feel
came back: The despair, the terror of having nothing that still fit to wear on
the airplane home, the terror of the fact that everything in my suitcase might
never fit again, but being too afraid even to try it on and see how bad the
damage was.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">Eating, drinking, not
exercising – sure, that’s what people do on holiday. But when I got back to
London, instead of getting back into more normal portions and foods, I carried
on justifying all manner of extra food as “oh hey, at least I’m not
restricting.” I felt uncomfortable, and didn’t want to face friends, thinking
they were looking at me with pity, wondering how I’d gained so much weight in
such a short time. (This last bit, given that it turned out I could still wear
all but my super skinniest of jeans, was probably all in my head, but that
didn’t make the feeling less real, or paralyzing.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">I’m still – six weeks
later – probably a little bigger than I was before I went (but again, I don’t
know what I weighed before I left and I don’t know what I weigh now, but
certain clothes feel tighter, or they fit differently than they did last summer.)
I have more uncertainty and probably fear in all areas of my life than possibly
ever before, which creeps into how and what I eat (more of which, in another
post.) And so here I am. I’m not sure I’ve ever dealt with a tiny weight gain –
I’d just start bingeing, first occasionally, and then more frequently, until no
amount of exercise or restricting could balance it out. I don’t do elaborate
diets or exercise regimens any more; all I want is just to feel a bit more accountable;
to take away the horizon of anxiety that has cropped up lately when it comes to
my weight.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">So I’m making a promise
to post for 30 days, however briefly. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "PT Serif";">It’s good to be back. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-59184676891183469762018-03-01T23:04:00.000+00:002018-03-01T23:04:19.341+00:00Prinsesstårta<div class="MsoNormal">
Act One, They Meet<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(Old Ms. Pac-Man arcade game music here)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ever since I saw it on an old season of the Great British
Bake-Off, I’ve been thinking about the Prinsesstårta. NB: This isn’t quite as
sad as it seems. I didn’t start watching GBBO until I got back to London, and I
don’t think about this cake every day! <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s really been in my head since late last month, when I
met up for dinner with a Swedish friend and another friend (Welsh, for the
record), both of whom raved about the cake and a particular Swedish bakery in
London where it’s served. All three of us have similar tastes in dessert -- our
WhatsApp group actually is called Crumble Lovers, in homage to a restaurant we
like where the apple crumble is so good we threaten to order it as an entrée and
then again as a pudding. (For the record – and lest we sound super-piggy -- we
stumbled upon the rather unlikely Crumble Mecca because we were in the area for
an absolutely brutal VersaClimber class.) <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, I went home after dinner and looked up the bakery.
It turns out it’s about a five-minute walk from my counselor’s office. I
promised myself one day after an appointment I’d go there. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wasn’t at all sure I would.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You see, I’m not sure how religiously I ever ate the
suggested two puddings a week the dietitian suggested. I think maybe I did at
the beginning, though I always behaved with them the way I did about calories
on a restricted diet or points when I was on Weight Watchers – I always wanted
to bank them. I’d tell myself I was saving them for something amazing – or
because I thought I might binge if I used them up early and didn’t have any
leeway for several days – and I’d never use them. The rainy day never came, so
to speak, but always, inevitably, there’d be a binge. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I realized the other day that I haven’t been eating any
puddings. For awhile, it was because I ate so off piste in Thailand that I
actually wanted a few weeks of simple, on-plan eating. But then it became: Oh,
but I have this trip coming up and then this restaurant and then… Except yes,
there always will be something on the horizon. But I realized if I never eat
puddings kind of randomly – for no special reason, only because I want them –
this is where the restriction and bingeing cycle takes root again. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so today, even though I would happily have gone home to
my regular snack (these days it’s so cold I’m loving porridge, to be honest) –
even though I’m feeling so anxious about so many things – I went and bought the
Prinsesstårta; braved the fear that it would not be enough, would kick start a
binge.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t buy it to take home and eat where no one could see
me do it. I bought a slice on a plate and took it and sat at a table with it,
with no phone or magazine out, like I deserved to eat it and wasn’t making any
apologies for eating it and wasn’t pretending I wasn’t eating it. I talked to
the couple next to me – on a first date, I think – about travelling to Iran. And
I ate my cake.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was divine. I didn’t wish I had more, I didn’t debate
buying anything else, and I have felt as good as I can feel tonight, under the
circumstances (extreme anxiety about other things.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Bring on the bonus round. </span><!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-90799067384571897522018-02-28T23:24:00.003+00:002018-02-28T23:24:58.464+00:00Constant Craving Redux<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #363636; font-family: Lato, serif; font-size: 13pt;">I had <a href="http://asenseofscale2.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/constant-craving.html">decided</a> I would wait until I could get to
Ottolenghi for my cake. And in the meantime, when I’m in Covent Garden this
week, I’d try <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/prinsesstrta_17336">Prinsesstarta</a> from the Swedish bakery my (Swedish) friend
recommends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And yet the need is still there: for cream, for
cake, for frosting, for too-fullness, for… I don’t know. Maybe the certainty
that comes with a binge? That shrinking of the world, that excuse not to do
anything much but get through the day, that acceptance of crappy things because
I feel that is all I deserve, or because I’m too defeated to ask for more? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Life feels scary and filled with uncertainty at
the moment. Bingeing is – to paraphrase the director of the treatment center I
went to – “shit but it’s warm.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I left dinner tonight with a friend where I
couldn’t eat almost anything on the menu – something that’s never happened to
me before, but I was allergic to one ingredient that happened to be in
everything, including sauces. But I had a margherita pizza (their normal pizzas
have my allergen – bell pepper – in the sauce) and a piece of my friend’s
halloumi cheese (which was in the dish I originally wanted but that they wouldn’t
make without peppers.) And I was thinking about dessert, which she didn’t want,
and we aren’t good enough friends that I felt comfortable enough to get anyway.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I could feel myself detaching slightly from the
conversation, slightly impatient, slightly thinking about where I could go for
something afterward. I kept bringing myself back around. (For the record, I had
gotten some fairly destabilizing news just before dinner; in fact had been a
couple of minutes late because I was on the phone.) I could tell I wasn’t
