I've been seriously missing in action on this blog and for that I'm sorry, but I've been off gallivanting, drinking eating and living. I'm finally getting used to the fact that I'm alive now and the novelty is wearing off and I'm beginning to dread a Monday morning so I've decided to adapt this blog and redirect focus away from me to topics that other would like me to write about.

I now have a new Instagram @heidisrecoveryhelp

And my email is heidib1995@gmail.com

So go crazy

What's it like to have anorexia? The question I'm most frequently asked. It's such a hard question to answer at the time you're in the thick of it as it's so all consuming that it becomes your life. I couldn't remember or imagine life without anorexia. So it became normal. 

As I finally began to accept I had to do something about my anorexia as I couldn't go on and finally admitted it was a problem I reay realised how horrible it is.

From the moment I woke up, to the moment I went to sleep my full attention would be on how much food I would eat that day, how much exercise I did, how much I weighed and how I could avoid food. I can remember feeling so frightened as you're constantly being told how ill you look, how thin and frail yet looking in the mirror, though you see bones you still feel too big. I couldn't believe a word anyone said.There becomes a point when anorexia becomes you, I was constantly being tormented by ridiculous thoughts. Everyone hates you. If you don't do 200 sit ups an hour your family will die. If you put body lotion on your hands the calories will absorb through your skin. The calories in smells can go through your nose, hold your breath or you'll have to run up the stairs 42 times. Everyone's tricking you, they've put cream in the milk bottle. The diet coke in the can isn't actually diet they made a mistake in the factory you'll have to not eat your apple for lunch. Food cannot touch, don't even think about eating carbs before veg. 

The thoughts though they sounds bizarre were so real. If I didn't follow these ritual so genuinely thought that I would be unloved, or someone close to me would die. It sounds ridiculous, but the anorexia personifies itself, and becomes so powerful.

A letter to myself

Heidi,

If you are reading this now, you're probably in a bad place. Life can get tough sometimes and you probably are just tired or have hit a mere speed bump in recovery. Don't be downhearted, take you're own advice. You know what worked last time. Being thinner, will not increase your worth as a person. It will not make you stronger, beautiful and not perfect. It will make you miserable, sad and unwell. It is not a healthy or realistic desire to fade away into nothingness, similarly it is not a rational thought that one cup of milk will instantly cause you to balloon. To be happy, you need to be alive, for being dead doesn't stop things getting worse; it merely eliminates the chances of things getting better. To stop feeling like this, you need to eat. You need to be strong and deserve a life. As hard as it can be sometimes, you are beautiful, successful, clever and worthy.

You are not ugly, not perfect, you are you. 

how i did it

I was in a position six months ago, where at a dangerously low weight I believed that the only help that would benefit me would be psychological. I was under the misconception that if i 'sorted my head out' everything else would fall into place (eating, weight, behaviors etc). Now I was told at the time by countless professionals that this was not true and that I would not benefit from any Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) or 'therapy' until my weight was restored to at least a BMI of 17.5.

One of the effects of being underweight and severely malnourished is that your brain, like the majority of other organs in my body begin to shut down. Your body prioritize the calories consumed for vital functions and apparently cognitive function is not one! I found it horrendously to comprehend this as at the time i thought i had the strength of an ox and was completely to capable of carrying out many complex mental processes. In hindsight, at a healthy, i use the term loosely, weight I realize how completely wrong i was, how little concentration i had, my thoughts tunneled into black and white thinking where I, or 'Irene', as My Anorexia is called was always  right and everyone else was out to get me. My day was completely consumed by calorie counting, baking, body checking and exercising yet i thought i had a fabulously busy day with fruitful baking sessions and fast paced walks.

I was weighed biweekly and saw the Urgent Help Service monthly. Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service refused me CBT as did a private therapist due to my low weight. Me and my parents were outraged at this point and we were just fed with the same line over and over 'she needs to eat more'. This infuriated me as it is just not that simple. However, it was a drizzly day in October, Urgent Help Service had just informed me that they were giving me until January to sort myself out and gain weight or they will remove all control.

Immediately Irene reared her ugly head and told me to do everything in my power to make it seem like i was trying. At this point i had no intention of gaining any weight yet three days later i was weighed and for the first time in 4 months had gained 0.1kg.

Realistically now in my logically assured state i am able to comprehend that it was not 'weight' in the form of fat it was most likely fluid, but this was monumental. I felt horrendous but at the same time the relief flooding over me of the fact that i had the option of choosing what to eat, when to challenge myself, how slow/fast to gain reassured me. I realized i would much rather slowly increase my weight giving my mind time to catch up as it is often said that your mind takes a lot longer to recuperate and recover than your body.

I gained very little amounts of weight to begin with but saw positive changes such as warmth, energy, sleep, less aching, more laughing. Now I'm not saying it was easy or that it would work for everyone, but for the moment and hopefully for the foreseeable future it will withstand the test of life. The weight gain, was and still is a struggle, but the more I filled my day with the more of a backseat Irene took. The nourishment in small doses coaxed me towards understanding that I would never be happy with the way I look, but the size of my body would not nor will it ever affect how stronger, better, beautifuller, (is that a word) person I am.

