Oh.

It creeps in slowly but surely, by the darkness of night. Every aspect of my being is overrun by the moster that lurks deep within my soul, my heart, my mind, my body. There's nothing to be done but to let it rule me; its presence is felt with an ache that doesn't subside. There, every second of every minute, of every hour, every day; it won't go away. It's my companion, one that is loathed with all that I am and ever was.

Is it all that I ever will be, or is it something I can purge myself of, once and for all, just like I purge the contents of my stomach with all the hate in the world. I loath myself, and it bathes in that loathing. All the hate I feel for myself is the fuel for its presence in me. 

Can I rid myself of this monstrosity? Can I be free, one day, maybe, just maybe? I wish upon the first star in the darkness of the night's sky, every time I spot it in the revealed blanket of night. Please, please, please let me be free, I wish. 

I'll keep wishing.

Troubles.

153 posts in and all I seem to ever do is complain. But hell, this is my blog and I can do what I like, am-I-right?

So, binging and purging has been a big thing for me in the past, and the very recent past.
How does one stop binging?

I am really concerned about it, because I don't want to gain weight. I also am extremely concerned about the health concern side of it, too. What it can possibly to do me scares the living hell out of me, as well as disgusts me. I hate that I do it, I hate how it makes me feel, I hate eating so much, and so much of the bad things that I'd otherwise be petrified of. But when I'm in that state of mind, I don't care what I eat. In my normal, every day mind, there is no way I would eat a cupcake or a biscuit. So why am I doing it?

While I do mostly binge on "healthy" food, such as nuts, dried fruit and cereal, I still hate it.
Why do I do it?
What makes me do it?
What can I possibly do to get a hold on it?
I've made myself a New Year's Resolution to get a hold on this side of my disorder. While I'm trying, I'm still "failing". I want to be normal. I just... I want to be normal. I don't like this at all - in fact, I hate it.

Please, anyone that has any advice, I'd love to hear it. I really would appreciate it. I need to get rid of this side of my disorder, because it disgusts me beyond belief.

Thank you for listening to my moaning and groaning. I wish I could speak of happy things but right now, I'm not happy, and I want to change that.

Thank you.

Trying.

Being at home, out of the hospital environment, has made me realise two things.
1) It's okay to eat.
2) It's really hard to eat.

I decided to throw my hospital meal plan out the window, because honestly, a meal plan that doesn't include fruit or vegetables in it, is not the meal plan for a healthy person to live on. But having thrown my meal plan out the window, I've also realised: wait, what the hell am I supposed to be eating? 

I'm eating, don't get me wrong. And I think I'm doing a pretty damned good job of it for the most part. But I'm still not getting it right, because I'm still binging and purging. Yes, hospital didn't break that horrible routine. While I was in there, no, I didn't purge, but being out and in my own environment has given me the chance to do it.

I'm struggling to eat enough during the day, and then I over-eat at night to compensate. This is the hole I fell in the first time round, which lead me to restricting, which lead to going to hospital. I don't want to fall into this heap again! That's the last thing I want to have happen.

I'm petrified I'll gain weight with these binge episodes, because they really are binge episodes, and I am not over exaggerating to make it sound like a bigger deal than it is. It's really concerning me, and thank GOD I have a dietitian appointment next week.

Having said all that, it's been amazing to be at home. I've gone out for drinks, I've driven around town with friends, I've had copious amounts of Coke Zero and coffee, I've walked and smoked like a chimney (I know, bad habit!) and I've been living. It feels amazing.

I'm living.

I'm struggling, but I think I'm just going to put my faith in this dieitian to help me figure out what's going on and how to work out a proper plan so I'm not binging, because it scares me how much I can eat and it disgusts me, which leads to hating food which ultimately just leads back to another hospitalisation, which I'm going to try and avoid, at least in the short term. If I need to go back, sobeit. But not now. Not after I've tasted freedom.

I'm trying, that's all I can say. I'm trying, and I'll keep trying.

