You know what? I’m doing well. I actually like my job now, I haven’t cut in more than a month, and I’m getting better with eating. It’s still a struggle but I am doing better. I might end up ok after all. 

 

Sigh. Long time no post. Right now I can’t sleep so I’m blogging. Lost count of the sheep. Do shepherds sleep very well? Probably.

I’m tired of weight being an issue. I’m tired of hating my appearance and assuming that people look down on me for being short and chubby. I’m tired of eating less than most people but looking plumper than average. I’m tired of caring. 

My depression hasn’t been as bad because I changed meds and this new one is pretty helpful. Unfortunately it increased my appetite and I have been eating more. Since I’m not used to eating this much, I don’t know how to handle that kind of appetite and I’ve taken to eating candy. What? I used to never eat candy. I’m embarrassed about it and I want to stop. I used to weigh myself every day but now I’m afraid to. 

But in general I’ve been doing fine. I love my pretty princess puppy and she’s short and chubby too like me, but everyone says she’s beautiful when I take her for walks. She’s so funny and quirky and affectionate. Sometimes it sounds like she’s talking when she yawns. 

Pretty princess puppy loves to eat. She eats everything she can, including dirt. The other day we walked on a bridge that was a little icy and someone had put down some rock salt for a little traction. It was so hard to keep puppy from licking the bridge. Then I let her go swimming in the cold, cold water. I was a little hesitant about letting her go in since it was so cold, but she was dying to swim and she didn’t seem to mind at all. 

I have such a long day tomorrow and so much to do and obligations and I am so scared I won’t sleep at all. Why? Why? Why? I need to tell myself that it’s ok, that I’ll survive, that the day might be hard but worrying about it now is probably more painful than any one moment during the day tomorrow.  I should probably get off the computer because they say that staring at illuminated pixels keeps you awake.  But my laptop is my friend at night, it’s sad but it’s true. It’s a strange bedfellow but I guess there have been stranger ones in the past, like men. Whatever. I have a fantasy about running away. The thing is though that at age 26, it’s just called moving, not running away. SIgh. 

Blogs and Dogs and Appetites

My last entry was a two-parter: first about a tender dream I had about my old dog I lost two years ago, and then about my usual self-negativity/drivel.

Nicole wrote:

i now feel connected to you. the eating disorder relationship didn’t do it. the dog did. i’m so sorry that you lost your old man.

I’m not surprised. When I write about my eating disorder and I go on and on about how awful I am in this way and in that, I am only showing one side of myself. It’s not a dishonest thing.  It’s very real, and that part of me is always there wherever I am. However, it’s just a small part of who I am, and the rest of me doesn’t usually show up on the blog.

I created this blog to be an outlet for the the most abhorrent parts of myself. The parts of me that are fluffy and funny and love dogs ! and music and my other interests… they don’t need a blog, because I live them.

I would like to post more about dogs because they are a very real part of my recovery. When I try to envision a long life, dogs come to mind sooner than a life partner. I don’t know what that says about me or my past partners but it does say that I connect with dogs.

One thing: I am very careful not to let my real identity leak out. I am a member of a community and I interact with the public in my job. I can’t have this site associated with my name, image, or anything.  I guess I’m always afraid that if I say too many personal things, someone might put the pieces together. Not that it would happen, but I’m afraid of someone figuring out [breed of dog]+[ED treatment this month to that month]+[current line of work]+[whatever other stuff I've said on this blog]=Stiny’s real identity.

Then I would delete the blog, furiously work on denying its existence, my own existence, and then I would run away. Except that when you are over 21 and you run away, they just call that moving.

I did run away once when I was 12, and I did run with my dog, “Old Man.” He and I were both young then. I didn’t plan it well. It was summer and that day we actually fell asleep in the woods. I didn’t bring food for either of us. So I went home at his dinner time.

If I were to “run away” now, I would have to leave my current dog, who I will call here “Pretty Princess,” at home. I live with my parents and she is technically theirs. More about Pretty Princess another time.

 

Dog/ doing ok generally

My old dog who has been dead nearly 2 years was with me today. I dreamed he was sleeping in my arms (100 lb dog!) and it was so sad to wake up. But I felt him all day, he was with me. I can feel him somewhere in my chest, warming me, it’s a heavy feeling, but I’m so lucky to have had such a deep connection with anyone, even if he was a dog. RIP old man.

I do have  a new dog and she’ great but almost too great. She’s cuter, has a better pedigree and is something of an entitled princess. Old man was a blue collar puppy mill drop out just loving me despite his horrible first year of life before he came to live with me when I was twelve. How many times did I choose to stay alive because I wanted to continue my connection to old man? (not his real name!)  I miss you old man. And young princess labrador perfection will never replace you, salt of the earth, flawed, blind snuggler. I love you and always will. I don’t believe in heaven. (I don’t believe in anything I don’t observe) but that doesn’t mean I can’t fanticize about beign reunited when I die.  Old man, will you be waiting for me, slapping me with your fat tail, jumping on me like a bad boy?