I'm not saying just eat. But I genuinely now as a person of experience that you cannot make an Anorexic want to gain weight until they have gained weight. I will live by that saying. It is all about choices, at some point yes, i was powerless to my anorexia, but it was about making choices to make changes.

I didn't want to change, but knew if i wanted to be as strong as Irene was saying i would be then i was going to have to defy her completely. I believe now and am willing to answer any questions or help anyone who needs it. I really feel like food is the medicine, then the therapy is the rehabilitation as you gradually gain health and strength. I also still completely agree that there should be more help for people with Eating Disorders and food and nutrition guidance should coincide. But hay, that's an ideal world. I'm also going to make a disclaimer, I am not advising anyone to take my word as gospel, or medical advice. Do not just discharge yourself if you are receiving help, you are very lucky - appreciate it. I took every oppurtunity for help thrown at me, i participated in weight restoration planning, anxiety disorder groups, had the Family Eating Disorder Service, Urgent Help Service, Psychiatry, Medication, Meal Planning, Family Therapy, Group Family Therapy. Go out, get a job, enjoy life - happiness is the best medicine.

to all of you

As a teenage girl in modern society there is so many pressures. To be cool, to be pretty, to be normal, to excel academically, to be on trend, to be rich, to be funny, to thin, to be normal - that i think we often lose touch of what is most important. To be all of these things would be a betrayal to yourself, being all of these thing wont make you popular or a better person and they certainly wont make you happy. Happiness comes from freedom, from excitement, from spontaneity, from being a little bit different, from laughing all day, to going for an ice-cream straight after a huge lunch or running around in some dorky clothes because you really do not care. A happy girl is a beautiful one.

Make-up will not make you happy, being size zero certainly won't. Wearing the same clothes as everyone else, liking the same bands wont. Studying extra math to please your parents and teachers even though you despise it and would rather be doing art wont make you happy. Not having a slice of cake when you so desperately long for the creaminess of the butter cream, simply because the girls at school say its important to watch your weight won't make you happy. Dieting wont make you perfect. Nor will it impress him. A hilarious joke or quirky fashion sense with a sparkle in your eye will. Wearing the wrong shirt, not liking the same shops isn't a reason to drag a blade across your skin as punishment, it is a reason to embrace your differences.

Dancing round the room crazily to a silly song, licking the bowl of cake mixture when baking, rolling around on the grass in an old sweater and silly shorts, having the odd hair out of place, a few freckles, a curve instead of a concave, the odd scar or two of what you've overcome is the strength and happiness that defines beauty. To be able to stand up proudly, dust yourself off, survive a hilarious trip in the corridor at school and still be able to shout i am who i am whilst dancing around the room to 'girls just want to have fun' is real happiness.

The scars you hide beneath are nothing to be ashamed of, they are the struggles you've overcome, or the suffering you may be going through. It makes you no less beautiful, quit conforming. No amount of 'ordinary' will make you happy. Its too boring

a letter to an ex-frien

I'm having mixed feelings at the present. Whilst I'm becoming more and more flexible with my food I'm struggling to come to terms that i will need to let go of my eating disorder. My crutch, my coping mechanism, my friend, my best friend. My anorexia over the past two years although not always for good reasons has been there, it became personified and she was always there for me to rely. So anorexia this one is for you.

Dearest Ana,
You've been in my life two years now. You were there from the moment I got up to the moment i fell asleep, often joining me in sleep to. You were often my only Allie, the only one who understood. When i wasn't in control, when i was stressed or everything was getting on top of me you made me believe i was winning. You made me believe that i could overcome my issues and problems by not eating and having you on my side. You promised me I'd be happier if i was pretty and things would be easier if i was thinner. These promises you could keep, you lied to me. But as the weight dropped off I became more and more miserable. You left me a shadow of my former self, a skeletal frail little girl. You nearly killed me Ana, I was dying.

When i had no where else to turn you were there and i suppose i thank you for that. When i was unhappy you made me feel heard. You made me feel wanted but at the same time worthless so i became more determined to please you. You've made me more resilient and if it wasn't for you being so bloody pushy i wouldn't be so successful in ridding myself of you.

You taunted me with words of hatred, telling me i was useless, worthless and undeserving, yet somehow for some reason i warmed to you. You warped and twisted my brain into believing you would help me. I was so tired Ana, so hungry. You made me feel stupid, ugly and sorry. I didn't need to be sorry, so Ana I'm writing this to you, I've written such things many times before but this is for real this time. Ana, i don't need you anymore, we are no longer friends.

I am a stronger person now, perhaps i have you to thank for that. I no longer have the hunger for control. I'm not happy with my body, then again who is? However, i do not need to punish myself for this, for this is who i am. Ana i am in control of my life, if i can't cope i can ask for help. It does not mean I'm weak. By not eating i do not make myself a better person, for my weight does not and never has nor will define my worth. I am beginning to like myself Ana, can you believe it? I put myself down for so long, i bet you never thought I'd see the day. Ana you are no longer wanted, i will enjoy my meals and live my life free of your grasp. I no longer want to be dictated by you and the numbers on a scale or calorie counter.