Oh and by the way, I recieved an amazing package full of Larabars from a lovely friend from across the seas (you know who you are!) and damn, this is what I'm missing out on. I can't wait to get my hands on some Cappuccino Larabars!

hint hint ;)

Home.

Home, sweet home.

I discharged myself from hospital a few days before Christmas. There was no way in my life or the next that I could sit and watch as my family went along with the Christmas celebrations without me. That would have been wrong, in every sense of the word. Instead, I took a stand and went against "medical advice", discharging myself. But somehow, I think it was the right choice to make. My family certainly thought so, so I wasn't alone in my decision.

After 3 months in hospital, I think I did my stint. And maybe the last stint in hospital I'll ever do.

Something's changed. I don't know if this is the anti-depressants talking, but I feel a change. A change for the better. Although I went against "medical advice", I know within me that my time had come, and that hospital was not the place for me to be. 

I'm 18 years old. I shouldn't be dependant on a nasal gastric tube to give me nutrients. I should be out living, like an 18 year old in Australia lives. Meeting up with friends, going shopping, drinking a little too much at times, partying, relaxing, having fun being young. I've missed out on the better part of a year thanks to Anorexia - confined within hospital walls has both helped and hindered me. Helped in the fact that I've gotten to a place - mostly by myself - where I am able to function and think rational thoughts, but also hindered in the fact that it's stolen my freedom and will to live. But I want to live. I want to be free, I want to have fun, I want to share all of my crazy teenage stories with friends and family alike. 

It's time to change. 

I am in a positive headspace at the moment, and goodness knows it's not always going to be that way. But I'm ready to live, now. Within certain barriers, yes, like the fact that I don't want to gain any more weight. But I am at a place where I'm able to live. And so, with that, I will. I will live. And learn. And cry and scream and have horrible moments, of course. But I will live.

Needs.

Being stuck in this room is killing me.
I need out, I need out.

I need something to occupy my mind, or something to make me smile. Anything to make me smile.
What can I do to entertain myself?

To keep my mind from wandering too far into the future, into the depths of the unknown - that darkness that I fear entering, the darkness that is nearing.

The weight-gain, the reintroduction of food.
The thoughts of food. Eating. Consuming. Gaining.
They disgust me. Terrify my. Petrify me.

I need something to keep me grounded.
To keep me here and now, but to pass the time.

I'm lost, helpless.
Lonely. Alone.

There's no room for smiles, laughter, happiness.
Where is the light?

* * *

I have a compulsion to get out of bed, to stretch, at every opportunity available.
I've gained weight. Obviously. And that's playing on my mind. I'm trying to be rational but I can't. I can't at all.
What do I do? How do I combat this?
I'm really asking for help, in all areas - from you, I need your advice. I need your advice so desperately.

Frustration.

I'm stuck in a bed. 

I'm being fed through a tube.

I can't do anything.

I can't do anything to quicken the recovery process.

So I stay stuck in this bed, not doing anything. 

I'm alone.

Terrified.

Exhausted.

Confused and conflicted.

Unsure as to what I can possibly do. 

I'm weak.

Too weak to fight.

Too weak to think.

So weak that even Ed is weak. 

There's nothing to fight, but I am fighting.

Fighting against what, I don't know.
Recovery? Recouperation? 

But I'm not doing anything.

* * * 

FRUSTRATION.

Please help. 

Somebody.

Hospital.

I'm in Hell.

Complete bedrest. No moving about.
24 hour feeds.
No food. (Not that I want it. But am I hungry? I don't know. I really don't know.)
Sitting down on a shower chair.
No privacy.
Toilet and shower supervision.

What have I done?

***

I hate where I am. I hate what I've done. I hate who I am. 

So much hate. So lonely, isolated, sad, depressed. 

I can't handle this.
Who knows how long this will go on for. Who knows how long I'll be on bedrest. 

I have no freedom. No nothing.
Just my thoughts. Just my mind. 

