When "Quitting" Is A Good Thing

• when you realise that what you are doing has started to hurt more than help
• when the passion has died and doesn't seem to be coming back
• when it feels more compulsive than enjoyable
• when it doesn't interest you anymore
• when it starts to lose meaning and stops making sense
• when it's taking up more energy and time than it warrants
• when it starts to feel out of your own hands
• when you realise it's taking you further and further from where you want to be going
• when it's causing sleepless nights and restless days
• when the "get up and go" feeling...got up and went
• when you face it with dread rather than hope
• when you reach limits that aren't possible to break through
• when no matter how hard you try, you realise there isn't anything more you can do
• when your health and happiness becomes compromised
• when it becomes a 24/7 obsession rather than a pleasant past time
• when you worry more about what people are thinking rather than staying true to yourself
• when holding on is more painful than letting go

This isn't related to anything in particular right now, just some thoughts/ideas that have been bouncing around my head- more so lately as 'life' has gotten busier and my priorities are being assessed (and reassessed!). I'm trying to prise things apart and figure out what is 1) important, 2) enjoyable and 3) what is taking up my attention/focus right now that is okay to let go of. I hate the idea of "quitting"- I like to think I can juggle a zillion things at once and somehow keep everything balanced in a nice pie-chart format. That's not working out very well so I am working on accepting that sometimes there are things that I need to just let go. My dad calls this a "strategical retreat"- cutting your losses and backing out whilst you can. I still see it as 'quitting' and prefer to stick with it and hope that things work out.

What are your thoughts on giving up/quitting if it's something that isn't working for you anymore? Do you find it easy to do?

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day , to make you like everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight."

- E. Cummings

************

The good stuff...

I made the BEST breakfast this morning, featuring this bar that Aisha sent me:

I cooked up some oats and swirled them together with plain fromage frais and frozen blueberries and crumbled a chunk of the bar on top.

The bar was amazing! Such a great oatmeal topping, especially with the blueberries and yogurt. Why have I waited so long to try the coconut and almond combinations I've seen on so many blogs?! (note to self: copy more bloggers- these guys have GREAT taste!) I am rapidly falling in love with the hot oat/cold yogurt bowls!

I've had this sitting in my fridge for ages and have been looking forward to trying it since it's so popular amongst bloggers.

I REALLY wanted to like it. Ccinnamon is one of my all-time favourite spices and I love the short ingredients list (if something has a list that I can read straight through without needing to stop for a break, I LIKE it), but the flavour was strange...spicy, sweet and not what I was expecting. Not a bad thing since I can't get these bars easily and am glad I don't need to add it to my list of stuff to stock up. I do find it weird how I can tolerate such high levels of artificial sweeteners, but I find Larabars INCREDIBLY sweet. Anyone else find this? Or am I just weird? Heh... Does anyone else keep their Lara bars in the fridge?

Hope everyone's weekend is off to a great start!

Sounds Of Silence

Today has been a very strange day. Not because anything particularly out of the ordinary has happened, quite the opposite- today has been a typical weekday for me. Strange because I am feeling lazy. Not 'lazy' as in an "I can't be bothered to do anything" way, but as in an "I can't be bothered to think about this right now" way.

Every time my usual anxieties and worries have barged into my brain, they have been met with an almost reflex reaction of, "I'm not GOING there today". Thoughts about food, weight, worrying about stuff that I don't actually NEED to worry about right now have been flying at me in their usual fashion, but I have had no desire to even consider them. The things that would usually irritate me or stress me out, I have shoved violently aside. "I don't have the energy for this crap right now".

I don't know if I am tired, or if something in my brain has actually shifted, or if this is too good to be true, but it's been so peaceful. A silent stillness that feels more serene than the creepy stillness that feels more like the "calm before the storm". It's WEIRD, but it's nice.

I don't know why I am posting this. I'm not really saying anything- merely observing silence and that's not much to blog about. But maybe that's okay. Life isn't always filled with drama and laughter or crisis after crisis. Nor is it composed of victory after victory, trophies and awards piling up, mountains being conquered, Nobel prizes being won. Sometimes it's just the mundane business of doing what needs done, going through motions with not much thought/feeling behind it. Just getting on with this living business that people rate so highly (lol)- I guess as long as there are peaks and troughs in between the periods of quiet, it all balances out into some hodge-podge picture of "normality"?..