Nothing tastes as good as thing feels Ana? Wrong thin feels tired, painful and weak and bannoffee pie is divine. Fat is bad? Legs together thighs apart? No Ana, i was not built that way, when i was that small my bones dug into my mattress and i felt a cold that I'd never felt. I felt it right deep into my bones, now i feel full of energy and life. Ana you've dominated my life for far too long, you've lied to me and tricked me into believing i was worthless. You made me feel in control but really you had captured me and dulled me down. I don't need you Ana, you are nothing.

anorexic, ana who?

My emotions are so erratic and unpredictable at the moment. A swooping roller coaster of drastic ascents and descents, I long for an

Am I free yet?

Following a beyond fabulous weekend of drinking in excess, dancing and barbecuing with my family; completely unplanned food and a general nonchalance of no fucks being given, I subsequently am finding myself on a Monday morning swamped by crippling depression and a habitual inability to drag myself from my bed. The saying ‘two steps forward three steps back’ bears far too much correspondence at present and I long for the freedom I felt previously both pre-eating disorder and at the weekend.

It was whilst dwelling in amidst my extreme self pity that my thoughts wandered over the fact it was Monday, and ante meridiem - when has anyone enjoyed a Monday. 

It seems there’s a global agreement that Monday mornings are by no kinder way of putting it, shit. 

Why? I guess, and I can only gather my assumptions on this as, as far as I am aware, there is no scientific explanation, is that a combination of a horrendous feeling of dread of the forthcoming working week, the come down from a care free fabulous weekend and the simple fact you probably had a few late nights and it’s early and you have very recently woken up.

As utterly, mind-numbingly horrendous Mondays are; if we were to live everyday as a weekend we would find something else to hate. We would no longer relish days spend doing nothing and long for the hustle and bustle of a morning spent on the tube or commuting towards the beginning of a hectic 5 days spent going through endless paperwork.

Now sitting on a train, heading towards Brighton whilst relishing my day off spent with a beautiful friend, I’m fully aware of the work I should be doing and the impending days work tomorrow.

I have decided to try and endure this feeling and enjoy the time I have off as opposed to spending it dreading a Monday.

Anorexia to an outsider

'Why can't you just eat?' 'Why can't I?'

'Do you just not get hungry?' 'Im constantly starving?'

'But your thin already?' 'Not thin enough'

'Do you think you're fat?' 

The million dollar question.

For an outsider looking in, for someone not consumed by the thoughts of a destructive, life (and soul destroying) demon, who has moved into your brain and shipped the majority of your personality and emotions out and replaced them with a manipulative, vindictive existence of calorie counting, food restriction and exercise; Anorexia can appear to be a 'phase' or a 'diet'. 

Living with Anorexia, or should I say existing with Anorexia, is far more than a quest to be thin. I don't remember when or how Anorexia moved into my brain, or when Heidi, moved out. It was a slow drawn out process that began with a diet which my perfectionistic, high achiever, competitive traits grasp onto as my life began and body began to change and I began to grapple control of anything I could.

Anorexia mostly happens to people of a highly competitive nature, a need to please everyone and usually intelligent individuals. It is not known why these clever people develop this, perhaps there is a genetic disposition that makes people vulnerable to anorexia, it's not proven yet. Ticking all of these boxes I was the last person everyone expected to develop anorexia. 

'What Heidi?'

'But she loves food?'

'But she's so clever?'

'But she was never fat?'

You do not have to be fat to be unhappy, unhappy is a feeling. Fat isn't. I developed an inability to distinguish the difference between 'being fat' and 'feeling fat'. As I studied for my GCSE's I set myself ridiculously high standards, took a crippling number of them and chose a competitively, academically strong sixth form and applied for a numerous amount of hard A levels. 

As I left school, started A levels, began to grow up - I was faced with many different challenges. My home life although stable was a rife with arguments, though none significant we all lacked respect for each other.

Restricting my food seemed to give me control and as I cut back on 'bad' foods, the weight dropped off me. I was noticed! I started cutting out more and more food, exercising to extremes. If I ate  something too fatty or too high calories, I was overridden with disgust an guilt. I was fat, ugly and completely undeserving of the food and space I took up. 

I began consumed with counting calories, I became withdrawn and deceitful; punishing myself for being such a 'horrible' person by not allowing myself food.

As my weight dropped my hair fell out, I got spots and my period stopped. I became achey, lethargic and freezing cold. I was consumed by the need to be thin, I felt the only way of being in control was to not eat. I felt something superior when I didn't eat.

I became bruised and my heart rate dropped significantly. There was less and less of my personality and the thoughts which at first felt like mine became difficult to distinguish as mine and some other beings.

I was no longer ablest to allow myself more food, food was bad, food was the enemy.

I desperately was hungry, I was preoccupied with this extreme desire to bake and would spend hours trawling round supermarkets and reading recipe books.

I never thought I would be the girl with Anorexia but I was taken unable to make choices controlled by the demons in my head.

