I eat 6 times a day here. I am always full.
Still, somehow, my body finds a way to crave binging and purging. Physically I feel the need each night when I get home. Sometimes I am successful in resisting the urge. Sometimes I am not.
Last night was mostly successful.
I meet with my counselor today. I’m not looking forward to it since I have been binging and purging, didn’t have breakfast yesterday, and have had to boost every day.
Every snack I have string cheese and 3 Carr’s whole wheat crackers. I’m too afraid to get anything else.
We have 20 minutes to eat snack.
Today, I looked at the time after finishing my string cheese. 10 minutes left. Plenty of time to eat 3 crackers.
Finish first cracker, check time, r minutes left. Crap. It took me 6 minutes to eat one cracker. I have 4 minutes left to eat the other two.
Rush through cracker two. Check time. One minute to go. One cracker left. I don’t want to boost. Panic
Ten seconds and half a cracker left. Super panic.
I actually ended up shoving the peft piece in my mouth just after time was up, but I think they were just happy I finished and didn’t have to boost and didn’t say anything. I walked away from snack with a mouthful of cookie.
Yesterday was rough.
It started with me being incapable of providing a urine sample, which made me late for breakfast. It’s hard enough to finish when I have the full time. I was grumpy and exhausted.
At lunch, it was one of those stupid meals where one person is having a hard time and it infects everyone else. Out of the five patients at my table, four of us didn’t finish lunch. My first boost at this treatment center.
It feels like we’re eating all day. Breakfast, group, snack, group, lunch, group, snack, group, dinner, wrap up, evening snack.
In the afternoon, I found out my insurance said if I went to the work conference I was supposed to go to today, they would cut me off. That was devastating, and it took me the rest of the day and overnight to recover.
Needless to say, I was in a terrible mood at dinner. On top of that, dibber was disgusting. This reinforced my contrary mood, and I refused to eat dinner.
More boost.
I chose the wrong flavor of boost and nearly threw up every time I tried to drink it. That was the hardest boost I’ve ever had.
When I was picked up, my parents wanted to get dinner for themselves on the way home. I told them I hadn’t eaten dinner and they bought me food, which I ate frantically, then purged.
I also found another bottle of laxatives I had hidden. I proceeded to take some.
So yesterday sucked.
Today is going better.
Today was really, stupidly rough.
More to come.
I finished day two of PHP, but it was more like day one because I spent most of yesterday in the ER instead of treatment. I met with most of the members of my treatment team today. I also ate 2 meals and 2 snacks there. Those were hard.
It felt like we were eating all day long. I cried several times today.
I felt so alone and out of place today. I also felt so crowded. I just wanted to be alone, but I can’t get alone during my treatment day.
I feel like there’s so much I want to say, but none of the words will come to the surface where I can reach them.
I’m exhausted, I’m full, and I’m drained.
I’m home now.
Thanks to my freakout last night, I showed up at treatment this morning sick, weak, tired, and severely dehydrated.
When I arrived, I had to strip down and put on a sheer hospital gown, do a couple jumping jacks, and get weighed. Then, an EKG, orthostatics, and labs.
However, because I was so dehydrated, they couldn’t get any blood. I had several people trying and still nothing. They decided to make me drink water and try again later, but I was having trouble getting the water down because I was so nauseous.
I went over to sign papers and get my schedule and program binder. When I finished, my doctor had looked over my EKG and orthostatics and decided I needed to go to the ER to get fluids.
So, 2 hours after my first day of treatment began, it ended with a trip to a local hospital. I was there for about 6 hours. Not only was I severely dehydrated, my potassium was dangerously low so I had to get fluids AND potassium. Then more labs to make sure my potassium came up enough to go home. Rinse, repeat.
The treatment center wanted to bump me up to residential, but my insurance said no. I’m relieved. I’m so glad to be home after that long day and not in a hospital. I am not looking forward to going back tomorrow, but I know I need to.
Also, I took a HUGE step tonight and threw away my laxatives.
Last night I was pretty freaked out. I binged and purged a couple times, but managed not to self-harm. I did, however, take an excessive amount of laxatives. I was awake on and off all night with nausea, severe diarrhea, and cramps. I got up an hour and a half before I needed to leave because I was tired of fighting sleep, showered, and got ready to go.
I leave for PHP in 13 minutes. I’m trying to stay calm. Wish me luck today.
I was just informed I start PHP tomorrow morning. I’m having a mild freak out.
I’m hopeful. Hopeful that php will be helpful and that I’ll be able to do what I need to do for recovery. But everything about doing PHP is scaring the shit out of me right now. And it’s all so very little notice.
In my effort to not self-harm, I arted some more. Neither is finished, but it helped me get through the evening injury free.
I’ve been having floods of emotion, moments of panic, periods of numbness since learning I’ll be starting partial hospitalization this week. I was told I would get more information today, and didn’t, so that added to my anxiety. In an effort to help myself calm down, I decided to art.
The first one I did was “How I Feel Now”. I am the center dot, retracted into myself, dark, trying just to hang on amidst the emotions surrounding me. Each level of emotion is spiky because it feels spiky and jarring. The bright colors in the center are “activating” emotions like anxiety, panic, excitement, and motivation and are like an explosion outward. The darker colors around them are immobilizing emotions like depression, overwhelmed, and fear, and are like an implosion, pushing inward.
The next one was my interpretation of what my emotions would look like if I were calm. It made me think of waves, or a gently flowing river.
a2eternity 