desperate – something that’s never happened before – just kind of seeking.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #363636; font-family: "Lato","serif"; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We said goodbye at the Tube, which normally I
wouldn’t be taking three stops, but it was too cold and icy to walk the half
hour home. Which maybe was lucky. I watched her recede down Parsons Green Lane
and turned back to the Coop. I saw Dunkin Donuts, thought about the aching
sweetness of a jam doughnut, and then remembered that the last time I’d had
Dunkin Donuts I’d decided it was just <i>too</i> sweet. I wandered the aisles
and there wasn’t anything that fitted the brief of what I wanted and – here’s
the kicker – I just did not want to binge. I didn’t want to feel the way I
would feel; didn’t want to wake up tomorrow and have to try to recover.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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I have eyed up several times but haven’t had yet this year – and came home and
had my evening snack anyway. Prinsesstarta tomorrow. Ottolenghi… as soon as it
stops snowing. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-80259376143770536202018-02-26T16:19:00.002+00:002018-02-26T16:19:34.493+00:00Constant Craving<div class="MsoNormal">
In the supermarket I pass a small, boxed chocolate cake and
I want to buy it and eat the whole thing. I walk down the street thinking about
vats of steamed puddings. I eat a ready-made lasagna for lunch and it barely
seems to touch the sides. There’s another in the refrigerator and I could pop
it in the microwave and just keep eating, I think.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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It’s on me right now, this desire to binge. It seemed to
come out of nowhere yesterday afternoon. I was walking home from the Tube,
having just been to lunch with an old friend, visiting from the US, and all I
wanted was cake. Not just any cake, but cake with frosting. Preferably a layer
cake or my favorite Ottolenghi cake.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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I’d just had a Sunday roast, but I wasn’t full from it. It
was in some bog standard pub by Paddington -- because he had to get on the
Heathrow Express and go back to New York -- and it wasn’t very good, but I ate
the whole thing anyway, almost without noticing. Well, without noticing
anything but that it wasn’t that good <b>and</b> – like an old lady in the
Catskills – that it wasn’t very big. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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I kept walking, trying to think about where I could go. My
favorite coffee place, where I always scrutinize the cakes but have never
ordered any? No, there’s a reason why I’ve never ordered any – they don’t look
sufficiently amazing. I kept walking.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Any of the chain coffee places near the tube? It was
freezing and if I couldn’t think of something specific I wanted, I perhaps
shouldn’t go looking for it. I kept walking. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The ginormous Tesco? Ditto, plus I’d almost automatically
set myself up for a binge, with the quantity I’d have to buy. Kept walking.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Should I turn around and go toward South Kensington and get a
Ben’s cookie? It was freezing (and yes, in that moment I was almost grateful it
was freezing) and that really wasn’t what I wanted. (Don’t get me wrong; if it
were in front of me, I’d probably have eaten it.) Almost home. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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For the first time, though, I was considering and rationally
discarding options, as opposed to becoming more and more frustrated to the
point of a binge by my inability to get what I really wanted. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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I thought about eating the random individual Christmas
pudding I still have in my cupboard, but I knew it wouldn’t satisfy anything
except the need to feel warm, however briefly. Well, that part, at least, I
could satisfy. I went home and had some porridge – warm and stodgy – and
decided I couldn’t face the cold again (and it was Sunday night) and I’d deal
with procuring cake today.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Except it’s snowing and I’m inexplicably exhausted and I
cannot face the trip. Cannot face the trip even for cake? I’m somewhat amazed
that I can be this person – and also a person who can decide I will hang on
until I get what I really want. The only trouble is, I’m not sure – in the face
of all these cravings – how long I can sustain it… <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-50127170548447783612018-02-10T22:32:00.002+00:002018-02-11T07:53:06.856+00:00Shades of Gray<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve started so many posts about so many things – started
them in my head, anyway! – and after this amount of silence, it gets harder and
harder even to think about either distilling it all into one post or settling
on one thing to write about.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There are things I’m not ready to share because I’m
superstitious and other things I’m not ready to share perhaps because following
the train of thought required to write them here might take me somewhere I
don’t want to go. (Spoiler alert: this entry is the latter.)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If I sound gray, I am, a bit. As gray as a London winter.
That post-Christmas nothing-nice-is-ever-going-to-happen again feeling has
settled in, especially because I had a trip to Thailand to look forward to
right after New Year – and to shop for, since I owned no proper summer clothes
-- and now that’s over, too. (It was maybe the best trip I’ve ever taken as
well as my first proper holiday in years, and I suspect the abrupt removal of
sunshine combined with the record cold here has also contributed to my current
low.) <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I feel a bit unmoored at the moment; peripheral. After so
many years, my industry – on its deathbed practically since I got into it –
really does seem to be dying, and I am struggling to work. There’s been a fair share of family drama that is
ongoing. A handful of friendships that have really sustained me over the years
– or in London over the past 18 months -- just… don’t anymore. Some are because
I’ve changed enough that things I used to do – in some cases, because I didn’t
think I deserved more – I’m trying not to do or to tolerate. Others are because
things in their lives have changed drastically.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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One in particular: My closest friend from treatment, who was
also one of my closest friends here, seems to want nothing to do with anything
recovery-related anymore. All the routines I had with her are gone; when I saw
her last – just before Christmas (this is someone I used to see at least once a
week and whatsapp a squillion times a day) she had gained enough weight for it
to be visible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I say this not in
judgment, but to say I can guess what’s going on with her, and to imagine – no,
remember, because I have done this before – that the world of recovery can be
excruciatingly painful when you feel you are failing at it. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We weight-loss bloggers, or those of us who started that
way, all know this instinctively, I guess. I mean, it was usually the reason
for a long since on a weight-loss blog. It isn’t the reason for the silence on
mine, though.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For the record, I’ve had my own slips – for the record, my
counselor from treatment definitely didn’t believe perfection is possible with
