cutting

I cut last night, so deeply that blood was gushing in rivulets down my leg. It was criss-crossed and in the shape of an umbrella. Cutting over healed keloids is my niche, and the scars on my legs represent the emotional up and downs I've dealt with. I've been trying not to give in, but last night was terrible. D invited Gary to dinner, which I didn't eat any of, thank god, and he was so much more supportive of me than my aunt was. Prior to my coming over, she had disclosed to him my bulimia, and how my b/p-ing was escalating, my bipolar disorder, and essentially everything I've ever decided to confide in her. I was completely humiliated, but Gary tried to reassure me everything was alright, and nothing was going to change between us, which obviously made me feel worse, since I'm in love with him. But I could tell he saw me differently, and that was devastating. I still have to go to D's every weekend, as well. I just can't handle this. I want it to end.

And now, despite everything I've ever loved going to hell in a hand basket, I am driven by the same desire to starve - to wither away into nothing but bones. I have completely dedicated myself to restricting, and I am already in love with the exhilarating high. I want to go as low as possible, or as low as it is possible for me to go, which may not be the same thing, in the long run. The lowest I've ever been was 105lbs, and that was a 00 - do I want to get lower than that? How do I expect to survive at 100lbs? I would be living a strange half-life, and I can imagine it wouldn't be a trip. I have found a control that I hadn't thought I could ever achieve again, and all because I am upset by how my life has gotten to be shit. I never expected this, and I expect I am a disappointment to everyone I've ever known - by golly gee, this girl is 18 and still in the 10th grade. I want to cry. I need warm arms around me. I need, I want, everything I cannot have.

I am angry at my body for not losing weight. I cut the flesh, and it does not tighten. I have hit bottom, and that scares me. I feel like I'm just floating along, drifting through life without capturing a moment. As sick as this may sound, when I cut, I always long for another to be with me, even cutting me instead. It is a connection that I have always dreamt of, and I understand how crazy it sounds. I want Gary to cut me, to love me, to understand me.

spiral down

Since Saturday, things have been sort of up and down. Maybe it's a pride issue, but I've been avoiding doing anything that could damage my sense of self - anything that involves decision making. I don't want to make the wrong choice, even if it's something trivial, I worry about whether it was correct or not. I'm more of the suffer in silence type of girl, the kind who won't ask for help when she can't open the jar of honey. If I need help, I'm not likely to ask for it.

It may get me into a lot of trouble, and give me a lot of grief, but if I'm restricting, I don't want support. I want to be alone with my disorder, and learn how to manage it on my own. That is why I say I want to reteach myself how to be anorexic. The decision is not on the fence, it's been made and stapled together by my pride. I am restricting again, and I like it - it gives me control, and allows me to vanish into the crowd. Eating on my own terms again, no forced feeding - I may not be in the throws of my eating disorder again, but I feel it encroaching, and I am scared. Where will it lead me this time? A shivering mass of bones and skin, my feet bound and my hands tied, with no air to breath and no space to move.

It is desperation that leads me to this state, and ever since I was notified that I "wasn't skin and bones anymore," I've been restricting with a vengeance. I want to prove to them that, yes, I can be that girl again, and that yes, I am sick. I am easily influenced by what happens around me, and I haven't had very many good experiences lately. My fuck buddy, is reticent to fuck me because I "look like an adolescent boy," and yet, he was with me during my low point last year - 105lbs. What has changed for him? I wake up beside him, and feel comfortable, and safe. He wakes up beside me and feels a bony waif.

D, also, has not called me back yet, after I left her house and after I left a note. I didn't want to end up b/p-ing so I decided to go home, it was as simple as that. But, I know that the longer someone has time to think on something, it becomes amplified and blown out of proportion. She is avoiding me, and by extension, Gary will be to. I am devastated about how things have turned out, how I always get the short end of the stick. I feel like shit, and I want Gary, or warm arms around me.

So, now I am floating along, not getting better, but getting worse and worse. My psychiatrist has handed me several ways of coping, of dealing, and of moving forward - past all the nitty-gritty. I am resisting that voice inside my head, and am restricting. I want to end this, and get rid of obstacles in my path. I want peace, but the eating disorder is never satisfied.

the one wrong thing to say

I binged this morning. It's frighteningly easy to revert back into bulimia - just lean over and purge. I am kicking and screaming for help, but I just lean over and purge. It's a reflex that I can't control without help, and my support system, my mother, is not with me. Going with the flow of b/p-ing was delighting in a long lost dream - a very short dream, at that.

