Tag Archives: mental health

Remembering A Year Ago (or Still So Grateful My Friend Got Help)

Posted on September 5, 2019 | Comments Off on Remembering A Year Ago (or Still So Grateful My Friend Got Help)

About a year ago, I wrote a post about a friend who I had to force to get help because I felt they were a danger to themselves. That night was one of the most terrifying nights of my life. I have shared a lot of what happened with my friend because he doesn’t remember much about it (which I’m grateful for because I said some harsh things to him to force him to get help). When I wrote that post a year ago, I had no idea what my relationship would be like with my friend. Now, I’m so grateful that it hasn’t changed. If anything, we have gotten closer.

That night will stick out in my mind for so many things. I feared what would happen if my friend didn’t listen to me. I had threatened to call the police to get him if he didn’t go to a hospital, but I was so worried he would drive somewhere else and I couldn’t call for help for him. I didn’t think he would do anything to hurt himself while he was in the car, but I was still scared he would get in an accident because he was acting very irrational. I had no clue if my friend would talk to me again but I had to realize I was willing to sacrifice our friendship if that meant his life would be saved.

But some positives came out of that night. First of all, my friend got the help he needed. He has told me since that night that his doctors believe he might have harmed himself that night, so he needed to get help and he did. He has done some amazing work with his doctors and in therapy in the past year and I’m so glad that he has taken those steps. If that horrible night was what needed to happen for him to get the help and medical care he needed, that’s a good thing. I also witnessed so many friends coming together to help, both that night and for the days after it. We pulled together to help our friend with things like moving his car to a place where it won’t be towed, picking him up when he was coming home, making sure he had things he needed, and looking into options for paying for his medical bills.

My friend has also become much more open regarding this since this happened a year ago. I think that’s a good thing because more people can learn from what he has gone through and that can support him if they are going through something similar. I’ve shared on here several things that I battle with, and I have only seen positive things from being open. I hope that that’s what my friend is experiencing as well. From what I’ve seen, he has only gotten good things from his openness.

I know that my friend has been a bit anxious about this anniversary and I can understand that. He has gone through so much in the past year and I have only seen a fraction of it. I have tried to remind him that this is also an anniversary of him getting help and starting a new phase of his life. I’m sure he is remembering things from before and it’s not always easy to see the difference in your own life sometimes, but I see the difference. I know he isn’t the same person he was a year ago. I don’t worry about him the way I used to because I know he is in a much better headspace than he was before. I know that he is more comfortable reaching out and asking for help if he needs it. He has more resources than he had before and can manage things differently. I’ve only seen positive changes in him and that makes me hopeful that things are just going to continue to get better.

A year ago, I had no clue what would happen or if my friend would be ok. I’m so glad that things turned out the best that they could. I know that not everything is perfect, but they are being worked on. And seeing all these positive changes in my friend makes me feel better about forcing him to get help because that was something I really did struggle with. But now, there’s no question that it was the right thing to do and I hope that anyone who knows of someone who is at serious risk of harming themselves would do the same. It’s not easy to do, but it was the right thing to do.

And if you are struggling and want help, there are many resources out there. Going to an emergency room is an option if you don’t feel safe. They will help you and make sure that you are safe or get the help that you need. But I know that some people can’t or won’t do that for a variety of reasons. So if you don’t want to do that or are not sure if you need help, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. There are available 24/7 and can offer resources or just be someone to listen to you. Getting help isn’t easy, but hopefully, you will see the good that comes out of it by hearing a little bit of what my friend accomplished since he got help.

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Default ThumbnailSo Many Birthdays and Anniversaries! (or A Month Of Celebrating And Remembering) Default ThumbnailA Non-Surgery Anniversary (or Another Year Of Being A Medical Miracle) Default ThumbnailTrying To Help A Friend (or Why Do Bad Things Happen To Good People?) Default ThumbnailTen Years Ago (or Another Big Milestone) Default ThumbnailSo Grateful To Work From Home (or Just Getting Through The Day) Default ThumbnailIt Can Be Tough To Get Help (or Trying To Be A Good Friend To My Friends)

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Wishing For A Vacation (or Finding My Own Time Off)

Posted on July 26, 2019 | Comments Off on Wishing For A Vacation (or Finding My Own Time Off)

I wrote about how I hit burnout recently. I’m getting much better from that low point and I’m glad I’m not feeling how I did when I wrote that post. Weirdly, it’s good that right now I’m experiencing nausea because it forces me to slow down and do a lot of nothing. It’s not really a great break from things since I’m feeling awful, but it does allow me to relax a little bit. And I’ve been trying to take advantage of the downtime that I’m being forced to have.