eating disorders, or (I think) even in counting days, though she wasn’t allowed
to say that. But all it takes is one for some of the shame and fear to start
creeping back in; the craving for control that makes me want to manipulate my
world so I can stay home and eat safe things. Most of the time I recognize
that’s what I want to do and don’t allow myself to do it. At times I’ve dipped
into the gray area between overeating and bingeing, and -- on the other side of
the danger scale for me – at times exercised too much. I haven’t weighed myself
in at least two years, though, and even if no one is going to see me, I get
dressed – in clothes with fitted waistbands – every day. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And they still fit, even if one or two days I
confess I’m happy to get out of them.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<!--EndFragment--><div class="MsoNormal">
I’m vowing to be back here more often. This blog and its
readers, though few (certainly at this point!) have always been a huge source
of comfort to me. In these gray times, I need to appreciate that.<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-38475862508923136502017-10-11T17:09:00.004+01:002017-10-11T17:09:28.905+01:00Cake Tapas<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">On Sunday, Friend Bearing
Chocolate became Friend Bearing Cake. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">She’d been to cake school
(yes, this is a thing), and when we met for coffee she brought me a container
(funnily enough, it was for some sort of horrendous sounding no-sugar ice cream
that must have been consumed by her housemate) filled with bits of things she’d
made.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">I looked at it, wondering
if it were six servings? Two? Four? The only thing I was pretty sure was that
it wasn’t one serving, which is the only way I really knew how to eat such a
thing. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">It sat on the table like a
bomb. I’d so so SO nearly binged the night before, and one of the ways I’d
gotten myself not to was to promise myself I would have something worth eating,
not the sort of shite one can buy at midnight in Earls Court, after a really
awful week and a rather triggering dinner with a newly gluten-free, dairy-free
friend (English, but living on the west coast of America) who also doesn’t eat
meat and a whole host of other things.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">None of these cakes the
friend came bearing were things I tend to crave. They were lovely, sure, but
with the exception of the mince pie, none were things that would ever be my top
choice. I imagined myself trying one and then the next, finishing them all
looking for some particular taste none of them offered, and then ending up
bingeing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">I thought about them a lot
while we had our coffee. I’d throw them out after FBC left, I decided. She
would never have to know. I’d done it before and I’d do it again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">And as we were leaving, I
hesitated. I do eat everything these days – meaning no weird diets – and though
I try to eat things that are worth eating, isn’t homemade cake the definition
of that? Plus, part of what keeps me from bingeing, I think, is truly <b>believing</b>
I can eat anything – and that I’ll stop believing that if I pass things up too
often. The fear of them will solidify, like liquid turning to jelly. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Plus, plus – I also know I
can’t, in the moment, eat things I suddenly start craving. I don’t go out and
buy something the minute I think about it. If I’m still thinking about it the
next day, then I have it. Usually I’ve forgotten about it. But again, what if I
stop believing I can have these things – that I will always delay? That’s a
binge waiting to happen. (In case you’re curious, I’m perfectly fine eating
unplanned things at restaurants. But I don’t in the middle of the day get up
and leave my house and go buy, say, Ottolenghi cake just because I think I have
to have it. I know; it’s complicated. I’ve spent 16 months trying to work all
these things out.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Anyway. Just as we were
leaving I said to FBC: “I have to ask you something.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">She looked worried.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">I confessed I had no idea
how to eat the cake tapas, which is what I’d mentally nicknamed the box.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">I saw her face: Slightly
shocked. But she recovered fast. Then matter-of-factly she suggested what she’d
do, and the order in which she’d eat them (some would go off faster than
others, which I wouldn’t know – when have I ever kept cake in my house long
enough for it to go off?)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--EndFragment--><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">And so I had three days of
cake. It was delicious. And fully worth the 30 seconds of embarrassment.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-82172304749510146572017-08-30T18:51:00.000+01:002017-08-30T18:51:07.796+01:00The Great Black Jean Freak Out of 2017<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Today I went to put on my
trusty black jeans and panicked. Like, properly froze and felt slightly sick. I
was standing in the gym with no other clothing if they didn’t fit, and I
thought wildly about what I would do if they didn’t, since I’d already showered
and stuffed my sweaty leggings into a plastic bag with my other sweaty clothes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">I hadn’t worn the black
jeans for two weeks – I’d washed them and wore other jeans and then I found
myself avoiding them and then, conveniently, it was something approximating
summer and so I wore more summery things and avoided them some more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Until today, when I
decided I had to face them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The craziest part of all
this is that I haven’t binged or even especially overeaten (except maybe a
little at one Sunday lunch that the hosts didn’t serve until 4 pm and there
were no snacks). I haven’t been able to run (issue with dizziness I think I’ve
mentioned before) but I’ve been to the gym and to Pilates. It’s just vestigial
panic. In the past the only reason I stopped wearing anything was because it
stopped fitting, and washing jeans was… uh… not something I ever did if I could
avoid it (I know, gross, but true). I mean, what if they shrank even a teeny
bit? (If that happened they wouldn’t have fit, and we all know how horrible and
traumatic jeans-buying can be. Or any kind of clothing buying, when it is the
next size or three up. Because I only went to a shop when my jeans actually
busted, which usually meant they were about two sizes too small.) <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Oh -- and if I put
anything away for a season, I’d always hope it would be too big by the time it
came to wear it again. Inevitably it was too small.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Today, when the black
jeans fit just fine, I thought about how sad the feelings the episode brought
up – and how incredibly grateful I am that for right now, that’s not my life. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--EndFragment--><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">I’ve resisted posting
again since my last post not because things have been bad, but because I’ve
been reluctant to tempt fate. Things feel better and easier -- like something
has shifted – but I’m aware of how quickly things can change again, and how
little it takes for that to happen. And so I remain vigilant. And also – I need
to repeat this again – grateful.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-15998124695201495142017-07-19T20:14:00.001+01:002017-07-19T20:14:21.670+01:00Relapse Drift<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Lectures were by far my least favorite part of treatment.