Ed, D's ex-boyfriend, casually pinched my arm, stepped back and examined me for a few moments, and then exclaimed, "You've put weight on!" I was and still am, devastated by his obvious delight in the fact that I "wasn't skin and bones anymore." He had come down to see D, and surprise! There he was, at Applebee's, waiting at the bar. I had to eat a 3rd of an Appetizer Sampler, and well, let's just say I managed to feel my hips expanding by the minute.

I've been careful through this whole process to ensure avoidance of people saying the wrong things, and allowing them to trigger me. But, this really muddled up the line. Immediately I wanted to prove them wrong, lose weight and make my point solidly - they'd even have a model to point at and ridicule! D and Ed have really undermined my recovery, harmed my self-esteem and ruined my renewed identity - all by those two congratulatory comments.

And to add the topping to the cake, her excuse for not allowing him to sleepover? "I'm sorry, but Jane's not feeling very well, she's, well she's been very anxious lately, and she's bipolar so when I told her last week on the phone, she seemed really exited, but she's been depressed, so lets try for next weekend." Are you fucking  kidding me!? She has no sense of privacy or of "keeping things in the family," and has told not only Ed, but Gary (!), J, M, and most likely all her other friends. "Hi! I have a niece who's anorexic and bipolar! Want to go out for drinks later?" I was vulnerable and showed my soft underbelly, and she throws all my consideration back in my face. I want to starve, I want, I want, I want.

I really would love to leave, but I made a promise, and one thing I pride myself on is that I don't break my commitments.

I need to learn how to find recovery in reality, not in isolation. But, in isolation, I am alone with my disorder, and am finally in rapture.

my stomach makes me ill

In celebration of St. Patrick's day, I ate a spinach soufflé - hold your horses! I didn't eat a real soufflé, it was a Garden Lites brand - only 140 calories. Delicious, but sinfully tasty, and I really did feel like I was disgusting tub of lard while eating it - that really shows how much of a down-slide I've made in recovery. I do not want to recover any more. I want to wallow in my anorexia, and my hunger, and not give a damn. But, I trusted D to understand my willingness to recover all those months ago, and she didn't bat an eyelash, just sat there and stared like I was some fascinating specimen under a microscope. She didn't ask how she could help, but rather questioned why? The reasons behind why I binge and then vomit, was and is something incomprehensible to her psyche. Vomiting is something solely devoted to sickness, and if I was purging up to 7 times a day then I was ripe for shock treatments according to her mind.

I feel dark on the inside, and my eating disorder has returned, but it is not as familiar and comfortable as I remember. It feels like a old, unwanted friend, who has showed at the eleventh hour ready and willing to reteach me the steps to an old dance. I am a caricature of my old self, and it's a misguided understanding I've come to. I may never be free of my anorexic side, but I sure as hell can beat down my bulimic side. I will never let up on my recovery from bulimia - it is a snaking, Machiavellian disorder that has no innocence or pretty outcomes. It ruins you, and you are left the slave of food; anorexia is the same way. All disorders make you the vassal and we are left wiping up the crumbs of ourselves. 

It has always been, "Yeah, I'll do it, when the time is right," well the time is right now, and I'm not waiting for the bottom to drop out. I am waiting for the light at the end of the tunnel, my dream realized. There are no erasers to wipe away the past memories of sloth and bulimia, they are like ink stains - indelible. I wake up with regret on the promises of life I wasted on bulimia and my next 'fix', and sleep with the guilt of ruining my family and future. I am hungry for change, that is what I need and want. The thoughts that came with bulimia, 'I will not do tomorrow,' have slowly trickled down the drain and I am left with the satisfaction hunger and anorexia brings. 

D will ply me with food, make me feel like a whale, and I will restrict. She is creating an disorder by her careless actions, and I am left lost and trudging through life with closed eyes.

telephone calls

I spoke to D last night, which was very taxing. I forget how crucial she is to my recovery progress. I live with her on the weekends, and if we didn’t, I know I would keep on restricting. In a way, it's a reprieve from the encapsulating ED. She was part of the reason why I began eating again, in the first place; she needed the company and support. Even though she has trouble understanding my bulimia, she makes a concerted effort to try to understand. The food she prepares is delicious and loving, and I can't help but eat with her chit-chat surrounding me.

