My Support Forums - View Single Post - Emotional triggers and self-improvement

Have Hope · Feb 17, 2020 at 02:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Purple,Violet,Blue

You are such a sweet person. It's awful, the way we beat ourselves up.

Sometimes, I say to myself, `Purple!` (That's not my real name

) 'Can we just have one ******* day off!'

Yes, I love 'The Power of Now'. It is a great, short, sharp shock to worriers like me.

Eating disorders are seriously difficult to treat, as you know. Even just wanting to change is quite rare. There's so much secrecy and denial around these conditions, isn't there?

With me, looking back, working on this masochistic side of myself was really important.

I had quite a bit of treatment for my ED's, over the many years I had them. Have Hope, one of the leading London hospitals gave me excellent (outpatient) care. They tried very hard. I couldn't fault them at all. But they didn't even come close to curing me.

It's strange, isn't it?

Maybe they were too focused on the anorexia (which later became bulimia), I don't know. They were kind of fooled by what their patients told them: 'It's about food / weight / how I look / my body'.

The poor patients couldn't help it, of course! We were absolutely convinced that peering at the weighing scales and thinking about food every second of the day was normal.

Certainly, there is an element of food-phobia, but this is - although incredibly powerful - almost incidental.

Long story short...

A much less sophisticated CBT therapist, duting one six week course, somehow got it!

She wouldn't be distracted by anything I said, and focused ruthlessly on the self-damaging I was carrying out on myself.

Although there were many relapses, I left her thinking, somehow, that she was right... I didn't deserve to hurt myself...

Months later, I was actually feeling that I didn't WANT to hurt myself...

The stage after that was not enjoying the behaviours around ED's, like bingeing and purging, or eating nothing until I virtually collapsed...

It's a crazy merry-go-round I was on! And for most of my adult life!

I hope this isn't upsetting, dear friend.

I just want to reassure that anything you say will not sound mad or disgusting to me in any way.

Awwwww.

thank you, @Purple,Violet,Blue!!!

Ah yes, soooo easy to beat oneself up! I am trying not to do this as much, but it's hard.

And it's not upsetting at all to me. I am very sorry to hear you suffered/suffer as well with an eating disorder... it's a most difficult disorder to grapple with, let alone admit fully to others. There IS so much secrecy to it.... I call it the silent suffering.

I have thought about DBT. I know it's emotional for me, at its roots, but also is a weight conscious/thinness obsession for me too.

My sister I think has an eating disorder as well. She looks anorexic... she has been anorexic previously without realizing it. We never speak of it, as a family, or even 1:1. My mother has a disorder with food too, which is how I learned this habit. We all only mention how my sister is far too thin.

I know it may take a long time to get out of it and recover, but I am determined to make myself healthier-minded and healthier with how I treat my body as well. I worry that I am damaging myself. I don't want to have health issues in the future.

I will try and address it with my next therapist. This time, I want to be open about it so that I can actually talk about it and potentially even treat it through therapy. I have not tried this before..... I have kept this a secret even from therapists. It's been hard to admit to anyone.

But it helps to talk openly about it on here... somehow, admitting it and seeing it in the open gives me strength to want to recover that much more.

Thank you for sharing your personal story, Purple.... I greatly appreciate relating to someone about this issue and personal struggle.

Many hugs and blessings to you, my friend!! You are a most beautiful person!