"This is the weird aftermath, when it is not exactly over, and yet you have given it up. You go back and forth in your head, often, about giving it up. It’s hard to understand, when you are sitting there in your chair, having breakfast or whatever, that giving it up is stronger than holding on, that “letting yourself go” could mean you have succeeded rather than failed. You eat your goddamn Cheerios and bicker with the bitch in your head that keeps telling you you’re fat and weak: Shut up, you say, I’m busy, leave me alone. When she leaves you alone, there’s a silence and a solitude that will take some getting used to. You will miss her sometimes... There is, in the end, the letting go."

- Marya Hornbacher

Pendulum Swings and Limbo

First of all, I want to say how much I appreciate your comments and kind thoughts on yesterday's post. I have been reading through them today sporadically, and it's been such a comfort to me to feel less alone with this.

Today has been a whirlwind of thoughts and feelings, from one extreme to the other. I know there is no "right" way to feel right now, but I am swamped with guilt around some of the thoughts I have been having right now.

One minute I am thinking, "I wish it was me". A horrible thing to admit to- I am NOT suicidal, but I guess there is a big part of me that just wants a way out of this. I don't want to say it's the "easy way out" because I don't think anyone, my amazing friend included, would take such a decision so lightly and without thought, but having it brought 'home' somehow makes it seem like... I don't know. Not an "option" per se, but a little less of "one of those things you read about in newspapers".

Then there is this other part of me that is SO grateful to not be in that place right now. I'm stuck and I'm struggling, but I'm looking for answers, solutions, ways forward, rather than embracing the dark shadows around me. I am grateful that I didn't succeed in my last suicide attempt, grateful that I *have* what I have- ie, a chance to make things better. I don't know how or when or what that will look like, but as long as I am alive and relatively well, I have more than a fighting chance of making a life for myself.

The moments of wishing it was me are fleeting but disturbing. More disturbing due to the sheer contrast between the other thoughts about using this to really throw myself headfirst into recovery and leave this behind. Using it as fuel to fight the fire that anorexia burns, using it as momentum to swing things around and start embracing life in all it's (albeit hideous at times) glory.

Torn between darkness and light, torn between wanting to stand up and say, "Enough- I am reclaiming my LIFE" and lying down just thinking about all the people this disease claims as it's own, and wondering why I should even entertain the notion that my future won't be the same.

It's scary to think about the statistics of eating disorders- the percentage that die, the percentage that struggle for the rest of their lives. It doesn't make a pretty picture to look at the charts and tables, the graphs and results, the data, the evidence, the research studies.

But you know what? F*** it. These studies only look at small pieces of evidence. YES, eating disorders kill. Either directly as a result of the behaviour, or more subtly by eroding the soul until suicide seems like the only viable option. And I don't believe it's just a choice of recovery/sickness. I really think people make the best choice they have, based on the options they see in front of them.

So what do I see?

I see a blank canvas. I have dreams of living back in New York one day. As soon as possible. It will always be where I call "home" and it's heartbreaking for me to not be there- but it's one of my main motivations for recovery and I'm not going to get dragged down by the fact that I am NOT there, because that blocks me from taking the steps to get there.

What else do I want?

I want freedom from my rituals and obsessions. I want to be spontaneous- to grab dinner somewhere just because I am hungry and need to eat on my way to do something. I want to have friends I can meet for brunch, go to comedy clubs with, go to bookstores with, wander around and take goofy photos with. I want to go to people's houses for dinner, take day trips to the beach. I want a regular-houred office job that I LIKE (or at least, not hate), but that doesn't define who *I* am. No more "Devil Wears Prada" scenarios, but something I feel good about doing, something that interests me, something that pays enough to not have to work 16 hour days and still barely cover my rent. I want to discover what it means to me to be close to someone, to share my time and thoughts with someone who is interested in me as more than a client/patient. Someone who makes me laugh but can take me seriously when I need them to. Someone who likes falling asleep at night watching "Scrubs" and looks forward to a big cup of hazelnut coffee in the morning. I want to go on bike rides on Sunday mornings, visit farmers markets, go to swing parks and night and rock back and forth looking at the stars. I want to go camping and fall over in muddy puddles, walk in the rain and gather round a campfire at night drinking hot chocolate.

I want so much more than what anorexia will ever give me, but ultimately it comes down to this: do I want all of that more than I want to be thin?

Yes. The problem I have is believing that by giving up the body/weight control, I'll have a chance at creating the life I want. It's NOT possible to have it both ways. To "not have the cake and not eat it either" :P There is this horrible limbo period at the start of recovery, when it feels as though you are giving up the "good" parts of the eating disorder, but yet to reap any of the benefits of recovery. They come later. Much later.