Her phone call though, mentioned that Ed might or might not come this weekend, and boy does he cherish his breakfast food. Every breakfast item includes pastries, or waffles, or pancakes, or french toast, with real maple syrup. My initial solution to this was to throw up after the meal. But then the thoughts of how, when and where, began to creep insidiously into my mind. How will I get around D and Ed? When will I be able to vomit the food that's digesting in my belly? Where, upstairs or downstairs?

At one point I was throwing up 7 times a day, reading or watching tv to distract myself. I couldn't binge without a distraction, otherwise I would be "aware" of what I was doing and stop; I didn't want to stop. It was out of control, and unmanageable. But, with D around I can't throw up - she keeps tabs on what and how much food is in the pantry or refrigerator, she checks the bathroom for unwiped stains. In her own way, she makes an effort. But in another, she doesn't - she'll still buy the cookies and the bulk foods, even if she knows it makes me uncomfortable.

She may have "saved" me on the weekends, but she reinforces the anorexia side of my ed. All week I restrict in anticipation of the coming weekend. She isn't helping me, she's ruining me. The path of restriction is a punishment for indulging in food, food that I actually enjoyed.

You can speed up time, and slow it down, but you can't rewind. I can't undo what I've done with my life. I can't undo what she knows, and thinks about my ed. The only thing I can do is move forward and resign myself to the inevitable - I'm going to have to eat, but that doesn't me I have to enjoy it.

very young

My psychiatrist (S) pointed out that I'm too young to have to 'act as a parent' towards my aunt (D). In some ways I agree; why should I feel obligated to be her confidant and support system if she doesn't do the same for me? She's not the only one who needs saving, I need help and a pillar too. But my needs are pushed to the back-burner, when she's involved; everything is about her, her, her. No asking where I stand with my moods and EDNOS, no asking whether I'm okay or not.

S suggested I set some boundaries, so that we're not stuck in a co-dependent relationship, because as much I gripe I miss D's presence. But I'm a nervous wreck when I come home - frantic to get some sleep, frantic to be alone. I so desperately want to experience things, which is something I do greatly at her house. I see Gary more often, and flirt with different cultures of people. Fun, is something I readily come by with her at the wheel. It's just the big things - her denial of my illness, her deliberate digs at her own weight - that tick me off. But does Gary outweigh those big things? I still love him dearly, so we'll see how it goes this weekend.

I commented on the idea that I felt like time was moving faster for me than for others, that lately I was impatient with the slowness of life. S said that maybe because I was no taking Lamictal, I was stabilizing my hypomania and pressured speech: I had been talking so rapidly, trying to fit my thoughts into the words that I was saying at the same time, that they came out almost completely unintelligible. It was nutzoid, and my dense thoughts were racing one after another. But, now my head is quiet and misunderstood.

One of my biggest fears is being misunderstood, or rather being judged without explanation. Everything I do is judged, justified, and rationalized by myself. Did I do that right? Did I put enough banana in my cereal to be acceptable to a normal person? Why did I pick a blue shirt instead of a red shirt? I try to find a reason behind everything I do, and fuck is it frustrating. Everything needs to have method behind the choices I make, and everything needs to scrutinized. Why can't I live without fear of myself and my own opinions?

soothing night

In a previous post I mentioned that I prefer waking up at the witching hour. I'm an early riser, now primarily getting up at 1 or 2 am when most well-meaning people are abandoning their books or desks or what have you for a cozy bed. That's when I'm up turning the coffeemaker on, listening to it gurgle in the silence, and when I'm at my most productive. I've long ago dictated that at any other time during the day I was not "allowed" to read. It has to be at night, when the world it well and truly asleep - when people have just been tucked into their beds, entering REM sleep, in no mood to wrench the coverlets off and dash out into the night. I'm almost always physically exhausted, and it's only my OCD that triggers the mad dash for the morning - the food, the coffee and the books. I have to take 2 xanax and 2 adderall to read, I have to eat a bowl of cereal with a banana, I have to read at least 80 pages of this book. There is no cognition when I'm in that state, and I feel like puppet of this eating disorder and my swinging moods. They are in control.