Since I’m only working one job right now, I do tend to have free time between customers. I’ve been enjoying watching shows that I have been meaning to catch up on or playing lots of random games on my phone. Anything that is a distraction from work has been nice when sometimes I only have 2 or 3 customers to help over a 7-hour shift. I do need another job, but I needed to give myself a break and enjoy a little bit of time that isn’t as crazy as it has been.

And I have been thinking about why I’ve been needing this break and I think I have thought of something. For so much of my life, there have been set breaks in my schedule. When I was in school, there were school breaks in the summer and for different holidays. When I was working at the Broad Stage, we had a little break in the off season. And most people who work full-time jobs get time off so they take vacations or take time off occasionally. But I don’t really have any of that now. Each week is the same as the week before and there isn’t much change for me in the day to day work that I do. Time blends a lot and I don’t have a big event or break to look forward to.

I have been able to take the occasional weekend away and I’m so grateful for those. But it’s been a long time since I’ve had a significant time off of work. And even longer since I’ve had a big trip. I know both of those ideas aren’t a reality for me right now because I can’t afford a trip nor can I afford to be unpaid to take time off. I just have to find my time off in other ways and that’s what I guess I’ve been trying to do with watching shows between my customers.

I wish I could do more with the fake time off I have, but I’m tied to my computer. I guess I could work from somewhere else because I have done that, but there’s nowhere else I really could work from right now that wouldn’t make things a bigger issue. I just have to find how to maximize what I can and it is limited. But at least it’s something and I don’t have to be stuck somewhere miserable every day or have a job that doesn’t allow for any breaks. I’m very lucky with the job I have even if I don’t get time off or vacation time (we basically only get Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years Days off).

I know that I’m complaining about things that are not that bad and that many people have it much worse than I do. I think my opinion is a bit skewed because of the lives a lot of my friends live. Many of them make 4 or 5 times what I make and they get paid time off, so they have the ability to travel and I am a bit jealous. I know that if I decided to give up on acting I could probably find a job that pays me significantly more and I could do the same. Right now, acting is still more important than money and travel although I do hope that one day I can have all of it. I am aware of the choice that I made and while right now it’s not making me completely happy it is still making me happier than I would be without acting in my life.

I think that all the random time off stuff I’ve been doing at home has played a bit part in helping me feel more like me as quickly as it has been happening. I have been allowing myself to be selfish and that has allowed me to have some more fun in my life when I probably should be doing more serious things. But sometimes I need that break and it has to be while I’m working since I don’t have a vacation or a complete break from my work.

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I Tried, I Still Hit Burnout (or Finding Some New Limits)

Posted on July 19, 2019 | 1 comment

It was only a few days ago when I wrote about having to not go to plans that I was looking forward to and needing to be selfish so I could prevent burnout. I had hoped that recognizing it when I did would help me not get to the point where I needed a real break and that I could take the time I needed to recover. But of course, plans don’t always go the way you expect and you can’t always help what happens.

After I wrote that post, I had a lot of things that hit me back to back that just got me to a bit of a breaking point. First, we are now experiencing the heat of summer. Things are so much better for me now than they were before since I have my little a/c unit, but they still aren’t perfect. I did finally get over my fear of the cost of a/c since I know the unit I have isn’t as bad as most, so I do run it a lot during the day now without worrying about the cost. I know my power bill will be higher, but it’s worth it. When I have to sit at my computer for a full work shift, my computer starts to get hot and that makes me even warmer than normal. As soon as I am done with work, I go to my room to lay in front of my fan. That helps me recover, but it’s still not easy while I’m working. It’s also affecting my sleep right now, which isn’t helping me recover each night. But I’m doing whatever I can to try to stay cool, including drinking more water than normal which I know has more benefits than just cooling me down.

I also am starting to deal with my monthly pain and nausea. I will say it’s not as bad as it has been recently, but I think the combination of that plus the heat is making it feel worse to me. I’m trying to do all the things I know that help me feel better and most of them are working. The one that I am not doing right now is using a heating pad. I don’t necessarily feel like I need a heating pad right now, but even if I did I don’t know if I could tolerate it with the heat we have right now. I guess I should be grateful that I don’t feel like I need it, but I am just feeling so irritable right now that the pain and nausea are just annoying me.