I wish I could say I woke up one day and was fine. But even now at a healthy weight it can be a struggle. Anorexia is a disease of the mind, it doesn't live in the fat in my thighs. It is incredibly hard for someone to look at me and not see I'm still ill. I painstakingly count calories but I accept this, I shall one day be free.

I made a huge decision to decide to gain weight, to choose to feed myself. An addict; I had to face eating my drug everyday. Do I look at myself now and think I'm fat? Yes, I suppose I do. But now I know food is not a punishment, I have energy, I get fulfilment from a yummy cake and am able to quash the feelings of guilt with pride. I have chosen life and health. I can laugh. I'm no longer completely numb painfully trapped in an Anorexic career. I had no feels as an Anorexic and now I laugh, frequently! My life has enjoyment in it again, I'm thankful for that.

Heidibelchamber.tumblr.com

I have decided to transfer this blog to tumblr! My tumblr link is heidibelchamber.tumblr.com 

Planning to do nothing

I've really discovered that for this recovery malarkey to work I need to be kept busy, distracted constantly from any destructive thoughts that may lead to relapses or negative behaviours.

I precisely plan what I will be doing when, particularly  after meals. Now I'm not saying this is the cure to anorexia - DISCLAIMER RIGHT THERE - I'm merely saying this tactic seems to aid me. 

A downfall of this is that whenever I haven't planned and am faced with hour upon hour in companionship with the thought in my head, that I'm terrified. This is resulting on me constantly on the go. 

I recently have realised that I do need down time, compulsory to a healthy lifestyle the opportunity to relax, be them far and few, are key to me being able to get up and fight the next battle I am faced with. 

I have developed a strategy of, therefore, planning to do nothing, I make no plans and merely accept the fact that on that day I can lounge and watch movies and aimlessly browse eBay and to be honest after getting over the initial, harrowing, anorexic thoughts of 'do not be so bluddy lazy' I managed to relish in the fact I deserve to be lazy! Why wouldn't I? 

Putting recovery to test

Presently I am nearing the submitting deadline for my college coursework. Up-to-date and previous deadlines smashed, I spent Monday waiting for work to be marked, I have enormous issues with the use of time, I really struggle with the concept of time being wasted as therefore I find it really difficult to spend a day doing nothing. My anxiety grew throughout the day but I managed to keep my treacherous mindset from seeping into the strength and management I have mustered up recently to keep my eating disorder at bay; by pacing backwards and forwards between the library and my class and aimlessly downing cup upon cup of black coffee. 

Monday night dinner was a complete catastrophe in the form of a voluptuous pasta bolognaise; which may I add I reluctantly ate after considerably persuasion but as the night wore on I found it hard to distract myself from my academia worries. I just couldn't contemplate the idea that my work might not be marked, leaving me no time to correct errors, meaning I wasn't able to achieve the ridiculously high grades I had set myself, I may have well have failed, there was no point to life. To the outsider my irrational thought patterns may seem over dramatic, excessive and pathetic but to me the lack of control; mixed with the idea that I may not have excelled, mixed with the prospect of not having enough time petrified me and worried me profusely. 

After a ridiculous gym session I got home and had the first of 5 anxiety attacks of the next 18 hours. Suitably calmed down and moderately reassured I was probably overreacting I attempted sleep. 

I cannot place the precise moment I fell asleep but it was certainly past the tomorrow mark. As Tuesday began I became more and more anxious.

Several horrendous cups of cheap college coffee, a cluster of anxiety attacks later and I had distinctions in all my work. But I was not calm and 'anxiety-free' until I had completed my lunch. 

I am asked so often how to recover and it pains me horrendously that I cannot tell you how to cope. All I can say is what I've learnt today and that's the important part food and weight gain has had on my recovery and being able to cope. I would never have been able to cope in my emaciated state I was in six months previously. I would have been crippled with anxiety and preoccupied without of food. But instead, today, after a minor meltdown, I was able to collectively realise that my teachers weren't going to let me fail and that restrict my food intake and not eating/ being thinner was not going to change my grades for the better - it would worsen them, not would it speed up the teachers marking, these were factors beyond my control. And today, fully nourished I could just about except that. Food is the fuel for success.

My Favourite

The favourite, something we all want to be. The favourite is the most loved, popular and preferred. Aren’t they?

Favourite - ‘a person or thing that is preferred to all others of the same kind or is especially well liked.’ – Oxford Online English Dictionary 2012. After reading this and thinking about something that I would consider ‘My favourite’, I found it hard all of a sudden to decide. Writing about my favourite person for example; ‘a person that I prefer to all others of the same kind’ - Oxford Online English Dictionary 2012, would prove an almost impossible task. How on earth would I be able to find a person of the same kind as someone else? How do you separate people into ‘kinds’? Does that mean putting people into categories?

