Ups and Downs

TRIGGER WARNING: eating disorder thoughts (and possibly behaviors, but mild ones) Thought I'd post an update in the interest of writing all this down a bit, and being honest to myself. If someone wants to weigh in on what sounds eating disordered vs. normal - if it's even helpful to think in those terms - you're free to do so. If this post interests no one, it's still helpful for my own recovery to read back on it later. I feel a bit embarrassed to write so much about myself, for some reason. I'm hoping to gain some courage to see a doctor about this, too. On Friday the 18th, I found out my cat is well. A huge relief came out of this. I'd been having a lot of symptoms on the days before that, and virtually nothing on the weekend, so I have to conclude that my worry over the cat - which was a lot stronger than I had assumed, judging by the relief - had made my ED thoughts worse. Perhaps it's easier to focus on your body size than your cat's possible illness? Osku had a mole, of all things - I was certain it was a tumor and I only hoped it was benign. The days after that went by in an almost blissful state. I was just super relaxed. Last Thursday, I went shopping for a new dress with my friend, who is also fat. We found so many possible ones. Maybe there are more sizes available nowadays? It was a huge issue in Finland about five years back to find a size 20, so I was very encouraged by this. We also had big sundaes at the ice cream bar. I felt normal and beautiful, even princess-like in the dress I bought. It's perfect for me. One of the salespeople tried to push black dresses on me, and I had to tell her "no black, please". I bet she thought I'd look fat in the other colors, but I absolutely wanted blue. The one I finally got was baby blue, my favorite shade. Due to all this, I was feeling really well for a few days. I still had some self-hating thoughts, but they weren't overwhelming. I ate a lot of food, but I enjoyed it, and the prospect of weight loss didn't seem awfully threatening, given that I had many new items of clothing, and could still fit into new sizes if I gained more. My feeling of being somehow larger than life had, if not vanished, at least been alleviated. I might want to spend more time with fat people, I mean ones who don't constantly apologize for their fatness like my mother. My friend isn't die-hard FA, but she's not scared to discuss weight, and is very natural about it. However, this past weekend I found myself slipping back to the ED thoughts a bit. Yesterday, it was a lovely summery day and I decided to go out into the park. I enjoyed the sun, the ducks, the trees, etc. However, after a while, I began to feel thirsty and a bit dizzy. I was going to sit on a bench but then I thought no, I can't sit on a bench if I sit down all day, I'm not that bad of a fatty. I made myself walk a bit further, and felt quite sick when I got home. The actual amount and intensity of the exercise wasn't so great - maybe 45 minutes of leisurely walking - but the mood in which it was done was not good, and it ruined my pleasure of the park. I came home feeling like I could and should have done more. After this, I had lunch: tortillas with ground beef, lettuce and cherry tomatoes. I really enjoyed it so I had three of these, which made me feel like I might not be able to stop. I remembered reading that your appetite winds down if you eat something sweet, so I took out some ice cream and spooned that in until I felt quite sick. The amount wasn't big (maybe half a bowlful), but I obviously ate more than felt comfortable. I'm not sure if that was a binge or just a well-intentioned but failed experiment. Maybe I would have done better with some fresh fruit? Maybe it would have been OK to have a fourth tortilla? The exercising mood struck again in the evening, when I exercycled - again a short while, maybe a mere five minutes, but there was an intense need to DO SOMETHING about my weight. It was a rather aggressive feeling. I was able to divert from this into doing some cleaning. Today, I got on some weird health kick and thought I have to buy the cholesterol-lowering margarine, even if I don't know what my cholesterol is. It just suddenly struck me that I might have high cholesterol, and I ate some oat bread with the cholesterol-lowering margarine, no toppings. This is not a bad thing, per se, but I felt like having cheese and was scared to have it. So the high from finding the dress lasted three days. What brought it down? I can't really tell. I have some stress related to my job and my future, getting a new part-time job and leaving one I hate. It makes me feel a bit out of control. Maybe I'm also reacting to a lowering in my meds (I've had odd nightmares and mood swings). So I can't control my job situation or my moods; could that make me feel like I can't control my eating? Maybe it's a diversion from the real issues. Also, it seems oddly like exercise triggers me worse than food does. I'm sure as hell not going to sit inside all summer just because of that. Maybe I need to focus on the things around me while walking, or listen to some music, or go out with a friend who can distract me so it doesn't FEEL like exercise. I thought of making a little schedule for exercising, like "I will exercycle each evening for 20 minutes". If I do that, I can do it even when I'm NOT in a self-loathing mood, thus making it more about a routine, like brushing my teeth. I don't brush my teeth because I'm an OMG fatty who eats sooo much sugar. I brush because it's good for my health. I could try the same with the exercycling.