I think the final thing that made me hit a point of burnout was some work-related stuff that happened. Nothing too horrible happened, but several issues required more time than it should have taken or needed me to repeat the same task multiple times because of random errors that were not able to be fixed by me. It was overwhelming waiting to see if I had to do something over again and waiting on others to fix the mistakes. Just like with my pain and nausea, I don’t know if this would normally bother me, but with it compounding with everything else it just hit me hard. After that, I hit a real low point and just had to have some time to be a hermit at home.

I did take a bit of time to myself yesterday and canceled some plans that I had made for a date (I wasn’t super excited about the date so this was a good excuse to cancel). I stayed home with the a/c on and just watching dumb videos on YouTube or reading. I’m still not feeling totally like myself just yet and I’m being cautious about what I plan. I wanted to not get to this point because I knew recovering from it was going to take time that I don’t have. Unfortunately, due to circumstances out of my control, I got there and now I need to take the time to fix it. I know it could get worse, and I’m doing everything I can to stop that. I have set new limits with myself and with others so I don’t get too overwhelmed. I also keep reminding myself that so much of what I’m dealing with is a temporary situation and will be over soon. That thought does help.

I have some fun things coming up over the next few weeks, but they are more spread out than things were the past few weeks. I’m finding what I can take off of my schedule to allow myself more downtime and more time to mentally and physically recover from things. And I do hope that these efforts I am making will help me get back to the normal me soon. All I can do is try and hope for the best. And maybe having that hope will help make it become a reality.

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Another Online Class (or I Just Have To Keep Trying)

Posted on June 19, 2019 | Comments Off on Another Online Class (or I Just Have To Keep Trying)

For a very long time, I have tried to find a way to recover from my eating disorder. I’ve tried lots of different things and nothing has been the fix I have been looking for. But as I have tried more and more, I’ve also realized that there is a chance that nothing will be the perfect solution and I have to probably use multiple tools and skills to get into recovery.

Most things I have tried have benefitted me at least a little. Or even if I found no benefit, I have learned that they aren’t the right thing for me and I don’t have to worry to keep trying it. Sometimes, thinking something might work can be stressful and it’s nice to know that it won’t so I don’t have to waste any brain space on it. And some of the things that I didn’t find super beneficial at first have connected with me at another time and they are helping.

Right now, I’ve got a few things that have been helping me. Those include the medications that I’m taking, the therapy that I do, and some of the books and research that I have continued to read. With my medication, it’s been an interesting journey with having to change things up to figure out the right dosage. I think what I’m taking now is a good dose and I do feel it helps. And there is a chance that I will be adding another medication soon which should help more. But that decision will come in the next month or so. Therapy was much more helpful in the beginning when I was still trying to figure things out. Now that I have a lot of the answers I have been looking for, therapy is a good check-in, but it’s not as mind-blowing as it was before. I don’t have a lot of huge realizations in therapy, but I do hope that I might have some from time to time as I continue to grow.

And the books I have read about recovery have been one of the more helpful things because it has made me feel less alone in this entire thing. Eating disorders can be isolating and I feel like binge eating was even more isolating because it wasn’t understood to be an eating disorder until recently. I have found some online communities that have helped, but I think the books and research I do have made me feel less alone than those communities.

One of the first books I read that connected to me was “Brain Over Binge”. Many people raved about the book and said it helped them recover when nothing else did. I went into reading the book hoping it would do the same for me. While it didn’t, it did bring a lot of insight into my eating disorder and helped me think very differently about it. I read the book a while ago and knew I wanted to read it again, but then I heard about the online course that the author of the book was doing.

I knew she had done other online courses before, but I never really looked too much into it. I knew it was out of my budget at the time so I didn’t focus on what it offered or what it was about. But for some reason, this time I really wanted to see what the course was about and really put some thought into if I could find a way to afford it since I know that finding a way to recover is priceless (as cheesy as that sounds).

Because of some of the changes that were made to the course, it was much cheaper this time than it was before. Its still something that I had to budget for and find where I could not spend money so I could pay for it, but I knew I had to go for it. This is worth it for me to try and I didn’t want to skip an opportunity just because of money.

