thanksgiving pain

today, I don't want to be here. but im sitting with myself, feeling and thinking and awareness-ing my way through this not wanting to be here.

today im in pain. my teeth hurt and throb like someone has been touching them with ice cream for too long. its the zinging pain of gums eaten away with acid, leaving their underlying nerves encased in too thin of membranes. they hurt from too much sugar, they hurt from so little water, they hurt from purging.

my stomach and intestines hurt from too much food and, again, too little water. the eating hasn't stopped all weekend and im quite sick of it. I want to be done, I want to be back in the safety and routine of my dorm. I am severely overweight and can tell I have gained fat all over my butt and thighs and hips. it is the most ive ever had and I hate it. all I can think about is D's being a size 2 and saying she didn't think fat looked good on people. all I can think of is the memories of D and E trying on the clothes from our aunt and actually having options to choose from because they could fit into them. I, on the other hand, was too big. I couldn't join them in the fun silliness of trying on hand-me-downs. I just observed from my bed, feeling the rolls of fat spill over my jeans.

and speaking of jeans, it hurts to wear the only pair I brought. It hurts to sit on the floor and cross my legs. hence why I gave up before even starting to pack. it hurts to have this much excess weight on my body. its exhausting and pinches and squishes under my knees. it shakes when I walk and prevents me from being able to wear dress pants. I cant give myself good things in life because of this weight. my clothes don't fit. its expensive to buy all this food, its expensive to leave my family for it, and its expensive to invest in bigger sized clothing that wont fit in two months.

all in all, this just makes me want to cry and be angry and depressed and just leave myself until im back at school--where im expecting everything to magically heal itself. which is not a realistic view; the same issues can arise there. but it would help not having all this food around to check myself on.

what I need right now is kindness. I need space to breathe, I need to sit with myself and listen to my heart or my silence. I need to massage my neck and drink water and feel what needs to be felt. im here for you, my dear; trust that this will work and your weight will not always be an issue. it starts with beliefs, darling. it starts with beliefs and staying present and identifying your needs before trying to heal them. so we'll keep showing up. we'll keep doing that.

therapy shit. again.

im not sure if just continuing to show up and be with myself is enough. i just want to bail and bolt and leave and be done with therapy, done with healing. i keep failing. i keep not doing what we talked about. i keep choosing binges and purges. i hate therapy. i want to quit. i don't want to stay with myself. i want to try healing on my own again, though even then i generally left at some point. im just not sure that my therapist really understands my idea of healing. i think she has a different idea in mind. and i don't feel like i can accomplish this because im so unwilling to come back to myself every day. i cant apply these concepts of eating what i want when i am hungry and stopping when im full consistently enough for them to make any sort of a difference. they're so sporadic i just end up gaining weight and getting sick. i don't want to just talk about my week every time we get together. i want to get at deeper issues.

if i leave therapy, what could possibly be left? this is why im convinced i will never go anywhere in life. because im just so fucking unwilling to change anything and deal with my feelings. AND I NEED SOMEONE TO STAY IN THAT WITH ME AND INSIST THAT I TRY AND KEEP QUESTIONING AND COMFORTING AND HELPING ME. that is what i need and that is what no one can give me. i cant do this alone, guys; you cant just help me with therapy once a week and then expect me to perfectly perform all we discussed over the next seven days. i cant do that.

this all feels disgustingly similar to Robbie. i hate that. it makes me wonder/think/fear that the problem is me. ha. what an idea. its probably the truth.

i don't know what to do in therapy. i feel terrified of being honest. i feel like my therapist has a way she wants things to go and i don't know how to perform that way. id like to die. id like to be DONE with it all. i cant keep coming back to this. i need HELP i need someone to tell me how to change. i need someone to cheer me on and not keep throwing all my shit back in my lap, just sorted out. i want actual ideas i can digest and run with. i know, this sucks because im supposed to be taking personal responsibility and working hard and making choices etc etc etc. but this is exactly what grace has done to me--its turned me completely into this lazy fat whore of a slob who reassures herself with every binge that it doesn't matter how much weight you gain because you always end up accepting yourself anyways.  FUCK THIS.


ugh. i need to tell my therapist this. i need to be honest with her and say hey, here i am--i don't understand grace again. i came into this from the other side and now have slipped right through to the opposite extreme. can you help me find the middle ground back from there? i don't know where it is.

i DO want to change. i just don't want the consequences of feeling pain that change brings. fuck this paradigm.

sliced

what S said to me just now was hurtful, very hurtful. I am in pain from it. she came in and told me that she finally realized her problem: she's incredibly selfish. why? I questioned, shocked. she said its because she has gotten like, three professions of love from men she doesn't care about this week and she doesn't love any of them back, she just takes their affection and walks away. and then after my asking 7000 times she finally admits who one of the guys was: Sam (a mystery guy who i expected liked her). but then she tries to change the subject when i get for more details, asking me about work and my day and blah blah blah. yeah, you may think im rude and stuck up for not being honored by this interest but she was NOT doing it for my sake--she was totally and completely doing it for her own. she doesn't want to tell me these things or share with me so she just either says nothing or teases me with details. and for a long time i just put up with that and figured it was her life, not mine, and she had rights to boundaries, etc. but i don't feel that way anymore. to quote Tom, "you don't do those kinds of things with your friends!" we have fun and we've shared a lot of deep things with one another and i feel like i tell her so much and she just does not share back. at least not nearly evenly enough. and i know that a huge part of me is just too curious for her sake and needs to not be hypocritical and practice what i preach about being selfless and thereby taking less information. but things are not the same as they were last fall or even last spring. we are closer now and i feel like S needs to understand that i am hurt, deeply hurt, by her rejection of my inquiry and her refusal to share things that happen to her with me. i am hurt and pissed and sick-and-fucking tired of playing these games where i beg for half an hour while she refuses to budge. i know shed claim to just be happy if i stopped and left her alone, but she seriously undervalues how humiliating it is to be the one in that position of begging. i hate that i do it to myself. but, for me, that insistence from anyone else would be taken as a sign of affection and i would appreciate it. that's clearly not the fucking case here.

i was also insulted by the culmination of several other things that happened at this time. S also tried to change the subject by asking me if id eaten dinner yet, to which i replied maybe. and she then says, i care about your nutrition. and then--this is the part that FUCKING KILLS ME--after i tell her she's being a little hypocritical, she goes, yeah i only had about a half glass of water today. I HATE YOU SO MUCH! i wanted to kill her. i just HATE her attitude when she says that, i HATE her control, i hate it more than anything else in the world. it pisses me off like nothing else. and it feels like shes pouring gravel into an open wound and then digging it in with sharp knives. it hurts so fucking bad. it's like she's saying to me, "guys like me, way too many to count, but they never like you--so take that emotional and social rejection." and then she adds, "and i don't eat anything and get to lose all this weight, that's probably why guys like me--so that that physical and emotional rejection even further, you little screwed up fucking bulimic." and then she finishes by utterly refusing to give me any details or share anything personal with me. another emotional and social rejection. really, really painful. i hate it. it hurts so bad. i just want to binge and restrict and purge and hide. i want to rebel against her stupid statements and recoil from her presence. hence why i left the room to go be angry somewhere safe. i was so tempted, the more i stewed over this, to just verbally spew in frustration, "God, S, you never give!!! You never give, do you?!" and then just leave. i guess her original assessment was correct. she is selfish.

but so am i, of course, in demanding that now that we're closer, our friendship should be done differently than it was before. i didn't become friends with S by forcing my way in. i let boundaries lie where they were, i let her share at will and gave her space when she needed it. i still think its okay to be hurt, but i cant expect to deepen our friendship through force. i need to be tolerant and respect S's way, if i truly want to be her friend. that's what friend's do, after all. they put up with each other's quirks, whether they're hilarious and delightful or really painful and challenging. i still love S. she still has great qualities, and i am no better off than her in the whole selfish department. i have flaws, deep flaws, as well. we both need grace. so i stay here in this. i stay with her, i choose to. i will let her let me in her own time. i will stop forcing so much. i will let things go and respect her space, even if i disagree with it. i will tell her when im hurt if and when its appropriate. i will remember that she can also be very selfless with other people. i will remember that she can still be very good.

ideally, id be dead

suicide ideation.

yes.

lots and lots of suicide ideation.

i just want to be done with life. please, please, please let me be done.

i hate addiction; i am sick of struggling. and worst of all--i really don't see any hope for myself. i realized that tonight in the bathroom, that depression and hopelessness are the norm for me. they are what i expect life will always come back to once the good parts are gone. they're, ironically, my blue sky above the clouds, not the happy/healthy/recovered me.

recovery feels impossible. i cant envision it for myself.

i also, once again, have come to the realization that i don't want to recover, i don't want to have a great life outside of Christianity. i don't believe its fully possible nor do i want to silence the nagging, haunting sense that there is something deeply flawed with me and Someone missing from my life that i long for. if i cannot have Him, and i cannot fully have my ED, but instead must try to live a semblance of a normal life, all the while dying inside, id rather die on the outside too. i hate this dissonance.

at least not yet

I feel as though today has been a day of mistakes for me. I repeatedly overstepped boundaries I had set for myself in terms of relationships with others/not prying, how I conduct myself professionally and casually, and, of course, my eating. Simultaneously, though, I also failed to meet expectations I've set; I fell short. I fell short in conducting the meeting with S, A, and J. I failed to workout. I failed to talk with anyone about driving me to observe a child somewhere, mainly because I knew my bank account was $0.00 and I wouldn't be able to pay for gas. So now I'll be lying to my professor in my discussion post because I'm too proud to admit my failure so late in the game and suffer the consequences of being honest and receiving the grade I really deserve. I just hate this. Failure failure failure failure. Every day. I need to stop behaving so lethargically and stop being so fucking half-hearted in my attempts at recovery. I'm irritated that I so blatantly looked choice in the face and gave pausing/reviewing my values the finger in light of temptation. I hate that. It makes me terrified that I'll never recover. See, I want to seeth, see -- you'll never change! No matter how much work you put in, eventually you crack! You'll never change--you CAN'T change. Fuck up. Screw up. You. will. never. accept. salvation. You have no fucking willpower! No wonder you're so fat. No wonder your body jiggles and jostles when you walk. No wonder you look like shit and your face is broken out. No fucking wonder. We all know why this is happening, you food whore, you slut. You FAILURE. You are not living up to who you should be, to the one thing that gives purpose to your existence, the one thing that makes your fucking presence even worthwhile. You slutty bitch.

