Feet

Happy Feet...

....

UNhappy Feet

Chilled Out Feet

We Sell Emotions - !

My folks recently came back from a trip to beautiful Tuscany; a celebration of forty years of their marriage.
I was amused to see a bag which used English (as places here use other languages to add to their 'classy' appeal).

It's the stuff of Dahl or Blyton!


As a very young kid I devoured Enid Blyton's 'Faraway Tree'. Something about the concept of selling emotions rushes me back to the bright and magical lands that appeared at the top of the tree... Bustling market stalls run by wizened old men and sprightly gnomes selling swirling magic potions and, perhaps, emotions.
Funny. I detested all fairy stories and as a rule, still avoid the entire Fantasy / Sci fi genre like the plague. 


Anyway.


How much for a couple of pounds of peace, two punnets of hopefulness and a slice of joy?

Tree trunks and Easter Eggony

What follows is a post I began writing a couple of weeks ago and then couldn't muster the energy to complete it. 
I'm returning because I wanted to finish but again, I find my mind can't produce the words I need...


**********************************************************
It's probably not quite accurate to say, 'I'm scared of myself...' 
More that I'm scared of the Anorexia that has taken up residence within me. I'm scared of the power that it has; the unyielding grip on a part of my brain; the power of a tumultuous ocean over a small vessel.


'Where is my anchor?' I ask myself as I type.
Good question.


I rarely refer to my faith in my writing. I'm not sure why, because spirituality is a central part of me. It runs right through my core, which would explain why it is that every time I have tried to walk away from it, all I've really done is walk around it, as if its the trunk of a huge tree which is wide enough to fit twenty of me in it. 
As I walk around it, the trunk appears to be different, hence I don't recognise it as the very same faith that runs through me, strong and woody. 


Easter, the trunk of the Christian faith, is a time of major celebration. For the Anorexic though, it is the equivalent misery of Lent's forty days rolled into one huge,  thick walled, Green and Blacks' finest milk chocolate egg! 
The eggs appear everywhere. 
Seductive to the starved flesh. It's like a tiny torture! 


 ***********************************************************


A few weeks later and I'm calmer. 
I'm still working. Building up to three full days a week. Exhausting. 
My weight isn't moving up but the desire to live is stronger.


Today I choose life.


I just have to actually choose to DO life. Not just conceptualise, theorise, spiritualise... I have to make it physical. 


"Easier said than done", springs to mind. 

Tomorrow, Tomorrow and Tomorrow...

... I'll write something.

Today...

... tears.

And I'm sorry that I can't feel stronger. I choose to be positive and to smile and to keep cheerful, and yet, alone, I dissolve. Head in hands. Desperation trickling through my, apparently, 'skeletal' body.


I was informed yesterday that I'm 1 kilo off being admitted. I can't have that. Not when I've just begun a phased return to work... not when it'll cost me my job... not when I want to do this so, so badly.


So why then, when I just have to put on a few pounds, am I battling the urge to exercise?


It's madness this illness. A bulging, black mass somewhere in the brain. It seeps and creeps and pushes into spaces, forcing itself against walls of reason and clarity.

Time...

... flies.


I have been trying to write here for days now but I have felt wordless. 


I've also been exhausted because I have started back at work.


It's a trial... in every sense as it turns out.


I'm not sure I can cope with the anxiety it is provoking.


And there is no TIME.

Social Comment - Proportion

Horrified mother's of too plump children spat and cursed; weight conscious women frantically defended a woman's right to look however she chooses; Men everywhere kept their heads down... 

Once again, the British media successfully caused an outcry last week when they gleefully sensationalised versions of designer Karl Lagerfeld's remark on Adele's weight. 

The all too emotive word 'FAT' was splashed over front pages right, left and centre and the worst possible angled shots of Adele placed underneath. 

Lagerfeld, demonised by the press as they subtly edited or paraphrased parts of the comment, must have wanted the ground to swallow him up.

Support for Adele had never hit such a high, and thank goodness because, in fairness, it WAS a bit of a stupid and thoughtless thing to say. Stupid and thoughtless however, is about the size of it. 