The course is 8 weeks long and it just started this week. The entire thing is online and there are assignments Monday-Friday. Some of the assignments are worksheets or journal prompts and some are listening to different types of audio coaching. Everything can be downloaded so I can keep the resources forever. I am making sure I download everything because I want to have access to them whenever I need them. I don’t know if this course will connect with me right now, so I want to have the ability to try again later if I need to.

I’ve only done a few lessons so far, but I am enjoying them. Even though a lot of the information is the same I got from reading the book, they are presented in a different way and it feels different. I’m trying to not have too much pressure with myself to make this course be the thing that gets me to a place of recovery, but I do have a lot of optimism that it will help at least a little and maybe more than anything else I have tried before.

Like I said, I have realized that recovery is going to require multiple tools and skills and every time I add another one it can only be a good thing. Of course I want this to work perfectly and be everything I need, but I am looking at it as another option and tool I can use when it feels right. And if I can have a tool or skill to use for anything that may come my way, that’s going to help me win this battle no matter what.

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Mental Health Month (or Better Late Than Never)

Posted on May 31, 2019 | Comments Off on Mental Health Month (or Better Late Than Never)

May is Mental Health Month. And yes, I’m aware that today is the last day of May so it’s pretty much over. But I wasn’t sure if I wanted to write about it or not. And I realized that my indecision about it was probably a sign that I did need to write something. I’m getting it in just before it’s too late, but that’s ok. I’m still getting it done.

I’ve written about mental health on here a lot. I’ve written about my various struggles as well as the struggles of people in my life. For so long, mental health was something that wasn’t shared openly. If people were struggling, they didn’t share it because they didn’t want to be judged. Now, while there still is some stigma it is getting so much better. People know they aren’t alone in their struggles and there is no shame in asking or getting help. If someone is going to treat you badly for working on yourself, then they are the bad one and not you.

I’ve been lucky that I haven’t really had people who have treated me badly for my mental health struggles. I know that some of them have confused friends and family and I still have to explain myself. I would say my eating disorder is the thing most misunderstood or questioned in my life and I understand that. Binge eating disorder is a relatively new eating disorder when it comes to being a real diagnosis and not everyone understands that it is not just wanting to eat. I usually don’t want to eat when I have a binge episode.

The other mental health thing of mine that seems to be misunderstood is my OCD. I don’t have it the way that most people imagine it to be. I think people think of OCD as rituals or cleaning techniques. I know some people also think it has to do with personal hygiene such as washing your hands endlessly or needing to use certain products to feel ok. For me, my OCD is mainly about having things look right to me. There’s not an easy way to explain it, but I will see something that looks off and I can’t focus until I fix it. It’s not always something crooked or dirty. If my pens look like they are not in a good order for me, I have to fix it. If there is a plate of fries and there’s one that doesn’t look right, I can’t stop thinking about it until it has been eaten (which isn’t easy to make happen if it’s on someone else’s plate). I’ve had some people claim I couldn’t have OCD because I don’t act like what they expected. It’s not upsetting to me anymore that someone questions my mental health issues. It’s a little annoying and I usually feel like I have to explain how it works for me. It’s a bit of education for them and a bit of reassurance for me that I am heard and hopefully understood.

Lately, I have wondered if I’ve been struggling with mental health because I’ve been dealing with a lot of mood related things that I usually don’t go through. I’ve been much easier to upset and anger and I haven’t been holding my emotions back. But I’ve realized that these are probably not struggles as much as progress. I have been working on standing up for myself more and I think that makes things more emotional. If someone is treating me a way I know I shouldn’t be treated, I don’t let it slide anymore. I call them out and that can get me upset. That’s not a sign of a struggle. Allowing myself to let my emotions out is a good thing and can feel very cathartic at times.

I know that I am incredibly lucky when it comes to mental health. I have insurance that covers medication and doctor appointments and I have a diagnosis. That is a lot more than many people have. And I have been working on this for a while and have seen so many steps forward. I have some people in my life still at the beginning of things and they worry it will never get better or that things will turn around. But I know that for them it will get better and they will see the other side of things. I know it’s hard to believe that when you are in a dark or difficult place, but hopefully they will see things from another perspective soon.