That is what I want to (and have partially been saying all day) to myself.

But I know that recovery means learning to treat myself differently, with grace and curiosity and understanding. With acceptance and kindness. So I need to re-approach these ideas and see if they line up with what I truly believe. That's the only way to move forward. I don't want to give up!

So. I believe that I did cave to temptation today; I did this because I was feeling like I needed to be grounded. I had already napped in an attempt to give myself the break I wanted, along with watching some YouTube videos. So that was good--I attempted to address my needs for a transition and rest without food and I was actually successful at that. The issue didn't come until S left to nanny and I was alone. The relief I felt at her going was tangible, which was unexpected. But I felt like I could breathe; I think that was partially just from feeling free from judgment/a dark mood, and also the knowledge that I could binge if need be. As time wore on, though, my mind became consumed with continuous thoughts/obsession over the thought of the food that was in the cupboard, waiting for me. I knew that I wasn't hungry and I also checked in with myself enough to know that I was feeling upset/sad because of all the things I felt like I had done wrong during the day. I wanted that feeling to go away because I knew that I needed to get started on my other assignments, but, of course, didn't want to. Combine all this together and it led to me standing in the kitchen, frantically yet not wholeheartedly whispering reminders to myself about what my goals were, about how I should go sit and think about this and reconsider what it was I wanted, about how much I would hate feeling sick/full/fat/uncontrollable later on. But when the food, solitude, and painful feelings are there, promising relief, you don't do any of these things. At least not yet. And that is what I am banking on. Not yet, I have not yet learned how to do that. However, that absolutely does not mean it will never happen! As I learn to accept my feelings (which I did try doing), and let myself stop and feel them and find another way to soothe once I know my needs, I can learn to feel like I have a choice--a viable, good choice--for how to act. But that will take time and repeated encounters. I am still willing to learn and change and discover who I am without this eating disorder. I trust and believe that my life then will be better in terms of overall well-being than it is under my relationship with food now. Not to say I'll never be in pain, but just to say that when pain comes, I will feel it deeply, and I will deal with it healthily, embracing and soothing it. And I will maintain a beautiful life through it--or as close as I can get. I feel tempted to eat maybe, but I know my real needs. And I love myself. I want what is best for me, so I will do what is necessary to treat myself well.

Today, I was trying to self-soothe through that binging and purging session(s). I was trying to help myself cope and feel better. But it was ultimately painful, very painful. It hurt being so full. It was humiliating to go through so much food and having so many dishes out when Serena came back. It saddened me that I couldn't save breakfast or lunch for tomorrow, that I couldn't plan ahead for caring for myself. I want to be kind to myself and heal/breathe through painful events and moods and problems in life without destroying me. So I need my heart and habits to be transformed here. I need to change and let these insufficient band aids go.

"Breathe new life into me so that my heart--and my habits--may be transformed. May I leave differently than how I arrived. May I have the courage to let go. May I be changed." -Karly Pitman

this is what it looks like

I feel the need to exemplify for everyone what exactly bulimia--specifically binging--looks like. Compulsive overeating. Gorging. Whatever you'd like to call it.

You take a road trip with your roommate and the entire drive you sneak into gas stations to buy coffee alone. Caffeine, you say, you need caffeine. She thinks you're buying black coffee. No. You're putting the sickeningly sweet, thick creamy coffee imitation of French Vanilla and Pumpkin Spice into the same Styrofoam cups that all the people who really drink black coffee use. You're not sure if she can smell the difference, but you're praying to God she can't.

You notice how sloppily the white, stretch-mark-lined cauliflower fat around your thighs bounces all over the seat as you drive. You hate your body. You feel high off of all the sugar you've been ingesting. You hate, hate, hate yourself. You feel suffocating with how stuck you are.

You spend the week with friends constantly trying to slip in more food at each meal without people noticing. You have never felt so self-conscious in your entire life. You never realized just how much more you typically eat than the people around you. You can't relax. You just want to be alone so you can eat.

You repeatedly make excuses to slip upstairs to "email my mom," "reply to a text," or "grab a hair tie"; you actually just want to shove a hand into your box of Cheez-It's and chomp it down as quickly as possible. You need that hit of food. A lot of it. Now. Alone.

You wake up at 4:10 AM to sneak downstairs and grab food  before everyone gets up to see you off for your return trip. You're in a spare bathroom, hoping your insomniac roommate it truly asleep, and blearily scarfing through each food item. Can people hear you chewing? You should have picked the snack without nuts.

You go grocery shopping with your roommate after this trip and are insanely protective over your cart. You "casually" pick a different checkout line and thank heaven that there are other, shorter 20 items or less lines for her to go through.

You avoid putting your groceries away until after she leaves. You don't want to give her a hint as to just what or how much food you bought. So you stall by unpacking your bags while she repacks hers for a weekend at home. You cheerily offer to help her bring stuff to her car. She asks, "Are you sure you're going to be okay here alone?" in reference to the last fall break when you were a little stir-crazy from being alone on a deserted campus for 5 days. I laugh at the insanity of the question. Hahaha. No, I want to say, no dear I will absolutely not be okay. I will be binging and purging on probably 10,000 calories worth of food all weekend (maybe more). I will be depressed. I will be in a haze. I will feel like shit. I will definitely not be okay. But I say "Yeah, of course; that's so sweet of you, but I'll be fine!"

You rip into the King Size Heath bar you bought as soon as the door's locked. You then unpack your groceries and ferociously dig into bags and boxes and gallons and cartons of good. You have to taste everything, now! You make odd combinations which taste surprisingly yummy. You use about 20,000 dishes. You eat and eat until you are literally shuffling, bent over like a humpback, to the bathroom. You bend at the waste and tickle the trigger. It's all water at first, the few sips you chugged desperately at the end once you realized how little you'd drank throughout. Then the food comes. And comes and comes and comes. You can feel the relief, so certain. As absolute as the fullness that told you to stop. You purge and purge until only small amounts are coming up. You try not to drip snot everywhere as you flush and move to the sink to wash the vomit off your hand and arm. You clean the toilet seat, feeling good. It's done. And everything you hated the taste of when you were full suddenly sounds so damn appealing. Maybe just a few more bites. What could be the harm? You won't get full enough to need to throw up again. Just a small snack.

10 minutes later you're back over the toilet. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Until the list of your transgressions looks like this:

-1 extra-large box of Honey Bunches of Oats cereal
-1 bag multigrain tortilla chips, a little bit of too-hot salsa
-2/3 gallon 1% milk
-1 box Mac 'n Cheese
-1 pizza crust, 3/4 cup tomato sauce, 2/3 cup cheese
-1 large bowl of rigatoni noodles, 3/4 cup tomato sauce, 1/3 cup cheese
-1 half-gallon toffee ice cream
-2 heath bars
-1 (entire) package coconut dream cookies
-6 Chips Ahoy cookies
-1 box brown sugar
-3/4 stick butter
-2 cups oatmeal
-1 banana
-5 buttery biscuits
-1/2 a sub bun with a little tomato sauce/salsa

You'd rather be dead, but the best option is going to sleep instead. It's 1AM and you're exhausted. So you purge one last time because it's painful to lie down when you're full and organize the endless dishes into a seemingly neat order for tomorrow's washing.

And when you wake up you're hungry. It begins again.

This is the hell of bulimia. It never stops.

literally

 

biting the hand that feeds me. literally.

we have reached our final destination

well, im depressed again. last night was particularly terrible but I can feel myself sliding back into the hole again today. all I could think of yesterday while washing the dishes was "god forbid the day hope comes back into my life." I just want to be done.

I. just. want. to. be. done. Please.

I hate life; I really do. I know, that's so preteen-y and emo-ish. uahhh. what a wimp, grow up, blah blah blah. but I don't really feel the need for attention or to whine. If I could, I would just silently raise my hand, and tell the teacher I need to leave now; then id slip to the back of the room, grab my poison and quietly exit out the door.

this is why I feel like I relate to movies about depressed, loner individuals so much, including ex-military men. I crave them because its like I am them. I feel safe when I watch them observing life. suffocation is comforting to share with another. though i guess in some ways its not, because my roommate has also been really depressed lately and sometimes I feel like between the two of us there is no air in this dorm to breathe.

I read this quote on pinterest the other day that said the way people around you feel about themselves is a good indication of how you make others feel. and I just thought, well shit, im fucked then, aren't I? because I continually seem to attract people who end up in a stuck, limbo-ish stage of flagellation. endlessly puttering around, trying to find something useful to do.

that's the thing, really. I wish I had a sense of purpose for life. laying in my bath last night, all I could think of is why. why, God, am I here, honestly? because I see no point and I wish I was never created. but on some low level I guess I believe that He has a purpose for everyone. so is there hope for me? could I ever find mine?