When I was severally depressed, refusing to take my medication, and when my moods and OCD ruled all, I was empty. For years, I was the weird kid, and simply thought I had an inferiority complex. Even when my current/past psychiatrist named my condition, I was still in denial, and embracing the highs and lows that I thought were god's gift - I was blessed. I was crazy. I was wasting time, piddling it away reading Harry Potter fanfiction, and binging/purging every food item in the house. I did all of this for 2 years and lived in total isolation, vacillating between waking up at 12am and 4pm and sleeping for up to 12 hours a day. I avoided my parents, forgot about them, and they avoided and forgot about me. It was always a surprise when we encountered each other in the hallway, and generally made half-hearted motions to smile before we caught ourselves and went back to ignoring eachother. Then there were times when I was manic, and talk-talk-talking to Dad about political mumbo-jumbo and to Mom about whatever was on our minds.

I didn't understand how bad it was until I realized that the people around me were maturing, and moving on with their lives, and television shows came and went. There was no passion for anything in my life; nothing other than b/p and reading fanfiction or watching reruns of Lost. Old friends have conquered high school and college, gotten jobs, and apartments, some have left the country and lived abroad. They have had mounds and heaps of experience, and joy and pride in their accomplishments. And I have nothing to show after all these years. I'm a 10th grader, plowing along. Please tell me this will end.

Oh! My psychiatrist appointment is this morning. *smacks forehead*

I have chipmunk-cheeks from chewing so much gum.

thorns

"Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us."
- Voltaire

manic day

Today, all afternoon, I rode the high as far as it would take me and it felt good. I spent the day with my father, and I gave him the precious gift of my time.

For so long during my bulimia he was the source of my triggers, my anxiety, and my bipolarity. He never went unpunished in my head. God knows what happened, but I distinctly recall the day I raged - screaming incessantly about my ED 'why couldn't he believe that I was sick, why couldn't he understand that everything he did hurt me, why couldn't he help me!' and I shoved and punched and eventually he pinned my hands and restrained me. I was humiliated, but still filled with righteous anger and I kicked and wailed. I couldn't rationally explain why I was behaving that way; every motion seemed instinctual; that made me even more enraged. He brusquely told me to "Grow up. Stop acting like a child." That upset me even more. At that point, all I wanted to do was open the door and run as far as I could, and as soon as I feigned calm and he released me, I ran outside. I vomited and slept on the dewy grass. He was worried and frantic, but I really didn't give a damn. I felt locked inside my own world and my own decisions. I was hurt and reluctant to show my face. I thought it would prove I was culpable. That day has been erased from my fathers memory, just like my ED, but for me it remains a constant reminder to never argue with my father; lesson learned. The thought of any confrontation with him makes me sick to my stomach, still.

Today though, was a manic day - no medication- the day that I felt like treating my father, and the only time I felt comfortable in his presence. He feeds my mania, he loves my mania; I'm fun and agreeable and devious. He enjoys talking to that person, not the depressed-wasted-waif. The happy, happy, happy, go, go, go girl is the one his loves; no me. All that does is make me want my full-time bulimia back, because that is the person he knows and can love without tip toeing around my "issues" that I'll "grow out of."

He took me to a used book shop Downtown, and I was hooked. He bought me 33 dollars worth of books. "Picture Perfect and Second Glance" by Jodi Picoult and the first 3 books of the "Mercy Thompson series" by Patricia Briggs. I was high on life baby, and it was rapturous. I had no control over it. But, I do feel a little hope that now my relationship with my father can be repaired. It won't be an easily bandaged wound, but I think we can accomplish a semblance of what we used to have - when I was a kid. I hope.

things i forget to tell

I want to say this now before I forget, or it becomes to hard to acknowledge. I don't know what I want from this blog, or what I expect to achieve - but I do know that's its a means of purging my thoughts, so they don't become bottled and explosive. I've trolled ED recovery blogs, in 2008 had an livejournal blog (which I won't name...) mostly focused on my angst with my father, and I've read about and watched ED recovery take shape not only in others, but in myself. I want my recovery to be noticed - as trite as that sounds.

My mother has been my confident for all these turbulent years of bulimia/anorexia and untreated mental illness, and she's helped me more than words can express. But I think that now is the time to set out on my own and become someone other than my mother's daughter. I cheated, I lied, I stole, and I took advantage of every opening I noticed to get what I wanted now, now, now. She stuck with me and for that, I cherish her dearly. I wasn't cognizant of her or anyone else, but at the same time I wasn't in the right frame of mind to care that I was damaging other people anyway.

So, I'll say this: I still actively engage in my ED, I'm still not willing to let go of its clenching grasp; I still measure my food, chew gum fervently after every meal, still relish in the flavors and textures of food, still make binge lists in my most vulnerable. I still go days where I'll only eat 500 calories or 700 (if I'm feeling adventurous) to maintain my lw. It is my niche, and I am comfortable in my routine. I hate options - having to decide between this or that.