The noun ‘kind’ ‘a group of people or things having similar characteristics’ - Oxford Online English Dictionary 2012, led me no closer to a conclusion. However, it was something on the same page, ‘one’s own kind’ (people with whom one has a great deal in common’ - Oxford Online English Dictionary 2012) that I found most interesting. Surely if you were to use this in conversation it would be suggesting that you were better than someone else or that you would not mix with someone who was different to you. If I do not stand corrected that is borderline racism.  When you think of the expression ‘someone’s kind’, for example ‘I don’t apologise to her kind’ it is always used to express disapproval towards a certain type of person. The use of the word ‘type’ is similar to ‘brand’. We ‘brand’ objects, a popular ‘brand’ of ketchup. I’m not sure I would want to be branded. Suddenly, people have become objects. Maybe it isn’t always such a coveted position to be ‘the favourite’.

Favouritism for instance, ‘the practice of giving unfair preferential treatment to one person or group at the expense of another’ - Oxford Online English Dictionary 2012 as children and even as adults we resent the subjects of favouritism. When someone is receiving preferential treatment you begin to question your significance. Why are you not preferred? We strive to be the favourite, be it for our own egos, for the feeling of being the chosen one or even to feel wanted.

Being the favourite comes with the pressure to remain the favourite. It becomes difficult to understand, in an instance where you are treated the same as everyone else, why are you not being favoured? The need to remain the favourite means conforming to someone else’s preferences. Do you lose your own identity?

Perhaps to be the favourite is not always best? When stopping to consider someone else’s feelings, is it better to all be equal? Perhaps, picking a favourite should be kept to objects rather than objectifying humans. The importance of equality is always being expressed yet surely we are discriminating against someone else by saying we prefer them to someone else? Its better surely to be the person you prefer to be, than be preferred most to someone else.  From experience this only creates a false relationship with someone.

I feel like you can learn so much about someone by the way they drink their tea? The britsh are avid tea drinkers; breakfast tea, earl grey, green tea, peppermint. Famous for our cream tea, Brits are very particular about their teas. Working in a tearooms you witness some bizarre tea drinking sights and I genuinely feel that the state in which you take your tea is very personal. 

My incredibly wise gay surrogate father, Micheal Jones told me his friend believes that, if you have a weak tea you are a feeble person. I'm sure its deeper than this.

One bite at a time

A very beautiful wise friend of mine, Miss Bhanderi, who at present is very poorly, told me, she was going to do this, (by 'this' I mean recovery) one bite at a time.

It's weird how significant a quote this is, because where most people would take things day by day, we take things bite by bite. Our whole world changes every time we merely contemplate a single mouthful.  

I remember a dreary time, in November where there was a ritual behind every meal. Wash hands, go to the toilet, wash hands again, get a glass of water in the tall glass. Get the ketchup and BBQ sauce out. Walk to door. Walk to table. Walk up to my room. Walk to bottom of the stairs. Walk to top of stairs. Walk downstairs. Sit down. Take a mouthful of water. Take in the meal before me. Strategically begin planning how I could hide or escape with eating as minimal amount of calories at possible. Separate the foods. Make space for ketchup. Begin eating veg, one centimetre square at a time. Placing my knife and fork down and taking a sip of water between each meal. Chewing 30 times no more no less. 

Someone forcing me to eat something extra, a mere grape would send my thoughts into disarray, as anorexia clawed at every opportunity to destroy me. Painstakingly measuring and calculating how much of each food I could eat. It's so hard to break the habits.

The decrepidness of the situation escalated to a point where I had to count between each mouthful to 20, if I was interrupted I'd begin again. I'd only sit in a certain chair, ate at certain times and with certain bowls. 

People still are victims of the common preconception that anorexia is I won't eat, it's more I can't or I can but only this and now. I cannot even delve into it now its far to warm.

 I wish I could say I woke up and stopped separating food, it would be so much more simple that way. I also wish so much to tell you how to escape, there really is no specific method. It's just a huge want to be free, mixed with obscene amounts of willpower as you sit and bite by bite undo all the pretentious time consuming habits. You just have to pull it apart until you are the stronger being.

Coping with stress and trying to concentrate.

At my almost target weight I am the heaviest ive been in over 18 months, I eat more than I have in over 2 years, I have more energy; so why am i not better yet? I feel like im stuck, in a limbo between the healthiness of my body and the instability of my mind. I'm nearing my college deadline but all i can focus my attention on is calories, food and calories. Did I say calories twice?

Why is it that it is only once your better you really are able to notice how much you've royally fucked up your body (apologies for the language but there is no other term for it), I am grateful for the perks oif recovery and i can honestly reassure you that it is heaps better than being consumed in a warped world of your eating disorder but my god, its tough.

At a critically low BMI i felt strong, like i could take on the world, that there was absolutely nothing wrong with my concentration, that i was the best. I obviously am aware that that is not true, but here I am a 'healthy weight' i have no excuse to be 'struggling' yet I'm sitting here correcting the fact I've written 'hear' not 'here'. I know full well i am overly critical, but there is no reason to not be able to concentrate now, i am no longer malnourished ir starved, so why am i so distracted and pre-occupied all the time.