Im doing ok generally, work is goign amazingly well. I still hate my body, I want to be thinner even though I feel scorn and disdain for skinnier people. I want that kind of scorn and disdain and envy. Because there’s always a litle admiration mixed in, or so I imagine.

I’ve been generally eating almost enough but Im’ taking a break today and doing a mini-fast, I guess to see if I still have the discipline. My dietician told me that she hopes I choose health.  The subtext as I perceived it was that I had to choose health over any hopes of not being fat. Why would I chose health? When have I ever chosen health? I get pleasure out of disfiguring my body. I have a permanent scar from a serious burn more than a year ago taht will last me my whole life. I love drugs. Why would I chose health over lookng hot? It’s not so much taht I want to look hot as that I want to inspire jealousy in other women. What else do they have to be jealous about me for? I’m pathetic, poor, socially inept. I have sex ONE TIME in 2011 and I get a pregnancy scare.

I love you old man and I miss you. Furry fiend.

old loveline call

Here’s something fun about having an anonymous blog: I can finally brag that I got on the air on the show “Loveline” in 2005. The actual content of my call was embarrassing, so the next day when I wanted to tell everyone I saw, “Hey, I was on Loveline last night!” I had to temper myself because surely they would want to know why I had called.

Right now I’m looking through an internet loveline archive for the show when I called. I know it was cold, either Feb or early March, and I don’t think there was a guest. I was the second caller and I told them my name was “Vicky.” My question and their answer weren’t that funny, but after the conversation was over, I told them to “have a good night,” and they talked for about 10 minutes about how that was nice of me to say, and that none of their callers are ever nice. Then their tone changed and they started saying things like, nice people are just putting it on, and we hate nice people! We’re on to you! It was funny and I felt loved by two men in California that I had listened to most nights since 1998…

It’s crazy that that radio show got me through so many hard times. I really dislike a lot of the television work that the hosts in 2005 are doing now, but I loved them on the radio, and I’m also really grateful for how much I learned about safe sex, psychology, and real information about drugs, addiction, etc. I certainly didn’t learn that stuff in school or at home. Any other (old) loveline fans out there? I tried listening after the host change in late 2005 but it was never the same…

where does death fit in to life?

Today I said goodbye to someone close to me–not a death, just a departure–and I got scared. What if I never see her again? What if today was the last time she and I ever connected, after decades of love?

My anxiety was a small part about her getting on a plane, what if something were to happen to her? But a larger part of my anxiety was about how often I think about death being an option for me, and wishing it upon myself. What if I die before I see her again? That would make today the end of our friendship, sisterhood.

I cried and then tried to distract myself by doing other things, only to find out a few minutes later that someone I knew from ED treatment died over the weekend.

Not someone I had stayed in touch with besides being facebook friends, but someone I had felt close to at one point, and someone I did care about. It’s so shocking when someone’s really gone. I want to swear, yes, she was alive, I saw her, this can’t be. I think she is more peaceful now probably, but it’s so sad to me that she never found peace in life. Is that how I will turn out? Making a tragedy out of my family and my sisterhood? Will my facebook wall be full of RIPs and “sweet dreams, angel?” Can I stipulate before I die that nobody call me “angel” on my facebook wall?

Death has been a character in my life today, and I don’t know what to make of him. In some ways he beckons, I want what she has now (except for all the facebook wishes) but in other ways I want to run in the other direction and never die and dwell in this earth pergatory and be close with my grotesque relations forever.

New year, same old me

Happy new year, weblings, warlocks, and wildebeests.

This year brings with it the promise of, well, more of the same, I guess.  I take it back.  I have grown a lot lately and I’m continuing to grow.  I stand up to the people around me now, at least sometimes.  I can see where things are not always my fault.  I really do have a talented therapist now, and I am really grateful for that.  We talk about my deep-seated issues and we’re addressing them too.

Sometimes, as in most of the time, I leave out details about my “acting out,” though.  I’m embarrassed, frankly.  I’ve established, on my own, after being told by other people, that restricting food as much as I like to, to feel like an ascetic, to feel deprived, to get super skinny, doesn’t work for me.  It makes me feel awful and I stop losing weight because my metabolism stops.

Basically, my metabolism has an “off” button and I am pressing it.  Because I like to.   I love eating, but more than loving eating, I love depriving myself.

There’s that, and there’s the self-injury.  That’s embarrassing too for me.  Google “self-injury” and look at what comes up.  So much of it is about teens and adolescents.  I’m going-on-almost-thirty.  It is so not cute on me.   But it is such a drug for me.  Like on Monday, when I totally went on an acting out extravaganza (fasted/self-injured).  I got so excited about buying a new sharp toy to play with that I tried it out in the car in the parking lot!  I couldn’t wait to bring it home.  That’s bad, right!  I’m like a junkie shooting up in my dealer’s driveway.  I should have just done the deed in the aisle of the store.

All this is to say, I wish I had never gotten into self injury because it seems like it is a lifelong problem for me.  When I was a teen I assumed I would “grow out of it.”  If I haven’t by now, how do I know I will?

When I try to think about eating disorders and self injury objectively, it’s hard to wrap my mind around them.  They really are the definition of perverse- getting pleasure out of harm.