Recovery Tumblr

I'm still going to post here, but the more small/mundane posts about this journey are going on my tumblr, enjoy!

I'm Going to Recover

Scars.

I have scars. Everyone does. But I have scars that are going to be a very permanent reminder of this period in my life. This time... it's not forever. But my scars are. I have them on my forearms and thigh, and they're going to fade, but not entirely. I hate that I have words etched into my skin that will be a permanent reminder of how f*ucked in the head I've been. I hate that I have a permanent mark to remind me, even on my best days, that I once hated myself so much.

But at the same time, they remind me that I'm stronger now than I was even weeks ago.

So, as much as I regret them, I am proud of my scars. The fact that they're scars, not cuts, reminds me just how far I've come.

1 Year Stronger

I was going to post this yesterday, but I couldn't bring myself to write about it yet.

Last year I was madly in love. I was in a relationship that felt absolutely perfect. But there were a few things wrong with it, details I won't go into here.

Basically, not through my choice or the person I was with's, that relationship ended. This was the spark that set off all the problems I have today.
That was May 17th last year.
So, yesterday, exactly 1 year ago this rollercoaster began.
In a way, I'm grateful for all of this happening - it's made me a stronger person, I'm closer with my family, I'm more aware of my emotions and I'm working on my perfectionism... but there's a little part of me that hates May 17th so damn much. If May 17th hadn't happened this time last year, none of this would have happened. I wouldn't have spent the better part of a month in hospital. I wouldn't have nearly died. I'd be okay. I hate this. I hate this day.

So yeah. That's my little rant over.

Calling her "Ana"

"Ana" and "Mia" were names I adopted for my ED when I was in hospital. The other girls talked about how "Ana" was laughing at them and taunting them, and I related.
Having an eating disorder is like having a little devil on your shoulder.

















"Ana" talks to me. She tells me I have no right to recover, that I never will, that she'll always be waiting, ready to starve me again when the opportunity arises. She laughs at me, taunts me, tells me I'm a fat, ugly, worthless bitch who'll never amount to anything. She tells me I have to be perfect, and assures me that as much as I try I'll never reach her impossible standards. But still, I try. When Ana fails and I eat, Mia slinks up, telling me to purge, to binge, to exercise, take laxatives. Do anything to get rid of the food.

But the crazy thing? Ana doesn't really exist. Neither does Mia. They're disorders, all in my head. They're my own creation, yet I have this abusive, love-hate relationship with them. With figments of my own mind.

But I'm just so stuck. It's awful, feeling trapped by a person that isn't even real. It's all me, it always has been. This disorder isn't some  evil entity on my shoulder. It's ME.

They tell me I have to separate myself from the disorder, but a part of me thinks that doing that is no better than trying to exorcise me. You can't take away a part of my own mind.

I'm so confused.

I wish I could make sense of this illness. I wish I could just let go of Ana and Mia.

Conquering a Fear Food

Okay, so on Sunday night I did something I haven't successfully done in over a year.
I ate pizza. Two whole slices. Fatty, cheesy, oily pizza.
I had a salad, some garlic bread and a sugar-free drink with it to bump up the calories a little, because two slices of pizza isn't enough food, but I ate pizza.
My ultimate fear food.
Pizza, pasta, cheese, potato, ice cream - they're my absolute scariest fear foods.

But I've conquered successfully pasta over the last few months, and I don't get too scared eating it anymore.
As for pizza, I never thought I'd get over that. Every time I've had it, I've purged it. I get scared just thinking about eating it. But I did it. Two whole slices of takeaway.

Some tips for conquering fear foods:
1. Have some non-scary food with it, like a big salad.
2. Eat smaller portions to start out with, and supplement the calories with something less scary.
3. Distract yourself while you're eating, music, TV, a game e.t.c takes your mind off it
4. Remind yourself that it's a food! Just a food, that normal people eat and enjoy, and that's it's okay to have it.

Remember everyone, you deserve food and life and recovery. <3

Admission no. 4

About a week ago, I was admitted to hospital for a fourth time.

I cut myself really badly at school, and my mum took me to the ER, and they admitted me to the psych ward for two nights. It was okay I guess. I calmed down, and they changed my medication, so by the time I went home I was feeling a lot better.
Hope you guys are doing good!

