Thank you!

I want to thank you all so so much for the overwhelming support I received after my last post
It truly blows my mind that people read my blog and leave messages of love and encouragement
It means more than you will ever know
Thank you

I must admit that I had quite a wobbly day after throwing away my scales
It was like my ED saw that I was trying so hard to get well
And it went in to overdrive
That on top of the fact that I feel so uncomfortable in my own skin right now and it made for a very difficult day
I felt quite reflective after writing yesterdays post
There have been a lot of changes recently
Mostly good
But change is hard
My ED is familiar and comfortable
Anything outside of that is pretty scary
I purged quite a few times yesterday
More than I care to admit
It was the worst day I've had in quite a while
It felt horrible
I felt horrible
It confirmed the fact that I do want to recover
I don't want to live this half life anymore
In anorexias waiting room

Getting used to my new body is taking alot of time and patience
I've gained quite a lot in a short space of time
I don't hate it but it does take some getting used to
Sharp bones and pointy edges have given way to soft curves
I feel bigger
Like I am taking up more space
I haven't reached a healthy weight yet but I am not far off it

It's really very strange because part of me feels like a failure
Like I have failed at having an ED because I have let myself gain weight
It just all feels so unfamiliar
So new
As I said the weight has all gone to my stomach
I'm not happy with that area but I know it will distribute eventually
It's a frustrating process
It's uncomfortable
And scary
But I just have a feeling that I will be ok

I saw my doctor this morning
He told me that Mary had requested up to date blood work
I love Mary
She is so on the ball
So he got the little butterfly needle out
All my veins in my arms have collapsed so he had to take it from my wrist
Painful
And messy
Blood went everywhere including on my clothes
I have a lovely relationship with my doctor
I've seen him every week for the last 10years
We rarely talk about medical issues anymore
Today we talked about child abuse
He reminds me a bit of my dad actually

I have a team meeting tomorrow with my new psychiatrist, Mary and my doctor
It's a family meeting so my Mum will be there too
I am truly blessed to have some great supporters
My family are incredible
The have been through my side every step of this journey
And all the while have kept a sense of humour
I am blessed to have Mary in my life
Everyone should have a Mary in their lives
Often I don't feel deserving of all the amazing people in my life
I get so much and give so little
It doesn't seem fair sometimes

As I said things are not perfect
I still struggle to take my meds correctly
The purging is still there
There is still so much work to do
I can't underestimate the power of my ED
She is cunning and powerful
I know I am at a vulnerable time right now
And my ED will try every trick in the book to lure me back in
I will take things slowly
One step at a time
One bite at a time

I had a reached a point in my life where I thought that recovery was never going to happen for me
And I was ok with that
I thought recovery was something that happened to other people
But now I think that it might be possible
There might be life after ED
I want you to know that it is possible for you too
I thought that I was a lost cause
That there was no hope for me
I was an eating disordered addict
With major depression and anxiety
My head was a scary place to be
I courted death
I couldn't see a future
Couldn't see beyond my ED
But if I can do this anyone can
Recovery is there for us all
We just have to reach out and grab it

Again thank you so much for your continued support
At the moment this blog is an incredibly positive thing in my life
Amazing things have happened through this blog
And the best thing was meeting all of you
Knowing that you are all behind me makes this so much easier
So thank you
From the bottom of my heart thank you

Goodbye scales, hello life!

Ok
Because my life feels a bit out of control at the moment
And I generally don't feel like I am in charge of my own body right now
I decided to take back a little bit of control for myself
So I would feel like a willing participant in recovery
Instead of feeling like a hostage
So I decided to get rid of my scales

I thought of many ways to dispose of it
Smash it with a hammer
Throw it off a cliff
But because I live so near water I decided to throw in to the lake near my house
Technically this is littering but I'm sure Mother Nature will forgive me this one indiscretion

The preparations started last night

No more weighing my worth in pounds and ounces!

One last weigh in!

Smuggling my scale down to the lake

Honey reads this sign and then ignores it

Will she, won't she.....

She will!

Splash!

Goodbye scale, hello life!

I felt a bit strange afterwards
A bit sad almost
Not sad to lose my scale
But sad to let go of the girl that I was
That sick girl
The girl who was anxious and depressed
Lonely
Afraid
The symbolic gesture of throwing the scale in to the lake made me realise that I am growing up
Moving on
Things are not perfect
Far from it
My ED still has a certain hold over me
But I am willing to let go of it bit by bit
I am willing to recover
I am willing to live

Goodbye scale, hello life!!!!

Does this mean I'm in recovery?

The annoying thing about re-gaining weight is that it has all gone to my stomach
I know that this is normal and it takes time for the weight to distribute to the rest of my body
But man it sucks!
I feel constantly bloated
My tummy is vast and huge and I have little skinny arms and legs attached to it
I'm in constant discomfort
My clothes are tighter
I'm a different shape
Things are changing here in eating disorder land

I'm ok with the weight gain
I'm not over the moon about it
But if this is the price I have to pay for being in good form
Then I'm willing to pay it
I'm just terrified that my weight is going to keep going up
That it is going to spin out of control
I just can't take that

So this is where I need your help
If you have re-gained weight
Or stopped purging
How did you cope with the weight gain?
Did it plateau when you reached your set point?
I really need some reassurance about now so please do comment if you have experienced re-gaining weight
I'm afraid
This is all so new
It's so different
Does this mean I am in recovery?

