5-8-2013

Only three more weeks until my classes start. I am excited because I am really so bored. I feel so pointless these days. I just wish these thoughts would go away. The thoughts that nothing is going to get better, the thoughts that tell me I can’t do anything. Just like so long ago I felt like I was going to be anorexic forever, I now think this horrible way of life and these depressing thoughts and feelings will be with me forever. I have no friends, I mean I have all my marvelous Facebook friends and blog readers but I have no one to hang out with around here. I definitely want to move to Maryland one day. I think I would have a great support system there because I have great friends there, as well the Doctors that know me there. Now I just need to get motivated! With all rational there is no reason I should be feeling so sad and irritated. It has to be a chemical fuck up in my head. But if that was the case wouldn’t medication have helped by now? Every psychiatrist I see always asks if my medication is working. I don’t want to say no because they might just take me off of it and I may feel worse, but I am truly still feeling like a shit show. So maybe it isn’t anything pathological and I am just whiny little feel sorry for herself brat. I just don’t think that’s the case either. I suppose there is nothing to do except keep on keeping on.

Yesterday was the 5^th anniversary of my Nana’s death. It brought back some sad memories but I know she is heaven. I have actually gotten a fair amount of feedback from you all of you through either Facebook messages or comments on my blog. I did not realize what I was saying in my blog was having that big of an impact on others. That makes me happy. It makes me feel like maybe I am good at something; and writing is not something I ever thought I would be good at. I always thought I was going to be a nurse. I still do want to be a nurse, but maybe I can do something in the middle.

I left off in my last entry at me being discharged from inpatient to PHP at Sheppard Pratt. I had been inpatient for a very long time. I was staying at a small hotel with my dad. I found being out of the hospital for even those 12 hours to be very difficult. I had begun to make the hospital my structure and way of life. At this point in life, I was beginning to not know how to function outside of a hospital. I felt vulnerable and scared. I did not do anything stupid like I did my first night out of Johns Hopkins though. I drank the old ensure and had my snack with my dad. He tried to do it for the first couple of days but eventually he got bored with it. Going to PHP every morning was very refreshing. I was going back to my structure, back to my safe haven. It was great that I was with most of the same people I had been inpatient with as well. As I ate in the PHP dining room, the thick glass wall separating us from the lesser mortals (inpatients), I felt distinguished. I had become quite good at this game by now. Day by day went by as I ate the meals. I ate them without struggle and sometimes enjoyed them. As I usually would have been worried about every little calorie here and there, after months in treatment I became an old timer. The old timers had been in treatment more than once or even twice, they may or may not have reached a healthy weight at that point, they played games at meals rather than dissecting their food, they still made sarcastic jokes or comments about food sometimes, but most importantly these people and mostly importantly myself, knew that they could go right back to their eating disorder after treatment. Putting on the act in treatment was fine and dandy, but losing weight and acting on symptoms was a custom and an art for these people including myself. New timers think that treatment is the death of their disorder sometimes; old timers know the opposite is true (however sad it is), only one person is in control of what one consumes and keeps down. These people myself included knew what we were good at and we were not afraid of putting on the front in treatment. As I ate those meals without any issue whatsoever, I knew that I could easily throw it all away when I was discharged. I don’t mean to sound vulgar but these thoughts and actions are true in some cases.

I became very fond of my therapist. She was always so bright and cheerful. I would talk to her about how I hated my psychiatrist, because my psychiatrist would not lower my “goal weight”. My therapist would change the topic. Thought charts, CBT logs, and DBT worksheets were my homework in 10^th grade instead of algebra and biology. I still got my school work of course, but it was very hard to learn. “School” at Sheppard Pratt was from 9:30AM-11AM. It was in one of the dining rooms. The ratio was, one tutor to about 25 anorexic/bulimic children, over half of them who didn’t even care about learning, but were more focused on how many calories they had consumed for breakfast. I however did try to learn. The tutor was just not qualified to teach some of the subjects. I think my teachers felt bad for me because I still ended up doing relatively well that year. I have always had respect for most of my Psychiatrists. I didn’t like that they made me gain weight, but I knew in my head that they were incredibly brilliant. My Psychiatrist at Sheppard Pratt was obviously brilliant. She lectured in a Medical School and still had time to spend time with all the patients. That is talent for sure; certainly more of a talent than starving yourself.