(Spot the pun)

The guy isn't a demon. He's not a terrible person. He doesn't deserve to be hung, drawn ad quartered.

He didn't just say she was 'too fat', as many of the papers implied. The comment, however crass and insensitive, was taken out of context in order to sensationalise an already highly controversial subject. 

And let's face it, Adele IS a little overweight.

(Okay... Put the shotguns away...)

No big deal.

So what? 

The average person on the high street is a little overweight.

Why should our celebs have to be different?

I'm glad that there was a public cry against the concept of 'the perfect figure'. 

I'm glad there was more recognition of the pressures put upon celebrities to be thin.

But I'm not glad that our press have, once again in a rush of greedy glee, apparently lost the notion of relative importance, and blown things far beyond their proportions. 

News Flash

I hate it that my main reason for blogging right now is that I feel under some kind of pressure to write something. My life seems to be full of 'shoulds' which are generally, profoundly unhelpful in terms of trying to reduce anxiety rather than maintain it.


I'm taking 200mg of Pregabalin right now but apart from a noticeably calmer initial phase, it seems to have made little difference. 
This being said, it is perhaps worth noting that my anxiety might be much worse without it.


"God grant me a peace
beyond Pregabalin" ... I prayed the other morning.


and I wait.




                                 *** Breaking news***


I have convinced my consultant and Dr Death that I would be better if I could return to work! 
And so... ladies and gentlemen
(drum roll)
... after a year...
... 
...
I am allowed a PART TIME phased return and 
the most incredible thing
is that my bosses
have agreed 
to make my contract part time 
at least until September.


They didn't have to.
They could have got rid of me.
They could have put me under nasty 'capability' conditions
especially as Dr Death's prognosis is incredibly negative, predicting the usual doom and gloom and failure to sustain and manage and recover and, and, and 
all the miserable misery that he just LOVES to pile into his letters.


Can I defy his predictions?


I have reached one major conclusion about recovery from Anorexia.


In order to recover, you have to act like a 'normal' person.


Even now I hear the horrified screams of  '...there's no such thing as 'normal'.
But there bloody well is where eating disorders are concerned.


In order to recover, one must pretend to be normal, which means that a)they must force themselves to cook and eat as if they do not suffer from their condition.
b) They must behave in such a way that, if being observed, nobody would notice anything markedly strange or different about their eating habits.


Totally impossible?
Well.
We shall see.


Tonight I ate what I was served.
Every mouthful hurt.
I smiled and chatted and ached and imploded.


Recovery is like being helped into a bed by people who have no idea that the mattress is packed full of upturned needles.

Blue Monday

Incredible. 
It's nothing short of incredible.
And I, the biggest cynic regarding all things 'Pseudo Science', am pushed towards AWE by the fact that, until I overheard a conversation in a local supermarket, I had no idea it was 'Blue Monday', or that such a phenomena existed.


It's practically against my religion to expand on such things, such is the level of distrust (and possibly even... disgust) of anything vaguely pseudo scientific. In this case however, I'll make an exception.


I woke early on Monday morning to find Anorexia squatting at my bedside bed, waiting patiently for a clamour of stupefying chants to fully penetrate every square centimetre of my being. 


Flatly refusing to succumb to the temptations offered, I ran through my normal routine and ate my porridge and apple, pleasantly distracted by Chris Evans and a large general knowledge crossword.


By midday however, the Anorexia had stepped up it's game and I, like a swatted-at wasp, zipped from cupboard to fridge to freezer to cupboard to fridge to freezer, unable to make a decision about food, furious at myself for being hungry and confused by the sums and figures coursing through my head.
And so I have nothing.
Or bits of food.
Or nothing.
Or bits.
And I don't know anymore.


I end up kneeling against my bed, hands pressed against my eyes, thinking of nothing at all.
Because that's the only way I can find comfort in a pain that is almost physical.
Ripped apart. Visceral pain.


Later, in a paler shade of darkness,  I forced myself to drive down to the supermarket, where I stumbled round in a malnourished daze.


"They say it's the worst day of the year today", the man said to the woman as he patted her back sympathetically.


Hopeful for something, ANYTHING, to explain the day, I googled it.
To find this.