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Just Dragging On (or Another Apology For Another Short Post)

Posted on April 30, 2019 | 1 comment

I don’t like when I have short posts on here, but I’m sorry this is going to be one. I’m struggling right now with some really bad nausea and pain that has really made yesterday (when I’m writing this) drag on. I did too much and I should have taken it easy, but I didn’t. I did things that I know made my nausea worse and I didn’t take care of myself the way I know I need to.

I’ve also been dealing with a severe lack of sleep lately. This isn’t due to my pain and nausea, it’s a bad habit that I’ve been struggling to break. I’ll write more about this tomorrow but I’ve been having a lot of nights with only 4 or 5 hours of sleep. Having those nights occasionally isn’t great, but it’s tolerable. Having them for an entire week or two really makes it tough and makes me feel like I need to nap. On Sunday, I ended up taking 2 different naps that were each over 2 hours long. I needed that time to get other stuff done, but clearly I needed the sleep more. But I should have gotten that sleep overnight and not during the day.

Pushing myself to my limit when I’m not feeling great is a recurring issue for me, but it never seems to go away either. I knew that I was doing too much, but that didn’t stop me. I just wanted to push through and see if I could get it all done (I did) and see if it might not wear me down like it normally does (unfortunately, I had the same reaction as always). So I’ve had to find where I could cut back on responsibilities so I could take care of myself. And writing this blog post was something I felt like I could cut back on.

I know some people would say this is a sign to not blog every day, but if I planned things out better I would have gotten this post written sooner and what happened during the day wouldn’t have mattered. But I didn’t do that and I’m sticking with my commitment to myself. Plus, writing posts like this shows that even if all my posts around this one were exciting and happy that my life isn’t always like that. I struggle just like anyone else and that’s exactly what happened to me yesterday.

Hopefully tomorrow’s post will be better and I will be feeling more like myself and more rested.

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Blogging Led To A Breakthrough (or I Need To Believe I’m Worthy)

Posted on April 11, 2019 | Comments Off on Blogging Led To A Breakthrough (or I Need To Believe I’m Worthy)

Yesterday I wrote about how I was putting off doing an elimination diet to hopefully discover what triggers flares of one of my autoimmune conditions. I was honest about why I’ve been scared to do it and what I might or might not find out. Writing that all out did help me sort through my feelings a bit, but when I was done writing I wasn’t done thinking.

I kept wondering why I was so scared of something that will lead to answers one way or another. Even if I don’t find any foods that cause flares, I will learn that I don’t have trigger foods. That won’t be the result I want, but it’s more information than I have right now. But I knew that there had to it than just that. I thought maybe I was scared that it would trigger disordered eating behaviors, but I’ve done so many random diet plans and I know how I behave on them.

Then I realized something that I don’t know why I hadn’t connected before. Part of the reason I am hesitant to do this elimination diet that might help me is that I don’t necessarily believe I deserve to find out.

I’ve written about how in my past someone in my life liked to tell me that I wasn’t lovable or worthy of things. I’ve always thought of that in connection to dating and friendships. Whenever I get ghosted by a guy, I have to work through the thought that I was an idiot to think I deserved a guy that great. I was just ghosted by someone recently who I thought was a really great guy and I was looking forward to seeing him again. It sucks to be ghosted, but I know it has nothing to do with me. There are women in my life that look like supermodels that get ghosted. It’s a numbers game and since I put myself out there a lot I have the risk of being ghosted a lot.

But this false narrative I have about not being worthy does go beyond relationships. Maybe I’ve never connected it before or I never had the reason to connect it before. For years, I have said that I was unlucky with health related things because I always have weird stuff. But I never felt like it was my fault those things happened. They usually had a reason I could pinpoint that took the blame off of me somehow. But with an autoimmune condition, there’s nothing I can blame it on. Even if I discover what my triggers are, those didn’t give me this problem. It just makes it worse.

And I know that I didn’t do anything to deserve this issue or anything else health related. I know that it’s just a genetic issue or mutation that I had no control over. But that doesn’t change the fact that I have been putting blame on myself.

Part of it is because I was misdiagnosed for a while and some people believe the skin flares caused by my condition are due to weight or bad hygiene. While weight can make some of the flares worse, weight doesn’t control whether or not I get this or get flares. And hygiene has nothing to do with it, but I do take a lot of care of my skin where I get flares so I don’t have any secondary issues. But when I was told that this was something I could have controlled and it wasn’t getting better, I did blame myself for not doing more. And when I couldn’t make it better, I figured I was doing things wrong and I couldn’t figure out what to do.

