'Mental Patient'

 Recently the supermarket ASDA  launched their new Halloween costume entitled 'Mental Patient'
Although they have since withdrawn it, it should never have seen the light of day
If I had the energy I would write about how utterly offensive and wrong this is
How the stigma of mental health is still very much alive and kicking
How I know many many people who have mental health issues and not one if them brandishes a meat cleaver or walks around in blood spattered clothes
How absolutely outrageous it is that ASDA suggests that people with mental health issues are violent and dangerous

This is not the face of a person with mental health issues



This is the face of a person with mental health issues

Spot the difference........

The Decision

I saw Mary yesterday
Things have finally come to a head
I was honest with her and told that I was spinning out of control
That the purging is the worst it's ever been
She weighed me and I had lost two and half kilos since last week
Usually I am quite coy about my ED behaviours but yesterday I just said it the way it was
I don't have the energy to sugar coat the truth
She that it's a choice between life and death
I said that I wasn't afraid of death
That life scares me more
That's when she brought up the 'treatment' word
She asked if I want to get well
I find this question impossible to answer
I do and I don't
I want to but I can't
I want to get well but I don't want to put on weight
I want to get well but...
There's always a but

She asked if I wanted to feel better
I said that I can't remember what it feels like to feel good so I don't know what I'm missing
I've been this way for so long that I don't know what it's like to feel any other way
We talked and talked
Going around in circles
In the end she gave me an ultimatum
She said that she can't continue to see me if I continue on the way I am
She gave me an ultimatum
My first option is that I go to treatment
My second option is that I continue to see her but agree to stop purging and restricting
I guess that there is a third option in there, that I do neither but I don't think I want that
That would be like giving up
So I have to make a decision and ring her on Friday morning to let her know

So this morning I rang the treatment centre
I thought I had calculated the time so that I would ring while they were in group and could leave a message
But the phone was answered on the second ring
It was a voice I recognized but it wasn't Imelda who runs the EDRP (Eating Disorder Recovery Group)
I said who I was and the voice said 'Oh hi Ruby, it's Una here'
Una worked on the ward on the my first 2 admissions
I was glad she remembered me
That I wasn't just another anonymous anorectic
I didn't know what to say or where to start
She asked me some questions
My weight
My behaviours
I said that I was wondering about going back in
'Why now?' she asked 'What's different now?'
All I could say was that I am spinning out of control
Purging umpteen times a day
Feeling like I'm going crazy
She was very kind and said she would speak to the psychiatrist at lunch time and ring me back this afternoon
I felt relieved after the call
It wasn't so bad

I understand Mary's thinking behind asking me to make this decision
I can't go on this way
Every day march from the kitchen to the living room to the bathroom
I am literally going round in circles
My father sat me down last night
I could tell he was frustrated
I can't bear the fact that others know what I'm doing
In my mind no one knows
But in reality they all know

The purging is beyond bad at the moment
Something is going to break, be it my body or my mind
I just can't continue this way
It's a living hell
It's a bad dream that I can't wake up from
Every morning I wake up and dread the day ahead
The only respite I get is when my head hits the pillow at night
For those few moments before I fall asleep I have a little bit of peace
A little bit of freedom
But then I wake up the next day and start all over again

It's not that I particularly want to go to treatment but I have to do something
I guess it doesn't hurt to find out what my options are and go from there
That's all I can do for now

Ps, Apologies for not commenting, replying to comments or emailing back, my head is all over the place

Friends

Monday was doctor day
Just after I sat down in the waiting room, I saw an old friend of mine walk in
I haven't seen her in months
Maybe even years
My knee jerk reaction was to bury my head in the magazine I was reading
It's a reaction that I can't help
It's not that I didn't want to see her
I think it's a shame thing
Shame for not keeping in contact
For weighing the same as a baby elephant
Out of the corner of my eye I saw her approach me and sit down beside me
She envelopes me in a big hug
I had heard that she had relapsed back in to bulimia
She's in the same boat as me
We talked for a while
Compared war stories
She said that she felt so bad that she had gained weight but in my eyes she had lost weight
She told me that I was 'fading to nothing'
She hopes to go to treatment
This thing has almost broken her
I showed her the magazine I was reading (Slimming World) and we laughed
It was so nice to see her
To sit and talk to someone who gets it
To know that I'm not the only one who feels this way
Don't get me wrong, it's amazing to have the support here but it's not the same as sitting down with someone and having a cuppa and a chat
It's not the same as a hug
Her doctor called her and she was gone
I wondered when I would see her again