This was, in part, because I’d read so many books about addiction that the
concepts weren’t new – and in part because the people giving the lectures were
better suited to the group therapy they also did than actually lecturing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oh, ok -- if I’m totally honest, another reason why I didn’t
like them was probably because when they happened, which luckily wasn’t often,
they usually were the second half of the evening, when my thoughts had long
since drifted to dinner.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But anyway, lectures. The most useful one, which I think may
be up there as one of the most useful things I learned there, was about relapse
drift. Basically, relapse isn’t an event. It’s a process that usually starts
out innocently enough, like skipping small things – meetings, calls, regular
grocery shopping, whatever -- that support recovery. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What makes it tricky, of course, is that life happens in
recovery – not every time you skip something does it mean anything. But there
are all sorts of other signs of relapse drift that are individual to each
person – things no one might notice but you, and that may have absolutely
nothing to do with food. One for me is when I stop blowdrying my hair, because
I can’t be bothered to make the effort. Or I’ve stopped gathering what I need
for the morning the night before, so I’m always that slight bit stressed and
late leaving the flat. Or – this one is particularly embarrassing – I leave my
gym towels on the bench in the locker room for the cleaning staff to pick up,
as opposed to putting them in the used towel bin.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How is that last one a sign of anything, you ask? (If indeed
you’ve even made it this far.) It’s a tiny thing that makes me feel bad about
myself and contributes, even in a small way, to the idea that I’m a bad,
unlovable person. Which, of course, is at the heart of an eating disorder. Or
at least, it’s at the heart of mine. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I fear I’m in relapse drift. I thought it yesterday morning
and on into yesterday afternoon, which is when I started (but didn’t finish)
this post because I had to go to my (beginner) tennis course. (If you’re
wondering if I have Wimbledon potential, I do, in that my balls are so wildly
out of bounds at this point that they could, theoretically, end up there from
Chiswick.) <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This morning I thought about it more, and it worried me that
I wasn’t more scared of it. Earlier this year the mere thought of relapse was
terrifying, and I’d have done anything to avoid it. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought about how my food has gotten a little messier –
and sometimes a lot messier -- than it has been in a year, and how I’ve
justified that to myself as recovery from my restrictive side. So tricky to
know with an eating disorder, isn’t it? But that combined with these other
behaviors, of which there are many, is… worrying. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Because I do not want to go back to where I was over a year
ago. I don’t want to buy clothes I don’t like because they’re the only thing
that fits. I don’t want to worry about what will fit every morning – that
losing battle, where I feel defeated before the day has even started. I don’t
want that fear that people are judging me (unfavorably) because of my size and
that worry and constant feeling that I need to make up for it. I don’t want to
shrink my life again, first with the bingeing and then with the need for
everything to be safe in early recovery. I don’t want to feel like I’m not
living the life I want because of this eating disorder, which has already
destroyed so many things over the years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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I could go on and on. And so I told my counselor today and I’m
writing it here. The drifting stops now. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-40126319183971388802017-06-01T20:44:00.004+01:002017-06-01T20:44:38.322+01:00A Year in London<div class="MsoNormal">
A year ago today a friend picked me up at Heathrow off an
overnight flight from NYC. She helped me lug my bags (including an enormous
suitcase) up five flights of stairs to a tiny studio I thought would be my home
for just four months – the amount of time I planned to stay in London. Then we
went for a dim sum lunch with a friend of hers who had done the same 14-week
outpatient treatment program as she did – the same treatment program I had
arrived in London to do. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve thought about that day a lot over the past year, always
with incredible gratitude. Overnight flights and jetlag can make everything
seem gray, and I was scared enough as it was – would this work? What if it
didn’t? Seeing friendly faces made all the difference in the state of mind with
which I started, and it also kept me from a binge free-fall before I started
treatment four days later.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So many things have changed this year – some of which have
been so terrifying that if I’d had any idea about them, I might never have
come. And yet here I am. After a couple of months of recalibrating, I am closer
than ever with the friend who picked me up from Heathrow -- I think she felt a
little invaded for awhile, because there I was in a lot of the recovery groups
she thought of as hers. The friend of hers became a good enough friend of
mine that I spent New Years Eve at her house. But she disappeared about a month
later, as people often do when they slip back into old (meaning bingeing)
behavior, which I know she has. Despite a lot of effort on my part, I haven’t
spoken to her since – she doesn’t reply to whatsapps or calls. Well over half
the people I was in treatment with have relapsed. I know I’m lucky, but I also
know I work really hard at it. Recovery is not something you ever really can
think you’ll always have, I’ve learned – it’s something you get for the day.
Some days are much harder than others.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I only realize now in writing this that I don’t remember my
last binge – can’t date it, can’t tell you what I ate. The month before I left
for London I overate a lot (huge meals, lots of cake), but there weren’t any
binges – it was almost enough to make me question if I were doing the right
thing. Almost. I had so much to do that month I think I knew I’d never make it
onto the plane if I started bingeing, and I knew I had to get on the plane.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I use June 4 as my one-year marker only because the night
before I went to a dinner party and drank a lot, which was forbidden while I
was in treatment. Plus, I can’t quite remember what I ate. I know I took a cab
home, so there wasn’t any post-dinner-party binge. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had this idea that I wanted to be in London for my one
year without a binge, and then the opportunity came up to be in New York and be
able to stay in my own apartment, before the new subletter arrives – a pretty
narrow window of time. I want to do some clearing out I didn’t have the
headspace to do before I left, maybe to drum up some work, and to see people.
And yet I was trying to arrange it so I was in London on the 4<sup>th</sup>.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then the invitation arrived for a friend’s kid’s first
birthday party on June 3, and it seemed like a sign. I have missed a lot of
milestones in my friends’ lives while I’ve been here. And I have lived all my
life I can remember ruled by this eating disorder, with it dictating where I
would go and what I would do. It seemed fitting, at the end of a whole year
without bingeing or starving, not to let it rule even how I celebrate its
absence.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Three hundred and sixty two days (at least)
without a binge.</span><!--EndFragment-->
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-60100378193224221432017-04-18T11:40:00.002+01:002017-04-18T11:40:32.637+01:00Easter<div class="MsoNormal">
Why, I wondered, was trying to decide upon clothes to bring
for three days at a friend’s parents so extraordinarily difficult? Then I
realized: I still pack like I’m going to binge.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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It’s been more than 10 months since my last binge, and yet
still packing isn’t just a question of weather – incredibly variable this time
of year, particularly in the country – but of what might still fit and when. I
can easily bust out of clothes in a weekend, particularly at my current size, which,
by my estimates, is separated from the next one up by maybe half a stone. (Side
note: Why can there not be fewer pounds between sizes when you’re bigger and
probably most need the thrill of a smaller size to keep pushing forward?)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I talked myself out of bringing a bigger pair of jeans, but
I did bring a backup outfit for Sunday, when the plan was to wear a fairly
unforgiving sweater dress. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I ate a little chocolate when it was offered, which is to
say, approximately five times a day. I had layer cake and crumble (with custard
and cream) and biscuits, also when they were offered. I didn’t exercise (apart from a little walk on Sunday).