Music

I have all these songs that I associate with my time in hospital, and it's weird, I can't listen to them without bringing back the old feelings of being in hospital.
Like "Kissing You" by Miranda Cosgrove. There was this one boy on the unit who was OBSESSED with Miranda, and he used to go into the gym and blast her CD while he exercised. But I remember a few times (during my second and third admissions) me and sometimes some of the other ED girls would sneak into the gym while this boy was exercising, which we were totally not allowed to do, and exercise secretly. Now, every time I hear that song I feel really pumped up and rebellious, like doing something naughty.

Then there was the music I sang while I was there. There was a nurse, Suzy, who brought in a keyboard and guitar and she'd sit with me for hours and sing and play with me because she knew it took my mind off things. Still, the songs I sang with her, like Hallelujah and Let Her Go, make me want to cry, because when I hear them, all I can think of is the desolation I felt in those darkest moments in hospital when I most desperately wanted to go home.

I had my MP3 player with me during my admissions, and I used to listen to music almost constantly.

Even now, I have a playlist called "Shrinking Mind" that, chronologically, has songs that lead from the heartbreak that triggered my ED, to the depths of my illness, to a shining light of recovery in the end, that I know I haven't quite reached yet.

For the Girls who don't think they're beautiful.

I've met other anorexics during my time as an inpatient...
Some of them only in the early stages of this devastating disorder, others painfully ill.
But I'm posting this because I need them all to know that I love them, and that I'm so proud of those beautiful girls for trying even when every fiber of their being was telling them to give up.
So, to Georgia A, Georgia B, Ashlee, Anneliese, Zara, Brooke and Grace, never give up.
It'll get better. For all of us. And we all deserve food and life and recovery.
Ana doesn't have to be forever.
<3

Saturday - School work, fear foods and sadness.

Today was a pretty average Saturday. I got up and had breakfast, waited my allotted hour and a half, had a shower, went shopping, did some school work, ate lunch, slept, then went out to dinner and a movie with my mum.
But it's a bit different for me, I guess.
I panicked during shopping, everything was making me anxious and I felt really stressed and upset for no good reason. When I got home I cried because I didn't want to do my schoolwork.
These past few weeks I've actually been contemplating dropping out of school because I hate it so much. I don't want to try, I don't want to work. I want nothingness. Nothingness is the only thing that could possibly appeal to me right now.
But I pushed through the anxiety and step by step worked through with my dad exactly what I had to do for my legal assignment, and I got it done. It wasn't exactly fun, but I did it.
I was miserable and exhausted, so I went and had a sleep after lunch.

I went out with my mum this afternoon, we saw a movie, which was pretty good. But I have this weird thing when I'm in a room full of other people where I HAVE to burn more calories than anyone around me, so I jitter and fidget for the whole movie so that I know I'm burning more calories than anyone else in the room. My ED gets better by the day, but thoughts like this still kind of rule my life.
After that we went out for dinner.
I decided I wanted to do what normal people do - eat a normal meal. So I decided to face a food that has been really quite scary to me for almost a year now. I haven't chosen to eat this food of my own free will since this time last year. Pasta. I didn't get a creamy one, because I knew that would panic me, but I got a seafood (low calorie meat!) tomato-based-sauce pasta. And you want to know something? It was delicious! I ate it all, and actually really enjoyed it and thought it was very tasty. :D So I'm happy about that.
It was nice to just get to sit and talk and not think about school or my life or any of the things that are making me miserable. I didn't have to think about how awful I feel. I just got to be a normal person for a little while, and that was nice.

I'm off to bed now!
Goodnight. xx

My story.

So... I guess I should start by telling you my story.
This is me.

 

My name is Georgia, and my eating disorder began in June of 2013.

I dropped from 88kg to 68kg before I was diagnosed at the end of August.

By the time we got my diagnosis, though I wasn't underweight, I was nearly dead.

I was eating less than 200 calories a day, and dropping up to a kilo a day.

I was weak, my muscles ached with every movement and standing up or exerting myself was leaving me dizzy and close to blacking out. I was cutting myself almost every day, and felt miserable and exhausted day in day out. But I was losing weight, and that was all that mattered.

After a visit to the doctors, I was admitted to hospital. I was on a medical ward for two days, recovering, before being moved to the adolescent mental health ward, where I was on strict bed rest for another three days. I then stayed on that ward for a week, on a meal plan and bi-weekly weigh-ins and daily blood tests. I was doing well, and they released me. I was at home for less than two days, and I stopped eating again. I cut myself and was very suicidal. My parents took me back to the emergency room, but I begged them not to admit me, and I got taken home again. But from then on, I refused to eat more than a bite at each meal and snack time. Though I was eating more than I had been before, in a week and a half I dropped another 4 kilos. My parents took me to the emergency room again, and my blood sugar was 2.8 - I was lucky to be conscious. I was weak and exhausted, and tests showed that all of my organs, including my heart, were shutting down. They called it full autonomic dysfunction. I was maybe only days away from a massive heart attack, or falling into a hypoglycemic coma.