It got me thinking about friendship and how important it is
My social life online is very active and I have lots of friends who I am in contact with every day
But I have neglected my real life friends
I just haven't been able to socialize
I know some of you meet up sometimes and I would love to do that but I don't know of anyone that lives in this country
I was contacted a few months ago by a girl who lives a couple of hours away
We emailed back and forth
I suggested to her that we meet up sometime and I never heard back from her and she hasn't emailed me since
I wondered if I had scared her off

It is difficult to hold on to friendships when you are eating disordered
Along with the disorder often comes depression and anxiety and that makes it tough to socialize
Losing weight and maintaining my disorder became my priority and I distanced myself from a lot of my friends
I guess that was one of the main reasons that I started writing my blog
I was lonely
I needed to talk to people in the same situation as me
And I have found many amazing friends here
But I think as great as they are, it is no substitute for real life friends

It takes me a while to build a friendship
I'm naturally quite a shy person when I first meet someone so it takes a bit of work for me to become comfortable around them
And I'm not very good in groups
Ideally I'd like to speak to someone one on one
I tend to get on better with people who are older than me
When I said this to Mary she said that it was probably because I compared myself to people my own age
That's true I think

My friend is thinking of going in to treatment, the same as me
It's hard to see her struggling so much as she was always such a positive influence in my life
It just goes to show that anyone can relapse
Anyone can slip
It's scary

I have no doubt though that she will get back on track on
And hopefully I will too





I was wondering about you
Have you managed to hold on to your friendships?
Do you spend more time with on line friendships that real life ones?
Do you meet up with people that you've met on line?

Beauty Pageants, yay or nay?

We've all seen them on tv
On shows like Toddlers and Tiaras and Little Miss Perfect
Hair perfectly coiffed beauty queen style
Spray tanned such a deep mahogany that their eyes and teeth almost glow
And of course the 'I'd rather be anywhere than here' smile
They look like little dolls
Like charicatures of themselves
And of course behind every pageant kid is a competitive, slightly loopy mom

Ireland hosted one of it's first pageants on Saturday
It split the nation
It seems that the world is divided in to 2 types of people
Those who agree with pageants and those who don't
The debate continued on a popular Friday night talk show
3 ladies took part to defend the upcoming pageant
Annette Hill from Universal Royalty, the pageant organiser
Micki Wood, the mother of Eden Wood, a beauty queen from the US who appeared at the pageant on Saturday
And Stephanie an Irish mother whose daughter Ashling was competing

Micki Wood came across as a pushy, outspoken mama bear
She vehemently defended her daughter and her beloved pageants
The organiser of the pageant said to expect 'family fun', 'new friends' and 'good competition from Saturdays pageant
She described how the kids get dressed up in 'glitz' dresses
Applied fake tan
Used wiglets
And also 'flippers' (fake teeth)
They made it all sound like good clean fun

Micki Wood

What was peculiar about this pageant was that it was a cloak and dagger affair, shrouded in secrecy
Although heavily promoted on the internet, the location of the pageant remained a closely guarded secret because of fears the it would be marred by protesters
Even the contestants were not notified of the venue until the last minute
Hill said that she couldn't understand the mayhem and negative media storm that had followed the pageant


On the talk show we were introduced to 2 of the pageant kids
Eden Wood was the star attraction at Saturday's pageant and at the grand old age of 8 has retired from pageants
She has already published her autobiography From Cradle To Crown
Eden was dressed in what looked like a hot pink feather dressing gown and stood with her hands on her hips
She was uber confident
Precocious even
She explained how she loves getting her hair and make up done, 'rockin' and rollin' and having fun
Her idol is Selena Gomez
But there was something disturbing about her manner and the way that she was presented
It just looked all wrong