Well the day came. It was my last day in PHP, and I was going home back to Virginia. I was immensely anxious about leaving because I had minimal professional support set up at home. I remember eating my last meal at Sheppard Pratt; it was dinner, as was my first meal this admission. It was definitely a sacred time. My therapist actually gave me a hug which I wasn’t expecting since Sheppard Pratt has a “no touch policy”, and a hand shake from the psychiatrist- definably very professional. I got some phone numbers and Facebook names from some of the patients, then it were off we went. The plan was for me to finish the last 1 ½ - 2 months of school. I had no problem doing this. Of course I was humiliated at the appearance of myself. My weight was only “low normal”, but I was so afraid that anyone who might have remembered me was going to think I was so fat. It was also set up for me to see a dietician 1x per week at the Naval Hospital. I had not been to this hospital since I was 13, and I certainly did not want to see a dietician because all that meant in my mind was weight and food.

I enjoyed my last few weeks of school for what they were. I know I had earned the reputation of the cancer looking victim that left school and came back, twice. I had earned that brand at the other school too. I didn’t really have much of a concept of what other people thought of me. I initially started restricting my intake again (not severally though). When I showed up for me first dietician appointment the dietician said “you have to get weighed in a gown, the psychiatrist from the hospital wrote that in her directions”. Damn her!!!! I was immediately pissed off to the moon and back that my psychiatrist from Sheppard Pratt would have expected me to do that. I was absolutely not going to do that, and I made it loud and clear to the dietician. She rolled her eyes and said okay. I could tell she wasn’t too familiar working with the eating disordered.  I had to see this dietician every week. I also weighed myself alone sometimes and I saw that I had dropped a few pounds, so I started to “water lode” again. Not a lot just enough to stay in safe zone. I was also seeing my therapist who I was getting along great with.

School round 3, it was decided I would go 11^th grade a private school this year, another “new start”. Sound familiar? My sister was also going to this school for a better start. I hadn’t been to a private school since 7^th grade but I was familiar with the customs of private schools because I had spent 3-7^th grade in a private school. I thought this would be a great because kids in the private [Christian] school were going to be nice and accepting of me. Before I started school in the fall, I went to a 2 week long camp. I had been to church camp a couple times so I thought this would be just like it. I was also excited because it meant 2 weeks of unmonitored food intake! The hell it was. It was not what I thought it would be though. The camp was in the mountains somewhere in North Carolina, and we went on all sorts of long hikes. I was loved and hated it at the same time. We stayed in a tiny little wood cabin which was definitely the worst for me. I have realized since then that I am not low maintenance, and I have never been to a camp since. Just like at school, the girls at this camp has spent years at this camp together. I did not know anyone. Plus I was eccentric about food, and I had cuts on my arm. This frightened lots of the girls I am sure. Eventually the camp leader talked to me about it, and I had nothing to say rather than “yep, I cut and have an eating disorder”, another strikeout for Marissa.

In fall 2009 I was going to start 11^th grade, my junior year in high school. I was determined to get all A’s. I wanted the best grade point average possible because I wanted to go to a great college and be a nurse. I was not thrilled about having to wear a “dress code” at this school, but I was familiar with that too. Skirt every day for females, oh crap I thought.  There was no room for me to show my unique sense of individuality. There was actually, and other people definitely noticed. This year was a strange year for me. It was the only year in my 8-12^th grade career in which I did not leave school to go to the hospital. Yet, I still was not happy or functioning ideally. I believe my state of mind had my therapist tricked because at the time she thought I was doing great. Although I was eating and at relatively stable weight, my relationship with food was still incredibly atypical. I was absolutely obsessed with food during a period of these months. I would go to a local farmers’ market and buy $40 worth of food in one time. I would bake really odd things, and look through cook books. The food I took to school and ate was very unusual. It was enough to maintain my weight though, and that’s the part that fooled everyone. My relationship with food was still cracked and damaged. During this period of time I still considered myself fat and I hated myself for eating what I was. It was just a different form of obsession. I want to clarify something. Anyone who thinks that people who Binge or people with Binge Eating Disorder are just lazy or unable to control themselves are sadly wrong. People who Binge may hate food as much as an anorexic does, but they get out of control with it. Although I have a long history of anorexia, I have also had bouts of Binge episodes and believe you me; they are not what you think. Also anyone who says an anorexic doesn’t like to eat is stupid. Anorexics love food and they love to eat. They have just trained themselves not to do so, or to restrict. Eating Disorders are so twisted, and they come on all end of the “spectrum”, but what unites them is there irrationality and mind boggling neurosis.

During my 11^th grade year in which I was not considered anorexic, I was at a minimal healthy weight, and I actually thought and even longed for my anorexia to come back. I did not think it would. Let me tell you something; the full swing and throttle of Anorexia came back and took control once again.