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

 I've been having CBT for eating disorders for a while now, I've had 9 of 10 sessions then will have a 1 month and 3 month follow up. I was getting told to eat 3 meals and 3 snacks but as much as I tried as best I could I didn't fully stick to it, cycling between throwing half eaten meals away then bingeing.  I've been doing a sponsored swim and been quite active at choir, trips away and the stables so have lost weight but I haven't found a consistent way I trust. I have been told many times if you eat 3 meals and 3 snacks, don't cut out food groups, your body will find its set point weight but it takes a long time to find it so I'm scared to try it on my own as dont know exact portion sizes etc. So I've given in to a fad diet that keeps showing up as an advert on my Facebook (that's great that I put lots about eating disorders on my Facebook and blog yet Facebook has tried to sell me a diet). I normally do a monthly food shop and I got a cost of liv...

I started writing my blog as a way to help people understand mental health from a perspective of someone with eating and personality disorders. This post is about eating disorders and that is where all my mental health problems began. A few conversations recently made me think of it.  When people think of eating disorders though they think of someone who is visibly anorexic or think of someone bigger as "fat". But someone with anorexia has a " voice" that tells them not to eat, that they're too fat, not good enough at any weight someone will start with that voice at a normal or even overweight weight so long before they get to looking visibly anorexic. Some people fall into a category called eating disorder not otherwise specified if they have all the thinking and behaviour of an anorexic without being the low bmi. For me bulimia came in too. I had the voice telling me I couldn't eat but then I had to give into it, sometimes it was my rational self telling m...

 Every summer I have the same problem that it's hot and I have scars on my arms and I feel self conscious so end up putting jackets or jumpers on and off, it's not because I get cold it's that I feel self conscious and embarrassed.  A friend who also writes a blog recently wrote about why someone would hurt themselves and its different for everyone. For me it's when I get too emotional as in I wouldn't just be calm and think it was a good idea to cut my arm or bang my head on a wall. I dissociate and lose control. My self harm has mostly been linked to bulimia and I would self harm to punish myself for eating and being sick, I hate it all and it's like then a switch is triggered to self harm.  I can only describe it as  if you imagine having a really strong emotion and you need to release it, mostly I can sit with the feelings unless I'm having a really bad day and the negative self hating thoughts take over. For anyone that knows someone who self harms, it ...

 It probably sounds like I make excuses for being overweight maybe I feel I have to justify why I'm "fat". I hate being this fat but until about 8 years ago I was never overweight.  I'm having CBT therapy for bulimia/eating disorder not otherwise specified and one of the exercises the therapist often does is get you to ask people if they think your overweight  (to try counteract your own negative judgement of yourself) but as I am overweight and other people also agree with me when I complain about being overweight that would be pointless.  I'm a long way from the weight I would need to be to stop hating myself because of my weight, even at times I've been underweight I thought I was too fat. An eating disorder voice will never be happy. That's what drove my self harm, to punish myself for eating and being too fat and then for everything else I " did wrong" too. When I was younger my eating disorder started alot to do with not feeling good enough...

 Yesterday I got a certificate through from beat the eating disorder charity as a thankyou for fundraising for them with a birthday fundraiser.  We live in a society where weight loss is praised and people are judged for being overweight or even a normal weight. If I go in a shop the magazine shelves are full of front page headlines of " how I lost weight" or criticising celebrities for what they look like if they have gained weight or praising weight loss even if they weren't overweight.  The diet industry cashes in on people's insecurities. But fad diets don't work, so many people do certain diets and come on and off them and yo yo with their weight. Its something I worry about as it was eating disorders that damaged my physical and mental health and I have had friends die from eating disorders either directly or problems relating to their obsession to achieve the perfect weight and I don't want anyone else to go down the same paths. I've known people de...

I was thinking I haven't done a blog post for a while. I'm generally feeling positive with my mental health but struggling a bit with physical health but have some goals and I think that's helping me try use eating disorder therapy whilst I've got it. Next year our choir is going to Florence and I really want to go so need to focus on being physically and mentally well enough to go and also I'm back working part time and need to be able to carry on. My pacemaker is also due a new battery in the next couple of months so I need to be as healthy as possible to get it done as last time I had it done was in 2015 and I was told there was a high risk of dying as my heart was only functioning at 20 percent but thankfully it improved and that's partly due to being less self destructive than I was then with self harm and overdoses and swimming improved my fitness. My self harm and overdoses were because of hating myself and my weight and not feeling good enough in general...

 Thought would write an update blogg post whilst things are looking really positive.  8 years ago, back in 2014 I stopped working for what I thought would be a few months to get on top of my mental health, from 2012 I had been having regular mental health crises ending up in hospital with self harm and suicide attempts, driven by an eating disorder,  a fear of failure and social anxiety and generally not feeling good enough or deserving to be alive. I was working towards being a mental health nurse, despite my own mental health problems I was a good carer and thought being a nurse I could justify deserving to be alive (an irrational thought) but I love supporting other people and wanted to be able to make a difference as a nurse being able to empathise with my patients because of my own experiences and my work experience too. But although I got accepted to do my mental health nursing at uni my own self destructive thoughts were getting worse, I couldn't have eating disord...