My story Part 5

Ok guys so I managed to get one picture of my food from yesterday. I completely forgot to take pic the other times I ate. We'll try again next week. So here's the last part of my recovery story...

Part of my dinner= chicken and guac and kale chips and roasted potato slices

That summer I took two trips back to back. First I went with my youth group on week retreat. The food was adequate but not many choices there and so overall I wasn't getting enough nutrition. Then my family took a week road trip. That trip was one I'll never forget. It was my wake up call. My family kinda has different eating habits than me and so being around them I tried to adapt to them instead of doing what I needed to do. For example they typically skip breakfast so that's what I did. We also didn't have much food available and would often go to a fast food place for dinner. I would get a chicken salad because I don't like hamburgers. Decreased food intake coupled with the walking we were doing at amusement parks depleted what little energy stores I had. I had a hard time enjoying the amusement parks and things we were doing because I was either incredibly fatigued or battling obsessive thoughts about feeling overly full. I remember this one day we were at a waterpark and we were eating lunch. I'd eaten what I typically did for lunch but remember still being hungry but I didn't know what else to eat. Well by this point my family was done eating and were ready to move on. But I knew I wouldn't have enough strength to get through the rest of the day. I remember sitting in the car crying telling my mom I didn't have enough energy (energy is always my code word for food/calories). She helped me get another half of a chicken sandwich to eat. And later my brother asked me what happened. And I didn't know how to answer. That was one of the hardest parts about that trip. I felt ill and estranged from my family. I couldn't enjoy things because of my hunger and obsessive thoughts. I was aware of why this was happening but I didn't know what to do about it. Even if I ate enough one meal or one day that didn't fix the underlying problem. I came back from that trip knowing I'd lost weight so I ate more at home. One of the most tricky things about being undernourished is that it's still very possible to overeat. There's a day I can remember feeling really full and being very distressed which again led to fear of eating that much again which resulted in chronic under-eating. 

Even before summer came I knew that I'd need to get help at college from the counseling staff  so I'd be able to get better fully from my disordered eating patterns especially because I wanted to study nutrition. Well anyway 3 weeks  before going to college I went to see an eating disorder specialist so the counseling crew at my college would have a basis for where I was. We drove over 2 hrs to see this specialist. Now it was right at noontime and I'd brought a sandwich but I didn't eat it because I was nervous. When she did her evaluation on me she recommended that I not go to college but instead go to a halfway treatment center. I guess the way she saw things I was in a danger zone and going to college would just make things worst. I remember sitting in that room in a paper gown shaking. It felt eerily similar to my trip to the doctor's office in seventh grade. However I was in a much different place mentally. I wasn't purposely trying to not eat. I wasn't trying to rebel. I knew I could gain weight in the next few weeks because I'd done it before. This lady wanted to rip my future away from me when she didn't really understand my situation! But on the car ride home the more I thought about it the more I realized I had to give this up to God. If he didn't want me to go to college this semester then I needed to obey. Ultimately however my family and I decided it was best for me to carry on with my plan to go to college and we'd just make sure I got treatment there at the counseling center. 

I'll just give a quick overview of my experience at college. First we made the right decision. College has helped me heal from my disordered eating because of the counselor I met there, the availability of healthy food, different opportunities for activities and friends, and getting on zoloft for anxiety. It was very rough the first semester because I was still learning how to eat enough and how to eat intuitively and I had to go see an eating disorder specialist off campus every couple weeks which meant my mom had to drive 2 hrs to take me there. It was also hard for me because I kept this a secret. Only a couple people knew about what I'd been going through. 

My second yr of college was similar but less intense.  I've been learning what intuitive eating is, evaluating  some of the core beliefs I've carried around my entire life, and been encouraged by reading other recovery blogs online. 

It's still a journey. Each day is a journey. I have not arrived but I can look back and see the progress I've made. I'm still learning, still growing. I still have struggles. I do not consider myself yet fully recovered but one thing I do leaving what is behind and pressing on towards what is ahead. I take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. (Yes I just paraphrased a Bible verse.) 

I hope this encourages you that no matter where you are, what you're facing whether it's good or bad. There is hope, hope for a life to come.