Friday, December 7, 2012

Destination Recover(ed): Day 679

The scale is not your friend. It's not my friend, either. I'm going to share a little silliness that happened this week that had me off my rocker crazy-girl angry. Months and months ago I put my scale away and let Scarlett be in charge of my weight. I couldn't handle the temptation to step on the scale every day. Every time I went in to or walked by the bathroom the scale beckoned me. It drove me nuts. In my healthy mind I know that part of recovery includes the number on the scale going up. But the scale was causing such an emotional tornado for me. I wasn't happy if the number went up and I wasn't happy if the number went down. The scale never matched how I felt. Some days I would get on the scale expecting the number the be higher and it would be lower. That played to my healthy mind, making me angry and frustrated because I felt as if I was gaining weight. Other days I would get on the scale just to make sure I knew where I was and the number would be slightly higher, making me feel unready as if it was all moving too fast I didn't have time to prepare for this. Half a pound would tug at my heart strings. Wait! Slow down, I'm not ready to say goodbye yet! I began to realize that it didn't matter what the scale said. It doesn't. Logically I know that 3500 kcals is equal to one pound. That's 3500 kcals ON TOP of what your body uses to function and repair itself. I knew it was impossible to be gaining and losing based on what my intake and activity was. I knew it was just shifting weight, extra fluids, retaining water and losing water. But for some reason common sense flew out the window as soon as I stepped on the scale and suddenly the scale became God and whatever that number was became the spoken word. It's not healthy, I'm pretty sure we all know this. So I let Scarlett manage it, on ONE stipulation. I agreed to not worry about my weight as long as when we got to a certain number, she would tell me and we could plateau and hang out there for a while, redusce my intake to stay there. Giving me time to accept and emotionally prepare for the next steps forward. A number that got me out of medical danger, where we would have a little cushion so Sandy could start the "real" EMDR and I could medically and safely begin working on trauma. And I agreed that if I fell below Scarlett's stipulated number then she would have free range to up my intake further. Agreed. Agreed. The scale got shoved in the back of the linen closet, on it's side, wedged between a wooden crate and the wall. Out of sight, out of mind. This weekend my Mom and I tore the house apart decorating for Christmas. This house was a disaster as we replaced every day knicky knackies with Christmas lights and Snowmen and Santa figurines. The regular towels came down and the snowflake decorative towels went up. I even have ice skating penguins on my bathroom counter. Christmas linen came out of the closet and winter flannel went on the beds. In the process of all that my Mom (innocently/naively) sees the scale in the back of the closet and puts it back in the bathroom by the bathtub. My bathroom, by my bathtub. Do we all know where this is going ... ?? The scale did not lose it's allure sitting in the back of the closet. It wasn't dead, merely hibernating, and now it was awake again ... and hungry. So I fed it. That stupid lying dog. In the moments before I got on it I tried to prepare myself, coming up with a number in my head that I was ready to accept. A number that was higher than I was before I put the scale away, but clearly under the number Scarlett had promised to keep me at. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and stepped on the scale. I stood there for moment and then opened my eyes. Took another deep breath and looked down. Common sense should have told me to check and adjust the calibration before and even after I saw that number. That awful, terrible, terrifying, outrageous number. A number that was above where I was promised we would stop at. Here's how the eating disorder works ... It instantly discredited everything Scarlett had ever said. It screamed at me "I fucking TOLD YOU SO!" I felt betrayed. I could feel the rage at my throat, the back of my neck was seething hot. I went between sheer panic and rage. I was along with my eating disorder. I wanted to call Scarlett and scream at her but I knew my anger would overtake my ability to articulate anything but nonsense which would only anger me more. I wanted to throw it all out the window. I was DONE. I even allowed myself room for a higher number that I was willing to accept, but I was well above that. I was consulted about this, I was not prepared. God had spoken and I was NOT ok. I picked up the phone shaking and texted Scarlett:
Me: Scarlett. We kind of disheveled the house today decorating. That's generally how it works and then everything gets in it's place and we're decorated. Somehow the bathroom scale made it back out ...
Scarlett: Awe jeeze! You?
Me: Fucking shit Scarlett. Now, I know I should not have gotten on it, so I'm totally taking responisibily for that. But you fucking promised me! You fucking promised we'd stop at ##. What. The. Fuck? I don't even fucking know right now. AND I already took my ambien and I'm going to crash out. I'm so angry right now. I'm really sad. I don't know what to say other than I want to scream so bad. Don't even respond right now because I am so fucking angry right now. I'm angry at you. I'm angry at myself. I'm really angry at myself.