I put away the kitchen scissors last night and was tempted at the fond memories of cutting my flesh. there's a reason you do things like that; theres a reason you get so desperate. If I cant kill myself--which, trust me, is possibly more hopeless than actually contemplating it--then I gotta find some way to cope, some way to function. my dream life would be living alone in an apartment, holding a steady job, and owning a car. then I can just get up, got to work, starve all day and then come home and buy 5000 boxes of junk food. and I can binge and purge and binge and purge until I am inside out. and finally, after enough weeks have passed, I can be done.

im so sick of trying. im so sick of going on the little trolley track around my emotions. fuck I hate life turns into oh looks its sunny and there are people I like living into im so stressed I cant fucking think straight to thank god my works partially done to oh great, here we are again, back to fuck I hate life. round and round the mulberry bush the monkey chased the weasel.

ive been thinking too about what A posted as his FB status the other day. how life is entirely what you make of it, no victim-mentality, go out there and get what you want. and I would agree most of the time. except here. except when your soul is a Russian wasteland and you would rather die than reach another fucking accomplishment. whoopy-dee-fucking-do.

every day I feel like I get hit by these realizations that most people really, really don't like me. im not even sure my family would be friends with me if they didn't have to by blood. I feel like I have no one. and I feel like no one, justifiably so, gives a damn about that.

right. so. should we pretend through another day? oh my little whore...of course. isn't that what you've been doing all along?

Tension Heartache

I don't understand why A and I are being so hostile towards each other right now. There's tension between us--I can feel it. And judging from his text yesterday, he senses this friction as well. I just hate that this is happening because I don't understand why it's happening! Seriously. I respect A, I appreciate his leadership, I think he handles things well; I like his personality, I think he's nice, I think he's a hard worker. So why the hell do I just recoil around him? We do not talk to one another; like...ever. Unless there's a project or something Enactus-related to discuss. Beyond that we're just silent and we don't even freaking LOOK at each other! Like, seriously? Seriously? What is up with that?

Why why why is this happening? Ugh.

Okay, so when did I first notice this? I guess after I realized that other girls really liked him and I, consequently, did not like him as much. I felt like, okay, reality check--there's 700 other beautiful women here who he is flirting with and paying attention to and I am not one of them. That was okay, that was manageable. I started transitioning then to being more business-y around him, being a good co-worker, applying myself to our projects. I felt like we worked well together and I was happy/proud to be on a team with him. He and Jake were praising my work, which was like the sweetest healing balm to my performance-centered self ever. Oh it was so good! And then...then what? I guess, that fire for liking him cooled reallyyy fast and I was suddenly reminding myself constantly of how much I didn't like him beyond looks. Maybe I took that too far--because the next thing I recall after that was dinner with Dr. Baugus/the team in which we hardly talked at all. And then this week came and then yesterday happened.

Yesterday was sort of the pinnacle (at least until this morning haha). I just could feel this irritation--concealed as it was--radiating towards me from A at the meeting. He sort of seemed to be projecting it towards everyone, but it was there. And then he asked for someone to write up this report which I leaped at the chance to do because  a.) it needed to be done and b.) I was pretty confident I could impress someone with my writing skills. Also c.) I have a sick desire to break my back over too-high expectations for myself. And A just let me; he handed me the project and basically said yeah okay get it done. So I left, and then later saw him in class, where he didn't seem to have a problem with Mar-Mar or any other classmates, just me. I asked him what time he needed the report finished by. He said noon Friday and threw in a reminder to ask for help if I needed to. I kind of gave him the mental middle finger at that point...which wasn't fair. He was giving good advice and I was choosing to pridefully bear the burden alone. Who the hell should I ask for help, huh, A? I wanted to spit.Who exactly are you imagining has time for this? Seriously? No one else does. Anyways, whatever, I brushed that off as my own issue that I needed to get over--A was fine. (Which I still think was true...)

Well then last night he texted me and apologized for coming across as arrogant or snippy--which MELTED MY HEART. Literally. I just sat in my chair and dissolved in his kindness. Then I replied back with a fellow apology and things seemed good. We were set. We'd see each other today at IHOP for the meeting.  Hope, rainbows, fuzzy bunnies--things would be perfect between us now.

Uh, no. Hell no. This morning was fine, we were civil and nice to one another. But that's it. And I could still sense this...this nagging avoidance. I don't know--maybe it was just me! I mean, really, it probably was. But after A acknowledged things from yesterday I'm slightly doubting that I was the only one who felt this. Thank goodness J was there because he kind of acted like a mediator between us and kept things lively. But we didn't look at each other and we didn't discuss anything except how he now has realized that I shouldn't be writing this report--the PM's should be. Okay....ok. Glad that's off my plate, I guess, but also not glad because now I can't show off and I also can't earn his approval by coming through on that. Now I have to find some other way of winning his favor, proving that I am enough, that I can do enough and do it well enough to be worthwhile to our team.

Ugh. I have a headache. I don't know what to do about this. I don't know if this is all in my head, if it even matters, if it will just pass with time. I don't know. But I hate it--I don't want our team to be divided like this! I don't want to act this way towards A! I want us to thrive and live in community and get along well. But we don't. And I feel like that's not normally my style, even if it is a mere personality difference between me and someone else. I sort of want to tell J about this confidentially; just mention that I can't figure out what's going on, but I sense this and I would like prayer for overcoming it/receiving clarity. I really don't want this to continue; I'd like to have fun working with A and feel relaxed around him but I don't. Maybe this is just me being a selfish bitch who expects to have her fur petted (har har punny)/life affirmed every time she does something good for the team. Stupid. But possibly the cause, which is in some ways reassuring. If I know what it is , then I can change.

Grace-fall

Grace is such a hard concept for me to gamble with. I recall scribbling that in a journal years ago, but never did I realize just how much I have a messed up understanding of that idea.

This article, in particular, really has a lot to say that I haven't understood before.

When I was reading even just the introduction, I couldn't help but think about the parable of the prodigal son and how I had always sort of thought it ended. See, I thought--subconsciously enough that I only now can pick it out--that the son did all of those evil things and then had to "purge" such actions and purify himself by eating pig food and living in mud before he was good enough and worthy of returning home to beg his father for forgiveness. But that is....that is not what was happening. He was living out the consequences of his wrong actions--he was not redeeming himself. Thank God! THANK GOD! Seriously. He had the intention here to go home and to try and provide for himself/earn back some level of humanity by working for his father; but he did not earn such a reunion through poverty-stricken living, he did not say, okay, now I've earned enough to go ask. No--he flat out knew he had taken freedom and money too far and, as this article points out, abandoned his relationship with his father.

But it is here that another astoundingly profound point needs to be made. And that is this: the other son is also guilty of having abandoned the relationship with his father! There he was--entirely consumed with staying at home, doing the right thing, following all the rules, and just slaving, slaving, slaving away to hopefully earn something that his rule-breaking brother had apparently lost. Yet in this, he, too, cared not about his father.

I see myself in both brothers--absolutely. Wholly. Completely. I am both brothers and yet Lord I still am not Your's. I have not come to have or value a relationship with You. I do not know grace. I want to know grace. God, I want to know grace and I want a relationship--a true relationship--with You!

Christian (n.): a definition

what is my definition of a Christian?

-someone who, in response to conviction over sin, decides to confess their sins to God and acknowledge that they deserve hell for what they have done

-they then accept Christ's death on the cross and His resurrection as the atonement for their wrongdoing, past and future, and trust in Christ alone for salvation/redemption

-finally, they surrender their life to God and agree to follow Him in whatever He asks them to do and to live for His glory, honor, and in accordance with His will/law, committing their life to serving Him

-following this there should be continuous communion with God, along with a process of sanctification in which sinful habits and behaviors are stopped in response to a love for God and in obedience to the conviction of His Holy Spirit; fruit should also be born here

last resort

ive said it before and i'll say it again: my body is one of the most disgusting forms I know. truly and really. I hate it, i hate the stapled bubbles of fat stretched across the back of my thighs, dimpling my butt. i hate the fine scars of cellulite that line my legs like gills, expanding and retracting with my movements. i wish i didn't have the shaky lard rolls encasing my hips, the ones that jostle like jello when i try and squeeze into my dress pants.

but even with all of this disgust, i still value what it is my body can do. i have a very utilitarian appreciation for the workouts i can blast through--the way my lungs can heave through a cardio circuit and the power with which my hip flexors can steadily pull my quads through a curtsy lunge. even though it doesn't help me feel better about how i look, i must admit that i don't entirely hate my body; there are some ways in which it is valuable and i want to celebrate those.

anyway, at this point i need to decide how much im going to tell E tonight. i know, i know--this again, right? we're going over this same shit AGAIN? how much rehash can a person endure, right? but i want to know now, before i leave for work, so that tonight im not making a freakishly terrifying and impromptu decision in the parking lot.

i feel like it would be disrespectful and somewhat wrong to just drop this heavy ball of confession onto E before whisking myself away to college for the semester. like, it doesn't seem fair and im, of course, dreading whatever her response may be. i also need to think about the future. E is extremely busy right now and i don't think she's going to slow down any time soon. do i really want to share this with someone who, though they will likely be very understanding and COULD be helpful, may not actually provide much help at all because they're so consumed with other commitments? i feel rather selfish sharing this; its like im assuming that E will want to hear it, should shoulder it, and should help me figure out what the hell to do. at the same time, i really think that E would be concerned and want to help me through this. i mean, hell, salvation is a pretty scary thing and it matters probably more than anything else in life. so as a Christian, E will probably sense that urgency and a certain amount of responsibility on her end to help me. (again--that sounds extremely selfish on my end, i know!) :/ i don't want to do this to her but i NEED HELP. i do; i am stuck in my old thoughts about Christianity and God and i don't know how to work through them or move on. ive tried and tried to ignore it but i cant. it keeps coming up and i hate being so apathetic about it. ive also tried, to no small amount of frustration, telling K and Robbie about this problem. but they primarily just denied the truth of what i was once hung up about--that i had no choice about whether i was saved--which did little to actually convince me of anything. or help me move on. *sigh* for as much i really didn't like Robbie's attempts to help me, though, he did make a very good point in assessing that i seem stuck to him. oh yes, Robbie, i am stuck. and i have been for years.