Only once did I eat something sneakily: an extra mini egg with caramel. And
every day I could wear the outfit I planned. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Coming home yesterday I felt such a huge relief not to have
to be fighting the urge to keep bingeing (and likely losing) as I know I’d have
done if I’d been bingeing all weekend. I got back at lunchtime and felt
slightly too hungry to first go to the supermarket and get proper food. And
then I realized if I ate something hodge podge I’d spend the whole afternoon
regretting it and replaying it and wondering if it were enough or too much. And
so I went and got my prick-and-ping lasagna. My jeans felt a little bit tight,
but not panicky-tight.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I threw out the Easter chocolate I was pretty sure I
wouldn’t like (um, in my as-yet-unwritten book, “lime” and “caramel” should not
be in the same sentence). As I did laundry, I had a little fight with myself
about retrieving it from the bin. But I didn’t.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This morning, the urge to eat chocolate at every legal opportunity
(basically, for every snack and after every meal) lingers, but I know it will
pass. This, for me, is one of the biggest differences between life now and life
pre-June 4 – the near-total lack of panic when I want to eat off-piste or to
binge. It’s the ability to sit through the discomfort and to trust – really
trust – that it will end. It will return, of course – usually at incredibly
unwelcome times – but then, if I sit long enough, it will go again. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Three hundred seventeen days without a binge (or according
to my trusty app, 10 months, 1 week, six days, 23 hours and 30 minutes). <o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-85933672509256451042017-03-19T21:55:00.004+00:002017-03-20T23:30:48.383+00:00Stretch Marks<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">(Warning: This post
contains adult content. If you’re offended by the idea of consenting adults
engaging in casual sex, normally scheduled programming will resume… um, as soon
as I have something to say. Which I have struggled with of late.)<o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Did you pick up some disease in all the places you
traveled?” B wanted to know. B is a former journalist and now photographer I
met on Tinder, where I went – possibly ill-advisedly – after the unpleasant end
of a 3.5 month relationship last week. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Last night, B cooked me dinner, which sounds really nice
until I tell you that he did it because he didn’t want to pay for dinner out.
(He told me this, even going to so far as to go into the costs.) My plate
included half a baked potato. (“Do you really need a whole one?” he had asked
me while he was cooking. It was somewhat rhetoric, since he didn’t actually
have a whole potato for each of us. Anyway, I am not exactly the best judge of
portion sizes, not that he knew that.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you’re already wondering why I stayed one minute past dinner – let
alone ended up in bed with this man – you haven’t been 41 and single. And also
in need of some distraction and adventure.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So back to this morning in bed. Or maybe it was last night.
There was a lot of red wine involved.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After he made the disease comment, he mentioned that he
could do without catching whatever it was, and still I couldn’t tell where this
was going. And then – I can’t remember the exact wording of it – he mentioned
that I had a lot of “weird lines” on my body. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Stretch marks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought about how he had undone my entire life’s reading
of women’s magazines about how men are so excited to sleep with you that they
don’t notice things like that. I wish I’d had the presence of mind to say
something funny, but instead I looked at this man – who, let it be said, had a
bit of a stomach, had lied about his height, and was by no means a male model --
and said: “I lost a lot of weight.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh,” he said. “I thought maybe that was it but I didn’t
want you to be embarrassed.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Um, then why bring it up in the first place? And ask in such a bizarre manner?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
I’m actually not remotely embarrassed or even offended by
this – I just find it hilarious, which I think is as much a sign of recovery as
any other. Nine and a half months (288 days, to be exact) without a binge.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-65692542610146811282017-01-22T16:53:00.003+00:002017-01-22T23:16:08.842+00:00Peanut Butter Dreams<div class="MsoNormal">
One thing I looked forward to so much this morning I practically dreamed about it: peanut
butter on crumpets.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s what I’ve eaten for breakfast almost every day for the
past seven and a half months, except for a couple of days in Paris in September
– and the past three days, where I had room service at a five-star London
hotel. (I did not complain that the smoked salmon and eggs were, as I can hear
my grandmother saying, “ice cold,” but I was tempted to.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I spent most of the past three days with a (British) guy who
lives in Germany. I met him a couple of months ago, and have spent more of the
intervening time than I care to admit whatsapping him. Things are not going
according to the script in my head – when do they ever? – or really, in any way
that could be termed a forward direction. He’ll be here at least another three
days and I’m not at all sure I’ll see him again, which is not a great feeling.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m trying to remember that whatever happens, it was a
mostly fun three days, and – more to the point of this blog – it was nice to
just be able to eat and drink whatever without too much stress. (One of the
nights, for example, we went for pie and mash, because it’s something he misses
that he can’t get in Germany.) I also skipped the gym without fearing I would never go back again.<br />
<br />
It also occurred to me this morning that for the first time
in maybe as long as I can remember, I didn’t (and haven’t) automatically
assumed that the problem is my weight – that things would be different if I
were thinner. In a strange way, this is harder to deal with – to sit with –
than just assuming weight or my body is the problem. I don’t know what the
problem is, and so I can’t even try to fix it, even if I wanted to. (Leaving
aside the issue that the problem may not even be me.) My brain runs through
everything I said and did and wants to find fault with it – to find fault with
myself. This, I know, is what’s at the bottom of my eating disorder – that
food, as they say, is the symptom, not the disease. Eating more (or less, or
exercising more) won’t change this feeling. I hope eventually I figure out what
will.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-12012251537892688202017-01-12T12:44:00.003+00:002017-01-12T12:44:27.333+00:00Resolutions<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
wasn’t until New Year’s Eve – when someone else mentioned her resolutions --
that I realized it hadn’t occurred to me to make any. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
chunk of my resolutions usually relate to diet or exercise or weight. I don’t
want to mess with the first two, and so I can’t do anything about the last one.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Seven
months it’s been without bingeing, overexercising, or restricting. Seven months
in which I’ve eaten a lot more lasagna and – oddly, because I can eat anything
– a lot less cake than I ever could have predicted. Until last Saturday, when a
friend and I learned Britney Spears dance routines (my Christmas present to her
– it was, as she said repeatedly, her “dream”), I tried exactly zero new
workouts. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Some
days have been easy; others have been ridiculously difficult. For the past few
days I’ve been going through a hard patch, where – despite lasagna and peanut
butter and spaghetti Bolognese in the same day -- I feel like I’m starving
(something I’ve only felt very, very occasionally since the first month, when I
felt it constantly). I’m trying to remind myself it isn’t always like this,
though when I’m in the middle of it it’s hard to envision that it will shift.