I didn't know what to do or what to think or how to feel. I just knew that I was angry and I needed her to know that I knew what was happenning. I knew she had lied to me. I knew she was tricking me and the game was up. I also knew that as soon as I said not to respond to me that she was going to respond, so I turned my phone off because it was just going to anger me further to read whatever she had to say. Before the Ambien kicked in I started crying. I didn't know what to do. My heart was trying to convince me to hook up to my feeding tube and go to bed, just keep everything the same until I can sort it out. My eating disorder said "What the fuck for?". I wanted to get up and start exercising like crazy, lose the weight, forget the Ensure, quit. I was having a tug of war. I didn't know what it all meant to me. This is what I wanted, right? I want recovery. I want to be done with this. But I wanted it on my terms under my control. I don't gain the weight unless I allow it to happen. It's my choice... And then the Ambien kicked in and quick as that, all was calm and quiet as I fell into my drug induced sleep. When I woke up in the morning, as dreamland faded away and the reality of the night before crept back in, the reality zinged the waterworks and a huge giant sigh. "Ohh, yeah ..." The anger had passed and I was left with sadness. I was Very, and this very was Sad. Very sad. I grabbed my phone and sure as shit, Scarlett had responded, but I sadness was a better platform for me to deal with this than anger.
Scarlett: Hahaha.... ## my ass! Awesome scale to make you feel so shitty, though. If only I could see ##.... I'd love for you to be that angry! I'd love for that to be true. But you stepped on an old dusty bathroom scale that could've popped up any number, it's the power you're giving to a piece of plastic. Let's wait to be angry until you weigh that much, not when a dusty old scale says it, deal? Whether you gave that old dusty piece of plastic all your power or not and saw that number I know it freaked you out and I'm sorry. I love you through all this. Oh, and you're not ## pounds, but I'll buy the pretend and sleep better knowing that day might come! I love you sweet Jessica. Night :)
Sleep put me in a better place to read and accept that. It would have just angered me further to read that at the time. Sleep allowed me to be a little more objective, a little more realistic a little less crazy. I got it. I took a scale that has been sitting on it's side in the back of a closet and stepped on it. Well no SHIT it popped up with crazy numbers. I didn't even checked to see if the needle was tarred out at zero. I still haven't. It's a fucking mind fuck. At that moment, I knew she was right. I knew my eating disorder puffed itself up in a huge huffy rage because it was threatened. It didn't change the fact that I freaked out though, and now I'm left with wondering WHY? Why would that number not be ok with me? It was less than 2 pounds over the number I agreed to in the first place. Why would it matter? It's in the direction I wanted go and quite frankly not far enough away from the "dying weight", the weight I was when I realized I was dying and I told Scarlett that I didn't want to die. The turn around point. Scarlett doesn't ever discuss my weight with me but for happenstance she let me know that I was only 6 pounds away from that turn point. 6 pounds away from dying. I would have thought that it would have to appeased to my eating disorder to know this, but it unsettles me even further. I know it's not the weight and I was sorry I had gotten so angry but now I feel like I'm in a mind trap that I don't know how to get out of. I keep trying to figure it all what, what it would mean if my weight was where I thought it was. My eating disorder was so thrilled at the thought of Scarlett's betrayal. It was overjoyed to think it had beaten her and could have me back. It makes me realize how strong the eating disorder is. It's like a cockroach, you can cut it's head off but it's not really dead. It will come back. I like Scarlett's analogy of the two wolves:
If you feed the Good wolf, the Evil wolf gets angry. He puffs up big and becomes violent, barking constantly, foaming at the mouth, viciously clawing at and threatening you. You have no choice but to feed him because you can't take it anymore. It hurts, so you take the Good wolf's food and you feed it to the Evil wolf and he stops biting you, he stops barking and snarling and the silence from the chaos is beautiful. The Evil wolf snuggles up to, keeps you warm, he even loves you, he protects you from everything that is not him, as long as you give him all the food. You feed him and he feeds you in return. He abuses you, feeding you hate and lies until you can't take it anymore and the silence of the chaos is overwhelming. The absence of the chaos is not love or serenity and peace though, it's a thundering silence. There is no more Good because the Good wolf goes away. You're not feeding him anymore, you don't pay any attention to him, so he leaves. Just because you have kept the Evil at bay does not mean that there is Good. Good is gone. Good went away. So you start feeding the Good again beckoning him to come back and protect you, save you and the Evil wolf starts snarling again, and so you plead to the Good wolf and you say "HEY! I'm feeding you, you're stronger now, why aren't you helping me? This Evil wolf is attacking me because of YOU! Because I'm feeding YOU! You're supposed to protect me! Help ME!" But the Good wolf just says, "But I just got here. You just started feeding me. I need more. And besides, I'm a Good wolf! I'm going to stay right here and be good, and love you. If I fight, then I'm no different than the Evil wolf. YOU have to fight the Evil wolf. I'm a Good wolf." That's where I'm at right now, I'm feeding the Good Wolf. My theory is that eventually, the Evil wolf will get weak and he will go away and as long as I continue to not feed him, he will stay away and my Good wolf will never have to fight him. It's just that right now now, I have been feeding my Evil wolf for 20 years, he's huge and giant and towers over me, he has muscles of steel. Strong. 20 years strong. He's not just going to whittle away into some tiny little waif of a wolf after missing a few meals. And my Good wolf isn't going to magically become Under Dog because I gave him a sip of water and some kibble. But if I keep nourishing him and giving him food Good will get stronger and Evil will get weaker. I will get stronger and my eating disorder will get weaker. Right now I've got two wolves again but my Good wolf seems to be curled up in a food induced coma and I can hear him snoring. But it's a beautiful sound.

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