I'm so exhausted. I'm so run down. I don't know what to do, what to think - how to think.

What am I doing? 

What have I done?

Bags Packed.

I'll be in hospital.
This Monday.

I don't want this.

But I have no other choice.

This is it.

***

My address is:
Eleanor van Enst
John Cade Unit - Level 2
Royal Melbourne Hospital
Grattan Street, Parkville
Australia, 3052

Too much, too much.

I really don't know what to do.

I'm not sure I should even be posting because I don't know what I'd do with myself if I knew I was triggering someone, so I'll try to be careful.

I'm... Not really doing well. At all. I've fallen further than I've ever fallen, into the deep hole of depression and the clutches of Anorexia. I'm falling continuously further and further, killing myself at a quickening pace - surviving on not much more than coffee, tea and cigarettes. I feel it, now. But it's almost satisfactory, because it's all I deserve. 

I hate myself, in truth. I don't know where it stems from, I don't know what it means, I don't know what to do about it other than let it affect me, because it's all I feel I can do - it's all I feel I deserve: pain. It's all I know how to do. Hurt myself. 

* * * 

The confusion is killing me: eat to subsist and maintain at the absolute minimum, or let it take over completely. I can't seem to face food. It just seems too much. Too much work, too much pain - I don't deserve it. If I let it take over, I can see just how far it goes. See how close to the welcomed Death I can reach - can I touch Him, can I feel Him, can I see Him and hold His hand? Do I let Him take Him with me? Away from the pain of living a life I find too hard?

That might mean I end up back in hospital. Which just means the cycle repeats itself: I gain weight, I dischanrge, I lose weight: the cycle repeats. 

I'm not ready to let go. I don't know if I'll ever be readt to let go. I don't want to - I can't. It's all I know, it's all I trust. 

* * * 

Which way do I turn? 

I don't want help. 

I don't know if I want to go back to hospital.

But I don't want to eat. Or at least, I don't want to eat to gain weight. But anything I eat will make me gain weight at this point in time, somehow. 

FUCK.

I need some advice, from someone who knows.
Please.

What.

I need help, but I don't want it.
I'm avoiding it like the plague, like I'm avoiding foodas if it's going to kill me. But realistically I know that if I keep going the way I'm going, it's the lack of food that will kill me. That's where I'm headed. But I don't know what to do about it.
I don't know if I want to do anything about it, that's the thing.

I can't think, I can't do - all I can manage to do is self-destruct. I don't want this, but I do. It's scaring me. I'm scaring me.

I really am helpless. Helpless and hopeless. I don't see there being any hope for me, nor do I particularly want hope for a brighter future.

In killing myself, I'm killing my parents. That's the only thing keeping me going - my parents. But I don't want to live my life for them. I don't want to be unhappy just to please them.
I am an awful person.

I feel so terrible for putting this out into the open - I feel like I'm hurting other people by putting these feelings out there for you all to see. But I don't know what else to do. I don't.
I can't go back to hospital again, because the cycle will just repeat itself. I can't have that, either, because that hurts more than what I'm doing now.

Help.
But don't.

Writing is a form of therapy - the only therapy that seems, in some small way, to ease the pain that is a constant on mind and body. A relief, if you will, of the incessant naggings that won't stop, and don't stop, regardless of the efforts undergone to kwell them.
Writing, therefore, is the escape route taken to take a heavy mind from that which makes it heavy. 

However, where to start, and where to finish?

That, ladies and gents, is the very thing that stumps me most. I want to write, but when it comes to the actual hands-to-keyboard motions, I don't know what to write, or how to write. So much is going on inside this mind of mine, but at the same time, very little is able to be put to words. Words to thoughts, and thoughts to words; that's my trouble. 

Everything swells up inside, threatening to burst, and comes out in the most horrid of ways.

