Falling for Triggers

ED has a sneaky way of coming up when you least want it to. Triggers surround us every day in our lives. Even people without mental health problems face them. The slightest things set off memories, feelings, behaviors, etc. For me, triggers have been all over the place this week, and I've done kind of okay at managing them. It's just led to extreme anxiety, body checking, and a lot of ED thoughts.

My biggest trigger this week has been being sick. For the record, there are gross details following. So, if you don't like bodily functions, skip over this paragraph. TMI:
 Over the weekend, I could tell I had a UTI, but kind of let it go. I took some cranberry tablets, and drank vodka/cranberries at the bar. Nothing seemed to help. Then, it came to a head on Monday night. I was at cooking class and was in so much pain that I could barely sit, let alone stand. I typically can't stand through cooking class with my heart problems anyways, but this was worse. Then, I went to the bathroom and saw blood in my urine. I spoke with the dietician and off to the emergency room I went. After 2 hours of waiting, I had a 5 minute conversation with a doctor who prescribed me antibiotics and sent me on my merry way. I took off from work on Tuesday to rest, but I could feel increasing pain in my back. By Wednesday, it was unbearable. I worked in the morning, but left early to go see my doctor. 2 hours later, I was in a CT machine getting a scan to see if my kidneys were infected. The next day, I got a call saying they were clear and was given a script for hydrophone to help the pain. About 7 hours later, I was in urgent care again, because I was throwing up and passed out. The doctor did some tests and suggested that my UTI had cleared, but there was probably something on my kidneys that might not have been strong or big enough for the CT machine to see. I went home, threw up some more, and then went to bed. I took off Friday to rest. Today, the pain finally started to go away. Now, I'm just exhausted.

So with all of that crap happening to my body and the pile of medications I have been taking this week, eating hasn't been my favorite thing to do. It's been really hard on my stomach and hard to eat to make up calories after I've thrown up unintentionally. It's a difficult battle. My ED voice says I can just skip all of those, and it'll be fine. Skipping a few meals this week won't hurt. It'll actually help me look thinner for my brother's wedding next week. All the crazy talk.

Trigger two actually has been my brother's wedding. It's knowing that it is going to be a heavily photographed event. These pictures are going to be ones that last forever. I am just so terrified of looking fat in them that I want to restrict to make sure I look the best that I can. Rationally, that's insane, because my dress is wonderful and flowy. It'll hide my least favorite area of my body, so I can rationalize that it'll be okay. It's also just a lot of people with a lot of eyes on me. This will be the first major event since I went through treatment. I mean, I've seen my family, but I am also seeing a lot of people that I haven't seen since before I went to treatment. So, it just makes me nervous. I just keep telling myself that I need to focus on TJ and not myself that day. Maybe that'll help.

Trigger three has been my isolation due to being sick. I have spent a lot of time in my apartment by myself this week. I consider myself an extroverted person. I thrive on being social and communicating with people face to face. When I'm alone, I tend not to eat, because 1) my hunger cues really come and go. They haven't been consistent in a long time. 2) No one to hold me accountable. 3) I have never really been a person who eats when they're bored. Isolation and people not reaching out to me leads me to feeling unworthy or useless, which isn't even close to true. My feelings just get the best of me sometimes.

So, how do I cope? I wrote the massive letter to ED blog yesterday, which was really had an impact on me. I had done similar exercises in groups during my first round of treatment, but always had a time constraint on it. I also don't think I was at the place to be able to do it back then. I would love to expand it for me personally with more details about some of those situations, because I think I need to. It was my way of starting to connect to that story and begin to somewhat feel everything in my life. I'm also writing this blog today as accountability. In addition to blogging, I've been watching a lot of horrible reality television. I learned that Undercover Boss makes me cry like a baby, and Intervention makes me miss my life of being a therapist. I've thought about signing up for dance classes and challenging what might be the most triggering thing for me. That'll probably be a blog in itself one day. I've listened to a lot of music, and taken a lot of showers.

This week has proved to me that I am probably stronger than I give myself credit for. I have strongly considered myself a survivalist for a lot of the crap I've been through, but I have also turned to really negative coping skills in the past. I didn't turn to any of those this week. I thought about having a drink to unwind, but I know that drinking on antibiotics and pain pills is an overdose waiting to happen. So, I didn't. Honestly, I haven't had a drink in over a week, which hasn't happened since the first time I was in treatment. I also don't have the craving to drink anymore. I haven't done cocaine in a while. I didn't try to exercise through the pain while not eating. I even took off work which, if you know me, never happens. I'm a workaholic through and through. I engaged in appropriate self-care. Surprising, I know. I surprised myself with it too. Maybe I am capable of all of this without turning to ED.

Triggers will come up at the most inopportune moments for all the wrong reasons. But if we can learn to engage in appropriate self-care and coping skills, they become easier to manage. Those skills will become a necessary ally in the battle against ED in the fight for recovery. Even though I did engage in some behaviors this week, I know it will be okay. I may fall, but I can always get back up and make the choice for recovery.

Alcohol, IOP, and What's Next? Regrouping

Yesterday and today have been very trying days. I have really struggled through meals, especially knowing there would be alcohol throughout the weekend. Typically when I know drinking is involved, I do not eat as much for a few reasons. 1) Because I want to numb out. 2) It's empty calories that I don't want to consume. So, it's been a major head battle the last few days.

Yesterday was the bridal shower and bachelorette party for my brother's fiance. I am a pretty anxious person normally, but adding in situations like this are really difficult for me when I am in a relapse. Luckily, everything turned out okay, and it ended up being a lot of fun. Today, I have just been attempting to deal with work and getting back on track. I have felt very off lately, which has made my work suffer. I am attempting to not get fired through all this, and I feel like, with the mass firing of a month ago, I am just teetering closer to that side every day. I really cannot lose my job right now, especially because then I would have to move back in with my parents. I am having a hard enough time without being hovered over. So, it's just a constant state of anxiety and trying to fight my demons, keep everything together, and not break down.

That's where the alcohol has come into play as well. When living in Milwaukee, I was going out all the time, because that was the social thing to do and it helped better manage my anxiety. I have caught myself drinking more lately, and I know part of that is with being social; however, I don't need to drink a bottle of wine in one sitting to be social. That's been happening more lately. Alcohol just helps me relax and gets my brain to slow down a little bit. With everything going on, I have been doing more solo drinking as well. This is a habit that I at least recognize this time. I just need to watch it and enlist the support of others to make sure it doesn't get too out of control. Again, this blog helps keep me accountable, so we'll see.

I've also been greatly debating IOP lately. It is a weird thing to enter treatment at an IOP level. The first time I was there, it was like getting to IOP was finally seeing the exit sign on the highway after being in the car for hours. Entering at that level, there is a random mix of people who are at that point, ready to leave treatment. Then, you have a very small group who are trying to work and keep their shit together to avoid PHP. It just leads to a very strange dynamic. Also, people aren't consistently there. By the time you get to IOP, you get days off. It just doesn't have that same tight knit group feeling that I thrived off of in PHP. I am not sure if this is the right next step. I don't want to get worse and go back to PHP, but I don't feel like IOP is quite right either. I'm not sure what to do right now. One day at a time.

So what's next? I was texting with one of my favorite ladies from treatment today about feeling like I am going backwards and even though I am trying to get help, nothing seems to be working. Her response was "It's not moving backwards, it's regrouping so you can continue forward." Simple, eloquent, and exactly what I needed to hear. I need to take the time to regroup and figure out what I truly want and need to be doing. Without doing that, I don't think I can move forward. I will just keep going backwards, and that's no way to live.