Now that I know that this is an autoimmune condition, I don’t have the same blame on myself. But I do wonder why I had to have this bad luck and what I did to deserve this. And the answer is that there’s no explanation for the luck and I didn’t do anything to deserve it. But in the back of my head, there is still the voice that says that I’m not worthy of good things.

And one of the good things that I feel like I don’t deserve is to get answers and to have fewer flares. It’s such a weird back and forth in my head about whether or not I deserve it. I know I do because everyone deserves to have whatever control they can over their body and medical conditions. But that little voice keeps telling me that I’m crazy to think that.

I have been working on quieting that mean voice through therapy and it has gotten better in the past few years. But it seems to pop up every so often and sometimes it’s in very unexpected ways. I never thought that it would be one of the reasons I have been avoiding working on my autoimmune condition. But the more I think about it the more I feel like that makes sense.

I’ve said so many times that writing this blog is like therapy for me. And I think that it always will feel like that because it allows me to get my thoughts out and even though I risk people judging me it is my voice and opinions uncensored. That freedom is so great for me. And having a breakthrough moment because I couldn’t stop thinking about something I wrote is a new way this is therapy for me. I’m so grateful I figured that out because now I have something new to work on and see if I can keep making that negative voice quieter in my head.

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Feeling Understood (or The Relief Of Shared Problems)

Posted on April 5, 2019 | Comments Off on Feeling Understood (or The Relief Of Shared Problems)

There are a lot of problems I write about on here that I know other people struggle with. So many things can feel like you are the only one dealing with it, but when you talk about it with a friend you discover they have the same worries.  It’s always such an amazing feeling when you discover you aren’t alone and it makes you feel so much better about how you are handling it.

I’ve been very lucky that I have this blog because I have had so many people reach out to me after I write a post saying they have been experiencing the same thing. I don’t always write posts so that other people won’t feel alone, but I have noticed that I have been doing it from time to time. I have a platform to help someone discover that they are not the only person in the world experiencing something and I want to make sure I take advantage of that.

But even though I am open about a lot of problems on here, I’m not always as open when talking with my friends. This isn’t me trying to hide anything about me, I just don’t always think about talking about them. Many times getting them out in a blog post is enough for me and I don’t feel the same need to connect with someone else going through the same thing in person. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but it is how things are for me.

The problem is that I know that not all my friends read my blog, and that’s fine with me. I know not everyone reads blogs or they feel like they don’t need to read it. I don’t mind because I don’t expect people to feel like they need to read this. I’m still sometimes surprised that I get readers (although I am so insanely grateful for everyone who does read these posts)! But because some of my friends don’t read what I write, they don’t know some of the struggles I have and they might be battling the same thing and think they are alone.

And that’s exactly what happened earlier this week. I was talking to a friend and they were telling me how they were struggling with the balance of being social with taking time to recharge. This is a recurring battle for me too! I over-schedule myself and then when I take the time to focus on myself I feel like I’m neglecting my friendships and I crave social interaction. It’s a balance that I will probably always struggle to figure out and I wish that it was easier. Or I wish that being social was my way to recharge and get back to myself.

When my friend was telling me their struggles, I told them I battled the same thing. I could see the relief on their face that I understood what they were going through and it wasn’t a crazy issue. I wish I had better advice to give to them other than the few things I’ve been trying to figure out the balance. It’s such a personal thing to work through and what works for me is not necessarily going to work for anyone else. And I still don’t know what works for me so I’m even more useless with giving advice.

But even without advice to give, I think having shared problems was a big help for my friend. They felt like I understood what they were going through and that it’s ok to struggle with it. Sometimes all you need is to not feel alone to feel a bit better. And now that they know that I have the same problems maybe they will feel ok using me as a sounding board when they need to talk things out or just want to rant to someone who understands. Being there for a friend is something I want to do more often, but it’s not something I can necessarily control. I can control that they know they can come to me if they need help, but I can’t make someone do that.

And even though I have known for a while that I was not alone in the struggle of finding the balance of self-care/being selfish and being social, it was still a relief for me to know I have another friend going through the same thing. If I need someone to talk to, I have someone else to reach out to that will understand exactly what I’m experiencing. And having a friend who understands my problems is so powerful in helping me when I’m struggling.