The date for ‘the most depressing day of the year’ was first identified by Cliff Arnall, formerly of Cardiff University, marking the symbolic time in January when people suffer from a series of combined depressive effects.

His date was devised using the following mathematical formula:

The model was broken down using six immediately identifiable factors; weather (W), debt (d), time since Christmas (T), time since failing our new year’s resolutions (Q), low motivational levels (M) and the feeling of a need to take action (Na).

The formula calculates that Monday 16th January 2012 is the worst day of the year, when the Christmas glow has faded away, New Year’s resolutions have been broken, cold Winter weather has set in and credit card bills will be landing on doormats across the land – whilst the January pay-cheque is still some way away.

The formula started a chain of events which led to the designation of ‘Blue Monday’ – the third monday of January.

Believe it or not... But it was certainly my worst day in a very long time.

Dear Alanis...

... If you think finding a black fly in your Chardonnay is ironic...


... try suffering from Anorexia Nervosa, an illness which is, ultimately, all about having 'control', and waking up to find that the future of your teaching career, your chances of going back to your job, rely solely on the words of two men who barely know you.


Now THAT'S ironic.


(I never got the black fly thing anyway)

Christmas: The Good, The Bad and The... Miracle...

Every year I am struck by the potential that Christmas has for being, in Dickens' words, the very "best of times and the worst of times". 
Whilst my natural inner cynic appreciates the odd bah humbug (and my mind's eye smiles affectionately as it casts over little blueprints of those I recall as I write), I cannot help but to be somehow drawn by the magic and sparkle that fans of Christmas sprinkle so liberally around the Western world.
As the festive season unravels, the dreariness of Winter is peeled further and further back as twinkling warmth unfolds and rests over the all too familiar landscapes in our lives. 
Strings of  lights glow warm on trees and houses, and people nod more; smile more; allow more.
Displays hark back to richly coloured illustrations of rosy cheeked, Victorian children gathered around candlelit fir trees.
And the world is in soft focus, with a gentle sepia overlay.


Until, 
that is, 
you turn on the news to hear about more bombs, more earthquakes, more famine, more drought, more human suffering than can be held in one heart.
And that's just the stuff on the radio.
Then there are all those that you know who are facing their first, second, third (and on..) Christmas without loved ones; grief gnawing away at brave faces, determined to make it bearable.
There are the many (so, so many) for whom the contrast of the magical Christmas atmosphere only serves to bring the agony of their own personal pain into unbearably sharp focus. Grief made more raw, bitterness more  acid, longing more weighty, loneliness more solitary, and heavy sadness more piercing.
I don't want to be a party pooper... I can actually be the life and soul of one given half a chance, but perhaps because I've been there myself, I can't help but feel like writing a miserable letter to Slade as the line "everybody's having fun" streams from the radio 


And then there is the real meaning of it all.
Which we miss, so easily... Lost amid the bright gold curling ribbon and the strewn wrapping and the glossy metallic bows and gift tags. 
How did we manage to turn it into something so loud that it can drown the cry of a newborn?


If you are the sort who believes in the miracle of Christmas, as am I, you'll probably agree that sometimes it's hard to remember that all the gifts and the glitz aren't really a celebration of US at all.
It's really all about the fact that a child was given to the world. Divine, and yet human.
No. I can't get my head round it either.


Today is a hard day for anorexics too. Food and drink dictate the day.


This year I asked God for a miracle for Christmas.
Or should I say, ANOTHER miracle.
I asked him to take the illness away.


Miracles do happen.
There is much evidence to show that they have always happened.
Without wanting to sound ham, I do believe. 
I will wait. 


Wishing anyone who passes here a merry Christmas, full of the warmth of meaning.
And if you are one of the struggling, I wish you peace and hope you can somehow take heart from the fact that it's a couple of days out of so many. And they are more painful, so much more. But you will survive them and the rawness will be soothed. I promise.
Take heart.

It's twins...

Possibly because of Belgium and ridiculous EU rulings about the shapes and sizes of fruit and veg... Siamese tomatoes are in short supply...

... so it was worth a photo

!!!

It's My Party...