i think that alone is probably why i think this is worth bringing up to E tonight. i am scared, i am terrified, id rather not say it--but i need help and this is the most important issue. this is The Thing. i don't really know what i would gain from not sharing with her. i think, in some ways though, that that is partially why i don't want to say anything. subconsciously, i think i sort of view E as my last resort. she's the final emergency rope and if i grab her and just continue falling i wont know what to do. i could spiral into a terrible hole of bleak depression. again. and then what? oh i know what; i see vending machine cookies and gas station danishes. i see crumbs on the carpet, spoons in my desk drawers, and the dread of ever-tightening jeans. i see the washing of acid over my throat three times a day, the need for saltwater to help me regain my gag reflex, and my nose rubbed red from all the snot pouring out of it. but that is not even the worst of what would come. no, the worst part would be the overwhelming depression and feeling of hopeless. the knowledge that nothing can change and no one can help.

i don't know. ha. that's probably a little dramatic. you never know who you're going to meet that might be able to help change you. and im not dead yet, so technically there would still be hope.

im terrified to confess this reality. but i think i need to. i just don't want to tell such a deep secret to someone who wont even care. or do anything about it. or ever converse with me about it again (as happened when i told D & E about my struggles with bulimia). that probably scares me more the anything. the fear of dismissal. i don't want this to be dismissed--i don't want this to be put in a little box, i don't want to be patted on the head or ignored. please.

hear me.

please.

help me deal with this. help me cope.

how much more do i need to act out until you will?

the self-suistaining introvert needs a friend after all

hello again.

ive realized that I repeatedly write on this blog when I am depressed, stressed, or on the verge of wanting-yet-not-seriously-considering suicide. ahhh. drama. :/ sorry. but I guess its a sign that this blog is clearly a stress outlet for me. so that's good.

anyways. today the sob story comes after a weekend in which E and I were able to chat at least a little bit. mainly I just asked her questions about her transition from obsession to reassurance/where she is in terms of Christianity. I was actually prepared to open the can of worms and talk about all the deep, bleak, uncomfortable lies I needed to tell someone. I was going to go there, but things didn't go as planned and our time alone together was horribly, horribly short. so I sort of just had to accept that and try to get as much from her as I wanted to know/could without explicitly stating the hundreds of reasons behind why I truly wanted to know those things.

today (and really the last 3 or so days) I have had serious body hate. like I just HATE my fucking fat body. this little lard cone that is my humongo butt and thighs. I get terrified every single time I have to put on my work uniform because last Friday my worst nightmare came true--my dress pants were too tight because I had lost control around food and all my binging had finally caught up: i.e. Id clearly gained weight. fuck. fuck fuck fuck. I hate gaining weight. I hate being forced to wear pants that are going to be too tight. it feels nearly impossible to let myself try and make progress with intuitive eating because im so terrified that if I gained any more weight or forgave myself for binging things would spiral out of control even more and my pants would DEFINITELY not fit, but because I don't have $30 to go buy a larger size, id be stuck wearing them. and im also so uncomfortable because of my weight/the realities of the gains that I want comfort and thus food.

I need so much fucking help its insane.

all I want to do now, of course, is go on a healthy diet like I did with my half marathon. I want to go extreme. focus on my workouts, set my calorie limit and ban sugars, processed foods, etc. even knowing as I do now that such behavior will only ultimately end with the same weight gain as I had lost, I still want to do it. I want to be thin at least for a while. that's better than not being thin at all and only gaining, gaining, gaining weight.

but that's not truly what I want to do. no, what I really want is to keep/start making progress in recovery and intuitive eating. I want to finally be done with this half-life of eating disorders. but that means facing very dark, deep things of my past. it means going through what I mentally picture as about 7-9 huge bins of old, dusty files. and then...I don't know...having to retype every page into a computer or something. but I am even willing to do this! I am willing to dig and hurt and cry and work through this all. however, I honestly do not think or know how to begin doing it alone. I need help. I need someone to assist me in sorting through it all. where do I start? which bin? the more I think about these things, the more revelation I gain about what how my past correlates with my current state and the development of my eating disorder. so its good to rehash it, I know, but still. who can I ask for help? what if I tell E and then we never talk about it again, like my bulimia? I couldn't handle that. I need someone who will not abandon me to these problems but will take my hand, inhale slowly, and then say with quiet strength and confidence, "let's go." and we will step into the journey together. I need a friend.

I was reading earlier today about suicidal thoughts in children. can they legitimately experience them? and of course, the answer was yes. yes, they can. and if they are expressed, they should be taken seriously and acted on immediately. they are often a voice to the child's desperate need for help; the child most likely feels that he or she is in such a bleak situation that they cannot see any way things could possibly get better. they come to believe that death is the only possible answer or way of escape. yes to all of that.

alright, I think that's all for now. im just gambling away with my body and health and future. I really want to talk with E about all of this.

healing

so I now know what I need to do to recover. I know the next step. I know what will finally bring me freedom from my compulsive binging and purging and obsession with food.

and I am terrified.

I am so scared of trying to address what is wrong, of facing it. not because it will be painful but because digging into it will necessitate that I tell E my darkest secret. she knows about my bulimia. she knows, from my parents, about cutting. she knows these hidden, disordered things and yet they themselves were never, ever the real issue. the real issue she does not know about; in fact, no one except Kim and Robbie know about it, this horrible haunting reality that I cannot move past. I can see now that I have been splintered from it, and it is the source of pain that keeps sucking me back from healing. everything I do in relation to food comes back down to this. and I have thus far just continuously tried to push it away and when that doesn't work, swallow it down with cherry filled donuts or, when the reality still claws its way into my consciousness, chug enough coke zero to try and violently purge it out of my core. then and really only then can I become so consumed with my immediate pain that the Truth has to take a backseat--my mental security, if you will, finally comes to haul this nagging Reality out the back door. once that's done i can rest in the murky, watery bleakness of my "Eating Disorder World."

but that's not going to work anymore, not if i want to ever truly recover. i have to confront the abuse of my past--not get stuck in it, but rock back and forth between its details and my present life. i have to reexamine what i came to believe then, when i was a victim, and compare it against what i know now as a strong, capable adult. i must take a second look. and i must let myself grieve over what happened. i need to let myself feel angry, heartbroken, depressed, scared. and i need help to do this. i wish i didn't, but i do. the context of what went down in my relationship with God is overwhelmingly confusing for me. and yet it is what keeps me in bondage to bulimia; it is the reality i am terrified of facing and in so many ways have blatantly refused to face, for several reasons.

for one thing, it is nearly absolute taboo within the church to ever call a relationship with God abusive. i know that. God is perfect and holy--He cannot do evil. i agree. im not saying that God Himself was abusive--but i am saying that the ways in which i interacted with God and the beliefs/rituals/mindset i had when i thought i was a Christian were abusive in nature. as i was reading through When Food Is Love by Geneen Roth, everything she kept talking about in the context of previous abuse as children came back to this. ive often wondered why i have so many fucked up relations with food and yet haven't been able to find a direct correlation between any abuse from my parents/friends/family and the habits i watered. but everything, and i really do mean everything, came together when i gently, hesitantly tried labeling whatever relationship it was i had with God as abusive in nature. it makes sense. i don't think its coincidence that the time i recall as being the start of my eating disorder is the same time i "ended" my relationship with God. i left. i said no more. i accepted that i was not a Christian and tried to move on. and in some ways, many ways, i did. but no matter what i do, i still cannot move past the relentless assaults on my conscience over what happened. its there every time i go to church, every time i hear of death; it seeps into my thoughts whenever there's a bad thunderstorm or i board an airplane. the thought, the question of what will happen when i die. where do i stand with God? can i ever be saved? will i ever be redeemed? i long for it and recoil from it at the same time. i used to think i was stupid for feeling both ways. but no, not now when i consider what happened. my reaction makes perfect sense. who wouldn't recoil at the thought of completely surrendering themselves to what was previously an abusive relationship? seriously, i mean, really, it makes sense. of course i am terrified, of course i feel an overwhelming jolt of despair--the relationship i remember was hell. it was horrible. it demanded perfection and did not give grace. it stripped me of dignity and required frequent recitations of my utter lack of worth. it assailed me with doubt and never, EVER assured me whether my endless confessions and prayers for salvation would be answered. i could be told by others that they were, but then if there wasn't fruit in my life, if i wasn't growing or perfect or whatever, then nope, surely you're not saved. that kept me locked in a viscous, endless battle of crying and headaches and OCD-like tendencies. and I have consequently thus far refused to go back to it, to even consider what happened or to try and find resolution within it. I just want nothing to do with it.

but now I am here. and finally I can see that this is the thing--this old, exhausting, painful relationship--is what fabricated the heart of my eating disorder. and i will never be able to move beyond it if i do not confront what went on...i have to face it.