After having come out of IP, I haven't done what needs to be done, because at this moment in time, what needs to be done doesn't meet the criteria in which I have (or the "other" has) put in place. Food is an issue, living is an issue, family is an issue, school and work are issues - all too much, all too soon. I knew what I was coming back to, but nothing could prepare me for it.

I am in constant fear.
Fear of food,
fear of weight,
fear of life,
fear of living.
Fear of letting go.

I can honestly say I am not ready to let go. A nurse in IP told me she knew exactly what I meant, and she knew, in the bottom of her all-too-caring heart, that what I was saying was truth.
But she also said "I live in hope."

At least someone does.

Home.

Home again.

What next?

A Beginning?

Well, well. Things have been interesting these past few days.

First thing’s first: This Tuesday, I will be a resident at a treatment centre in Melbourne. To say I’m scared is an understatement. To say I want to go would be a lie. To say I’m ready to give up ED and recover is the absolute last words I would utter. 

I am stressed beyond belief. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know what I’m supposed to be thinking. I have no idea what to expect and that’s what kills me most. Especially about food.

Also, I don’t have internet access there, except on my phone. So blogging is out of the question. Facebook will be used only on my phone, and infrequently, as with emails. So please, if you want to email me, do so! I would love some support or words of kindness once in a blue moon. 

***

But on to other things. Something, dare I say it, cheery. Cheery isn’t an emotion I would equate with myself, not in the last few months. I’ve been anything but. I’ve been in a shell. But today, on the first of June (which is actually quite symbolic), I had a smile on my face.

Today, I got my first ever tattoos.
And yes, I did say tattoos. 

The key is actually a replica of a key that my Mum gave me as a present. It represents new beginnings. But it also means that I possess a key to unlock all doors, all locks and barriers that ever get in my way.

The locket, I don’t know. It means a lot. Secrets, but also openness. I have the ability to open it and share myself whenever I want. Control, I suppose. Control of my heart, myself – a safe control.

***

I’m still all over the place.
I can only see how things go. Enter this new stage of my life, this new door, with an open heart.

Advice Greatly Sought.

Sleepless nights: constantly tossing and turning as a way to ignore the mind that refuses to shut itself off and give itself peace and quiet after long days of fighting, discussing, stressing, crying and decision-making.
The thoughts never stop.

***

I’m not running on much, anymore. I slipped and fell and I haven’t been able to pick myself up, nor have I allowed anyone else to help me up and dust me off. So now I have been lead to this:
I am going away to IP. 

I am terrified. And that’s why I need advice. I need advice, support, help, anything. I need girls with experience of IP to tell me what it’s like, what they’ve been through, what to expect. I know each and every treatment centre is completely different, but I just need some sort of heads-up.

I’ll be in an adult ward now, seeing as I’m the big “18”. 

The people at this particular clinic haven’t given us any real, solid information. I have no idea how long I’ll be there for, how much weight I’m going to gain, what sort of therapy I’ll be getting… I don’t know if I’ll be able to discharge myself because I’m 18, either. So really, I’m going into this completely clueless and I am terrified.

Mind you, I don’t actually know when I’m going away. Not even that is certain.

My head is in the clouds, I am in a complete daze – everything around me is in slow-motion. I’m losing track of everything. School, friends, my boyfriend, my life. And that’s why I need this. That’s why I need to go away.

That’s why I need your help.

I would honestly appreciate ANYTHING you have to tell me.

Thank you. So much.

Lost, Dazed, Confused.

How is it possible to express emotion when you have been paralysed by numbness?
How is it possible to explain the current situation when all you want to do is escape it?

I’m lost. Oh, so lost. But I am not particularly sure that I want to be found either, which is the most dangerous and worrying part of all.

I still feel the rational side of me, I still hear her, screaming in the background to “GET UP GET UP GET UP” before it’s too late. However, I think it may already be too late. I may already have fallen too hard and fast for it to be possible to get up. The confusion is overwhelming. I don’t know which way to turn, who to turn to, where I should be, who I should be, what I should be thinking, how I should be acting… It’s endless:
A maze of confused thoughts, feelings and emotions.