... and I'll cry if I want to.

Okay so No Party and No Tears, but it IS my birthday...
...and whilst it's been nice in many, many ways, I've struggled to keep my smile in place. 
On two unguarded occasions  it slid off my chin, provoking the observation that I looked sad.
It's important to me that they don't think I'm sad today. 
The pain is more painful for those who watch.


My weight moved up by point seven of a kilo last week. 
I can't begin to describe the misery that this small gain has caused, or the battle which has ensued.
Yet, I know I have to kill this Anorexia.
I know it even as I skip manically; as I push my body up on breaking arms; as I reach a breathless forty on my knee - to - elbow jumps, and as I crunch unforgiven coccyx on the hard floor.
I know it as I push each coveted mouthful past guarded lips, willing myself to swallow, to allow, to stay.
Each grind of my teeth, a perfectly synchronised nod and shake. 
A simultaneous, stereophonic yes and no.


In all my wildest nightmares, I never once imagined that my birthday this year would be spent trying to claw my way out of Anorexia.

I hope against all hope that next year, the narrative will be very different.

Update

To my addled, heavy - saddled mind, the increasing pressure to write a blog post has borne a wormish hole through my head and I can't sleep properly until I have, at least, been here and written some words.

I don't even think it matters what they are any more; just so long as I break the silence.

What follows is a week's worth of situations I have seen myself in:

 

I've been scooped and planed and smeared with gel for an ultrasound on my liver, which continues to register stupidly high ALTS in a determined display of disapproval.

I attended a weigh in appointment at the unit, which revealed another small drop in my weight. Again, I was told I was unable to 'do' this and that I needed to be back in the treatment centre. 

Again I refused, knowing that they have no real grounds for threats whilst my weight is above 31.7kg / 5 stone / 69 lb... Today it stands at 34.0kg. I am incredulous (again and again and again) at the way this illness can CONVINCE me that I have put on at least 3 pounds every week. I can even SEE it.

Or not.

I saw The Woman, having completely forgotten to attend last week's session.

She has noted that lately I seem unable to allow myself a 'whole' of anything. I can't allow a whole packet of cereal, a whole apple, a whole sweet, and (judging by a regular pattern of totally unintentional lateness) a 'whole' session of therapy. (She doesn't appear to 'DO' "unintentional". Apparently (assume cynical tone) apparently its all to do with the unconscious mind.

Needless to say, my failure to even show up for a session was duly interpreted in the light of such analytical theory rather than the more truthful fact that I'm fairly malnourished and my brain isn't quite functioning as it should be.

The Woman has continued to be my place of safety.

Today we discussed Something Very Difficult (very briefly). I let it slide across me rather than through me.

We both know it was enough for now.

Tomorrow I am going away for the weekend with two friends.

We've rented a little cottage very cheaply and though I have questioned whether I can possibly enjoy a break from my safe but painful routine, I am now quite excited by the idea that I am doing something 'normal', with normal people, in a normal situation.

Normality is an underrated state, in my opinion.

Words being available, I will make some attempt at relaying just how successful I am in my attempt to join this fleeting dance with something outside of my world of body and battle.

Wish me luck.

Ode To Honesty

Fragrant cotton
Sun-bleached soul
Death black scorpion
Sting in its tail.

Note To Self #1
All those pretty fables about the warm glow of Doing The Right Thing?
It's all a vicious lie!

(Particularly when it costs over two thousand pounds!)

Autumn - The Side Effects

A Post In Pieces

Again and again I stare into a murky pool of muddled metaphor and ill fitting adjectives in an attempt to find something powerful enough to describe the chaos of trying to recover from Anorexia Nervosa.

Plucking tangled fronds of slime gripped sentences that have no visible beginnings or ends... Dark words that, lifted lightwards, slide and slip heavily back into mud, resisting context and order.
Somewhere, there's a likeness between this 'independent' agony of being unable to adequately express the agony, and the quandary of being desperate to recover whilst being unable to physically complete the actions necessary for recovery to take place.
Re-feeding... This 'process' a mouth-less creature, starved to its skeleton, placed before a piece of fresh, tender meat. Driven mad by the hunger, its endless pacing surrounds the meal, carving circles in the earth.