i don't want to tell E the truth about what happened or where i am at now because it will irrevocably and very deeply change the way we interact (there is no way in which it could not). although of everyone i know, E is by far the one person i would feel most comfortable telling. ive learned from my last confession regarding my bulimia not to expect an outburst, not to expect any sign that what i have to say is shocking or unsettling. but things will be different most likely with this revelation...she will have to adjust to the fact that i have been lying about the core of my identity to a lot of people for about 5 years now. i don't want to tell her this. but i know that she struggled with similar issues in terms of OCD-like compulsions regarding what the Holy Spirit was guiding her to do vs. what she incorrectly just felt like God was guiding her to do when she was younger. i don't know how she found freedom from that...but it was one of the key things that made me give up. she may be able to help me do differently now. and she's also grown up in the same family as me, went to the same church on Sundays and youth group on Wednesdays. she will know more so than others where i am coming from. still...even with all of that, i am scared. this is the most basic and fundamental lie i have kept up--it has allowed me to feel safe and protected and comfortable within my family. it has allowed for them to be a safe haven for me. but it has been a sham. i have not been honest and i guess in some ways that means the security was a façade as well. shamefully, i must also admit that telling E now would not be nearly as bad as having told her earlier because at least now i rarely see her anymore anyways. only our limited interactions would be awkward. and yet...and yet. vulnerability terrifies me.

but i have to do this. i have to tell her. i have to face what happened if i ever want full recovery.

and i do.

compulsion

yesterday was a weird day. my parents had a political rally/event at the county level to host and we had made about 3 large pans worth of brownies, blonde brownies, and lemon bars. earlier in the day,  I had done well with intuitively eating my way through breakfast and lunch (essentially). but when I got home from spending some time at the beach with my sister, my mom had sliced the bars and had saved the crumbs for us to eat. of course D didn't have any, but I felt extremely compelled to just go dive in. and so I did. and it was horrible because I knew from the first chocolate chip all the way until the final crust that I should not be doing this. I shouldn't be eating standing up, and even though I was hungry, I should really be asking my body what it wants. but for whatever inexplicable reason I felt entirely unable to get control and stop. I felt like I HAD to eat that food and I desperately didn't want to say no. so that was weird and threw me into a spiral of not wanting to workout or do anything self-caring, even though if I hadn't eaten them I would have been perfectly happy working out.

so that was that.

then came the evening I had been greatly anticipating and dreading for days. oh yes--the buffet style meal in which there would be endless amounts of food to partake in. I was worried I wouldn't be hungry to begin with, but I was, so that was good. And I pretty muchly only took what I wanted to eat and did sit down. That was okay. The problem came when I went back for more...and then more...and kept trying to sneak more and more food. I didn't actually get my hands on nearly as much as I wanted to or as much as this post probably makes it sound like I ate. but the problem I have, and what I still do not fully understand (and thus am trying to cultivate curiosity about) is what the hell was going on in my mind in relation to this food. its crazy how much during the meeting I felt so INSANELY possessive over the food that was present. like, literally, after some reflection last night, I think the best way to describe it is like watching your ex boyfriend sleep with hundreds of other girls, and some of them sluts, just like you. seriously, it was awful. I kept my eye on the table of food basically all night long. and whenever people would grab a helping of something I was so internally anxious and broken. I felt antsy, like I was only one knee jerk away from leaping from my chair and sprinting to go protect the desserts on the table. and then at the end of the night, while we were cleaning up, I was like,  oh my gosh--I can't let anyone take any of this food home! T and others would say, "alright guys--come get more food! don't make us take this all home!" and I wanted to cry and scream and push everyone away and just hover around my food. I felt like a mother protecting her children, her precious children, against vicious wolves.  I mean, there was even a point last night where I was playing out my full fantasy of being able to just be entirely, entirely alone with all that food in the field near the airport parking lot. and nothing had ever seemed more deliciously satisfying and lonely. what stupid, selfish, horrible images--and yet how telling. seriously, if this is how im feeling about something as simple as us making a lot of bars for a potluck/buffet dinner I need to sit up and look closer. clearly there is something a  hell of a lot bigger going on under the surface here that is causing me to react with such desperation. I mean last night when we got home I binged with dad basically on bars and cookies. then I woke up starving this morning and basically on autopilot went downstairs and binged a lot harder on the same bars and cookies. and im still planning to binge again when everyone leaves for the morning. so what's going on, dear? huh? what is causing you to do this?

I need to give it some more thought.

to feel pain, or not to feel pain. why am i supposed to choose the first?

if you believe your pain will never end, you will act in any irresponsible, desperate way that could possibly bring even the slightest reprieve. intuitive eating was going extremely well for a few weeks there for me. i had had some slip ups, of course; things were not perfect but i was growing, i was learning, i was healing. and then Friday came. i was feeling bored, annoyed, lonely as hell, and just depressed. there was a relentlessly pissy mood that kept gnawing at me. and i had been trying for days to shake it off, breathe through it, welcome the feeling, even. i kept expecting it to eventually pass but it wasnt. and finally i just got so sick of it that i decided, to hell with it! i want to eat to be rid of this crappy mood! i justified that it was Friday and i finally had a day off at home with my family and i didnt want to ruin it by being crabby with people all day. so i checked out and binged. and binged. and binged some more with Mackenzie and Danae. and then i went to bed, feeling sick and disgusting and fat, but also fairly confident that Saturday would go differently. id go back to intuitive eating and things would return to normal. this was just a little desperation-caused mistake.

but that's not what happened. and i guess if i had given even the slightest of closer looks at the realities of my eating disorder history, i would have known that there is almost never an overnight change. no, coming back to a desire for sanity and health can take days or weeks after you slip into the coma of binging and purging. it does not happen after one bad day. it happens when youre $50 in debt over food and your pants dont fit and youre exhausted from getting up at 5 AM to go sneak the bag of vomit you produced while purging in your closet the night before to the outdoor garbage. ít comes when you have so many canker sores in your mouth from vomitting that nothing with sugar or salt sounds appealing anymore. that's when it happens. not when you've just sucked comfort and relief and ecstacy from your drug. no, you simpleton, no. it never comes then, never when you want it to.

and with that reality i find myself still, as of Sunday night, binging and purging my heart out. i have little to no desire to come back and feel pain. i think that realization was sort of what did me in on Friday. i was just like, enough! okay? enough! even if i can survive this pain and "feel" my way through it, the feelings still are here. and they hurt, they just.....hurt. and i dont want to hurt. i dont want to have to sit through feeling uncomfortable. why cant i just numb myself up? shoot up my brain with seratonin through cheesy potato wedges and mint heath shakes? i just want to get lost in the endless cycle of body hate and obsessing and sneaking that comes with numbing myself. why do i have to stay present and hurt? to what end?

i guess one thing i forgot then that ive sort of come to recall over the past few days here is that one reason it may be better to stay "awake" and alive with your pain vs. trying to run from it is that doing the latter doesnt actually make things ultimately better. i know, i know--you dont want to hear that or think about it, but it doesnt, Shannon. yes, you stop feeling the pain of the moment. i will give you that. it's a blanket-like way of canceling out anything and everything uncomfortable. but trust me, being full as hell all the time from overeating and never wanting to stop overeating despite having to face people/work/etc. is not fun. neither is having to drive from walmart to restaurant to public park bathroom to purge because youre so terrified of weight gain any fun. and for that matter, neither is having your body be so used to involuntarily purging that you end up just throwing up all over yourself while coming to a stoplight after you chugged a Mint Condition Cooler. that is not fun. and  you will find even then that you're STILLLLLL unhappy, just now in different ways. you want to be hungry and enjoy meals but because you're so endlessly, compulsively driven to not face reality  you can never ever pass up a chance to shovel in more food. so the pain still comes, only now you cant bear to face it, any of it, so you cant stop your behavior. your issues begin piling up like laundry.

but i think,...in the spirit of honesty, that this is exactly part of what appeals to me about having an eating disorder, part of why i can never let this thing go for good. id rather just worry about my ED that have to deal with real problems. real problems mean coming to the horrifying reality that i am not saved. and that how i am living and issues i face are signs of something deeply wrong with me. and i dont have any clue as to how and even begin engaging with Christ again. i am so mystified and scared at the thought of having to entirely surrender and change my life that i avoid thinking about it at all costs. i avoid reality. and that means i must avoid intuitive eating as well. i must stay stuck if i want any hope of coping...what a horrible realization.

unexpected

so among the things i didnt see coming today:

1. having a hard time sleeping last night initially and yet not waking up to severe thunderstorms this morning

2. having a meltdown/panic attack in front of Mom and D in the van because i was so overwhelmed with anxiety about seventy five different things

3. not going with Mom and D to shop/go to D's appointment but instead staying home and binging and purging for three hours


i thought today was going to be an easy day for me, food wise. i got my workout in early, was planning to be gone shopping with the safety net of my mom and sister all day, killing time and having fun. but that is not what happened. instead, i got up early and was in a great mood. i felt good. i enjoyed breakfast but had no desire to binge or overeat. i was reading all these posts on this Fuck It Diet eating site that's basically all about how to eat intuitively and not give a damn about diet rules and the diseased mindsets that accompany them. awesome, right? i was simultaneously continuing to watch these intuitive eating/eating disorder recovery videos on youtube with this wonderful lady named Nina that ive been working through for a while. ive been planning to commit to recovery/intuitive eating once i finish with training for this race, so ive been doing some research. today it was a double-whammy for twice the impact, right? who knows.

