Throw In A Little Perspective and I'm Good To Go...

Firstly- a HUGE thank you for yesterday's comments. I am continuously amazed by how supportive the blogging community is. I am so glad that the group I started on Facebook has had such a great response! I've also sent out some emails to various mental health organisations who specifically deal with suicide prevention about how I can get involved. It feels a little hypocritical of me to want to give out advice/help to others, but on the other hand, I find it most helpful hearing from people who have 'been there' so maybe it's okay that I am not 100% recovered yet.

Onto today. I am still fighting off this cold- I hate being sick. I didn't go to work and have spent much of the last 2 days sitting on the sofa drinking cups of tea, ploughing through boxes of Kleenex. I usually do a fair amount of exercise and my activity level has plummeted yesterday and today. I *know* that the more I rest, the sooner I'll feel better and be able to get back to my usual routine with exercise and work, but it's frustrating nonetheless. I sat for an hour yesterday going back and forth in my head about whether to just have half of my planned snack since I hadn't moved around much. This is nuts. Whether I have half or the whole snack is NOT a big deal. This is just a few days in the grand scheme of a lifetime. Even if I am not exercising in the conventional sense of the word, my body clearly needs fuel to fight off this bug. My brain still needs fuel to think. My organs still need fuel to do their regular job, on top of whatever extra is required to heal from this cold.

I don't know why this feels like such a huge decision to be making. It was a damn Clif bar. I eat them all the time. It's JUST FOOD. It isn't an entire pizza buffet, it's not that I will never go for a walk again...it's a few days when I have to focus more on getting my physical health back rather than on being productive/active. In fact, I should probably use this cold as reinforcement for why i want my immune system to be as strong as possible. But where is the logic in anorexia?.. It's times like this when I really miss being in hospital- someone standing there taking that choice away from me, giving me 'permission' to eat. That's all I ever really WANTED- permission to look after myself because if it came from somebody else, I didn't need to feel guilty about it. I didn't need to decide whether I deserved it or was worthy of care- the choice was made for me. It's been the same with losing weight- I wait for someone else to step in and stop me, because to stop myself from hurtling down a path of self-destruction would imply that I CARE about myself. I starve/punish myself because I imagine that's what other people think I deserve. I want to start treating myself the way I *want* to be treated by others- with compassion and understanding.

I'm starting to see that I DO deserve to be nourished and healthy. I'm starting to realise that the voice telling me I don't need/deserve to eat is not really 'me'. I don't NEED a nurse or a doctor or a court order to force me to eat: I choose to give my body the nourishment it needs in order to thrive because I am starting to believe that there is a real life out there for me where I can be doing useful and meaningful things, living with purpose and enjoying the world as it is. I don't need to hide behind the walls of anorexia anymore. There's no glamour or glory in anorexia, and I am finally starting to see beyond the walls around me, and seeing the world in colours again...a world I want to be a part of, and WILL be a part of as long as I believe that it has a place for me.

I just need to remember a few things...

• my body needs fuel to LIVE LIFE to the fullest whether I am hiking or sleeping- all require energy
• a hundred calories here or there, in the grand scheme of things, makes very little difference: it takes quite a shift in either direction, over more than a few days to have any effect on weight
• this is a good chance for me to test out if I CAN cut back on exercise and see that I don't need to do quite as much as I force myself to
• I want to RECOVER, and that means recognising what is anorexia's voice and what is my own. I *know* I should eat the same amount because I'm still working up towards an adequate intake for my body right now and cutting back on exercise whilst I am sick is probably a good thing for me
• the more I rest/eat properly, the sooner I'll be back to my usual routine
• this is an opportunity to IGNORE anorexia's whispers and do what I know is the right thing to do, even if it does feel 'wrong'.... I know it's not *me* who thinks it's 'wrong'/bad. It's just a snack. How can 1 snack somehow make me a different person inside OR out? It's a BAR. Not some scary evil body-maiming beast. In fact, it looks pretty sweet and innocent...

...and it WAS delicious.

Rock on.