I don’t want to accept help. The monstrous voice inside, the demon, the dark cloud, the black-cloaked figure with its skeletal fingers outstretched, scraping fingernails down my back; it wants me to fall.
But if I fall, I have too much to lose.

I’m being threatened with hospitalisation, yet again. The third time ‘round. This time, however, would be different. I wouldn’t be in the “Child’s Ward”; no, I’d be in a proper unit, with proper treatment. Part of me knows that is a really good thing, and another part of me is terrified, as is to be expected. 

There are positives to it (and the Eating Disorder is kicking and screaming at that admission) but there are also a whole range of negatives, and I can’t seem to weigh them out properly.

I don’t know what to do.

I am lost, I am scared, I am confused.
I wish I could be anywhere but here.

A Celebration.

Today is the day of
my 18th year. 

Eighteen years of existing.

Eighteen years of exploring the world.

Eighteen years of discovering who I am, and what that means.

Eighteen years of being Eleanor. Whoever she is, and whatever that means.

* * * 

Quick:
catch the memories like butterflies before they wither and fade.
If carefully preserved, beautiful they will stay.

Caught in the Golden Web of Time, a victim of change.
Yet life continues on, being written page after page.

I'm running.
But I'm not sure what I'm running to and what I'm running from.

She's there. With open arms. Wiping tears from crying eyes. Stroking hair away from a tear stained face. Whispering promises into desperate ears. Rocking gently back and forth to calm the storm.

Or maybe the storm is just beginning.

She's lost in the ether.

Words form themselves in pools of confused thought; streams of consciousness make their way through a mind made out of pieced-together emotions, experiences, wants and needs, numbing everything but bringing everything back to life simultaneously.

Questions, questions with no answers, regardless of the amount of searching and sifting through the mind-mess roam free:
“Why?”
“Why me?”
“Why now?”
“What for?”
“What are the reasons?”
“Is there a way out?”

* * *

I often wonder if these questions need answering, or if it’s just a comfort to have a solid answer, a confirmation, whether it be positive or negative. I don’t know what I want to hear anymore. I don’t know what I’m searching for, besides escape. But if I escape, where do I escape to and what am I escaping from? Who and what would I leave behind?
Too much. I’d leave behind too much, if I were to go. And as for where I’d go, there is no answer. It differs from person to person, belief to belief, faith to faith. I have no faith. I just have needs. My need to be free is increasing daily. These thoughts in my head are killing me.
Physically I may be fine. To others, anyway. Physically, I hate what I see with such fiery rage. It scares me, the extent of which I hate myself.
Mentally, however, I am not fine. I am nowhere near fine. If anything, my mind will be the death of me.

I still think like Anorexia. I still feel like Anorexia.
But I’m not Anorexic anymore.
That hurts me. That physically and mentally pains me. And I do know how sick that is, which hurts me even more.
My eating disorder is something else, now. I don’t know what, exactly. But it, as well as food, still rules my life. It’s with me, wherever I go.

I’m not okay.

I love my boyfriend. And he loves me.
However, I don’t feel as though I deserve that love, that adoration, that worship, that respect, that kindness. I don’t deserve his words, I don’t deserve the times he says “You are so beautiful, Eleanor”, “You are perfect, Eleanor”, “You are amazing, Eleanor”, “Your body is beautiful, perfect and amazing the way it is, Eleanor”. I don’t deserve that, or at least my eating disorder doesn’t think I deserve it.

I am scared of losing him. But I’m also scared of losing ED.
I need my boyfriend. But I also feel like I need ED.
I can’t be with them both. I can’t please them both. I can’t hold onto both.

I am lost. I’m growing up, growing beyond, attempting to find myself and ignore myself at the same time, trying to hold on, hold back and move forward all at once.
I am confused and scared and hurt and ashamed. 

I just want freedom. I don’t want to be lost.

Words.

Opposites:

Elation – Depression

Two extremes. No balance. No in between. No warning.