Then we met Ashling, a 9 year old pageant contestant from Co Cork
Although also over dressed and made up, she came across as lot more natural in the her manner
Her mother Stephanie explained how her daughter had seen an episode of Toddlers and Tiaras  and asked her mother if she could do that
Ashling has won prizes at 19 pageants and her mother estimated that she had spent up to 35,000 euro funding her participation
She has one to one session with a coach where she is advised on her stage routine
She learns modelling skills and how to look confident and make good eye contact with the judges
Ashling said that she enjoyed pageants but like a lot of these kids, her answers sounded rehearsed




My curiosity pricked, I watched an episode of Toddlers and Tiaras
It was disturbing to say the least
And more than the kids it was the mothers that worried me
They were competitive to the point of obsession, more so than any of the kids
Of course they are not all like that and the show does focus on the most extreme cases
The kids  take part in different divisions such as casual wear, formal wear, swim wear and talent
They wore outrageous costumes, over the top make up and hair
As it is a long day for the kids, it was inevitable that they got cranky and tired
One mother was shown giving her daughter  soda or 'pageant crack' to keep her awake

The pageants seem to mean a lot more to the mothers than they do to the kids
The majority of the kids seemed to be just going through the motions
Some obviously didn't want to be there at all
And there is no doubt that these kids are being exploited
One child came on stage dressed in an angel costume
She then proceeded to rip it off to reveal a very skimpy leotard with cones on her chest ala Madonna
Others danced provocatively
Shaking their bums
It was all just a little sleazy

So the pageant went ahead here on Saturday despite the controversy and maybe even because of it
It was due to take part in an upmarket Dublin hotel but it pulled out at the last minute
As the organisers appeared on Friday night tv, they still did not have a confirmed venue
At the eleventh hour they found a venue in Co Monaghan
But the pageant went off with a lot less sparkle and glamour than was hyped
It took place in the back room of a pub

Just over half of the expected 50 kids turned up for the pageant
It began at 11am and lasted just a couple of hours due to fears of protestors

In a week which saw the French government ban beauty pageants for under 16s, pageants are in the firing line for a lot of criticism
One paper reported that 'French women may pride themselves on their grooming but they draw a clear line between maximising your assets and touting them to the highest bidder'
Another paper described the kids in pageants as looking like 'fun size sex workers'

The thing that doesn't sot right with me about pageants is that the kids are judged solely on cosmetic appearance
Organisers believe that it is all about personality but the kids don't speak one word while on stage
These kids are learning at a very young age that looks and appearance are what is most important
Never mind that you play the piano
Nevermind that you are a maths whizz
If you can pout your lips and bat your eyelashes then you are on your way to success
These kids are being taught to rely on physical appearance and not on their personality or talents
It's just wrong
So very wrong

I was wondering about you
Do you agree or disagree with beauty pageants?
Have you ever been in a beauty pageant or ever considered entering one?
Inquiring minds want to know...........

One Thing

The one thing that helped me get through today is my dogs (and many cigarettes!)

What's the one thing that helped you get through the day?

Ruby x

Gaining

I saw Mary on Tuesday
Tuesday is weigh day
I would have happily eaten my own foot than go to that appointment
I had stopped weighing myself as home but after being sick curiosity got the better of me and I weighed on Sunday
Somehow even though I ate next to nothing for 4 days
Somehow even though I slept for most of that time
Somehow even though I neither binged or purged in that time
I gained weight
This is hard to take because no part of me willingly participated in this gain
I decided to go to the appointment but politely refuse to be weighed
Yes, good idea Ruby

When the time came and she invited me to step on to the scale, I said 'No thank you'
I explained that my delicate mental state could not handle big horrible numbers right now
We talked for a long time and somewhere along the way I heard myself agreeing to be weighed
To prevent myself having a total meltdown I didn't look
But of course I was dying to know
It's like putting your hand on a hot stove
You know you shouldn't but you touch it anyway