How do I hold onto the bigger dreams I have for my life, whilst living through the limbo?..

Growing Up

As much as I want the FREEDOM I talked about in yesterday's post, there is obviously something holding me back. I don't know quite what it is that makes it so difficult to give up my eating disorder, as much as I want to, but there must be SOME kind of pay-off to being sick.

Perhaps it's partly habit- in terms of eating, exercise, food choices, etc. I have been stuck in patterns for so long that breaking out of the pattern feels strange and almost unnecessary (ie, why would I eat more when I am comfortable with my current intake/why would I gain weight when I am *just* accepting of the size I am now?)

But I am pretty sure there is more.

Something about facing up to life, to myself, to the world, without hiding behind my behaviours or appearance is terrifying. Life confuses me. The unpredictability, the constant changes and need to adapt, the whirlwind of emotions in everyday life, never mind the extra turmoil that major events cause. Seemingly small stresses overwhelm me- a part-time job, going out for lunch, paying bills. I feel like I am still the same 12 year old I was when this all started. As if the hands of time stopped in my internal world, leaving my completely unable to "just deal".

Of course, restricting, overexercising, bouncing in and out of hospital, etc hasn't helped the situation. The less I eat, the more overwhelmed I get, the narrower my vision gets, the less capable I am of coping with day to day life.

I know this. And yet I continue to retreat into what is familiar and predictable as soon as life gets "too much" (by "too much", I mean I stop hiding and face up to the responsibilities of adulthood and realise, I don't know what the hell I am doing- I think a lot of people probably feel the same and make it up as they go along...at least, that's what I tell myself!)

There is also the very real fear of being just as screwed up emotionally/mentally at a healthier weight, but due to looking "normal", not getting any support/help with it. The times I HAVE been at a healthier weight have been when my mood swings have been out of control, my urges to self-harm have been through the roof, and barring the suicide attempt I made last year, all the others have been when, to the outside world, I looked "healthy".

Remaining in my anorexic body is, in a way, how I can communicate and say, "I'm not doing so well". But on the other hand, I cope with things so much better when I have the starvation-induced numbness. Because I don't feel so deeply. I don't have to think about what I want to do with my life, worry about the world/my place in it/how it all comes together because all I care about is food/eating/weight.

I want a bigger life? I need to buy some bigger jeans.

So do I *want* a bigger life? Yes. Without a doubt. I want the freedom back that I wrote about yesterday, I want to sparkle and shine and have a true purpose and meaning to my days beyond that false satisfaction and security that anorexia gives me.

It's just so complicated. I don't know HOW to actually change things. How to literally scrap the life I have created for myself where there are a zillion rules and regulations, habits and compulsions, rituals and obsessions. How to create a life worth living, how to deal with life the way people my age do. How to eat properly regardless of what size jeans I am wearing, how to exercise in an appropriate way, how to fill my time, how to be ME, in a world where I have experienced all but a few months of adulthood as a patient/anorexic/crazy person.

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."

Anais Nin

Hold On Tight

Usually after a morning like today, I'd spent the afternoon distracting myself by writing up meal plans, lists of foods, planning what/when to eat. I'd throw myself headfirst into any anorexic thoughts that passed my way and cling to the "comfort" of my eating disorder, as false as it may really be.

Today I listened to music, did some arty crafty things- stuff I don't usually do, but I wanted to make sure that I nurtured that voice inside me saying, "I'm not the same person I was".

Sounds cheesy when I write it out- I always hated therapists saying, "oh when you feel like XXX do YYY" because it felt so invalidating to the feelings/urges I had. Today, for whatever reason, it felt OKAY to just accept that I DID feel anxious, upset, scared, angry, hurt...

I think feelings are weird things. They are often triggered by something small or don't quite match up to actual experiences in the way you might expect. But they are THERE and they are VALID and most importantly, they pass. Nothing can or will last forever. As horrendous or wonderful as it might feel *right now*, there is no telling how or when it will change. Feelings aren't good or bad or right or wrong- they just are.


I'm posting this more for my own reference than anything else. It's so easy to get caught up in whirlwinds of anxiety/fear/anger/hurt/excitement/happiness, that you forget how, in time, things shift. In the meantime, all you can do is embrace whatever you have right then in that moment because it's our thoughts and feelings and experiences that make us who we are. We are ALL products of the people we've met, the things we have experienced, the lives we have lived. We can't go back and change things, do things differently, take back what has been said and done. We might never get apologies we are owed or "thank you"'s we deserve. But it's our choice how we use the *us* that stands today to shape our future. Easier said than done- believe me, I know. It doesn't feel like a choice when we feel pulled towards old habits, previous ways of dealing when the s*** hits the fan. But it is. Every second we make choices in how we act or think. And every second is a chance to do things differently from before.