Peak and fall.

And falling hard.

*   *   *

Poisonous thoughts.

Binging.

Purging.

Restricting.

Killers. All of them.

It hurts. Too much.

*   *   *

Boyfriend.

Love.

Affection.

Adoration.

Awe.

Smiles.

Laughs.
Sharing everything.

Petrified of losing him.

 

*   *   *

Sentences aren’t doing it for me right now. There is too much going on.

I’m living. I am in the real world. And it's scaring the shit out of me.

I HAVE MY PERIOD.

I am a woman. Again.

I GOT MYSELF A JOB AT A COFFEE SHOP.

My first job, ever. And I’m making coffee. Dreams do come true.

I HAVE A BOYFRIEND.

He treats me like gold. He listens to me. He accepts me – demons and monsters and all.

I AM GOING TO MY FIRST EVER MUSIC CONCERT.A Day To Remember and Underoath.

Wow.

I AM TURNING 18 IN TWO MONTHS.

And I’m going away. With my boyfriend.

I AM GETTING A TATTOO.

Well… Tattoos.

*   *   *

This binging and purging is killing me. I hate who I am. I hate who I am. And that scares me. Never have I felt such intense feelings of loathing for someone or something before. And it’s all directed upon myself. I don’t know what to do about it. I’ve put on so much more weight than I ever thought I would and I hate it. I’m over an 18 BMI and I wasn’t even supposed to know but my idiot doctor told me.

I don’t know what I’m doing with myself but I’m scared that I’m going to lose everything. I mean, I want to lose weight and I want to lose my period, but I don’t want to lose my boyfriend, or my job, or my schooling.

It’s all just too much.

“You’re standing on my neck.”

I don't really know where to begin. For the past few weeks, my life has been a rollercoaster. Not the enjoyable sort, either, the one in which you can feel the wind in your hair and the smile spread from ear to ear, nor the sort that gives you an exhilarated rush of excitement and thrill.
The sort of rollercoaster I am talking about is the one our dearest eating disorder has control of. For the past two and a half years I have been on a constant peak and plunge trip – whipped from one extreme to the other within a matter of days, hours or even minutes. My happiness is short-lived and my sadness is always creeping in the background, waiting to take advantage of a mere second of neutrality. Needless to say, depression has hit an all-time high (or low?) and all I've wanted to do is crawl up into a ball and cease existing.

I remember I used to make up these worlds of my own – a hole in the Universe that was mine, and mine only. Everything I wanted was there; everything was perfect. But perfection doesn't exist and the hole in the Universe I long for won't ever exist, either. All I have is reality. Yes, I can do what I want with that reality but right now I'm not sure I'm calling the shots.

I was binging. Now I'm not. That problem seems to have settled down. But now I'm left with the feelings of "oh my God I've gained so much weight I am so fat I need to lose it all as soon as possible I can't believe this happened to me, LOOK at me I'm HIDEOUS, I can't let anyone see me, I can't go back to school looking like this"… You get the picture. I'm a mess.
To top it all off, I've had my heart broken, too. What else does a girl need besides an eating disorder? Oh, that's right, a boy who's broken your heart repeatedly over the past 3 years.

I'm not really doing well for myself. I wish I could say otherwise but the fact of the matter is that I am struggling. Yes, I'm "weight restored", but I'm still sick.
My mind… Where to begin. The self-loathing is on the rise, the self-esteem in sloping downwards (if that was even possible), and any desire I had for leading a healthy and happy life has dwindled dramatically.

I've been getting comments like:
"You look so healthy now, Eleanor"
*LOOKS DIRECTLY AT THIGHS*

…Needless to say, again, I'm not really liking the situation I'm in right now.

 

I apologise sincerely for the complaint. I've just needed a place to vent and no one here has been able to help me in any way, shape or form.
I'm on my own. And distractions are getting harder and harder to find.

I've already worked my way through 3 seasons of Daria…