I’m not asking for suggestions about what to do about it – I know I can eat
more, and sometimes I do. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
<i>that</i>, some days, makes things even harder. I know to dismiss the voice
that suggests bingeing is the answer, but I have to entertain – or at least
consider -- the voice that suggests more. I’ve started plenty of binges in the
past having just a little bit more of something, and then being unable to stop.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
is an app I use on my phone to log days without a binge, and it makes a
satisfying ping when you check in, which on hard days I do repeatedly. The ping
is like the gong in yoga, or the chimes at the end of a massage I once had at
an Indian spa. It brings me back to the present, back from spiraling out of
control from the fear that things will always be this hard and that I cannot do
this any more. And eventually – sometimes only with repeated check-ins within
hours – it passes. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Seven
months without a binge is longer than I ever thought it possible to go but not
long enough to forget what it was like being unable to get through a day. And
to be honest, I don’t want to forget. And so I will remember this: I would sit
in meetings listening to people talk who had done what I simply could not,
which is to put one foot in front of the other, one day at a time, and just <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> do the thing they really, really
wanted to do. Jealousy would well up. Also anger: Why could I not do this
thing? Why did one day seem so unbelievably long? (Frankly, when you want to
binge, the 10 seconds it can take a cashier to fumble with your change can seem
like a year too long.) <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
would vow to do it, maybe after just one more binge. And I couldn’t.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know why I can do it now or even really how. But I’m grateful.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-10195985612970389852016-11-28T12:58:00.001+00:002016-11-28T12:58:13.036+00:00Thanksgiving<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">For awhile there was a hashtag floating around on Twitter
called “Confess your unpopular opinion.” Here’s mine: I really don’t like
Thanksgiving.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I think I like it. Every year I think: Oh, it’s going to be
fine. But it’s basically a national excuse to binge eat and (in New York, at
least) overexercise, and frankly, it’s often a reminder of what I don’t have.
My father’s father died on Thanksgiving morning when I was five – the table was
already set for guests. And my grandmother died the day after Thanksgiving six
years ago, after I’d overexercised (it was either two or three hours) then
binged so badly I passed out and didn’t call her on Thanksgiving – and I
usually called her every day. I never got to speak to her again.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought I might avoid Thanksgiving entirely this year, but
instead I had it twice – on Thursday and Saturday. The eating disordered voice
in my head found this stressful and difficult (especially with a trip to NYC
looming), but on the flip side – and in the past six months, I have gotten a
whole lot better at seeing the flip side – I have friends who care about me and
sometimes go to pretty great lengths to show it.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On Thursday the plan was just to go to an English friend’s
for dinner. I had eaten every meal except breakfast out for the previous week,
and was looking forward to a relatively safe dinner (friend is from treatment.)
But she surprised me by making the whole dinner, texting an American friend of
ours pictures to check things were turning out right. It was incredibly sweet
and thoughtful. (And yes, it turned out right, down to the cornbread, which is
not something we ever had at our Thanksgiving growing up, but which I love.)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Saturday a Scottish friend and her half-American housemate
threw a Thanksgiving dinner party. It was the first time I’ve done much
drinking in nearly six months, and I have to say, it did make things harder on
the food front. I struggled so hard to stick to one plate of food and one plate
of pudding – so much so that I left earlier than I might otherwise, in part
because the only way I could imagine staying would be consuming more. (Also: I
was tired.) Yesterday I felt terrible: Hungover, tired, depressed (you forget
when you haven’t drunk for awhile that alcohol is a depressant), and the
cravings were through the roof. I spent the whole day basically waiting for it
to be over, and it felt uncomfortably close to how I used to feel post-binge. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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But on the plus side: I had a plate of food and didn’t even
consider whether it was carbs or protein or fat – just food. I had a plate of
pudding, just like everyone else. And I didn’t overexercise and didn’t restrict
either before or after. I confess I thought about jumping on the scale to
monitor the damage, but I can’t, because I have nothing to compare it to.<o:p></o:p></div>
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177 days -- and boy am I grateful for them. <o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-65540744626903467322016-10-28T12:37:00.002+01:002016-10-28T12:38:07.176+01:00Anniversaries, Again<div class="MsoNormal">
Six years ago today I left London for New York. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You know how sometimes you feel peace after you make a
decision? That wasn’t one of those times. I had a feeling of impending doom
that crept in repeatedly, though I pushed it away. I exercised, I starved, I
binged, I worried about having the perfect handbag for my big new job. I
focused hard on all the details so I wouldn’t think about the big picture, like
the way I dictated my mother’s death notice over the phone to the New York
Times: Focusing on each word alone as I read, so I couldn’t think about the
sentences they formed and therefore wouldn’t cry.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t think I’d love the job but I didn’t think I’d hate
it the way I did. And New York became one big, long downward spiral. I keep
hearing a friend’s father’s advice when I was trying to make the decision about
London versus New York all those years ago: Whatever decision you make, <i>make</i>
it the right decision. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Was New York the wrong decision? Despite what I wrote above,
I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t think so. It brought me back here, for better
or for worse. There were some career-related things that may never have
happened. And nearly two years ago I found a writers group in Brooklyn – and
with it, a handful of friends -- that may well have been the best thing that
happened to me the whole time I lived there (and is one of the few things –
almost the only thing -- that really tugs at me when I think about not going
back.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m genuinely not quite sure what I’m going to do about
London versus New York. I’m starting to feel a bit betwixt and between, not
really belonging in either place – having been gone for so long from New York,
and then having had such a small, small world here with all this recovery
stuff. Last weekend was the first one where I thought about just leaving at the
end of December (the amount of time I’m definitely here for) and going back.
But that is old thinking. One bad weekend isn’t something to base a decision
on. We shall see.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
* * *<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yesterday I did something I haven’t done – or at least,
haven’t tried to do – for nearly five months now: I skipped my afternoon snack.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It seemed like a fairly small thing to do. I got busy, didn’t
eat it, and then it was 6.30 and I was having an earlyish (7 pm) dinner with
friends. So far, so good, right?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(evil laugh)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Reader, I was like a crazy person. We had only agreed to
meet at South Ken tube, not the restaurant, and I was just… controlling. (It
didn’t help that I’d also eaten lunch in a restaurant – 2 meals out in the same
day is still a bit of a challenge.) Quite focused on deciding the place to eat,
panicking at queues, frustrated when we were just chatting and chatting and no
waitress seemed to be appearing. And even when I finally asked if we could
order – I could feel myself getting farther and farther from the conversation –
I couldn’t settle. Nor could I when the food came. I felt frustrated, impatient
(or maybe that was with myself?)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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Lesson learned. I’m not doing that again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Day 146.<o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-56760210622345723082016-10-11T16:45:00.002+01:002016-10-11T16:45:31.121+01:00Family Drama<div class="MsoNormal">
Saturday night, I took my aunt and sister to Ottolenghi. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My aunt, whom longtime readers (all 1 or 2 of you!) may
remember has the same problem I do (though has chosen to handle it differently,
if she even acknowledges that she has it), suggested we order one of every
single thing that looked appealing. This being a tapas restaurant with a fairly
short menu, luckily this wasn’t quite as bad (or as much food) as it sounded.