A background information post

I could write this predominantly about my anorexia but that's only taking up a small portion of my life. Though I can't deny that it will forever be with me, I am determined that I shall have only lived a fraction of my life as what I call a 'practicing anorexic'. At an almost healthy weight on this day and feeling horrifically undeserving of the small space I worthlessly take up I found myself reflecting on what I've overcome this year already only 5 months in not to mention what I've achieved throughout my life. 

I was, and I guess I still am or could be; a model student. Excelling in the majority of my subjects but never excelling enough by my extortionately high standards. Being the best was always my aspiration. Maths, science anything even to one handed cartwheels I would tirelessly practice. Though I was tall at a young age I was never fat. In hindsight I'd want my old body back. I can remember complaining to my mum how I was too big and too tall. Why it mattered I do not know. 

My childhood was fabulous. I couldn't have wanted for anything. The eldest of three girls, we were spoilt rotten but appreciated everything we were lucky enough to have. My dad earnt enough money but I believe my competitive urge and determination came from him. A powerful man who could dominate a large amount of people simply with a look. I can remember adoring my dad and to this day still do. My mum; a beautiful woman with the most caring instinct in the world. Everyone says that about their mothers but I genuinely believe I have the best mum ever. I bickered with my sisters but we played alot together also and strove to get on amicably a fair amount of the time. We holidayed at least twice a year and were given treats all the time. From a young age I wanted to do everything to the best I could, maths, spelling tests, homework and auditions. I loved drama, I believe there is a difference between being a confident person and a self confident person. And although i was never very self confident i was good at talking and could convince people of lots of things, I believe that although my mums side are talkers that my dad is a good negotiator and can persuade people with words very well. I danced from a young age and was constantly performing. Me and my sisters would perform shows for my parents often. 

I always remember being happy.

Though we haven't always lived in the house I live in today it is the only house I remember living in. In a rural village called icklesham, in my opinion it's a brilliant house. We have a huge garden and my room was plenty big enough for the huge collection of toys I had. 

My paternal grandmother was a fabulous woman. Very shy and meek but with a wicked sense of humour. She had amazing stories and I could sit for hours in her company. My maternal grandmother is glamorous and lives the life of a vibrant 30 year old. Her and her husband, my grandfather, an antique restoring, base player and my favourite person on earth are an eccentric couple, who drink home brewed wine with lunch everyday and eat out more often than in. My grandfather is my idol. Regardless of the situation, where I am I know if I needed him to be, he'd be there. He's so kind and funny and I love him. Everyone adores him and his generosity and it makes me feel proud that he's my grandad and not their's. He spells of distinctly of wood burner, wood glue and wood and I don't know what I would do without him. 

I just want to make everyone proud.

Mixing things up

Choosing my future seems to be the predominant topic of conversation at the moment. 

There are so many people sharing their opinions or more accurately telling me who or what I should become. A future is something that yes, is important but not only is it something you choose but it is changeable. We are given daily challenges and choices that not only shape but can change our futures.

If I decide to study and become a nurse then if I want it that bad and work for it ill achieve it, similarly if twenty years down the line I want to become a tattooist there is nothing to say I cannot train to become one. 

A future is something you choose to live with it is not something disposable. A future is something you are given, to shape into whatever you choose.

Don't let anyone change your future

I've got soul but I'm not a soldier

The thing with recovery that you have to learn to accept that whilst its two steps forward there's always that crippling one step back. 

You eat the ice cream, after endless tiresome battling, but look in the mirror and feel compulsed to do 250 crunches and 300 jumping jacks. You know the drill.

Never ending torment with yourself, the enemy, but also your best friend. I often find it hard to distinguish between me and my anorexia. More often than not she becomes personified. Similarly she becomes your best friend and your worst enemy. 

Three steps too far forward, and you are thrown backwards. You've got the strength but don't fight.

I've got soul but I'm not a soldier. 

My anorexia wants to grasp every single part of my body, grapple on to the littlest piece of control it can have. The stronger I get, the weaker it gets. I just have to battle on.

Six months, 14 kilograms and apprxomately 360,000 calories down the line

After tentatively mustering up every strength to destruct my already frail body by forcing brutal exercise sessions fuelled by minimal to zero food. I can remember very little just this bleak feeling of cold. Not the crisp Christmas morning cold, the middle of September, 4:30 pm wet, harsh, wind. I remember being so cold I ached from being so tensed up all the time. I can remember my skin stinging and bones throbbing. Every step I could feel my muscles burn as I relentlessly marched up and down stairs, tapped my feet or jigged my leg - anything to remove calories. I can remember standing up and having to brace myself for the momentary blackness that blinded me as I waited for my blood pressure to normalise and my weary body to readjust to the extra strength having to be applied to standing. I'd often fall back down, only to have to force myself back up again. Yet I felt strong, invincible, like I could take on the world. In hindsight, I couldn't even spell words properly, let alone take over the world, my brain was so warped and shrivelled by the need to punish myself, push myself further and further down the treacherous path I was stumbling down. As the scales dropped lower and lower, the food became less and less. The ham with my salad became too much, the tomato went from one, to a half, to none. The lettuce went in the bin soon after, the Pepsi max was limited to a can a day, 1.5 kcal was enough. I didn't deserve anymore. 

