| I love my body! |
[Apr. 28th, 2012|01:47 pm]
Fall Together
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Recovery is a scary thing. When my psychiatrist told me I hade an eating disorder, I cried, because I knew it meant that I had to gain weight. My bmi was about 17 and if I had my way, I would have lost and lost and lost until something horrible happened and I told her that.
Since I've been medicated (I have Bipolar I) and in therapy, I've feel better about myself. I did freak out because I gained 10 pounds in a month. Some of it was period bloat, and some of it was due to really bad food choices, like going out to eat constantly. Then I found out I have osteoarthitis in my knee + hypermobility, causing horrific, constant knee pain. I gave up on exercising for a while. Recently, I found that walking and pilates is okay, and if my knee hurts, I take a rest or cut my routine short. I use Walk Away The Pounds. You can choose to walk in place for 1-4 miles. It only takes 15 minutes for the one mile "walk", and it doesn't hurt my knees one bit.
Between doing that, pilates, and short ab workouts, my body has changed a lot. My problem area is my butt. However, my butt is much, much fimer. I'm starting to get oblique definition in my abs, and lower back dimples, which I've never had before.
Also, I can eat loads more food and still stay the same. On top of my usual food, I had two huge bowls of mac and cheese (practically the whole box), two big, double chocolate chip cookies and a good amount of Goldfish crackers. Guess what? I didn't gain! That's such an improvement, as I only used to eat around 450 calories a day.
I'm still a size four (women)/size seven (junior clothing). The shorts that I wore when I was 112-115 lbs? They fit perfectly. Didn't think I'd be able to wear them. Jeans actually look good on me for once, they're not baggy anymore.
I am not cured. I do have bad days. I have ED thoughts and the temptation to starve to lose a little weight, but it comes at a horrible, emotional toll. I still see myself bigger than I really am and I don't think I'll ever be able to see myself as normal, and I do want my weight to be at the low end of normal. For me, that's 120 lbs, a bmi of 18.8. I will not go any lower than that, I don't feel the need to. I do have a super small frame. I can touch my pinky and my thumb together around my wrist, with some space to spare. If I had a larger frame, I'd probably be around 125-130 lbs.
I didn't think I would ever be happy with myself. I thought happiness = starvation. I was very resistant with eating more and gaining weight, especially on Seroquel, which is known for weight gain. When people say "it gets better", I thought it was a big fat lie and that I would be wrapped up in my ED forever. I asked my psychiatrist if it's even possible to totally recover, as I know ED's have a high relapse rate. She said she has had patients who have 100% recovered. She told me that she didn't doubt that I could. She said I would.
Right know, I would say I am 80/20. 80 percent positive, 20 percent negative when it comes to my body image. Before, it was something like 10/90. As I have OCD, I saw everything as flawed. But that's not the case, it's just my mind playing tricks on me.
Anyways, for those who think that it's not possible to recover, that weight gain means never fitting into your clothes again, that you'll be fat because you're eating more: it's NOT true. You know what eating regularly and exercising does? It enables you to eat more and stay at a stable weight. Yes, you will gain initially. Like I said, I gained ten pounds in a month and thought recovery was bullshit at first. But that weight gain goes to restoring muscles, organs, and feeds your brain. It does stabilize and then you'll find that maintaning weight is easy after a while.
Basically what I am saying is this: don't be afraid, and start living.
I hope that in seven years, I can say I've fully recovered. |
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