I am loosing my sense of comfort though, and discomfit is loud and blaring when I binge/purge, 'Why Why WHY! You have xanax, you don't need this high, you've come so far so why!?' I have the ability to secure what I think I need and want, but I don't have the assurance or faith that I'm going about it correctly. ,And the thoughts are screaming at me unceasingly - I'm doing this puzzle wrong, that's not the right thing to say. Everything reminds me of what I cannot have. I know that there is no correct or incorrect way of handling life; there is no fundamental life experience that I am not going about correctly. I just didn't expect this life to be so up and down.

poem 2

tomorrow i will live in my new skin,
i found underneath a dough of white,
silk spun tattoos,
it will cling and cleave,
compelling my flesh in paralysing faith.

i will stride naked free and wild,
white skin polished and preserved like a cadaver,
a silent mouth and pounding wail,
newly sketched out of control and awake,
i'll try this later and forget.

gluttony

I've been banned from my Aunts house for this weekend - indefinitely, in my mind. I feel too damned and destructible and self-recriminating to ever go back. There will be no more packing dresses for a “just in case we have to do something fancy” situation, no more 'I hope Gary calls~!' moments, no more 'lets try and hide my bipolarity, so there aren't any awkward moments' days. I binged at her house, ate all her food, and that did irreparable damage - something she finds simultaneously disgusting and worrisome. I forced her to damn her pride, and ask for help to buy more core groceries - milk, cereal, etc. Basically the items I stuffed my gullet with.

The cause though, is what I'm having no trouble at all defining. I've been storing up and packing away, vainly, all my emotions, which led to an overflow and the damn breaking. My computer is not working properly (the battery doesn't hold a charge), my father is around and poking his head in every nook and cranny of my head, I cannot control my binges any more, I am dependant on xanax and adderall to read, I'm worried about my unmentioned (Rone) stalker, worried I may get pregnant because I can't simply ask for my "special friend" to wear a rubber, and I'm getter fatter - My zeros don't fit, and that is a crazy making event.

This eating disorder is my default coping mechanism, and I need to practice other ways of slipping into my comfort zone. I'm addicted to hedonism, and it is addicted to me - no matter how hard I try, it keeps shoving itself into my life like an old unwanted friend. It consumes my thoughts and my time, and demolishes whatever I'm discovering about myself, things I'm beginning to respect. My bipolarity reinforces the cycle, I feel inadequate, and the eating disorder jumps in, rests on my shoulder and whispers "It will all get better once you eat those cookies, you'll see,"and I'm down the hole again. It removes any and all doubt, leaving me feeling like I'm floating on cloud nine.

I've taken a step backwards and really have no idea how to get back on track. Yes, it emphasised the progress I had made - I had created a life outside of my eating disorder, one that revolved around school and books, and excitement. I want that back, but to get that why do I feel like I need anorexia to achieve it again? I'm keeping a meal planner, and I haven't done that since I was a pious anorectic.

please quiet down

Believing I'm in recovery is a hard thing to accomplish when my Aunt D is consistently running to the bathroom after nearly every sit-down meal to vomit. She has horrible acid reflux, yes, but I can't help but feel indignant - and jealous. It a war between whether I should or shouldn't purge my meal too, every time I hear her heave. I am reminded of the reflex of just contracting my stomach muscles and vomiting, and for the stubborn bit sticking my fingers down my throat and feeling that high after. I want that so bad at her house.

She needs me by her side eternally, else she thinks I'm avoiding her or angry at her or "just like my mother." It's never ending. In her house, I'm the parent and she's the child. I prepare the shopping lists, do the housework, rouse her out of bed, console her, sit with her, talk with her. She laments about why she's not losing any weight, when she recounts with startling clarity that she ate pizza, 2 bowls of ice cream, and a candy bar for lunch. Everyday. It kills me, and triggers me insanely. She buys cookies or Hershey's kisses if they're on sale at Food Lion. She makes heaping portions of pasta (binge food!) or says something insensitive, and forgets that I'm bulimic or bipolar.

She's crazy making.