I don't remember what changed, I wish I did, I wish I could recall the exact thought process, the whole meticulous procedure; so I could share it with all of you. So you can live too.

I just remember it began so hard, but the more I ate, the more I gained, the easier it got. Be it that I was more rational, be it that the food was so good, what will be will be. I didn't wake up one day fixed, I don't believe in fixed, I'm healing. Constantly healing. 

Whether ill be 'healed' I do not know. I hope so. Planning is key, enjoyment is essential, food is paramount. Everything else will fall into place. 

I have so many posts that I wish to write, so many things I wish to share. I have so much work to do, both college, work work and mental work. How I am coping I do not know.

The fact is I am.

Where it all began

Adoration of Pepsi max

I am completely infatuated with the new Pepsi max advert, though I am by no means surprised that such a delicious, beautiful product could produce such an amazing advert. 

The new advert feature beyonce, an all round fabulous woman and amazing role model with a curvaceous, healthy figure. The slogan used is, 'embrace your past, live for now'. I think it's a brilliant message and it's so enlightening. There are so many negative messages fed from the media and to have something like this fed from something that is, maximum taste; zero calories, makes me realise that it's not all bad.

Embracing my past is difficult, presumably I'm supposed to learn from it, if I'm honest I feel I am being haunted by it if anything. I can remember feeling horrendously unhappy, though the majority of the time I was blissfully happy, yet all I can remember is negativity. I want to be able to embrace where I've come from, but I'd rather be something new. Perhaps the key, learning from the past, 'embracing' it as it were may translate and interpret to realising your past is where you've been and don't want to go again. So you begin shaping now, as you live for now. 

A relapse?

I find it hard to distinguish what a relapse is. The difference between a minor blip in the never ending pursuit of freedom and a full scale relapse is so fine I cannot decide where I am. From the outside I'm fine; 'healthy', 'glowing', 'curvy' whatever society chooses to label it as. From the inside I'm also fine, but by fine I mean 'mediocre', 'not great', 'average', closer too 'completely rubbish' and stuck in between recovery and relapse. I know almost certainly that I don't want to go back to the horrific days of little more than a diet coke and several cigarettes on the side of a six mile run and a dessert of chewing gum and 2 hours cardio. But I am still longing to hold on to the smallest bit of control I still have. I really do not feel ready to release the grasp of the anchor that I believe, yet know it is a false avowal, is the only supportive coping mechanism I possess. I am desperate to find something so numbing and powerful as the control I get from monitoring my calorie consumption. I am compelled to starve myself yet I am today under the realisation that the strength and determination I am using to defy my eating disorder is by far more monumental and momentous in contrast to my ability to starve myself. I am a strong and august person and I one day hope I believe that. But for now I shall settle with being cemented at fine.

Crying over milk spilt

Though fortunately I have moved on in my eating disorder and progress far enough into recovery to be able to aptly deal with a milk spillage with out a severe breakdown resulting in an anorexic meltdown, I am sorry to say that I still react over dramatically and incredibly badly to a minuscule misdemeanour. I find myself punishing myself with unnessecary force. I am proud now that I have moved on from thinking I was the worlds most useless person simply because I knocked over my milky night beverage and in concordance with this disallowing myself food for the foreseeable future. Spillage of a drink now would mean a brisk squirt of kitchen cleaner and a wipe of a cloth. It is not needed to cruelly punish ourselves for a mere accident that someone else would think nothing of. You are no less useful than the next person, it may simply have been a clumsy glass.

Bank Holiday Monday

As a child i can remember the anticipation i felt in the days prior to a bank holiday, as i relished in the thought of an extra day off. Now at 18 I dread a day of work in a busy cafe full of rude impatient old age pensioners eagerly awaiting an afternoon cream tea. Not even time and a half is enough to deter my angst towards the thought of screaming children and upper class Londoner's seeking solace from the busy city streets only to find themselves knee deep in foreign students with manners almost appalling as their's.

I can remember being desperate to grow up and gain independence and earn money; yet now as i consummate a fair quantity of money and am finally able to drive, i find myself longing for the carefree days of my preteens. Where my biggest worry was who i was going to sit next to on the coach on a forthcoming school trip or what i was going to wear for mufti day. I find myself faced with somewhat substantial life changing decisions such as university and foremost which path i choose to take my life, whilst I cant even make a small change to the amount of milk i have with breakfast. I am faced with an impending feeling of doom that this will last forever.

It is while writing this that I am telling myself that i am the author of this here life and coinciding with this it is my choices that decide how i am controlled by my eating disorder. Making decisions ultimately that now may go against my better nature may petrify me profusely will do me a greater deal of good in the long run. For if i was to deny myself the mere grape i have been craving or the slice of fruitcake ive been looking at for so long i would remain stuck still in the depths of the portentous demon in my mind. For if i want to be free you must push yourself. Break the barriers and habits formed. I don't want to fear the unknown i want to relish it, the spontaneity of life. I want to be 65 and at the drop of a hat deciding to go sky diving, because i coud afford it, was healthy enough and because I wanted too. I want to look forward to the buzz of a busy workplace on bank holiday Monday, share the excitement of children as they enter the cafe ready for ice cream and cake. I want to be able to sit with my children and eat cake and ice cream with them and savour the taste both. The time is now for me to escape anorexia, im over being controlled by the alarming desire for perfection.