So when the urges are overwhelming and every fibre in your being is pushing you into something you KNOW isn't going to take you any closer to the life you want to be living, remember that sometimes all you need to do is hold on, breathe and wait for the storm to pass.

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was
more painful than the risk it took to blossom."

-Nin, Anaise

Dear Anorexia

Dear Anorexia,

It has been fourteen years, almost to the day, that we first met. I’d seen you around before then- on TV, on the streets, at school: did you see me too? I remember the very first day we were properly introduced. It was a school day and in my rush, I had no time for my usual breakfast. When break-time rolled around, you appeared: “you don’t need a snack”, you said, “see how long you can go”.

From that moment on, we were inseparable. You were with me wherever I went, and at the time, I was thankful. You told me that my fears about school, friends, all the normal thing a 12 year old worries about, didn’t matter. You would make things okay again. I, naively, believed you. It wasn’t long before people started interfering- friends, family, teachers, doctors, “Ignore them,” you said. “They don’t understand”. I remember stopping going to my friend’s houses after school. I didn’t have time anymore. I stopped playing hockey because I was too tired. I stopped playing my harp because I was too distracted by your seductive whispering of rules I needed to obey. I remember one night, lying on the kitchen floor at my mom’s feet- crying and begging her to HELP me. I was so hungry, so tired, in so much pain. Suddenly you seemed more threatening than friendly, and I was scared. I remember crawling up the stairs to bed that night with you whispering soothing words to me: “It’s okay… I'm going to things better for you”.

The years that followed are a blur of one hospital to another. I never really went back to school. I vaguely remember people’s faces, seeing their lips moving. I remember just wishing you would GO AWAY. I remember running into your arms when I was locked up in hospital, with you showing me how to trick the nurses, fake my way out.

I gave up everything for you. My friends, my passions, my interests- most people my age are married, working, having fun. I can’t remember the last time I ate my own birthday cake, went a day where your voice wasn’t whispering in my head.

I remember how much louder your voice got when I tried to fight you- how angry you got. How the more I disobeyed you, the more you tormented me. “You are WRONG,” you said. “This isn’t the WAY- you are making things worse”. I remember not being able to see any way out of the walls you had built around me, and walking into the ER begging for help. I remember you and I went for a little walk that evening? Do you remember too? Do you remember telling me that I would NEVER break free from you, that you would NEVER leave me? I will never forget how the thought of a lifetime under your reign was enough for me to hide on a side-street and swallowed enough painkillers to kill a horse.

I listened as you told me I would never be able to go to college, never be able to hold down a job, but that it didn’t matter because at least I would be thin. I listened as you told me that no matter what, you would always be there for me.

Now it’s your turn to listen to me.

For fourteen years, it’s been “You And I” against what felt like, the world. For fourteen years you have cast shadows over every aspect of my existence. Everything from my clothes to my fridge has your signature all over them. I’ve lost count of the number of people who have cut me out of their lives, jobs I’ve had to leave, classes I’ve had to drop, hospitals I’ve been in.

When I felt overwhelmed with work or school- you were there. But don’t you see? You didn’t help. Losing weight wasn’t the magical answer you said it would be: it made everything worse. I’ve spent more of our relationship locked up in psychiatric units than I have being happy like you promised me. Being thin didn’t make me popular, successful, important. Losing weight might have been something I was “good” at, but you know what? It’s not so special. It’s a scientific fact that if you eat less you lose weight: it doesn’t make me a better person.

So why am I writing to you now? Because I’ve listened to you for long enough. Over half of my life has been shared with you and it’s time to cut my losses and move on- you have nothing to offer me anymore except more of the same crisis’, hospitals, therapy, isolation, despair and drama that the last fourteen years have been filled with.

I wanted so badly to be accepted and loved, and when you offered that, I JUMPED at the chance. Believe me, nobody is sorrier than I am that I didn’t find acceptance and love- I’m still looking for that, but I know now that it will never come from you. The time ha.s come for us to part our ways. My answers aren't in your hands

Yours, with regret,

ellie

Scrapping "Plan B"

Every time I start to make progress, I have these niggling thoughts in the back of my mind of restricting at some point in the future. It's really hard for me to grasp the idea of never starving myself again. It's always *there*- I can do my grocery shopping for a week and plan my meals out and it's all good, but I can't seem to get my head around the idea of carrying on for longer than a few days at a time.