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National Eating Disorder Awareness Week (or Not Talking About It Is Part Of The Problem)

Posted on February 28, 2019 | Comments Off on National Eating Disorder Awareness Week (or Not Talking About It Is Part Of The Problem)

This week is National Eating Disorder Awareness Week. I know the week is almost over, but I decided to write something about this. I wasn’t going to originally, but I realized that even though I am pretty open about my eating disorder it would be wrong not to write about this week.

I don’t know exactly when my eating disorder started, but I honestly feel like I’ve had it my entire life. I remember binge episodes when I was a kid, I just didn’t know that they were anything other than me liking food. I’ve had issues with food as long as I can remember. I used to just think that it was a willpower issue or that I was weak and not able to control myself. It doesn’t help that there was very little information about binge eating disorder when I was growing up and I couldn’t really just go online to research about it. I was very educated in anorexia and bulimia and I knew that I didn’t have either of those. I recognized signs of my issues in bulimia and I actually was frustrated with myself that I couldn’t be strong enough to find a way to get rid of the food I ate.

My eating disorder wasn’t officially diagnosed until I was in my 20’s, but I already knew I had a binge eating disorder before that. I needed the official diagnosis for medical purposes, but it was just a technicality. I already knew what I had and I knew that it wasn’t just about me liking food or being fat. I had an eating disorder and I shouldn’t consider myself weak because of it.

There isn’t a lot of information yet about genetics and eating disorders. I have seen studies that show that people can have a tendency toward an eating disorder because of how they were raised, but I honestly feel like it is a genetic thing for me. If it was about how I was raised, then I don’t think it would have started so early for me. But even if it’s genetic, that doesn’t mean I can’t conquer it one day. There are people with a genetic marker for addiction and they are able to get sober. The difficulty for me is that I cannot be totally sober from food since I still have to eat to live.

These are all things I’ve written about on here before. I was terrified the first time I posted about having an eating disorder because I hadn’t been open about it with many people. I didn’t know what people would think about me once they knew I had an eating disorder. Obviously they knew I struggled with weight, but not everyone struggling with weight has an eating disorder. But I was relieved to discover that once I was open about it I was getting support from my friends. Some of my friends shared with me about their struggles with food or said they had a loved one with a binge eating disorder and didn’t know it had a name.

Being open and honest has been the best thing for me. I have gotten so much support and love from the people in my life and I don’t have to feel like I need to cover up for anything. When I am having a bad day, I can tell a friend about it. When I am out to eat and have obsessive thoughts about food, I don’t have to hide it and I can talk through the thoughts with the person I’m with. While I have been working toward recovery in many different ways, the one that I feel has made the biggest difference is not feeling alone. Finding other people going through the same thing as well as having friends who know what is happening makes me feel like this battle is not just me against the world.

So when I was debating whether or not to write about National Eating Disorder Awareness Week, I realized that not writing about it would possibly prevent someone else not feeling alone. While I have written about this multiple times, maybe this is the first post that someone else is reading. Or it could be toward the top of the search results when they are searching for something. I want to allow opportunities for someone to know that this is not their fault and they can get help.

If you are battling an eating disorder of any type or have someone in your life batting one, this does not have to be a solo battle. There are so many ways to get help and support and not being alone in this seems to bring the most success. You don’t have to be strong on your own to get over this. Allow yourself to accept help and know that the more people you have on your side supporting you the better off you will be.

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Posted in Food, Health, Tough Stuff

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Still Finding New Life Lessons With Dating (or Some Skills I’m Proud Of And Some I’m Not Sure About)

Posted on February 19, 2019 | Comments Off on Still Finding New Life Lessons With Dating (or Some Skills I’m Proud Of And Some I’m Not Sure About)

It still surprises me that I’m learning new things all the time with all the adventures I have with dating. I would love to be done learning, but even if I found the person I wanted to spend my life with I feel like I would still learn new things about myself. But with dating, I seem to find new life lessons in the uncomfortable parts of life and that’s probably a good thing for me. I had 2 realizations over the past few days about dating that could potentially be beneficial for me in life.

The first one is one that I knew I needed to learn and that was how to get over feeling heartbroken or betrayed. I’ve talked about this before and said how I wished that dating rejection felt like the rejections I get with acting. For some reason, I can get over not booking a job pretty easily but I can’t get over being rejected or ghosted the same way. I never would want to learn how to get over feeling so upset over something ending or not happening, it is something I need to learn how to do.