It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. -Abigail Adams

too many posts, spoil a blog?

Much the same as 'too many cooks spoil the broth' I am plagued by the idea that if i am posting too many posts people may find me irritating, there are just so many things i wish to write. So many experiences and lessons that i've learnt and wish to share. But for fear of scaring you all away im disheartened to be a frequent blogger. ive tried to stick with a post a day but already i have completely infringed this original stratagem. So as follows this post there will be another, my apologies.

Beautiful girls,

Wash off that unneeded make up, you're beautiful as you. Quit dieting and exercising on the perilous quest to be perfect, for who is? Your flaws define you, they shape and teach you. Learning is the key of your success. Wear the crazy clothes you want, fashion is wearing the clothes that you feel happy in, for it is there to make you happy not anyone else. Ditch the friends who tell you you are stupid and unsuccessful, don't let anyone crush your self worth. You are the author of your life, learn from the paragraphs, spelling mistakes and grammatical errors. Bloopers are things that make for a better ending. Having to work at being you is the first you can get from being real. Falsities and fakery make a deceitful happiness and that will not lead to purposeful living.

Breathe, put down the blade.

Smile, and stand up tall.

Delete the negativity out of your life

Illuminate the successes 

Embrace the hilarity of your falls

They are a mere fragment of the making of your positive attributes which shape the beautiful you. 

My darling Miss Binns

This post is dedicated to one of the very few positive influences anorexia has had on my life. 

Had we not have been thrown together by the demonic, veracious grip of our eating disorders she wouldn't have aided me in the saving of my health and rescuing of my self. 

I remember first meeting Miss Binns at the taster session for our intensive Multi group family therapy course* we had been told to go to by our CAMHS** workers. At this point firmly in the grip if Anorexia I can remember thinking why the hell am I here? These girls are tiny I'm huge... Sitting in tears I saw a minuscule blonde girl walking looking absolutely petrified. I caught her eye and I can remember her just giving me this look which almost said, it's ok I'm scared to. Since first meeting her although I didn't speak to her for very long at that initial meeting we began texting. We texted all day everyday. For the first time someone understood, it was such a relief to be getting such amazing support. I received endless encouraging text frequently reminding me why I was doing this, not to give up and tell me how beautiful I am. At fifteen Miss Binns had been through so much but was still going, she's incredibly brave, clever and not to mention beautiful. He's bloody hilarious and if it wasn't for her I think I'd be in a hospital somewhere frozen in the wrath of my eating disorder. She's fiercely determined to beat this and I'm in debt to her entirely.

My darling, you're beautiful and clever and amazing and I am blessed to know you! You deserve the fantastic life planned out for you and adore you. You can do this! Fuck gretel you need to go out partying! I'm stupendously proud of you for working so hard and studying so hard with your exams! You deserve to do incredibly well. 

I love you 

There's a time and a place to die

As I lay here in bed at 9:46 after a hell of a day, exhausted and aching from working all day I am reflecting on the past year or so of my life. It was approximately a year ago I was doing the same but with much a contrasting view on things.

This time last year I was nearing the end of my first full year of full blown anorexia. If I was to tell you all about my anorexia in this first post, not only would I bore you and scare you off but I'd have very little else to write about. I can remember spending my nights laying in bed calculating how much I'd allow myself to eat (or not eat as the case was, more often than not) before I fell asleep as I tumbled down a perilous path of self destruct with the ultimate goal of disappearing completely. I wanted nothing more but to starve, be thin or die and thinking over that now I am really saddened at how miserable I was. As I lay here now I am suddenly thankful at my failure to kill myself. I have realised now that the fact my body did not give up on me, besides being nothing short of a miracle, was also because there is a time and a place to die. There was a reason, however significant, for me to stick around. This journey has taught and is teaching me to appreciate that everything happens for a reason, what will be will be and that you cannot mess with fate. We do not and cannot choose where our life ends, we may miss out on the amazing oppurtunities that have been planned out for us. The lessons learnt and tests we face on the journey to love ourselves are mere setbacks in the saga of our lives. Giving up is not an option, for it is out of our hands. There is no telling what is around the corner but accepting that nothing is perfect as things are always changing and it is acceptance that we must seek as opposed to flawless immaculacy. Our lives have been bestowed upon us with such a responsibility to go out and live them as we are the lucky ones, some do not get given a life. We must embrace our life as we have a purpose to live as full, happy, enjoyable, hectic and crazy life as possible. Embrace the immaculacy, the craziness, the hurt, emotion and beautifulness. Accept the flaws and do everything to strive to be you and not conform as tomorrow is a Monday. A new week. A new start. Save your own life. Sometimes you're the only person who can.

Concluding this possibly a little bit pretentious rant, I'm not fixed but I'm on the road to greater happiness and I cannot wait for my next challenge.