basically i did that, worked out, and showered. for some reason though, in the shower, i noticed how overwhelmed and panicky i was beginning to feel. i guess the forecast triggered that for me. i knew that it was supposed to storm strongly later today and tonight and i ALWAYS get the most dreadful, sickening feeling when i hear that and have an extremely hard time forgetting it/focusing on anything else until the predicted time/storm has passed. anyways, so there was that. there was also, oddly enough, this nagging in my mind about my body image. yeah. not really something i normally get too hung up on. i mean, i dont like how i look and i have been dissapointed somewhat this week with how much fat i still have from all that b/p-ing for four weeks of my race training. but i thought i was okay with that, in the sense that i felt like i deserved what i had, was still working hard this final week, etc. i was okay. i thought. but for whatever reason, despite my attempts at positive self-talk/affirmation, i was really, really bugged by how i looked. i hated the fat on my legs. i hated the cellulite on my butt and the muffin top on my abs. i hated it and  couldnt get over my despising it. this wasnt, again, too big of a deal, it was more of what came after it in combination with it.

after i was finally dressed/ready to leave, i headed downstairs and ended up having made D and Mom late having to wait for me to hurry my fucking ass up and get the hell out the door. i felt bad about that. then i needed to pack a lunch because i had zip-o money and didnt want to request a stop at the bank. however, i normally drink V8 for part of my lunch, but of course, couldnt pack that. i also wanted to bring some cottage cheese along for an afternoon snack but wouldnt be able to because it wouldnt keep (too hot) in the car all day. strike again. this meant, essentially, that i would be about 150 calories or so under my given amount all afternoon, and for whatever reason i mentally couldnt cope with that. i was terrified that this would mean me either being miserably hungry/irritated or going on a binge. now im like, how would i have binged without money??? i think maybe i was thinking itd be like last week where i had mom buy me a protein bar because things had run later than expected and i was hungry and also entirely unconcerned about eating healthy. yeah. that was a bad week. anyways, i knew that now that mentality was not going to fly and i was going to need my perfectly healthy little foods if i wanted any hope of checking off today as a success. then i started thinking about how if i binged, thatd be the fucking end of the world and i really didnt want to. i couldnt. i and then remembered again how entirely fat i was feeling and how i had to try on dress pants if i went. that stressed me out because i was pretty sure i would have no idea what size to buy since i could easily gain weight within the next few weeks here. i really didnt want to make mom buy a pair that i couldnt fit into again. that, however, reminded me that i would be looking into dressing room mirrors and seeing my cellulite covered thighs all lumpy and pudgy under the lights. that would likely trigger a binge urge/utter disgust.

anyways, normally these things are struggles i can handle. yes, i get stressed sometimes, yes i dont like storms, no im not a huge fan of my body, but normally this is something i can manage. but today i just couldnt. i dont know, i just felt so fucking stressed and literally on the verge of a panic attack. i kept feeling like everything was too tight, like i couldnt get a deep breath, like i would/had forgotten how to breathe. i just felt SO FUCKING ANXIOUS about everything!!! it was overwhelming and i felt completely vulnerable to the mercy of my fucking mind. powerless. just lying there, terrified that it would consume me and make me hurt myself. it was horrible, absolutely horrible. and as soon as i started expressing my not wanting to come with/telling mom i felt like i could have a panic attack, i started crying my eyes out. like hiccups, deep gasps, shuddering, cant breathe/get control kind of crying. the more i thought about all that i had to choose between and all that id have to endure if i went with, the more anxious i got. wrapped in spiral of "if this, then end-of-the-world" thinking. for some reason that idea of trying on dress pants and feeling fat was really getting to me. my mind felt like it would need to start cutting off my skin if i did that. yeah......that happened. crazy, i know. even when Mom, very sweet Mom, tried asking me what i normally packed/offered to buy me Subway or something i was okay with, i couldnt get control, i told her i didnt want to make her spend money on me, but she said she was okay with it, even though she normally makes a big deal of it. i was actually touched, really, even though i think she was just desperately wanting to help me stop freaking out. but and then mom started praying, which was a nice gesture, but also was nearly impossible to take in because i am not a Christian, so all these promises she was claiming in Christ do not apply to me. in fact, when she said that God is powerful, more powerful than anything, all i could think about was how, for me, that meant one thing: i could be killed by a storm from Him in an instant, He could make me die and start facing the eternal hell that i deserve for these addictions and pride that i have. so that just made me depressed. in the end, i felt like it was clear that i needed to stay home. if i went with, i would likely have an even greater panic attack, and more importantly, the only way i saw to squash this anxiety was to binge and purge. oh rah rah, right? good job, you little whore, let's immerse ourselves alone in our eating disorder to solve our problems. great work. *sigh* i know, but i justified then and even now that panic attacks are really scary shit and i didnt want to risk falling into one alone at home. so i needed to drug up my mind with seratonin so that it couldnt even go there. so far so good.

i just dont know what to do anymore. things felt and probably will soon again feel very out of control. im hoping that these panic attacks dont become a regular thing, though, because i dont want to have to keep binging and purging to handle them. that would be horrible. as for now, im rather scared for Mom and D to come home because im not sure if they're going to make me talk about what happened. and im not sure what to say. i feel like that kind of gave them a peek into how utterly overwhelming this ED is for me a lot of the time. but i also dont want to admit what that was. i want to ignore it, shove it under the rug, say i dont know what happened, im good now, etc. but that would be lying and truth is probably good. when you have secrets, though, its hard to let people in a little. they get quite close to unveiling the ugly then, and the tightrope becomes even tighter for trying to keep things in control.

oh control. oh bulimia. you two fucking bitches won again.

%$@# this eating disorder

as i sit here in bed, warm tears filling my ears, my tummy full enough to force regurgitation without trying, all i can think is

FUCKKKKKKKKKKKK this eating disorder!!!!! FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

i hate this thing that consumes me! i have fucking fallen into its FUCKING lies again. again again a-fucking-gain i am desperate and depressed because of its whoring control. just FUCK this thing! im so fucking sick of it.

there is an insistent track in my mind that this was and is my choice, it's always been my choice. i look temptation right in the eyes every time, and think to myself, i could say no here, i could resist. but then i still cave. i directly say yes to giving in. FUUCCCK this eating disorder! FUCK IT! i hate it. i hate all the fucking stress it brings to every fucking mealtime. i couldnt even enjoy Erin being home because from 4:30pm this afternoon onward all ive been able to think about is how hellishly hungry i am and how desperate i want pizza NOW. and i dont want two pieces--i want as many as i want to eat. and then with that desire and temptation comes the obsessing, the fucking endless obsessing of every afternoon where i dont have to workout. oh yes, my little fucking mind will relentlessly spend its time consumed with thoughts about that food and whether im going to binge or be good, binge or be good. "nothing lasts forever" "you CAN get through this" "think of the half-marathon" and then during dinner, all i can think about is food and i begin to thoroughly hate my family, hate that they're at the table, in the house. my fucked up, selfish little mind begins whispering a stream of bitter, angry thoughts. why do they have to be here? i dont care about this conversation, i dont care about church or ideas or people or newborns or weddings or gardens. i just want that damn food! why are they here?! they're preventing me from getting what i want! food food FOOD! i dont want to stay here. i keep checking the clock and checking out of the conversation. how long till dinner's done?

and this whole time im nearly in tears. i need to stop doing this, i tell myself. stop hating. stop being jealous over how and what others are eating. stop racing to shovel food in. stop being so nonchalant. stop looking at the time. stop licking up food with your fingers. stop obsessing. no one made you do this. its your choice, its your choice, its your choice. oh yeah? well than WHY THE FUCKING HELL DOES IT NEVER EVER FEEL LIKE MY FUCKING CHOICE?!?!?!! IF ITS MY CHOICE WHY CAN I NEVER FUCKING WIN?!?!?!?!?!!!!!?????????????????

fuck this eating disorder.

it never stops

i am stuck here again. stuck in this fucking eating disorder. stuck. stuck. stuck. choosing to be stuck, yes, yet still stuck.

i cant fucking escape this thing. bulimia you whore, you have overwhelmed my life. i cant move past you, i cant let you go. like a fucking parasite you have latched on and i cannot get rid of you. the harder i try to recover, the harder i fall back into your safety blanket of indulgence. my binges are bigger than ever before, my purging right behind it. gorge, retch, gorge, retch, gorge. it is disgusting and i hate that i am doing this to myself. every time im gagging over the toilet bowl all i can think is how did i get here? why did i ever choose bulimia? why did i ever start purging? i thought i would be able to stop that part of it when i wanted to. but the truth is that purging is essential to any binge, once you have learned it. its the key, the secret to unlocking a blank slate, so to speak, upon which you can shove all your favorite foods onto again. over and over and over. it never has to stop because you never get full.

these binges are so expensive and i feel entirely selfish about how much money i am wasting on food for them. ive spent over $20 in the last two days...and mom and dad have no idea. that hell will need to be paid soon enough, but as of now im just hoping i can bullshit/cover up/deceive my way through having to give account to them for where the cash went.

i hate that i keep choosing to lie to mom (and dad too, in a roundabout way). i want to be honest with them and tell them when i mess up, but i just cant bring myself to be honest. i cant bring myself to look into mom's eyes and say, nope, the entire time you both were gone last night, i was here shoving endless amounts of food into my throat and then i threw it all up in our backyard. im so ashamed of what i do; and even though i desperately want and need mom and dad's help, it also ultimately comes down to my choice. they cannot force me into making the right decision by simply trying to elimiate every possible time for me to binge. if i am determined to do it, i will do anything possible to get my hands on the food. that also ultimately does nothing for my recovery--it doesnt change how i think or approach food, it just changes my outward behavior. i so desperately wish that they could bring me into recovery, that they could somehow structure things enough so that i could never fail. but they cant. its my choice.


