Meal plan nightmare...

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 on mirtazapine an antidepressant and I also got heart failure around the same time and the combination of water retention caused by the heart failure, the effects of the mirtazapine and being unable to exercise led to weight gain of between 4 and 6 stone over 4 years. I stopped taking mirtazapine and lost a stone and a half but now can't lose anymore. I rarely am sick now as it affects my voice for singing in a choir that I love but I still restrict. I do low calorie meal plans which I know rationally won't work. Rationally I have the tools to know what meal plan to do according to eating disorder services for bulimia recovery as the cycle I'm on at the moment is feel guilty eating so then skip meals then eat more than I planned although not full on binges as i have support to do my food shop which limits me being able to buy binge food. But it's the same cycle. For eating disorder recovery from anorexia and bulimia a meal plan consists of 3 meals and 3 snacks. And to think of food as medicine and we all have a predisposed set point weight...the weight our body naturally is. People that don't understand eating disorders think when I can't stick to a meal plan it's me saying I can't stick to my diet. It isn't the same as for someone who hasn't got an eating disorder who has an extra biscuit on their diet. It's the mental torment that extra biscuit causes. Someone who is anorexic who tells me they are in control because they can stick to their meal plan is no healthier than me. Yes they are sticking to a rigid low calorie meal plan. If I gave them the recommended "recovery" meal plan they too would find it just as hard as for me to stick to and the reason they don't ask for help with their eating disorder is because they don't want that control taking away from them. An anorexic who thinks they are superior because they never eat chocolate and only eat fruit is no healthier than me the fat bulimic both are warped eating disorder minds. I want to recover. I want to be healthy.  I don't want a stupid eating disorder voice to control me and I'm fighting it every day. But that is made harder when there is diet talk and fat shaming going on constantly everywhere you go. ...

EXAMPLE MEAL PLAN WE HAD IN EATING DISORDER CLINIC

8am Breakfast: cereal with milk (we had a pint of milk we had to use daily. I had soya milk.

10am mid morning snack: toast with margarine

12pm Lunch: jacket potato, filling, 5 bean salad and salad. Yogurt.

3pm mid afternoon snack: banana or chocolate bar.

5pm dinner: lasagne, garlic bread and salad. Fruit cocktail.

9pm supper: Muller rice or cereals or toast.

Quorn wasn't allowed as it was classed as a diet food. As a vegetarian we had to have tofu and houmous. No food was classed as "bad" . You can have a chocolate bar as a snack.

Society has warped diet ideas. It is not healthy to cut out full food groups. Sugars and fats are needed as part of a balanced diet as are carbs. My kidney function isnt normal so a high protein low carb diet would be really unhealthy. My kidneys have failed before. Rationally it is healthier for me to try the above meal plan and not worry about the scales. When I was a healthy BMI I wasnt healthy I was being sick daily   ...that's how warped society is as all people see now is I'm overweight and need to lose weight but i dont want to get back to where i want to self harm or kill myself because I "couldn't stick to a diet".

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