I am going to be moving into my own place soon, and although I am 100% responsible for buying/preparing my meals at the moment, and usually eat by myself, my thoughts are drifting to what I will have the freedom to do once I am on my own.

There is a small part of me that doesn't want to let this go. The identity that I have, the support I get now, the body, the whole kit and caboodle. Of course, on many more levels I DESPISE my eating disorder and am desperate to be 100% free, but there is this grey in-between area where it would be so easy/is so tempting to slip backwards into the shadows of anorexia.

I had an appointment today about accommodation (the plan is to move into supported housing, where I'll have my own place but have someone come visit a few hours a week) and whilst I was on the bus there, I started making my "new" meal plan, shopping list, etc.

I can't seem to grasp the concept that I don't need to do this anymore.

I still buy a lot of diet products- I argue with myself in the store ("why are you buying that one just because it's X cals less than the one you really want? you don't NEED to be stressing over such a minimal amount"). I still weigh myself daily hoping that the number will be less than the day before. I feel like my brain is splitting in two- the part of me that is talking the talk and making big efforts to change the way I think and act, then the lingering habits and romanticised notions of losing more weight, packing in the idea of "recovery".

I don't know if it's because I am scared of what recovery would really mean, or if I don't believe it's possible for me or if it's simply (ha- not "simply") the nature of anorexia itself to dig it's claws in every opportunity it gets.

Does anyone else find themselves doing this?

I am a little apprehensive of posting this. I don't want this to be construed as me NOT wanting recovery- I guess I am just struggling to get to grips with giving up my eating disorder. For many reasons. I think I had kind of hoped that having made the decision to get well no matter WHAT it took, it would somehow be easier.

I have to admit that this train of thought was prompted by me weighing myself this morning and seeing a significant change from yesterday which completely freaked me out.

Moving right now is a REALLY good thing for me and would be a GREAT opportunity for me to start afresh with the progress I've made recently and the support I'll have, yet my mind immediately jumps to how I will have the freedom to let anorexia run riot with no intervention.

(Possibly partly the idea that I will be by myself for the most part, and it's easier to give into my thoughts/urges than admit how scared I am that I'm going to fall apart without any type of accountability).

Frustration, Fear, Freedom

I'm still in hospital, still unsure about what is happening, still swinging wildly between optimism and despair. Throwing myself into the mundane routine that life on a hospital ward provides and doing everything I can to avoid, avoid, avoid.

Avoid the emptiness. Avoid the pain. Avoid the anger, the hurt, the loneliness. Avoid the choices. Avoid the constant barrage of impulses, compulsions.

I want so much and yet so little. I'm seen as "weird" here (ha- being called "weird" by someone who spends more time talking to her coffee mug than she does to people is rather amusing). Weird because I don't WANT this life. I don't want to rely on other people for money, for help, to take care of me. I don't want to have a future that is filled with hospitals and pain and torment and rituals. I want so much more- well, not "more", just different. I want to feel useful. I want to feel cared for. I want to be content. I want to be earning enough money to get by, without wearing myself into the ground. I want stability. I want to sleep through the night, live through the day. I want to laugh, to have friends. I want to be back in New York. I want to go to bed each night feeling like I did something worthwhile that day, not praying that I don't wake up.

And yet it's so difficult. My rituals and compulsions are filling my time in hospital. The routine itself has changed slightly, but the underlying rigidity and obsession remains untouched. Just with the added stress of having to fit my craziness around the schedules of the most chaotic people I have come across. I want so much to be free from this. THAT was where the suicide attempt came in. I didn't see an alternative at that point. At this point. I still see no alternative that I haven't already tried.

I'm telling myself to hold on. Just hold on and hold on and hold on at some point, it may get easier. It's a fight. Every damn minute that passes is a struggle. It's a fight one part of me believes in, is determined to win. Then the other part that is tired of fighting without actually getting anywhere.

I WANT to move forward but I really don't know how. It's not as simple as just eating, or just gaining weight, or just taking a pill each morning/finding a new hobby/reciting affirmations. Anorexia consumes every minute of my life and there is no easy way THROUGH to a life without it. Easy way OUT, but that isn't going to take me to the place I want to be in 6/12/18 months time. I want so badly to be well. And yet I *need* this. It's like oxygen to me and I don't know if or how I could exist in this world without it.