Is this what recovery looks like?

Summer?

Summer is most definitely here
The weather is heating up
The are lobster red bodies everywhere
And all my family are on holidays (A lot of them work in schools)

I don't usually like them summer
I prefer autumn and winter
I hate having to get my arms and legs out
Hate feeling hot and sweaty
I love the snow and the frost
I love wrapping up
Curling up in front of the fire
I always thought that summer was for happy people
And for the longest time I wasn't a happy person
I was the exact opposite
Winter suited my mood
The long dark days
And I do love Christmas
Whatever mood I am in Christmas always gets me
The lights
The music
The atmosphere
I can't get enough of it

So what's on the agenda this summer Ruby?
Well, come a little closer and I'll tell you
The first exciting piece of newa is that my sister is coming home from Australia at the start of July
Those of you reading a long time will remember her being here summer 2012
And of course my trip to see her Christmas 2012
I can't wait
The thing about my sister is that I can be my bat shit crazy self around her and she doesn't bat an eye lid
In fact she is just as crazy
If not more so than me
So that's something to look forward to

What else?
Well this week my mother and I booked a trip to London in August
For 2 weeks
I was a bit apprehensive at first as 2 weeks is a long time to be away
And as you already know having an ED is someone elses house is a lot of work
Frankly it's a pain in the rectum
But what else will I be doing?
So I'm going
And that's that

Usually when I have a trip planned my ED goes in to overdrive
Have to lose weight
Have to be skinny
Have to be tiny
The trip is like a deadline
I have to lose as much weight as possible by then
And of course it was the first thing that popped in to my head after we booked the tickets
But you know what?
I'm not going to
I'm not going to kill myself
Starve myself
Deny myself
All in the hope that I will be thinner than everyone else

As I said earlier I hate getting my arms and legs out
So I've had to come up with a plan B
What will make me feel more comfortable with my body this summer?
My first thought was to get a tan
A tan forgives a multitude of sins
So I booked time in a sun shower
I went for my first one yesterday and I think I stayed on too long because now I have a big red belly
So get a tan is strategy no. 1

Strategy no. 2?
Have nice clothes to wear
So I went and raided my wardrobe to find some nice clothes to wear
An hour later I had found 6 pairs of comfortable yet fashionable leggings
And 7 acceptable dresses
Plus two pairs of light shoes (I don't do sandals, the world is not ready for my horrible feet)
So after all that I feel a bit better about facing in to the summer season

I haven't weighed myself in nearly two weeks
I just don't want my happy bubble burst
Everyone around me including my friends insist that I am still tiny and I haven't put on weight
But I have
I know I have
Maybe it doesn't show yet because it has all gone to my stomach
But it will
Have no fear it eventually will

What are your plans for the summer?
Are you like me and dread the thought of exposing skin?

Mindfulness

I am doing a mindfulness course with a friend of mine at the moment
We were there last night
Mindfulness is paying attention in a particular way on purpose
It's about living in the now
Being in the present moment
I was very keen to go to this course as I spend most of my time ruminating about the past or projecting in to the future
I also find it very difficult to just be
I always have background noise
The tv or the radio or music
Even when I'm falling asleep I have to have  my DVD player on
I don't like silence
Because when there is silence I think
And over think
And analyse things to death
My thoughts can be very negative and intrusive
So I try to drown them out

Last night was very interesting
We learned about thought diffusion
This is how to manage negative thoughts
The course tutor did a guided meditation with us
We had to imagine ourselves walking on a empty beach
Feet in the sand
Waves lapping
It's a peaceful place
Then we had to imagine something that was bothering us
We then had to write the word in the sand
And let the waves wash over it make it disappear
I found this really good
Very symbolic

For my word I wrote heroin in the sand
Because it has been bothering me a lot lately
I have been having a lot of drug dreams
Dreams where I actually use drugs
My ex boyfriend is always in the dream
It's horrible because I wake up thinking that I have used
It's such a relief to realise it was just a dream

My mother and I went for a walk on the beach this morning
We decided to practise the thought diffusion
The tide was coming in so we wrote our words at the shore

My word

Washed away

Mums words

Me and Mum

Having a dip on a warm day

Partners in crime

And then she disappeared

I often read a bloggers name or blog title and wonder what it means
Or why they chose it
It is obviously of some importance to them and I am intrigued to know the story behind it
When I was choosing a title for my own blog, I had a few in the running
Beauty from pain
Wearing thin
Or simply Anorexia and Me
But I kept coming back to And then she disappeared
Why?
Because I was planning to disappear
It was as simple as that