(When told this, her response was: “Should we order more?”)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My sister looked for something to dip the lavash into and
sounded upset there wasn’t bread. We’d spent a lot of the day shopping for her;
as the mother of three small children, she rarely has time. It’s probably also
worth noting that she arrived in London exhausted from days of prepping things
to make it easy for her husband while she was away, and spent the entire trip stressing out about what to buy them all as presents.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When it came to dessert, which Aunt M doesn’t allow herself,
I ordered my favorite cake and my sister – at my aunt’s prodding -- ordered two
she wanted to try. Aunt M took a couple of teeny, tiny bites; my sister
complained that she couldn’t stop eating the two she ordered. (For the record,
I finished mine – it was a pretty big slice -- but didn’t feel any desire to
eat more.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sunday morning my sister and my aunt separately informed me that
last night, back at the hotel, my aunt asked her for the Hobnobs my sister had
bought.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Should I give them to you?” my sister asked. Aunt M nodded.
She ate some, along with some almonds my sister had brought for snacking,
because what she really wanted was the dessert she hadn’t allowed herself. That
morning Aunt M ordered oatmeal, but wouldn’t eat it because it because she
thought it tasted too good and so therefore had something in it she shouldn’t
be allowed to eat. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That afternoon we went to a pub for Sunday lunch. Aunt M
couldn’t get her Yorkshire pudding off her plate fast enough, putting it on
Friend Bearing Chocolate’s (anyone remember her?!) Portions were generous but
not enormous (certainly not by American standards), but all Aunt M could talk
about on the way home was how she was glad not to be going with my sister to a
friend’s house because she couldn’t face any more food. She didn’t mean because
she was too full; she meant because she didn’t think she could navigate it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m writing this while the two of them are at my
supercalifragimazing Pilates class, which is not in itself notable. What is
notable is that the two of them spent more than an hour at Pret on a beautiful
Saturday afternoon scrolling through class times and locations and working out
when they could go, and being quite willing to severely inconvenience
themselves (and me) or forgo other things just to do it. Like many of the other
things they did, I used to do it too, and watching them is alternately sad,
painful and frustrating (and I feel guilty that those are words I use to
describe a family visit.) The anxiety is radiating off of both of them like the
swirling mess around Pig-Pen in Charlie Brown. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now another day has passed and I’m finishing this up
exhausted, having gotten up at the crack of dawn to sign them into my gym for a
pre-plane workout while I dashed off to Ottolenghi to pick up some airport food
for them. (Plan foiled, as Ottolenghi had mostly breakfast pastry at that hour,
and the aunt watches carbs. I knew she wouldn’t want to face figuring out what
was a meal from the amazing-looking pieces of quiche and cakes I brought my
sister, so I ended up buying her a calorie-controlled lunch box from the gym
café, and she seemed grateful for it.) <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yesterday also included a meltdown from the aunt, the likes
of which I have never ever seen – crying and yelling on Kensington High Street.
And I am left stunned and reeling, not quite sure how much of it was my fault.
I won’t bore you with the whole description of what happened, but some of it
was food-related, and my behavior there wasn’t perfectly stellar, either. She
later bought me a cashmere sweater (!), which I have no way of knowing if is
some form of apology. All I know is that we were all on our forced-cheerful best
behavior last night, and I suspect there will be a hangover of sorts that
lingers for days now that they’re gone. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On the plus side, I’m on Day 129 – officially the longest
I’ve ever gone without bingeing, restricting, or overexercising. I’m beginning
to ask what it is I’m really afraid of or anxious about when I laser-focus on
worrying about food. And yet I’m not sure when is the point that I’ll feel more
confident about it; when my brain will stop thinking of it like a secret snow
day when someone cancels a meal on me, and I can go home and eat exactly how I
want. I guess all I can do is keep going until that day comes -- the day when I'm not counting days at all. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-41372585268088143802016-09-29T13:16:00.001+01:002016-09-29T13:16:01.548+01:00Anniversaries<div class="MsoNormal">
Facebook kicked up a memory I knew was sometime around now,
though I didn’t know the exact date.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was a friend’s bachelorette party three years ago, though
I’m the only one looking at the photo who also knows it’s the day I binged after
123 days of not bingeing, which is the longest I’ve ever managed since I
started counting.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t descend immediately into days of bingeing nonstop.
In fact, I don’t think in the past three years I ever got there, though the
frequency and intensity of the binges was soul-destroying. But after that binge
at the bachelorette party I binged again about three weeks later, I believe, and
– as is my pattern – the binges became more frequent from there. Things
spiraled downward until I made the decision to get some treatment earlier this
year. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I saw my counselor yesterday, and she was trying to convince
me that relapse is not the end of the world, and that even if I did, I don’t
have to fall as far as I did last time. Which I know. And yet I worry anyway. Now
that treatment is over, life is opening up and getting bigger, and events are
coming thick and fast. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I know that if I get to Day 124 this time all there is is
the possibility of getting to Day 125. This isn’t something I’m ever done with.
But I’d like to get there anyway. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Day 117. <o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-39663160446058168082016-09-13T09:49:00.002+01:002016-09-13T09:49:17.975+01:00Recovery<div class="MsoNormal">
Sunday morning I ran a 10k I was particularly anxious about.