They admitted me straight away this time, and put me on a drip.

Still, I refused to eat. It was Thursday night.

They took me to the medical ward, where I was on bed rest and had nurses checking in on me every few minutes because I was a suicide risk.Friday afternoon, I had still not touched any of the food they'd given me, and so they put me on a naso-gastric feeding tube. That's a tube that goes down your nose, down your throat and into your stomach, where they can give you the liquid nutrition your body needs.

It hurt my throat badly, and for about a day I still wouldn't eat... but eventually, with the support of some amazing nurses, I started to try my meals. For a few days, most of them had to be topped up through my tube because I couldn't finish them in the allocated time limit, and every now and again I was still refusing, but I quickly learned that the supplement in the tube had more calories than the food they were giving me, and I began to eat more. They took my drip out, because my blood tests and daily weigh-ins were stabilising.

The only problem was, I was still throwing up most of my food, even with the tube in, I'd force myself to throw up, and sometimes have to shove the tube back down my own throat. What I did keep down wasn't being digested properly and I was swinging wildly between sever diarrhea and constipation, with constant nausea and bloating. Re-feeding was painful and unconfortable, and I was still weak.

I was on bed rest on the medical ward for a week before they released me to the mental health ward again. Just before I left, many of the amazing nurses I'd met hugged me and wished me well, and, best of all (!!!) they took out the damn tube!!!

It felt amazing to have that horrible piece of plastic out of my nose and throat, and I desperately hope that will never happen again. 

I moved to the adolescent mental health ward, and unlike the first time, there was another girl with an eating disorder. She was very underweight, though far taller than me, she weighed only 40kg. We talked and laughed and cried together, and I'd finally found someone who could relate to the pain of having 'ana' living in your head. I quickly made friends on the ward, and met up again with some people who'd been there a few weeks earlier during my first admission. I was off bed rest, and allowed to participate in activities like art and music therapy, and even cooking group! As any fellow anorexics would know, people with eating disorders LOVE to cook, though don't really love to eat the cooking! :P

A few days later, another two girls with eating disorders arrived. That made four of us, and we became close friends, and still are now. We understood each other in a way no one else could. We all sat together at meal times, supported by the nursing staff through every bite, and encouraging one another to keep eating. Though we didn't quite believe the words ourselves, we reminded each other that for us, food was medicine and was as vital to our bodies as chemotherapy drugs are to a cancer patient. We told each other through every mouthful and every tear that we were beautiful, that we weren't fat, that ana didn't need to control us, that we deserved food and life and recovery.

I was still throwing up some of my meals, but not all of them, I was on supervision for half an hour after meals, and I was making headway.

They decided after a few meetings to try me on some medication, fluoxetine (prozac is the brand name) for my depression, bulimia and self harm,  and a drug called olanzipine to help with the anxiety of eating, and my general anxiety about everything at that point.

A few days later, the staff made a drastic decision that the would later realise to be a huge mistake.

They decided, for reasons I still don't understand, to stop treating my eating disorder. I still believe that the only reason they didn't take my ED seriously enough to bother treating it was that I wasn't underweight. But whatever their reasoning, it all stopped. I didn't have to eat my meals, or get weighed. I had no meal support, or post-meal supervision.

I was conflicted over this. The disordered side, the little voice in my head I had come to name Ana, rejoiced. I didn't have to eat! I was still in hospital, but I could starve myself again!!

The other side of my cried and sobbed over this. Cried at the injustice of my life-threatening illness not being taken seriously. Cried, because I knew that Ana would win. I knew I'd stop eating, and there was a little part of me that was scared I was going to die.

And stop eating I did.

Completely. 

Not a bite of food and barely any water went in for four days. After a day and a half, I was back on bed rest because my vitals and blood tests had gone horribly bad, and I was weak and dizzy again. Psychologists talked to me, asked me why I wouldn't eat. Nurses told me I was being silly. One told me I didn't even have an eating disorder and I was wasting her time. But I did have an eating disorder, and I was fading fast. I lost another two kilos in those four days.