Even though her uncle (foster father) was bipolar, she can't seem to comprehend that her niece is crazy too. I've been careful to hide my mood swings, slipping away quietly when in a rage or depression, and coming out to socialize when I'm manic. I love her, but that's even who Gary only knows too - who everyone knows. Just the mania. Not the empty person I really am. Maybe this is just a down phase, or my low self-esteem, but I've lost my passion for every thing - especially school work. I love my mania, my wanderlust, and any trait I have when I'm high. But no one but my mother and psychiatrist knows about my 3 years spent in absolute isolation, just binging and purging, and I had to be reading fanfiction or watching tv to b/p. My OCD dictated my ED and what I would binge on that day. It numbed my moods. I want it back.

love, love, love

“Love is a force more formidable than any other. It is invisible — it cannot be seen or measured, yet it is powerful enough to transform you in a moment, and offer you more joy than any material possession could.”
- Barbara De Angelis

I have finally come to rest with the fact that I am in love with Gary - my 40+ friend and I don’t give a damn. He’s a mess, but I love him anyway. On March 5th, I was sandwiched between him and my Aunt on his bed. We all were asleep and I was in rapture. It was a moment unlike any I’ve ever experienced, and being as close as I was to the man I love was enchanting - I’m still warm from the memory. I’ve been with other men his age, but this is the first all-encompassing love I’ve ever felt - and it’s for a man who will most likely never see me beyond a young friend. It was his birthday, and he was delighted by our company and genuine appreciation for his character - I was almost worried he was going to cry. I really do love him, and have for 3 years - hopefully not in vain.

redux

While this blog is in its infancy, I'll point out that instead of pirouetting around the truth, I'm barebones-honest on here. I'm reluctant to post a full blown identity, but I will mention that in addition to my introductory post, I'm a true chameleon. My colours change like the day, and being bipolar is nothing to hanker after. I remember a time that I revelled in my mental illness - until I tripped over the stigma and morbid curiosity that's attached.

One truly infuriating about me is that I lie - in a nutshell I've always been a pathological liar. This blog is a way for me to learn how to speak truthfully. I remember being thoroughly chastised for my soothsaying in school, but it really didn't deter me. I was a master at keeping poker face, and I never had "tells" or "ticks" that gave myself away. But at 18, I want to be honest, and instead of spouting fortunes, tell people verisimilitude. I feel, though, that when I do tell the truth, that it's as if I've removed a piece of myself and given it to the other person - that I don't own those words anymore. It's become opensource code for everyone who may have overheard.

I'm a dedicated student, and despite years of clawing interruptions, my academia is my number one priority at this point. I'm a 10th grader, and I'm running ... somewhere, somewhere I can scoop out my innards and put them on display. KIDDING!

Aspirations? Just to finish school, and kick my ED in the ass.

No matter what 'Wasting Jane," writes from my head and heart primarily - no filtering necessary.

noises in the darkness

Dad purchased a new computadora for me – HP 625 with Ubuntu Linux. My old 2007 MacBook has crashed not once but twice, needing a new dvd drive not once but twice, too. Luckily I back up my laptop; especially lucky I backed it up the morning it crashed. Why are Mac's so flimsy? Expensive?

I've relapsed, after going nigh 3 months with b/p, like an unrestrained zoo animal – leaping for food any chance it's swung.  I'll wake up with the best of intentions – and then after my first bowl of cereal desperation will settle in and I spiral out of control, shuffling bowl after bowl of cereal into my gullet. The loss of control is startling, and in the middle of the act I am often doggedly hunting for the reasons why – why is it that this time I lose control?

Lately, I've been intellectualising, and scrutinising my ED under a finely-scoped mental lens – trying to shuffle this spastic mess into some semblance of sense. According to my psychiatrist, my ED is a extrinsic response to urgently wanting to purge my father from my body - which I believe. When I binge, I am numb, when I purge I'm relieved of the encumbering heaviness. Just like a metaphor, I numb myself of my father's expectations, purging myself of his oppressive weight.
It's a symbolic killing machine.

But the relapse. Was it triggered by the nitpicking my father resumed, or his recent hefty assurances? Both are equally spanning, and acknowledging one of them hefts the blame on his shoulders as well as my own. The correlations are obvious to me, but choosing one over the other is faulty reasoning. Bulimia is murdering me, so why do I need to find the roots?

Because it comes with experience, and as stomach clenching as it is – for the hope of recovery I need to know and prevent the roots from nudging their way in and taking structure.

poem

In the end (if we could divine it),
We would know what profit
the possibilities could grant us.
But not knowing,
we risk loss,
loss of the small things,
loss of the big things -
And gain, greater or lesser
than we imagined.