I think bringing up the Skinny Gossip website was a good discussion topic, but in the end I made the post all about me which is something I most always regret doing in the morning.

If you followed my relapse diary, my previous entry probably sounded similar to 90% of the entries found there. The whole reason why I started blogging in here again was to stay grounded and humble, and posting weight related things and pictures only sets me back.

I can’t promise I won’t ever do it again, but just know that I am aware of the situation and am actively trying to tone it down a bit.

Onto other things:

I had a long discussion with one of my bosses today. Out of nowhere he said, “So, it doesn’t look like you’ve been gaining any weight.”

I looked at him, raised an eyebrow, and said, “Well, I don’t know what to tell you.”

He then proceeded to ask how much weight I lost since the first time we met. I told him he was putting me on the spot. He said he was just asking a simple question. I was tired of dodging questions so I just told him the truth: 30 pounds. He said I looked perfect at the weight I was and didn’t see me as overweight. This ended in a discussion about how it’s not all about weight. He prodded a bit, trying to understand where I was coming from.

I told him I needed him to trust that I was doing what I was supposed to be doing and that as long as this doesn’t affect my work, that it shouldn’t be a big issue in the workplace. He agreed, but stated that he was concerned our clients may see my weight loss and think I was a hypocrite in recovery. I assured him that no client knew about my eating disorder history (a lot of drug counselors are open to clients about being in recovery from addiction) so they didn’t really have any basing as to why I am underweight. I think most of my clients assume this is just how I look. My weight loss was tremendously slow, so not many people really noticed.

It’s hard having a candid conversation with a psychiatrist because they will start analyzing you regardless if they make it apparent or not. I could tell he was trying to get a read on my personality and behaviors in relation to the ED. He started talking about isolation after I told him my hobbies were reading, watching movies, and going online. He started talking about how I needed more social interaction after telling him my husband goes kayaking and biking without me. It was very sneaky — I didn’t think divulging such innocent information would turn into a counseling session with my boss.

I didn’t take the time to justify my personality as he would almost surely see it as a form of denial.

On a positive note he said he thought very highly of me and that he trusted me as a counselor. He indirectly said he respected my counseling style and professionalism over that of other staff, which felt good to hear.

Do I regret divulging all that and finally being open about my problems with food? Not really. I think it was time to get it out in the open, even if I feel it was none of their business. It’s one thing to bring in an employee who comes in drunk or high on the job, but for someone with an eating disorder who doesn’t let it affect her work? That’s a little different. And yet, its hard to keep everyone off your back when you can’t necessarily hide your body shape.

At least I feel like he’s more educated on it. My damn coworkers really should take the time to learn about it if they are going to continually ask me about my weight.

www.imwearingthin.wordpress.com

01/26/12, 81 lbs.

I was introduced to the website, Skinny Gossip, a few months before my relapse. I actually refrained from looking at it for fear of triggering myself, but people were fighting over whether or not it was a pro-anorexic site. To appease my curiosity, I went and took a peak. If you really, thoroughly look through the site, you’ll see it’s not really a pro-anorexic site. Although they do offer “starving tips,” a lot of them are mere diet tips. The owner of the website does not promote anorexia, nor does she glamorize the mental disorder. She states this in her disclaimer and claims she just enjoys the “skinny aesthetic.” She does post semi-triggering photos of skinny models and celebrities and does encourage her followers to continue on their paths to ultra thinness, but in a “healthy” way (if that’s even possible).

Now, whether or not you agree with this is a whole ‘nother story. The owner clearly detests fat people and belittles even those celebrities who are at average weights for their heights. She praises celebrities who are on the verge of emaciation. To the owner, as long as you are physically healthy, there really shouldn’t be a problem if you choose to be underweight. This is her philosophy and she diligently tries to maintain a weight of under 100 pounds at all times.

I battle with this on a daily basis. I see my body in the mirror and take pictures like the one above because I’m horribly conceited. I actually like the way it looks and I can see myself relating to the owner of that blog. If I’m physically healthy, what is WRONG with looking this way? Some say it’s not about the weight. It’s about why I’m pushing so hard to be underweight. But what if it was? What if I just liked the way this looked? If you dye your hair blonde year after year despite being a natural brunette, am I supposed to judge you and say you have inner problems you aren’t dealing with?  Or do I just take it for what it is and not over-analyze the fact that maybe you just like being a blonde.

On the other hand, one could say the most healthy way to live is to just accept yourself for who you are. I obviously wouldn’t be striving to be ultra-thin unless I had insecurities or low self-esteem. And yet, on the contrary, I’m a very conceited, attention-seeking person who knows very well she is a beautiful girl. Who knows very well she got lucky in the looks department. Who knows very well she doesn’t need to be 78 pounds in order to be attractive to the opposite sex. So why would any normal human being want to look like a skeleton? Deep-rooted issues or mere preference? And one could argue even the most conceited person is probably more insecure than anyone — hence, the need for attention.

What do YOU think about Skinny Gossip? Do you think the girls who follow the blog religiously, who claim to not have eating disorders, really do have eating disorders? Does the owner have an eating disorder she is just in denial of? I think it’s an interesting thing to discuss — Sort of like the drug addict who says he just likes doing drugs.