I hold a license to eat but find my mouth has been stitched up.

Enough metaphors. 
I did warn you...


For those interested, these are the facts:

• Although I'm not in the unit anymore, I attend fortnightly reviews / weigh ins with the head consultant, a fantastically dedicated man with whom I have a very good rapport. 

• The aim is to move my weight up by following a strict meal plan. 

• The consultant's recommendation is that I return to the unit. I steadfastly refuse to do this. If you had to sit in a circle and discuss how you feel about your weight day in, day out for over nineteen weeks, so would you.

• I am managing to maintain a steady weight, although at 34.6kgs, it is still very low.

• My current BMI is 14.1.

• My ALT levels continue to be much higher than they should be. Doctors are monitoring it carefully. The nurse at my local surgery does weekly ECGs and takes enough of my blood for us to consider each other as friends. 

• I had planned to return to work at the beginning of next half term. Occupational Health, my consultant and my bosses have told me this will not be possible.

Importantly, I continue to see The Woman. 

The little house in the woods is my safest place and she is a worn piece of warm, brown leather with all the woody comfort smells of autumn fog and fir and fires.

She has been the one constant in the chaos, and although my financial situation reduces my time with her to once a week, this feels plenty enough balm for a mind  addled from trying to win a battle which bleeds deeply, no matter which side wins.  

I keep reading my flashcards (see Recovery Resources page). 

The mantras are clear and loud at the start of each day but seem to wane as the hours pass. Towards the evening, I can barely hear a whisper.

It appears that the coherence and volume of these positive statements, corresponds with the amount of food I have inside me.

Declaration at Dusk.

Still the battle rages,

And though the field dark red,

Rather now the agony,

Than live already dead.

So 'til the foe is silent,

Ignoring pleas of aching limb,

Through soul's dark night of madness

My heavy sword shall swing.

***

I'm fighting so hard that the mental exhaustion of the constant clash of thoughts, matches, even outweighs, the physical exhaustion of the eating disorder. 

At times, the swords swing so fast that I can't recognise whether it is me, or the Anorexia, who has won the round. 

Two things I know for sure: It hurts like hell 

and 

it doesn't stop for a minute in any waking hour. 

I want...

I want my life back.
No matter how bad things were, nothing, NOTHING can be as bad as Anorexia.


My weight remains in limbo, my mind in hell.
I am unable to complete tasks I attempt as my brain is just too addled.


I have started taking Pregabalin, despite the fear that its most common side effect is weight gain. 
I don't care anymore.
I just want the illness to go.


I wish that I could be put to sleep whilst my weight is restored.


It occurs to me that I haven't written about The Woman lately.
I have so much to say. 
So many words in a swirling vortex - half formed ideas dance purple shadows in front of my closed eyelids in the early hours.
I resolve to write posts about the nature of Anorexia and my understanding of its relationship with anxiety and depression.
I swear I'll reply to friends, blog friends and world friends, whose words and caring constantly brush soft against my bruises.
And yet, come the morning, I haven't got the mental energy.
It's all I can do just to force the bran through my lips.


I want to go back to work.
I want to live again.
I want to eat without feeling like I'm sinning.
I want to live outside of hell.


I want to ignore the old parental adage that whispers that 'I want doesn't get'.

Graffiti That Grabbed Me

Taking a shortcut down a small alley the other day, I came across this message stencilled on a wall.

Ignoring the somewhat sinister effect of the dripping paint... the message itself brought a little flame of hopefulness in the midst of all the dark.

"You're Gonna Be Okay".

The feather-gentle sinking into reassurance. A warm blanket round the shoulders of a shaking crash victim.

Reckon we could all do with hearing that phrase sometimes. 

Hits From Reality

Things have been pretty awful. (An oxymoronic phrase if ever you saw one)

Two weeks ago I began frantically re-feeding after dutifully attending a routine fortnightly 'weigh in' at the unit, where they have insisted on monitoring me.

I hadn't quite realised how horrific I looked until I faced the concrete reality of the much feared scales. I hadn't really SEEN my sunken sockets and protruding cheek bones.