Mary asks me what is so terrible about weigh gain
It's hard to explain
It has nothing to do with how I look
In my eyes I look fat whatever weight I am so it's not that
I tell her that I don't want to regain to a healthy weight and still feel anorexic on the inside
I have been there before and very nearly went insane
A couple of years ago I gained weight and reached my all time high weight
Even though I was still a healthy weight I still felt anorexic inside
People saw I looked ok and presumed I was ok
But I felt worse than ever
It's like I want my appearance to match how I feel inside
To give a visual clue of what is going on in my head
We talked about mental illness and how it's invisible
In fact anorexia is probably the only mental illness that manifests itself physically
Having an invisible illness in incredibly frustrating
If you have a broken arm people can see it
They can see you are in pain
They can empathize
They can ask you about it
But with mental illness no would ever know unless you told them and lets face it who wants to admit that they are depressed or bipolar or bulimic

I told Mary how my doctor said to me that I look well
I can't tell you how much I hate hearing those words
'You look well'
'You look good'
It's like a knife in the gut
To someone with an ED telling them they look well translates to 'You look healthy'
Which translated to 'You've put weight on'
Which translates to 'You are fat'
I know the person saying this means well
They think they are giving you a compliment
I understand that
I've done it myself
But I don't comment on anyone's appearance anymore
You just don't know how they're going to interpret it

The session with Mary is an hour and a half long and I'm exhausted when I get out
I see my father later that day and can't help but ask him if I've gained weight
He says no
I tell about the gain
I tell him I can't understand it
Then I remember back to March when I was in hospital
I gained weight then too and then suddenly lost it all
What is the common factor between then and now?
I wasn't purging
After realising this I spent yesterday eating and purging
More to test the theory than anything else
And this morning I had lost most of the weight I had gained
This is a hard pill to swallow
Knowing this makes it even more difficult to get the purging under control
I just don't know where to go from here

I can't even fully explain why gaining weight terrifies me so much
I guess it's symbolic
Of getting well
Of growing up
Of letting the past go
Of taking responsibility for my life
Of taking control of my life
Of being ready to recover
Of being normal
Of being average
So many things that I don't know if I'm ready for

Words aren't coming easily these days so instead of writing about myself I want to throw the floor over to you

Have you regained weight?
What have you found the most difficult thing about it?
If you have regained to a healthy weight, what helped you come to terms with it?
If you are underweight what is stopping you from gaining weight?
Are your reasons the same as mine?
Please do let me know

Keep on keeping on

I knew Autumn had arrived when I walked in to my kitchen yesterday and smelled my mother's chicken soup
It's strange
The seasons change
The months change
The days and the weeks change
And yet nothing changes
Does that make sense?

After reading back my last couple of posts, I was very tempted to delete them
Does the blogosphere really need to know the gory details of my ED?
I asked myself this question and came to the conclusion that yes it does
When I started writing this blog I was determined to expose my ED for the nasty, cruel, ugly, disgusting thing that it really is
I didn't want to sugar coat the truth
I didn't want to be in denial about the lengths I go and the depths I sink to for this thing
I find it quite difficult to put my drug addiction in to words but for some reason I seem to be able to explain my ED in a way that maybe a person without an ED may understand
But it is really hard to explain addiction
Especially to someone who has never experienced addiction
It's like trying to describe a colour
If someone has never seen the colour red, how do you explain it to them?
It's next to impossible