I started writing this blog just over two years ago
I had been reading blogs for quite some time and finally decided to start my own April 2012
Back then I was in a dark place
I had pushed all my friends away
I felt so alone
And I was in it up to my neck with my ED
I don't consider myself a very proficient speaker so writing was perfect for me
I feel so much more able to put my feelings and thoughts down on paper than I do speaking them

I was adamant that this blog would not be a pro-ana blog
But reading back on my first few posts I can see that I was coming quite close
I'm really not comfortable with the idea of people egging each other on to lose weight
It just doesn't sit well with me

So I was planning to disappear
I couldn't find a reason to go on
Recovery seemed so far away
I can think of a thousand reasons for you to recover but I couldn't find one for me to recover
I just wanted to slip away quietly
I felt like I was a massive burden on my family
I truly felt like they would be better off without me
I hadn't made any concrete plans to disappear
I hadn't decided how or when
But I would say that I had a passive death wish
I wasn't actively seeking it
But I was willing it to happen
I wanted it to happen
I just didn't have the courage to do it myself

A lot has happened in the past two years
The most significant thing that has changed is that I am not planning to disappear any more
I can now see that I have a lot to live for
I have an amazing family who cherish me
I know it would literally kill then if something happened to me
I have friends
One particularly good friend who has helped me massively
She has never turned her back on me even when I pushed her away
I have 2 dogs
Lea and Honey have saved my life over and over again
They will never know how much they have helped me
I've discovered a love for writing
I've found that I am not alone
That I am not the only one going through these things
I now want to live
I didn't want to for a long time
I couldn't see a future for myself
I couldn't see beyond my ED
Now I can
Now I can see that there is life worth living
That there is life after addiction and disordered eating

I know that I have a long way to go
I know it won't be smooth sailing
I know this will be toughest thing that I ever do
But what is the alternative?
Living this half life
Some where between life and death
In anorexias waiting room
I've given almost 14 years of my life to this cruel illness
I'm not willing to give any more

I don't even know if I can say that I am in recovery
I don't feel like I am
I feel like I am in a kind of wishy washy no mans land
Limbo
In between my ED and recovery
I'm an all or nothing type of person
Black or white
So to be in this place is beyond frustrating
I have one foot in my ED
And one foot in recovery
I need to make a decision one way or the other
Ed or recovery
Life or death
You would think that this choice would be easy
It's not
I want to hold on to some parts of my ED
And that's just not part of the deal if I choose recovery
It has to be one or the other

A while ago my sister suggested that I change the name of my blog to And then she escaped
I really like that

I was wondering about you
Why did you choose the name of your blog?
What does it mean to you?
Do you have suggestions as to what I could change my name to?
I'd love to know

ED

I've written a lot over the past couple of weeks about how things have improved for me

And they have

I am so grateful for that

But everything is not perfect

The purging has gone from 10 - 20 times a day

To 1-3 times a day

This is a vast improvement but Mary says that it is still too much

I have to admit that there is a part of me that is reluctant to completely let go of my ED

It's not that living with an ED is particularly good or fun

It's a nightmare most of the time

The anxiety

The depression

The negative health effects

The isolation

The constant fear

The eternal loneliness

The emptiness of living this way

Even with all these horrible things

I am still clinging to my ED 

It was a similar situation with my drug taking

The life of an addict is pretty pathetic

You wake up

Try to find money

Take drugs

Go to bed

Wake up

Find money

Take drugs......

Every day is the exact same

It's like Ground Hog Day

But even though I living this nightmare I still had reservations about stopping

People think that the problem is the drugs

And it is

But it's more about why you take drugs

What you are running and hiding from

People think that once you stop taking drugs

Then  that is the problem solved

But it's only the beginning

Once you are clean, then you have to face life and reality

And that's exactly what you have been trying to avoid all this time

In some ways I wonder if I have even conquered my addiction

Because I went straight from drugs to medication

As you know I am on quite a lot of meds

And I struggle to take them properly

Isn't that as good as using?

I think it might be

Just because they are prescribed doesn't mean that they can't be harmful

Anyway

I digress

Back to EDs

Having an ED is like having a full time job

You work hard all week ie restricting and exercising 

And at the end of the week you expect a big fat pay cheque ie weigh loss

It's an all consuming occupation

A thankless task

Once you have reached one goal it's on to the next

We never get to enjoy the fruits of our labour

One reason why I am reluctant to give up my ED is that I have no clue what I would do without it

What would I do everyday?

What would I think about?

Talk about?

Write about?

What will I fill the ED shaped hole left in my life with ?

I guess there are a million possibilities 

But nothing captures my attention as much as my ED

I just don't know how I would fill my days

I started restricting and purging when I was in a very dark place
It was a coping mechanism
Over time it became a habit
An addiction
One that is so very hard to break
I do it now because I don't know any other way
I don't know life without it
It has become as natural as breathing

I haven't weighed in almost 2 weeks
I'm too afraid
There is  price to pay for being in good form
And that price is paid in pounds and ounces