I feel like there is only one person who has gotten close to breaking my heart. They took advantage of my openness and betrayed me and I didn’t think I would ever give them a second chance. But I did and they hurt me even more than they did the first time. I know that his rejection had very little to do with me and was a lot about issues he has, but it still brought up feelings that I don’t deal with well. While I know I am worthy of being loved, having someone close to me tell me otherwise while I was growing up is stuck in my head. And when I was rejected I immediately went to the thought that I was stupid for thinking I deserved to be treated the way I wanted. I know I didn’t deserve what I got, but it’s hard to remember that sometimes.

I shared my feelings in a dating Facebook group that I’m in and I am so grateful for the women in that group because they really helped me work out some things. And they also had amazing advice. A few people recommended the Mend app, and I decided to download it and give it a chance.

While Mend is meant for getting over a breakup, it really helped me a lot with my feelings of being betrayed. And one of the things a friend helped me realize was that my feelings also had a lot to do with me having to accept that I will not have the answers I want. And Mend went into this idea a lot too! I only did the free 7 days, but I’m debating about trying it longer because it really got me into a better mindset about rejection with dating.

And I got to experience this new mindset this past weekend when I had a second date with someone. He and I seemed to really connect and get along and things were going well. But then it was like there was a switch that went off and he immediately said he had to leave. I don’t know what happened (and I have gone over things in my head a few times to see if I can think of something), but whatever happened was something that clearly made him want to end the date. He said it had nothing to do with me, but I really don’t think I’ll be hearing from him again. I did text him since that date, but I’ve heard nothing. I’m pretty sure I’m about to be ghosted.

I hate being ghosted because if I’m not interested in seeing someone again I will tell them and not leave them wondering. But I know that not everyone is willing to be honest about that. Being ghosted sucks and there have been other guys I’ve gone out with a few times that have ghosted me and really hurt me. But this time, I don’t care as much as I did before. If he’s going to ghost me, there’s not reason I should worry about it because I don’t want to date someone who would treat anyone that way. It’s so weird to not be worried about if he will text me again or not, but I also love it since this is what I’ve wanted to figure out for so long!

While dealing with being hurt and rejected is a really good life skill to have, this other thing I figured out this weekend isn’t necessarily as good. When I started dating again a few years ago, I tolerated some really horrible dates. I didn’t want to be rude and leave a date that I was not enjoying so I suffered through them. I always want to be polite and staying through a bad date seemed like the polite thing to do.

I’ve been getting better at leaving dates that I’m not enjoying, but it’s usually because I find a good way to have an out. Either the guy will say something that is really offensive and I feel like I can walk out or I can have a reasonable excuse to leave. I know that I don’t need an excuse and I should be able to just walk out, but I haven’t gotten to that point yet.

But I did have another date recently that I was able to leave quickly even without a good excuse. I wasn’t totally sure I wanted to meet this guy, but I decided to go for it because some people just aren’t good over text. And when we met up, I immediately knew that my gut was right and this date was a waste of time. Fortunately, I usually plan first dates to be something I can easily escape like getting coffee or a drink (even though I don’t drink caffeine or alcohol). This time, I was supposed to meet him for a drink, but it was so crowded that we went for a walk instead.

We only walked about 2 blocks and it felt like miles. The date was horrible, the conversation was going nowhere, and I was just wanting to go home. When we walked past where I parked my car, I told him that my car was parked in that lot and that I needed to head home. I think he wasn’t really enjoying the date either so I didn’t have to give him an excuse, but if I needed to I would have just said I wasn’t feeling chemistry. The date only lasted 10 minutes and I was so grateful to be out of there.

I don’t know if getting out of bad dates is necessarily a good life skill, but I can see how it could be. By trying to always be polite, I’ve put myself in situations that I wanted to get out of and felt stuck in. I need to learn to stand up for myself and not be afraid to be a bit rude if I know I need to leave. It’s still a fine line between being willing to be rude to leave and learning to tolerate things I have to, but I’m getting better at finding that line.

I am glad I have gotten better at dealing with rejection since that is something that I have wanted to work on for so long. I know that I will still struggle with it from time to time, but I am happy I have a resource I know I can turn to when I need help. And if I do continue to use Mend, perhaps I will continue to build that skill set so the next time I’m rejected I will hear those ideas louder than the voice in my head telling me I don’t deserve love or respect.

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