With addiction you can use words like 'compulsion' and phrases like 'physically addicted' but it doesn't really explain the feelings that someone in the grip of an addiction or an ED go through
On the other hand I find it hard to understand what it's like not be an addict
To be able to have one drink and stop there without any difficulty
For as long as I can remember I have been an addict
Maybe I was born that way, I don't know
I was addict long before I picked up a drink or a drug
Food was probably the first substance that I experienced an addiction to
Of course at the time I had no idea
As I child I loved white bread
I just had to have it
I ate at home
I requested it at friends houses
I ate it slice by slice and couldn't get enough
I remember when my family put bread out to feed the birds I would eat it when they weren't looking
I couldn't help myself
That was harmless enough but as I grew in to a teenager I became addicted to shop lifting
Then drugs
Then alcohol
The prescription drugs
And now an ED with some sub addictions (exercise, enemas, purging)
I've always been addicted to something

I truly believe that a person can become addicted to anything even if it's not physiologically addictive
If I can get a good feeling or a high of something, then I will do it over and over and over again to the detriment of my life
When I was addicted to drugs I was both physically and psychologically addicted
I just couldn't stop
I don't have that switch in my brain that says 'Ok that's enough now'
After I overdosed for the first time I was admitted to hospital with respiratory arrest
I was lucky I didn't die
But the very next day I was using in the hospital bathroom
I just couldn't stop

That feeling is incredibly difficult to describe
The feeling that you have to use even though it could kill you
Even though it's drive you insane
Even though you are breaking your families heart
Even though your life is in the toilet
Even though you are suicidal
You. Just. Can't. Stop.

Imagine you have an itch
It's the itchiest itch you have ever experienced
It's driving you crazy and it's all you can think about and focus on
Now imagine instead of fingernails you have razorblades on the tips of your fingers
If you scratch that itch you will shred your skin to ribbons and possible die from blood loss
But that itch just won't go away and you can't help but scratch it
Every time you scratch you tear in to your skin
You bleed and bleed but you just can't help yourself
Everyone is telling you to stop
Everyone is trying to help you
To bandage your skin and help you stop scratching
But you can't
You just can't stop

That's what it's like to live with an addiction
It's an itch that you just can't help but scratch
But of course the paradox is that you can stop
Yes, it is extremely difficult but it can be done
For some people it's a life changing event that makes them stop
Maybe they have a near death experience
Maybe they become homeless
Maybe they hit rock bottom
But mostly people just becomes sick and tired of being sick and tired
Then it becomes possible to stop
When the negative effect of using out weighs the positive effect
And the crucial thing is to want get well
To want to live
That is half the battle
It's a long and difficult road to get to that place
It takes a lot of hard work and an army of support to beat an addiction
But it can be done
I truly believe that

A good friend once said to me that it's not a choice between my ED and recovery
It's a choice between life and death
I think this is so true
Living with an ED is a slow suicide
It's a very visual way of saying 'I don't want to be here'
I do believe that recovery from disordered eating is possible
But I don't know if I am in a place where I want it
Of course I do want it but there is a huge part of me that feels I just can't stop

Addiction is all consuming and I hate that
Addicts become completely self absorbed
They forget that there is a whole world out there
Places to see
People to meet
Experiences to have
Food to taste
Everything boils down to the drug or weight loss or.......
It becomes your whole world
Nothing else matters
Not family
Not friends
Not love
 Nothing

Being in the grip of an addiction is soul destroying
You lose everything
Confidence
Zest for life
Dignity
Self esteem
Independence
You lose that spark that makes you you and you become a shell
You lose you

I have come through drug addiction and alcoholism so I know beating an addiction can be done
Beating an ED is slightly trickier
With drugs I could literally walk away from my old life
Away from the drug
Away from using friends
My old town
Everything
I walked in to a brand new life
With food I can't do that
I can't cut food out of my life (well I could but that would defeat the purpose)
I have to eat
I have to find a balance
A happy medium
And that's the hard part

As grim as things are at the moment I do have hope
As long as I am breathing there is hope
I will continue to fight
Continue to write and spread awareness
Continue to live my life the best I can
What's the alternative?
Lie down and give up
That's not really my style
So if you are struggling today remember that it doesn't have to be this way
There is a way out
There is life beyond addiction and EDs
There is a second chance for you
There is hope
Recovery will be the hardest thing that we ever do but it will be so worth it
Don't give up
Don't give in
Keep on keeping on