oh i just hate this thing so much. my throat is bone dry, even with all the water ive been drinking. im worn out. i feel unable to win. fighting these impluses to binge and purge are beyond stressful and depressing; giving into them is equally so. i dont know what to do any longer. i can feel myself slipping towards depression the more i focus on this. i just dont want to have to deal with it all anymore. i want to be done. i want to be done...

let me hurt myself

today i am really in the mood to hurt myself. yes, i know, that's weird as hell; but it's true. i just want to punish myself. i hate my body, i hate who i am, i hate my hair and my face and my bloated stomach that gurgles from the clotted blood of uterus. i hate all this fucking weight on my body and how im not working on stuff and how im tired and obsessed with fucking, fucking food. part of this motivation is coming from my roommate too. she is not responsible for any of this--it's just my stupid reaction to her behavior. you see, she doesnt like to eat. like AT ALL. and she doesnt have (or at least doesnt claim to have) and eating disorder. i suspected that for a very long time, but apparently she's been this way for forever, according to her friends from highschool. she also will eat junk food when the urge hits and speaks about ED's with the ridicule of stupidity that most non-ED followers have. however, she has been trying to lose weight in a general sense for a while now, so the fact that she eats about 500 calories, give or take a 100-200, a day is pretty fucking disconcerting to me.

her control around food makes me want to destroy myself. i want to cut my arms and throw myself against furniture and get punched in the back. i just HATE the utter perfection and normalcy she displays when food is involved. i hate even more how entirely far from that i am! i hate myself, i hate myself, i hate myself. FUCK this self control she has. i cannot get away from the guilt that haunts me when i see her eating like that. she doesnt get hungry, apparently, or simply doesn't let it move her will to not eat. i always feel like she's judging me when i make a meal. she probably thinks, "gosh--what a gross, fat cow...she's such a food whore, licking up every last drop with her finger and counting out every little jalopeno so she can exploit her calorie count." i feel disgusting around her. i feel like this out-of-control, stupid, ugly bitch.

i hate myself. i want to hurt me. i want to stop this and clear my head through pain.

earlier this week i freaked out when i learned that this fucking squash i'd bought was not the variety i thought it was, and i was therefore abour 400 calories above what i thought i had eaten. i consequenlty ran to the bathroom and purged about 70% of it up. the best/worst part of it was that i hadnt drank any water during the meal, so my throat was STRUGGLING like crazy to heave up these rough, undigested balls of squash. it was disgusting and i had never felt more like i wanted it OUT of me. i didnt want a single calorie of its fattening substance inside my guts. gross. i just kept shoving my fingers down and heaving my stomach muscles to get it fucking hell out of me. it hurt and my throat was in so much pain. and afterwards my eyes were so bloodshot from how much id been straining to purge and my roommate had brought our friend in while i was in the bathroom. so when i came out i felt so exposed, like they knew what i was doing or would assume i had been crying or something. but there was nothing i could do except just endure the potential ridicule. thank goodness no one feels comfortable enough to ask me about it.

anyways, at least that time i felt like i had gotten what i deserved. even if i had over-purged calories i needed, i didnt care. i wanted to be feel pain and be hungry that night. and i think i was slighlty, and totally felt like i deserved it. i just want to feel that punishment again. not the overeating part. gosh no. i dont want to gain weight. but the hurt? yes. yes please. i hate myself.

loneliness

loneliness overwhelmed me this past weekend. i went with Charity to her hometown and we stayed with her friend. we also visited Ethan and his new eternally present gf and helped them and some other friends who id met before paint a house. and then i met Ethan's parents and Charity and I ate midnight 7-Eleven snacks and went back to her friend's house to sleep. the next morning i snuck breakfast and we had to coerce a dog out of a bedroom with meat and silence so as to not wake her friends' dad who was back from the hospital. and then we went to church and ate Chipotle and shopped at Ross and read at a library. finally we went and watched a movie and played a few games with, essentially, a lot of the same people as the night before. only now there was this guy, Mike, who i had met last fall, and also 3 or 4 new girls who i hadnt met before but one of who ended up knowing the backpacking group from school here. so that was a nice coincidence. i observed and sat in silence and watched and enjoyed people. and i saw Ethan's brother flirt with every girl there and felt amused and humored. and i refused to read his script with him. you know how you can just tell when someone keeps looking at you? yeah, well, during a board game i could feel his eyes on me, but i just continuously avoided eye contact, very purposfully. i kept looking instead at other players (particularly Mike), only occassionally throwing a bemused smirk his way. i will admit it--as its proabably already obvious--i was quite secretly smug and satisfied at having mastered his little game. he is one of the most beautiful men around and every girl seems charmed by his ways. um, hell no. i hate that. seriously, ladies, we are stronger than the cute guy who throws a smile our way. the longer i was with him, the more set i became that i was over this man, perhaps even disliked him a little. pride & prejudice in the making, i suppose.

but while this is all important, it is not the main point. no, the main point lies in how lonely i felt this weekend. it was insane, this utterly overwhelming deep sadness despite lots of people. and, ironically, right after church, when i had just run into Mike again, it was him i desperately wanted to connect with. insane, yes; out of nowhere, absolutely. but i could not help but crave him the entire get together and drive home. it started, i believe, with meeting Ethan's parents. they really threw me on Saturday night. they felt like home and reminded me of my mom and dad and i just wanted to hug Mrs. S and cry into her shoulder and gasp and shake with the loneliness that my sin and deception and guardedness has created. i cannot get close to anyone. and even worse, i hate the thought of it. i realized that this weekend too. i hate the thought of dependency, the thought of need. i love people and relationships and yet i cannot revel in the beauty of them because i cannot fathom making myself vulnerable and humbly admiting an inability to function without another person or persons. family is okay, i guess, a tolerable Achilles heel. but a boy-girl relationship, no. liking someone and becoming obsessed with them and needing them just to breathe--it is insane and i hate it and thoroughly believe that possessing it would destroy me. and so i avoid it, to my detriment; not even just the consequential never having a boyfriend/husband part--rather, the part about my not being able to admit i need God, that i actualy cannot do it all. in my efforts to sculpt my identity into an independent, strong, successful (and single) young lady, i have isolated myself to an island of loneliness and longing and pain. all of this appeared in little sentences of gray thought in mind while sitting at the library on Sunday. and then later that evening it came to me, why i was craving sex with Mike so bad. i am desperate for an intimacy binge. i know, you might think that that sounds ridiculous, but its true. i feel and am so entirely cut off from anyone who knows me that i feel this intensely frightening need to just connect. im not alone simply in the sense of being 30+ hours from home, but also in how literally no one absolutely no soul on earth has a complete view of all the addictions i have and hypocrisy i put up. this facade of strength i have built is the fucking loneliest place i have been and i am desperately, desperately wanting to just get as close as i possibly can to someone i dont know and who i wont have to deal with again. yes, my purpose in wanting to fuck  Mike was entirely selfish and entirely out of pain and evil. there would have been consequences, i know....but im not sure im glad i didnt pursue it (though, of course, seduction is something i am clueless about). but i wanted to. i kept thinking about it, kept lusting after him, wanting to get close and breathe his scent and when the party ended, innocently stay behind to clean up. and then we could kiss and stumble into the bedroom and fuck and i would finally be able to cry the silent, gaping wounds i feel so deeply inside. hopefully he would have a good time. and then we could just lie there and sleep and i could finally, finally feel numb again. and gutted. and whole. at least until the next day.

Mike, i still long for you. not Jacob, you. with your opinions and humor and style and silence. you. i want to get as close i possibly can to all that you are and feel the rush of pain and ecstacy as i discover you. oh how i wish you lived here, how i wish we could become friends. im sure your morals are in actuality what mine only claim to be in church, and, consequently, sex would probably never happen between us. but i want it to. please. please! i dont want to be desperate, i dont want to need others but i do....i need to get close with someone. please help me. gosh. Mike....i am in so much pain.

as we were leaving the party, Mike said bye to me. we had played this mystery case game on the couch, and at one point he got sick of being the only one who knew the answers, so he filled me in so i could help field others' questions. well then later, when Charity and I had to head back, he said, "bye partner in crime!" and i just laughed and said bye too. but my heart was touched and i just wanted to be with him. not necessarily for more flirting or name calling....just to heal. Mike, you looked like healing to me. i wish you would come back. but thank goodness you will be staying far away. i am a viscious, disgusting, revolting monster who would ruin you and suck out any good. i hate that i am that, but its true.

im sorry. im so sorry i cant offer you more.

throw yourself in with passionate curiosity

so tonight im watching the movie Liberal Arts, about this guy who has graduated college and now is a college admissions counselor and basically is depressed and slightly hopeless about his life; anyways, he vists his alma mater one weekend and meets this absolutely amazing sophmore who's there and they begin falling in love. my point in telling you all this is not really romance-related, rather the film has just caused me to question, "why doesn't anyone at Christian schools seem to care about learning itself?" like legitimately, i have not met anyone yet who has actually been really passionate and excited about learning, just LEARNING. gaining knowledge, studying thier passions, pursuing a deeper understanding of things they like. and i now that outwardly, everything i talk about would put me in the same category as these people. but im starting to realize how stupid that is--bceause deep down, i like learning. i like pursuing psychology and business and public speaking. it's painful sometimes, yes, and not always fun. but i like it and im glad to be here, to be in college. im grateful for this time in my life. i want to find other people who approach learning this way too. now, granted, my friends will occassionally highlight things they are enjoying and Sean has said that he enjoys school. but i would say that other than him, 90% of what my friends and i talk about it is how much we are dreading/putting off working on things, how much we wish we had free time, didn't have to apply ourselves. and i hate that attitude. i hate that my friends are okay with just cheating and bullshitting their assignments to get a decent grade. there's a reason i apply myself to my work, beyond the fact that i could never keep my scholarship without doing so. i actually want to learn these concepts and apply my own thoughts to them. i want to be here and i like being here.