At this rate, now that the ED is out in the open, I don’t feel like it’s put too much of a hinderance on my life. Isn’t it only a problem when it begins to affect your life in a negative way? I guess my whole point is, as crazy as the owner of that website sounds, I think she has a valid point. If being this weight doesn’t affect my health, my relationship, my job, my finances, or my sanity, what’s wrong with it?

I will admit to being an attention-seeker. That IS an issue I am willing to say I need to deal with. And maybe that is the underlying reason to this “eating disorder.” At this point though, I really do feel like this is a choice and not a mental disorder. I honestly feel like I am choosing to live this way. I don’t feel like I have a chemical imbalance in my brain, or that some other force is driving me to do the things I do. I will say, however, that the thought of choosing to live any OTHER way scares the living crap out of me, and I think there lies the “eating disorder” part of it, or the “non-choice” part of it. As in, this is NOT a choice. I can sit here all night and try to analyze and justify…in the end I’m either going to live a long health life as a thin person or I’ll eventually hit a rock bottom and/or have one of those “A-ha” moments where I come to my senses and live like a “normal” person. Only time will tell.

EDIT: Just read all the comments regarding my last two entries. Thank you to everyone who supported me. I can see where both sides are coming from. And if I could just say a few things (and the following is to the general public, NOT any specific person or commenter):

1.) Addiction and eating disorders are seen as very selfish. This is why you’ll often see heated debates regarding the subject. “WHY CAN’T YOU JUST EAT” or “WHY CAN’T YOU DO IT FOR ME?” If it was truly that easy, there wouldn’t be millions of addicts in the world, nor would the RELAPSE RATE of eating disorders and/or addictions be so INCREDIBLY HIGH. I will admit that yes, they are selfish, but we don’t just wake up one day and say, “Hey, I’m going to hurt all the people I truly care about by hurting myself.” That’s totally fucking ignorant if anyone thinks we feel that way (pardon my french).

2.) I can stand commenters calling me a whiny bitch. I can stand commenters rolling their eyes when reading my posts. But the thing I cannot stand is when people judge my husband and/or relationship based on my choices. As in, “She must have an insensitive husband if he doesn’t notice what she looks like,” or “They must have a really shitty relationship based on the things that she does.” People ASSUME, ASSUME, ASSUME. I know it’s WEIRD that my husband doesn’t really notice my weight. I know it’s HARD TO BELIEVE we have a deep, loving, committed relationship when I’ve hid so many things from him. But there IS such a thing as unconditional love — despite what I have put my husband through, he’s willing to support me and stand by my side.

3.) I know it may not seem like it, but I do have one foot in the recovery pool right now. Those of you who are just “tuning in” to my blog, I had a relapse diary over at www.opendiary.com for six months documenting my “weight loss journey” of total destruction. The diary has been chucked and I’m currently working with a sponsor in a half-assed attempt to get back into recovery. I’m still on the fence about whether or not I even have a problem, but for now, I’ll play along because my relationship depends on it. I do get a lot out of it, and I know the longer I work with my sponsor the better I’ll feel. I’m not going to lie and say my life is perfect, but I’m working the 12-steps not because of the eating disorder, but for all the other crap I have to deal with on a daily basis (work, stress, lack of motivation, depression, etc.). And when you work on all that stuff, the food/weight stuff really just takes care of itself. (And there lies the DENIAL — the entire post above I spent trying to convince everyone I had no other issues. HA!)

EDIT EDIT: All blogroll requests have been added. For those of you who don’t know how to add a blogroll, it’s under your dashboard under “Links.”

I know that. I agree. I don’t think there is anything wrong with average girls or girls who eat. I just think it’s such a weird concept. Sort of like how a meat eater may look at a vegetarian. We know there’s nothing wrong with being a vegetarian, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t baffled by the concept or fascinated by the idea.

I’ve been like this for so long that I have this unrealistic expectation that every girl on the face of the planet must feel the way I do about their bodies. And when I realize they don’t, it’s hard to get used to and understand.

This commenter also brought up my husband. To the commenter — my husband is so blind to my what my body looks like that he wouldn’t even notice if I dropped another five pounds. Before I exposed my ED to him in November, he had no idea I was starving myself or losing weight. The weight loss was so slow that he did not see the drastic change that everyone else did.

I’ve been underweight the entire duration of our eight year relationship, so what he sees is what he perceives as normal for me.

He can stand my body frame as long as I am physically healthy. What he cannot stand and has made clear that he will not tolerate is the emotional side-effects of the ED: the lying, the secrets, the depression, the rudeness, the irritability, the isolating, etc.

Why do commenters always bring in my husband anyway? Is this like a jab in order to make me feel bad? Until someone knows who we are and what consists of our relationship, assumptions shouldn’t be made and judgements should go elsewhere. And if that isn’t/wasn’t your intention, then kindly disregard this last part.