I don’t run more than 45 minutes these days and I rarely run straight through –
usually I’m doing some sort of speed or hill work and there are plenty of walk
breaks. I also don’t run nearly as often as I used to, and despite small
improvements, my pace is only slightly faster than an anemic turtle. I’d just
agreed to run the race – a friend’s company’s charity run – on Wednesday, and I
only realized on Saturday night how small the field was (maybe 100 runners)
meaning there was a good possibility I could come in last.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Which I know would not be the end of the world as I know it,
but I wasn’t looking forward to a flashback to my school PE days (only without
the horribly itchy maroon shorts that were uncomfortably tight on me.)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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The run, which was two laps around Regents Park, turned out
to be glorious. It was a beautiful sunny day, and I was able to enjoy it, in
part because I don’t run so often that it feels like punishment. I suspect it also
helps that I’ve been eating carbs for weeks now (99 days on the day of the
race.) I think they may slightly have messed up either the timing or the
distance of the race, because somehow I finished in less than an hour, not
last. (Although not all that far off it – I believe I was 109 out of 127.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I picked up my goodie bag, the guy handed me a size
medium t-shirt without asking me my size. Bless.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went and met a friend for Sunday lunch, which included an
indifferent Yorkshire pudding I took a couple of bites of and left without
giving it much thought. I realized I wasn’t far from Ottolenghi, and that maybe
I could get my favorite cake – which I have not eaten all summer, for one
reason or another – for a snack. I debated calling to make sure they had it,
because some locations don’t (the one closest to me never does), and I knew I’d
feel slightly rage-y if this one didn’t. But I was also scared of eating the
cake, and told myself that if I walked over there and they didn’t have it it
was a sign I wasn’t meant to eat it that day.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On the 15-minute walk over I decided I didn’t really feel
like eating the cake, which – I know, I know! – I couldn’t decide if were the
actual truth or just fear of what might happen if I did. I decided I was eating
it if they had it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They did. I bought it, but my hands didn’t shake the way
they sometimes do when I buy things like it. It was 45 minutes before I got
home, and en route it didn’t feel like I was carrying a bomb. Nor did I feel
the need to eat it immediately, the way I often have in the past. I thought
briefly about whether I should try to only eat half, but I let it go.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got home and ate the cake maybe a little too fast, but
without panic. I didn’t cut back on dinner or on my evening snack. I didn’t
decide I needed to exercise more to compensate. I felt – and feel – curiously…
fine.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not every day is like that. But I’m hopeful if I keep going,
more will be.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Day 101. <o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-49765164563095422842016-09-02T12:12:00.001+01:002016-09-02T12:12:07.526+01:00Ninety Days<div class="MsoNormal">
Today is ninety days without a binge. I’ve been here before
– twice that I know of, and a couple of other times I’m sure of, before the
days I knew what a binge was and was only paying attention to how well I stuck
to a diet. But it feels different this time around, because I didn’t get to 90
days by restricting food, which is always how I’ve done it before.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s been a funny old summer. There are girls in treatment
with me – and I say girls because they’re in their late teens and early 20s –
who body check, patting their collarbones and their thighs. But I sometimes sit
in treatment pinching the tops of my thighs only to check that I am actually
here – actually doing this. It all feels unreal somehow, this little bubble so
far away from New York and even the London I used to know. I haven’t seen many
friends, I don’t often leave the general Earls Court/Notting Hill/High Street
Ken/South Ken area, and I’ve only been to a pub a couple of times, for dinner.
(As I mentioned, mine is a general addictions treatment program, so we are
randomly tested for alcohol and drugs – so I’ve had no booze for 90 days,
either.)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Did anyone read any of the other Noel Streatfeild shoes
books besides <i>Ballet Shoes</i>? I remember half a line from <i>Movie Shoes</i>, something
about how if regular days were beads on a string, the days in America (or maybe
it was on a film set) were… well, I can’t remember the rest of the sentence,
but the idea was that they were completely different. And that’s how I feel
about this summer. The above may sound bad and boring, but it’s actually been
kind of nice. I finish treatment in a week – I’m not fixed, I hasten to add –
and I’m a little scared about real life setting in again. I’ve fallen off the
map with regard to work, and I’m realizing also that I can’t work at the pace I
used to – at least not right now. I’m not so interested in the things I used to
write about, and am struggling to do a couple of assignments I pitched a few
months ago – it’s almost like they were pitched by another person. And I
haven’t worried about how long it’s been since I’ve been on anything resembling
a date and what that means for the rest of my life. But it’s all starting to
come flooding back.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Assuming there are any readers left, you may be wondering
what’s happened to my weight in all of this. Well, I am, too. I know I’ve lost
at least a little bit of weight, because a dress that was can’t-leave-the-house
tight is now wearable in public. I don’t get on a scale, though I’m
blind-weighed every week to check that I’m not bingeing or restricting. I’ve
found the desire to restrict goes up when the urge to binge goes down, and –
although it feels strange to say this on what was once a weight loss blog – I
sometimes struggle to eat all the food I’m supposed to. Which is not to say I
struggle to actually get it down. It’s just that some days I have to really
make myself eat all my snacks, instead of thinking, hmmm, if I could just skip
those for a few weeks maybe I could be a little thinner. In the restricting is
the roots of the bingeing, I know. I eat chocolate just about every day, but I
haven’t been as good as I should be about eating my two puddings a week. I
know. I know. It doesn’t sound like it should be difficult. But the desire to
lose weight is still very, very strong, particularly so lately. I don’t know
why – maybe because it’s still so much work to stick to a food plan that it
feels like I should get to lose weight out of the deal, or maybe it’s because
there’s still an idea in my head that the people who do know what I’ve been
doing here will wonder why I’m not thinner. <o:p></o:p></div>
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But going back to the 90 days: The thing I’ve always
struggled with in terms of counting is the idea that nothing happens. That your
only reward for getting to 90 days is the chance to hit 91. I like to finish
things, and the idea that recovery is an item on a to-do list that reappears
every day is hard to, well, stomach. The most days I’ve ever had (in all the
years I’ve counted) is 123; at least for now it’s going to have to be enough to
work to surpass that. And then, who knows? <o:p></o:p></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4743870941320473465.post-62834413233014541212016-07-21T11:59:00.000+01:002016-07-21T13:41:08.470+01:00Day 46<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "georgia";">“Have you lost loads of
weight?” the <a href="http://www.heartcore.co.uk/">Heartcore</a> instructor said. “I meant to ask you last week.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia";">I’ll take the compliment,
but I honestly have no idea (and suspect “loads of weight” is perhaps an
exaggeration, given the way my clothes fit, which is pretty similar to how they
fit when I got here.) I haven’t binged for 46 days now, but as I sadly know too
well, just not bingeing is not enough to lose weight. I debate getting on the
scale a lot of days, but I always end up deciding against it: First of all, I
have nothing to compare it to (haven’t weighed myself for a few years now), and
second of all, no matter what the number is, I’m 99 percent sure it would ruin
my day.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia";">I do know that despite the
required pudding-eating (yes, seriously – I’m supposed to eat it once or twice
a week and not cut back/exercise to compensate) I have lost a little bit of
weight. I get blind-weighed every week as part of the treatment (sometimes, randomly, by male assistants I haven't even met yet), and my
counselor told me last week the number has been gently going down. Of course finding that out made me immediately torn between
wanting to eat a pudding (because hey, I’ve earned it) and restrict to make the
weight peel off faster. Hmm, yes, I guess I do belong in treatment for an
eating disorder…<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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