i know that if i want to find these things  in others, ive got to start displaying them myself. be the change i want to see, you know? so that's what im going to start doing. no more of this endless complaining and negative talk. im going to be honest about how much i enjoy my work. now yes, i dont want to be annoying or criticize others without ever being sympathetic. but when people ask me what i have to do, from now on i want to give a positive outlook and lead my an authentic example. again, not that things will always be fun and i certainly dont need to lie about that, but what i do enjoy i want to say i enjoy. i want to be part of what i see in so many secular liberal arts schools--a passionate dive into one's education.

it's time to learn. and thank goodness because i cant wait.

ive taped the phrase, "throw yourself in with passionate curiosity" on my desk.  that's what i hope to do.

woven webs of deceit

i cant help but feel like ive entirely lost respect for myself these days. i do not think i deserve to be esteemed in the basic, good-person sense of the word. my actions absolutely suck; i am self-centered, lazy, INDULGENT as heck, a cheater, a liar, not hard working, unfaithful, not committed to goals, a quitter, fat, a binger, a bulimic, a thief...the list could go on for forever. i hate who i am, i hate how easily i give up. i dont like dwelling on the negative or being against myself but gosh dammit i suck! ugh. its disgusting. and consequently, i cant help but feel like absolute shit around other people. i cant help but feel unworthy of their friendship and also internally distressed over what they are attributing me with doing or being. no one knows what a hypocrite i am! i am the most worthless, faking piece of shit. and i hate it. i feel like the incessant acne emerging on my face is a perfect analogy for who i am...the digustingly repulsive crap that has been circulating within my heart over the years is finally bubbling out in its oozing, pussy boils, creeping slowly from beneath my skin until they are unsightly mountains.

i deserve death for who i am. i deserve death for what i do.

God help me, i feel like i cannot get out. here i am again...in the same shit hole, trying and committing and hurting and choosing and caving and binging and purging and slaving. and then repeating it all over again. another semester of expensive, windowless addiction. i dont want to go down this path! and to be fair, i did pretty well this first half of the spring session, with only 3 out of the 8 weeks being bulimic-centered. i can do it again--i need to do it again. i just dont know how. i keep attempting to start and then i get overwhelmed and upset and i cave, with a little reprimendation and reminder that this isnt the real thing yet, 1/2-marathon training is still weeks away and thus this is okay.

what in the world can i do? i dont know how to get out anymore. i dont know how to cope without therapy, without some guideline. and i dont want to recover without Christ. there's no point and even if i could do it, i wouldnt want to.

so basically i need to talk with Pastor Kidd. he's really my only option right now, seeing as how Mom and Dad don't know about the purging element of my ED or my not being a Christian. thus i cant tell them why im not in therapy--i can only lie and say that im getting better and still having sessions with Robbie. and i hate that because id like to be honest with them, but this truth would be too much. it would change too many things; it would destroy them. i cannot tell them....which just sucks. i feel really alone in this deception. har. har. right? oh the fucking webs we weave, when first we practice to deceive...

i wish i could just heal. this is why i so often try to avoid this shit and live as vibrantly as i can for as long as i can. because when i sit down and face it, its all so depressing and tangled that i fear there is no hope for restoration. besides, who wants to acknowledge their life is down the drain? how the fuck do you not kill yourself at that point?

i guess all you have to do is believe in hell...that's what's always stopped me.

gah--enough of this.

a roadblock. or more like road-break.

i just feel so insanely depressed now that therapy has been cut off. my heart is just...dying inside. i just want to curl up in a ball and cry and mourn and stay depressed. i dont want to fucking live! gosh i hate life. but anyways, sorry, i know this sounds really self-pitying and pessimistic, especially when i have so much to be thankful for. i will justify myself when i have the energy.

but today i dont. it was and is extremely weird to think that after spending months talking with a person, sharing with them your deepest, darkest, ugliest secrets that you've never told anyone else before, nearly crying in front of them, being totally, gut-wrenchingly honest about everything, you could just end it all with a handshake and a "thank you." i mean seriously. i just cant move past this...i cant. im heartbroken and devestated and totally off-kilter. i let someone in, deeper than i think i have let anyone else in throughout the course of my entire life, and we're just done now. just fucking done. i feel like throwing up. i have thrown up. and ive binged. today that hell started gradually, with me slowly eating two mushroom english muffin pizzas, but then gained momentum as i scarfed down more and more food. and then i purged, of course. that part lasted for a long time actually. i felt the acid touch my raw throat as i stuck my vomit-covered fingers back inside. another gag. another. another. felt the familiar splash of throw up kiss my foot. saw a tear fall into my mess. hurt and hurt. tried not to think. thought even harder. and then it all repeated itself. its amazing how creative you can become in the kitchen when you have little food and strong binge temptations. so im back to the same shit again, huh? another fucking semester of expensive food addiction. i miss Robbie in an extremely weird way. i feel like i cant cope with how our relationship ended; i dont understand how to just walk away from such a relationship. and part of me feels like we left things without a mutual understanding.

i feel like telling him that the past three weeks i had been binge-free may not have been a good idea. i feel like once he heard that, he just scrapped the whole thing and was like, well, apparently you can change when you want to so 'dont say you cant. and im worried that he feels like i was deceiving him. and his perscription, that i should essentially just decide to eat and run like someone who is always in training, was ridiculous. in his mind, if that's all i need, then i should be set. but i brought up the point that i cant seem to function in in-betweens. im either binging or perfectly perfect, but there's no wiggle room. i personally see that as a problem, but i think he was just like, well hell you're not b/ping so be happy. and even when i brought up that i dont think that style would work because i always return to binging after intense training, and that is in some ways the only way i know how to get through those training weeks, he was just like, well, then you've set yourself up mentally to binge when that's done and if you just didnt ever stop training you would stop binging. i just want to cry...he really doesnt get it. i mean, i think those are valid points, but i also know that i simply dont work like that. i tried to be healthy and think tiger-training-fanatic mindset but still ended up giving in to the Ben and Jerrys and candy and cake and cookies last night. why? because my mind and the part of me that craves binging is like, dude we dont buy it--there's no real goal or commitment here, you're just doing this to do it. so bullshit--give in to the junk! enter weight gain and overeating and purging. i just wish i could start training for that half marathon now. i dont want to wait until March to start--i want to be committed and have success now, while im still in relatively good shape from the 3 weeks of work i did put in. i dont want to gain it back and lose muscle and go ape-shit over food all the time.

i guess im just going to try and be decent, keep crap out of the dorm, and maintain a decent exercise routine. then after spring break, we'll hit it hard with new eating and a 12-week training program. for now, though, im just going to go sign up for that race so i dont lose my spot or my dedication to training for it.

anyways, overall im just super depressed and lethargic and crying and missing lately. hopefully (and most likely) this will pass in time. but for now...it's here. i guess i should go try and get some work done for my classes...

ceasing

i really wish, more so than probably anything else in life, literally, that i just honestly did not exist. not that i could just be dead--because we all know that death just brings you right into your eternal reward--but literally never have been conceived of in the first place. i hate living. i hate having to deal and be responsible and care and choose and try and work and sweat and love and break. i hate having to endure that, day after day, week after week, year after year. what's the point of it all? everything i do i meaningless. seriously, like literally does not make a SINGLE difference in what i ultimately end up like. i could strive for perfection, try my darndest to work hard, enjoy life, gain balance, love deely--but it would matter as much as me endlessly giving in to sin. the total net effect of these actions, or even a combo of them (as my life has been so far): 0. a big, fat 0. so why the fuck should i even get up tomorrow? i just desperately want out. and ive wanted out of life for  a long, long time. if i could...i think i would take myself out of the game, out of reality. i want to be done experiencing and feeling and fighting. not like i have a really hard, painful life or anything like that. gosh no, definitely not; i have a lot to be thankful for and appreciative of. but ultimately none of that will matter; my judgment is already screwed as guilty. and i feel powerless to change. im just....stuck.

im stuck in this same place.

and i have been for years. i cant get out or over or around or through it...im just here again, repeating the same shit and trying like hell to keep things together. i just feel so apathetic--i dont care what happens to me, i dont care. nothing will change and i am doomed, essentially, to the same shitty, fucked up, justified existence in hell. all because of my choices and desires and lust for sin. and yet i can never let go of this haunting inside of me that death awaits...the torment of hell is breathing down my neck. the righteous anger of God is going to consume me for forever unless i stop and accept Christ as my Savior. but i just literally dont know how to do that! what do i do--there are so many roadblocks in my mind....Father God, please help me. please, please help me...

i dont know what to do. i dont know who to talk to about this. Robbie would be good, but i really dont think he has any time considering that there are so, so many students already needing his help and ready to heal. i mean....im ready and really needing to talk. but im not actually ready to change--at least not in anything except maybe my thinking.

i hate that i have to go through all this and even consider it. i wish i could just erase myself. bam. done. gone. never existed and never going to exist. part of my heart feels sad, like i would miss the good things in life, i would miss the people i love. but if i truly were entirely removed from the equation, i would not be in people's lives and unlike It's a Wonderful Life, those people would be thriving and happy and sufficient in the world they have. think, in some ways, of all the lives that we already think may have ended too soon or never really started. everybody, hurt as they may be, is still getting along. i guess what im saying is you dont miss what youve never had. people would be fine wihout me. yes, the world would be fine--maybe even better--without me.

if only i knew how to cease...if only i knew how to erase myself entirely.