Emotions

I have been riding a tidal wave of emotions just recently, the last few months have been hard - really hard. My body has reacted violently and my brain has no idea what is going on. One minute I am happy go lucky and the next a text message has me bursting into tears. Overwhelming tiredness doesn't help, I am caught in a never ending circle of napping in the afternoon and then being unable to sleep at night. I have a constant feeling that I have failed, this relapse has hit me hard, probably because I honestly didn't see it coming. Yes I only had perhaps three weeks of eating 'normally' but since then I have restricted like crazy, my list of safe foods has got shorter and although I am fighting that disgusting voice that tells me I'm not good enough she has been getting louder just recently. Running is the only time that I feel completely free - immersed in working my body and taking great satisfaction in feeling tired and sweaty when I have finished, the only problem is I can't differentiate between what I am feeling and what 'She' is feeling.

I will not give up though. I will ride this emotional wave and I will come out stronger than ever before. I am not prepared to roll over and let 'her' storm though my life. Whilst I have breath in my body I will fight as hard as I can.

Fighting

Fighting a daily battle with your body is exhausting, from the moment I wake up until I eventually drift off at night that's exactly what I am currently doing. I don't like to think I have an eating disorder, in fact seeing it there in black and white makes my heart race and I can feel tears pricking at my eyes, but I do and I was doing a pretty good job at hiding it from everyone. My battle with food is a complicated one, one that even I don't fully understand yet but I know I need to be strong.
A typical day will see me exist on nothing but fruit and coffee until the evening when S and I enjoy a dinner together, I obsessively check the calorie content of everything, I exercise excessively, I will make up excuses as to why I need to walk up and down the stairs. My body hurts, my head hurts and the only person to blame is me. There is not a moment during the day when I am not thinking about food, trying to decide what I am going to eat that evening, how I am going to be able to up my exercise to burn extra calories. It hurts, I hurt - the constant battle is exhausting and never ending.

I can't remember when it began, but I have a feeling it has been building for a long time. A couple of years ago I had to take extended leave from work which meant that I wasn't dancing at all, I made a conscious decision to cut down on food then in order to maintain my weight and things have accelerated from there. That fateful day when I made that decision is the reason why (I think) I am now in this position, I know there is more to it than that, but those reasons are personal and I am still working them out with my counsellor, one day I hope to be strong enough to share them with you all but for now I can't.

I long for a day when I can go out for dinner with friends without spending the day worrying about what I am going to order, when I can spontaneously eat without feeling ashamed of myself or panicking about how I am going to fit extra exercise into my already busy schedule. I want to be ok, I want to get better and for me admitting that is the first step to getting better, I need to stop avoiding the issue and accept that there is a problem before I can get better.

My name is Gemma and I have an Eating Disorder.