My weight had dropped below the 5 stone (70 pounds) mark again.

They told me I had a week to turn it around or... hospitalisation.

Despite my subsequent weight gain, later blood results showed that my liver had gone into crisis with ALT levels soaring.

Last Friday was a fairly terrifying of panic stricken phonecalls from the unit, my GP and the hospital. By early evening, I was sitting in A&E whilst too kind doctors apologetically eased needles into swollen veins.

No wonder I weighed light on the scales.

I wondered if they were going to bleed me dry.

Following three days of sterile corridors and needles and bleeping machines and spidery graphs and the clinging smell of industrial disinfectant and linoleum, they were satisfied that my levels had dropped and that the alarming elevation in ALTS was either due to the effects of prolonged starvation or to the delicate process of re-feeding.

I haven't been able to think straight for a while.

I'm still struggling to order my thoughts and to complete even the smallest of tasks. The painting was one thing I managed to finish, and now this blog post is another, although I haven't got the emotional strength to write about the things I want to; things that swirl in frenetic streaks through my mind, clamouring and clambering over my sleep.

There is no rest...

Enough now.

Paint For Peace

I CHOOSE LIFE

Life Outside...

I want to be honest.

Although nothing in me will tolerate the conditions of returning to the unit, I am, quite frankly, finding it very hard to manage the process of re-feeding.

It's tough going from the moment I wake up.

Impossible not to compromise on the calories I'm supposed to be having.

My weight is down to 5 stone, BMI 13 point something... maybe less.

I'm going to do a meal plan for tomorrow so I don't wake up and torture myself in the middle of the night with it all.

When in doubt...

... make an owl.

Fascinating Trivia

When I attended a review meeting at the unit this week, I caught up with some of the lovely girls from my group.

One of them asked me what I was doing with my days and it got me thinking...

Because my weight has dropped a little, I am finding concentration very difficult. I am also spending vast amounts of time walking about, an anorexic 'behaviour' really.

Anyway, what follows is a list of some random information.

Currently reading: How The Light Gets In - A fantastic first novel by M.J Hyland who creates a complex and fascinating protagonist, a young exchange student whose troubled life leaves her desperate to both 'fit in' and 'escape' almost simultaneously.

A Purpose Driven Life (Rick Warren). My spiritual reading being almost zilch over the past year, I decided that the title of this popular book sounded like something the doctor might order. The two and a half chapters I've read so far, have confirmed this instinct.

Being True To Life (David Richo) - A random find on a rickety table outside a secondhand bookshop last weekend. The whole purpose of this book is to inspire the reader to write poetry. Flicking through, I was instantly captivated by the lines:

I'm too depressed

To write a poem

Yet here it is

Simple. Brilliant. Truth.

So far, I've only read the introduction.

Currently Listening To: The Avett Brothers - I And Love And You - Loving this album at the moment!

Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues -Quirky, choral, undoubtedly indebted to Simon and Garfunkel for inspired melodies.

Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More - What an Album!

Anything country, as per usual really.

Currently Watching: T.V series, The Apprentice (even though I hate Alan Sugar and the absolute unbridled arrogance of the contestants!)

Film - Mystic River, which I turned off halfway through cos my attention span is short right now.

Currently coveting: The Canon 430D SLR camera, although I have also looked at the Canon SX30 IS. I am passionate about photography and would love to take it up as a proper hobby. However, I am reluctant to 'rush' into anything at the moment and these cameras are very expensive.

Currently Enjoying Eating: Tesco Goulash Hearty Soup This is one very good low calorie meal if you halve it and add the odd new potato and salad! (Not that I should be doing low cal in a big way but...)

Currently Creating: Felt Flowers (er... yeah... I'm not sure either but hey... I have some time to spare between the hours of 4 and 6 most mornings).

My Recovery Project Scrapbook is still looking sparse (but not quite as sparse as my recovery itself - ho ho ho, tounge in cheek, hurts a bit to laug, etc etc...). I'm trying to complete a page about scales and numbers.

And there you have it. An assortment of trivia.

Anyone want to share in a similar fashion? Feel free to reply in comments.