Life is a journey not a destination so .....my story isn't over yet;...me

It's that time of year again. The time of new years resolutions. The time when the diet industry can cash in on our new years resolutions and everyone is trying all the different types of restrictive fad diets. My new years resolution to lose weight never rings alarm bells to anyone despite my history of eating disorders as everyone in society spends some point in their life on a "diet". (As my previous post said my new years resolution this year is to NOT DIET) As part of some CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy)I had for eating disorders back in 2012, I was given a handout about a study carried out just after ww2 by a psychologist called Ancel Keys who did an experiment on the effects of starvation on some mens psychological and physical health. The men were fed a 3500 calorie a day diet for 6 months then were fed half of that on a starvation diet for a further 6 months in which the men lost 25%of their body weight. The results were that the men became preoccupied and o

Every year, like everyone else I say my new years resolution is to diet and lose weight. However for the last 16 years I have also said I need help to recover from bulimia/unspecified eating disorder (that is my official diagnosis). If I diet it just triggers the eating disorder to get worse...in fact it triggers the same in everyone who diets....obsession with food, guilt about eating, extreme hunger which leads to unstable moods and bingeing which then makes the guilt worse and so you feel you have to compensate for the binge. (I will do a blog post about an experiment called the Minnesota study where some men were starved and the effects on their psychological health). I used to be sick daily and even the physical health problems it caused wouldn't or couldn't stop me. (I have a heart pacemaker as it caused a hereditary heart condition to get worse)...fortunately for the last year I am rarely sick apart from if I have physical pain but psychologically I resist the urge to

For a long time I have thought I'm not good enough at anything. Socially or academically or anything so my weight became my focus and over the years my obsession with food and weight to deal with my fear of failure led to it making my physical and mental health worse and ironically made my life worse. It made my social anxiety worse especially as most social situations include food. Last night I went to the choir Christmas ball and had the best night in ages. Over the last 4 years my social  anxiety and bulimia had been so bad that until joining choir and feeling comfortable and included with everyone there I wouldn't have even considered going to the ball. Me in those sort of situations usually ends in me in worse case scenario getting changed loads of times then deciding I'm to fat and avoiding going. That nearly happened.. but I didn't want to let anyone else or myself down. The other thing that usually happens is I usually end up overthinking everything and thinking

For the last however long I have been meal planning and failing.  That is because I'm constantly battling with an eating disorder "voice" and my rational self. I have had every variation of eating disorder but the mindset from being young is that all calories are bad and to be a good anorexic and achieve my ideal weight I can't eat. I have battled with that since I was about 12. However I have always given into hunger so for me restricting always leads to bingeing.  Sometimes i restrict then feel physically ill and have to eat or drink sugary food or drinks to bring blood sugar back up. For years that giving into hunger or having to eat to stop feeling ill caused such guilt I had to make myself sick to get rid of every evil calorie. When I was working I wouldn't eat all day I would just drink and then would eat when I got home and make myself sick then not eat again until the next day. The cycle was pretty consistent for the majority of 16 years and then I got put