The staff caught on that I meant business, that my eating disorder was truly there and that it wasn't going to leave me just because I wasn't underweight yet. In fact, it was doing its darndest to make me underweight.

They tested my blood sugar and it was 2.7, again, I was lucky not to be comatose. They begged and pleaded with me until I drank some lemonade, and quickly put me back on eating disorder protocols - meal support, post-meal supervision and weekly weigh-ins. 

I'd been on the mental health ward for a week and a half now. I'd started going to the hospital school, and was even enjoying myself some of the time with the new friends I'd made. Most of the time though, I was miserable and just desperate to go home to my family. I had scars up and down my arms because I was scratching myself with my fingernails (which I had stopped biting because I was scared of the calories in them) and with a sharp badge I'd found in the pocket of a pair of jeans.

I was doing better though. I was eating of my own volition now, and though I was still throwing up and skipping some of my snacks, I was on the way to recovery.

I still had a lot to work through though. I was secretly exercising at every chance I got, and constantly jittering and fidgeting to burn calories. My hair was still falling out, and a fine layer of "peach-fuzz" hair, called lunago  still coated my skin, my body's attempt to keep warm. However my blood tests were coming good again, and my ECG (heart test thingy) and blood pressure were beginning to become more normal. My heart was no longer irregular or skipping beats.

A week later, I was discharged and said tearful goodbyes to my new friends.

But I was elated to be going home.

A few days after getting home though, my worst nightmare began. I found out my parents had a new regime for treating me. "The World Stops Until You Eat". No more could I refuse meals, no more could I skip even parts of meals. They would sit with me, for 12 hours if they had to, waiting for me to eat my meal.

And as much as I detested this treatment method, by-God it worked. I ate. I lost a little more weight, now weighing about 60kg. But I ate.

I even went on holidays for a week to the beach!

But all hell broke loose when I got back.

I'd upped my anti-depressants, but lowered my anxiety medication, and as a result I became acutely suicidal.

When I  got home, I refused to eat anything. I screamed and cried and hid in my room. I broke a new razor blade, and I cut my arms deeply.

I was rocking backward and forward and jittering and crying. I was begging my parents to let me die.

I'd never felt so horrifically bad in my life.

My parents, worried for my safety, took me back to the emergency room.

A kind doctor glued my cuts together - they were deep - and bandaged me up. They then admitted me in what's called a "crisis admission" to the mental health ward for a third time.

I was there for three days, and though I didn't eat much, I calmed down a lot, and got used to the new dosages of my medication. At least I was safe. I made even more new friends, most shockingly, my anorexic room mate Zara, who at the time of her admission, weighed just 28kg.

But I helped her through her meals, just like the ED girls had done during my last admission, and I even helped her to avoid being tube fed by encouraging her to eat.

After my discharge, I began to do a lot better. I stuck to my meal plan, and my weight stabilised at around 57kg, the least I'd weighed since I was about 9 years old.

Over the following months I became stronger and healthier, and though I still exercised more than I should, I was recovering.

But everything fell apart yet again in April 2014. My weight shot up (we later found out this was because of some serious hormone imbalances, I still wasn't getting my period) to around 60kg (or thereabouts, I haven't been told my weight in weeks because it's too scary for me) and though I was eating with relative ease now, I was (and still am) acutely depressed. I don't want to go to school, or try. The perfectionist side of me is being just awful and is telling me I'm fat and disgusting and worthless. No matter what I do, I can't escape the black hole of nothingness that is my life. I'm still convinced that as soon as I have to opportunity, I'll starve myself again. And if I can't be skinny, I want to be dead.

I've got an appointment with my treating team tomorrow, and they should begin to help me. But I've started cutting again, and meals get harder and harder by the day.

I don't know how much longer I can keep going like this, but I'm forcing myself to try.

It's hard.

But I have to do it. I don't have much of a choice. So. One day at a time. Meal by meal, bite by bite.

I will recover. In the end.

This blog is for me to post daily updates. I'll talk about my life, my feelings, my experiences as an inpatient, my weightloss journey and just general things about my life as a recovering (and struggling) anorexic.

You can follow me on WeHeartIt at http://weheartit.com/georgia_collings

Twitter at https://twitter.com/GeorgiaCollings

Instagram at http://instagram.com/georgiakc9#

If you ever want to talk, you can DM me on twitter, or email me at georgia.collings@hotmail.com. I'm happy to answer any questions and talk to anyone who needs help. I know what it's like. So please talk to me.

xx