I'm stuck.

Stuck between the happiness of moving forward and the heartache of letting go.

Choose Your Battles

At some point, I need to accept that some things are simply not worth fighting for. Give up, and move on. Whether it's a relationship, recovery, or life itself...at some stage, it's time to call it quits.

How do you accept that something is just not worth the hassle? It is painful to want something so badly that you are WILLING to stand up and fight for it, but maybe some things are just not worth the hassle.

I've talked before about my relationships- the will they/won't they. It doesn't happen like it does in movies- there isn't always a "happily ever after" ending in the real world. How do you know if it was right to begin with, and how do you know when to throw down the cards, kick back from the table and just.walk.away.

I seem to invest a lot of time and energy into things which in hindsight, aren't worth it. These people will never be who I want/need them to be. If it is constantly causing more pain than pleasure, maybe cutting my losses is the best decision I can make.

I don't want to.

I am really rather immature when it comes to my interactions with others. I want things a certain way. I want people I can relay on. People who follow through with what they say they will do, people who don't make me feel like I am worthless and horrible. I want people around me who choose to be around me- not because I pay them, because they feel sorry for me or guilty that I have thrown a fit because they cancelled our dinner date.

I want to fight for my relationships because I am scared of being alone. And yet time and time again, with the same people, I end up feeling hurt, angry and lonelier than if I had never gotten involved with them in the first place.

I'm tired of the games, the fighting, the cycle of making and breaking plans, adding and deleting the same people on Facebook. It all seems rather immature. I was like this when I was 12...doesn't seem to have changed. I am amazed that so many people I seem to get involved with are like this too.

Except they don't seem to think it's worth fighting for.

Is there any way of knowing if it's worth fighting for something? If you try, time and time again, only to get shot down, time and time again...at what point is it okay to finally give in and accept that it's over? Is it ever REALLY over? Or was it never there to begin with, and I just WANTED it there so badly I pretended it existed?

Holding On... Letting Go...

I'm wondering, at which point, holding on becomes more painful than letting go. My specific situation is irrelevant- this is applicable to so many things. Clinging to something, desperately wanting it to work out the way you envisioned it, unable to accept the reality that it's NOT working, and letting go (a "strategical retreat" as my dad calls it) is the only thing you have left to do.

So why is it so hard? I make it sound so easy, so simple. It's not working, cut your losses and try something different.

There has been so much time, energy and hope invested in this. There is so much meaning behind holding on/letting go. It's far from easy, far from simple. Oh-so-easy to say...so much harder to actually do.

I refuse to let go. On an intellectual level, I KNOW that this is never going to work. On an emotional level, I desperately need it to work. Or maybe I just believe that I need it to work? Maybe it was never right to begin with. Maybe I am walking down the wrong path altogether...or maybe a miracle will occur and suddenly everything will be.just.fine.

I don't know.

I'm facing lots of decisions right now. Well technically, that's not true. The decisions have been made. Some by myself (not by choice- I didn't/still don't see alternatives), and some have been dictated by others.

Where does this leave me? I feel lost. Heartbroken. Scared. Lonely.

I am so incredibly hurt by everything that's happened over the last few months in New York. I put on this facade that I am happy it didn't all end as badly as previous stays here, but really...this feels different. This isn't my doing. This isn't something I had control over. And that's what hurts the most. There has been so much rejection and pain and betrayal that I'm wondering if coming back was a mistake. I wasn't prepared for this. How could I be? I, perhaps naively, didn't see this coming.

I'm going home, once again, broken. Words fail me at times like this.

I'm hurting. I'm angry. I don't know how to deal with this. I'm scared of what lies ahead, and scared of what I've left behind. I'm scared of the can of worms that has been opened, and scared that things can never go back to how they were.

I just want someone, hell ANYONE, to tell me that it's going to be okay. Instead of the countless number of people that have said it's NOT okay. I am not okay. There's something wrong that they don't want to deal with. I need people right now. I need to hear that you know that I tried, that I pushed myself as hard as I could, and that maybe it wasn't the right thing at the right time.

Guys- I struggle with this more than I will ever tell you, more than you will ever know. I can completely understand that you don't know how to deal with it, or that it's not your problem. You're right. It's not. I'm sorry for all that I put you through, the things I ask of you, the things I need from you. I'm sorry that I'm not who you want me to be. I'm not who I want to be either. Trust me- whatever you think of me, or the negativity you throw my way...it's nothing I don't already do to myself. And I punch harder than you ever could.