I’m so cautious and ritualistic when it comes to eating around other people, so when I see my coworkers eating their lunch or women grazing at a party or teenage girls snacking on skittles, it’s like WTF?! How can you just eat an entire bag of skittles?! I could never do that, not even during a binge! And please keep in mind I am not coming from a judgmental point of view but from an envious and/or baffled point of view.

And then really, more girls I come across with probably do have eating disorders or disordered eating and I just don’t know it. I mean, how many fucking times have I written that I don’t look like or appear to have an eating disorder?

I will link both recovery and non-recovery blogs. I won’t be linking random blogs…only those that have to do with addiction, mental health, eating disorders, or other related material.

I skipped breakfast this morning and forgot to eat my fruit at dinner. So I was at around 530 calories for the day. I could have stopped it there and been okay, but I decided to eat a Clif bar. I’m hoping I can make it through the night without a binge; my husband is gone for the next two days and I’m more prone to bingeing when he’s not home.

Here are some recent pictures of me over the Christmas holiday. I was around 81 or 82 pounds in them, so you can get a feel for what I look like now. My face is covered for anonymity purposes. These photos may be triggering, so click at your own risk.

I wish I didn’t have to angle my body in certain ways to make myself look thinner. I actually like the way I look for the most part; I don’t see a fat person. I just don’t see a super thin person either. I often imagine sucking the fat out of my upper arms and inner thighs. I imagine chopping the fat off of my lower hips/back. You’ll notice, if you’ve followed my (no longer existing) relapse diary that I never, NEVER, posted pictures of my legs. Well, there was a reason, and that reason was because my legs look like NORMAL people legs. It’s true my inner thighs do not touch, but the gap there isn’t the grand canyon or anything. I think the only thin part of me is my arms and my back….when angling.

My body naturally has more fat in the hip area due to genetics. My dad has it, my brothers have it, and my niece on my dad’s side has it. I have an extreme hour-glass figure for my height, and for some reason a lot of fat accumulates in my lower back/hip area. Most women have flat lower backs; I, unfortunately, do not. I have that “muffin-top” thing going on a lot. My boobs are also abnormally large thanks to my dad’s side of the family as well. So I often wonder how much I would weigh if I didn’t have these genetic defects. 78 pounds? 75 pounds? How much does a small C cup boob weigh? Why am I even asking such dumb questions? HA.

Anyway — I wish I could just eat foods without giving a second thought. Being able to maintain this weight AND eat without weighing and measuring my food? Or making sure I don’t go over a certain amount of calories? That would be awesome. And yet, life just isn’t like that. If I truly wanted to eat without thinking, I would have to surrender my weight and let my body naturally get to the weight it’s meant to be at. But for now? I just can’t do it.

Nobody on the outside would ever really suspect I had a problem with food. This makes it harder to accept the fact that I have an eating disorder, especially when I’ve never been emaciated. I am underweight, but given my height, it looks rather normal.

Regardless of whether or not I have a diagnosable eating disorder, I can’t deny I have issues with food. I restrict during the week, I binge on occasion, I only buy diet foods, I don’t drink soda, I never buy candy bars, I never eat at the movies, I count calories, I always have to eat less than others around me, I make every food decision in relation to my body image and weight.

When I really sit and think about it, the majority of girls with eating disorders are not emaciated. Now, however, I can’t say whether the majority of anorectics are emaciated. When I was in treatment there was a total of four anorectics there (me included in that four), and although we were all visually underweight, I’d say only one of us was truly emaciated. So with that, there’s no denial I have a “right” to consider myself eating disordered. Whether I have the right to use the title of anorexic is debatable due to never losing my period, but either way I had a problem.

And yet, because our culture is so diet and weight obsessed, it seems my behavior is normal (in my eyes) and nobody would really give a fuck if I let them in on all my food secrets.

But as I sat thinking today, I realized just because an alcoholic skips a day of drinking, that doesn’t mean they aren’t an alcoholic, right? So even though I have normal days of eating, that doesn’t automatically negate my anorexia. Or maybe I’m just trying to hard to have an issue.

Anyway, I ate relatively normal this weekend and had a mini-binge after dinner (a clif bar and five or so crackers…about 310 calories) and am terrified to weigh tomorrow. I’d hate to see that I gained back the two pounds I lost last week.

My apologies if I do not read or comment on some of your blogs, but I find that a bulk of them are non-recovery. Although I’m not fully devoted to my own recovery, reading those blogs are triggering and make me feel uncomfortable. If I let myself get competitive, I could easily become compulsive in reading your blogs and that’s the last thing I need. I hope you can understand.

As for me, I lost two pounds in the last three days. So I am back down to 82 pounds.

Also, I need help. A few weeks ago I was prescribed some antibiotics for an abscess. I found I’m allergic to them as I developed severe body aches and flu-like symptoms. I stopped taking them after only one dose, and the flu-like symptoms went away after two days. However, ever since then, my calves feel weird when I stand. Only when I stand. It’s not exactly pain, but it feels like I have poor circulation or something. Not the pins and needles feeling, no swelling, no throbbing….they just feel weird like I need to stretch them.

Is this medication related, ED related, or just lack of movement related? I have a desk job and never exercise. I don’t even walk or stretch. Any ideas?