Messages

Sceal- omg I am in love with your trainer! You lucked out, most of them really push people into dieting/food shaming. They sound really competent and like they know the research! Kudos to them and you for getting support for healthy lifestyle. Proud of you.

Blueberry. I've been feeling really fat too. It's a crappy feeling for me, like I'm not good enough/don't deserve to live even. Deep shame. I'm dealing with so much right now, not feeling like I deserve care or support because, I realize, that's the environment I grew up in/am living in. FOO contact is really triggering, esp for the food issues. My cycle is trigger, overeat, then beat myself up/shame self for not having willpower. In a way I am abusing myself for them...with food. Nothing to feel bad about, just something to notice. And honestly it feels safer sometimes for me to be 'fat'. Like I'm less shiny or less of a target to predators. Like my family. To the narc M who is obsessed with her looks and I'm def a threat. I think that's a big part of why I've been overeating. And what I survived last fall with DV and assaults. Of course, what's actually attractive is confidence, but because of societal stigma I feel less confident when I feel fat or gain weight. Something to think on anyways.

The truth is you are doing the best you can. Proud of you

I have been overeating a lot since I moved back in with M, and gaining weight. To hide. To self soothe, to shame myself and prove I'm unworthy of love and support and resources. But I just filled out an app for a grant that may be awarded to me for psychiatric hospitalization which I could really use a long term stay at a trauma specialized one. And I finally called this crisis center here that's amazing, they deal with sexual trauma/rape. But they are so good and I should get some counseling and she said there is safe housing program I can apply for. Please pray or send good vibes out for me for this. I have to get out of this environment to heal. They just can't be supportive whether they are abusive or just in their own denial/ignorance about my illness.

Sceal, I can totally relate. My ED and food issues don't fit neatly under any diagnosis. Plus, they totally shift and change. Sometimes I'm eating too little thinking it's too much, I used to do this and purge it some years ago. Then sometimes truly eating too much. Then not at all. It's just all over the place for me. It's totally shame based, you nailed it on the head. I think that not eating really helped me keep myself in an even more extreme state of dissociation as well. It's numbing. Over eating feels more like addiction/self medication kind of a thing for me. It's compulsive like. It's all so complicated.

Kizzy, I can relate. Overeating is partly a symptom of pain. It's also a cycle that happens with dieting and weight loss/gain and body shame. The science is conclusive, when we restrict something, we end up binging. The idea that we 'shouldn't' eat something tends to make us eat a lot more of it. It's a vicious cycle. It's exhausting. For me, at times, food IS the ONLY or one of the only real comforts/pleasures in my life. How many of us carry shame about pleasure? As a survivor of sexual trauma, I know I do, but all abuse leads to this thing where joy and pleasure get cognitively mixed with shame in some way.

Plus, in today's world where the media tells us what to eat/what not to eat, how to look/how not to look and all that horrible stigma you are talking about, we have forgotten that we are SUPPOSED to enjoy eating, it's one of the greatest pleasures of life. Just some food for thought. 

And then the bad days start again without any warning. I'm tired. So tired. I don't want to do anything. I don't want to be anybody. Nothing is appealing. Nothing is enjoyable. Any amount of pressure from FOO and I buckle and I'm back to wishing I wasn't here anymore.

Love the mantras Kizzie. Yeah I can share it but it destroys my anonymity haha. So that's the only drawback. Not that I really care at this point...but maybe better for now as I still fall prey to paranoia/hypervigilance. 

The other night I was feeling 'disgusting' in my body and 'fat' (yeah, fat is a feeling now in the 'woke' nutrition community). And then I finally remembered, 'I'm not the disgusting one, the people who abused me are, their behavior is, not mine.' I'm carrying the shame for their behavior, down to the feeling itself, and projecting it onto my precious body. It's like, sometimes, we seek a way to become what they project onto us so we can rationalize all that cognitive dissonance. It continues the abuse in our minds and lives for them. I am not disgusting, I'm perfectly lovely, inside out. Putting on some weight is like some protection. Soothing myself with food is helpful, I'm just letting myself do this now. Slowly turning down the volume on the shame voices. Slowly making sure I also eat nutrient dense foods for my health, out of self love, and not to shame myself that I need to lose weight.

I'm glad you shared, Elphanigh. I've done that as well at different points. What i realized in my journey was that it was easier to feel shame about my body than about the trauma I went through...easier to feel it about something I perceived to be 'controllable' as well! And in a society where no one is safe in their body type, regardless, and body shame is part of the culture (very much now for men as well), it's easy to just slip into this behavior, and totally understandable. 

 

I'm glad you brought this all up Kizzie, I'm dealing with it too rn. It's easier when I can relate to others for sure.

I'm not sure if I mentioned it here, but the article I published that has my F up in arms and being stalkery and annoying, it was all about this, and it was/is beautiful. It's not about him really. But reading this and responding has given me a lot of strength and courage and I'm not afraid about him anymore. A peace has descended over me about it. I remembered why I did and and will continue with it. I wrote applied for a grant to get some funding for my site and realized there are other ways to do this. Maybe create a whole resource page and just drop the coaching till I'm well again. And shame on him! I will turn what happened to me into something good. I'm coming back to life! Thank you for your courage and vulnerability. No shame, no shame!

Today is another peaceful kind of day. Didn't get out much but I'm just allowing that to be ok, feeding myself better. Working on getting more vegetables in. I love them so much and all this processed stuff isn't making me feel so good. I didn't realize I was starving for vegetables. I'm coming back to simple self care things and adding back one at a time with less pressure on myself.

That perfection driver, the inner critic, says do it all and do it now! now! NOW! already!!!! She wants me to be eating perfectly, getting exercise everyday, always on top of everything, daily routine. She likes to throw shame at me like 'you are so lucky you have gym membership you're just wasting', 'why can't you just go for a swim', 'why wont you go to gentle yoga...' blah blah blah it's never ending and I'm over it. I want to do all those things but when I hyperfocus like that I just get overwhelmed and feel like, forget everything!

I could have had a coronary today. I'm being sued by debtors. I don't owe a huge amount of debt, but I also have zero resources or assets. Still, it's overwhelming, they have a decade to hold it over you and seize bank funds, garnish wages, etc. Not very motivating. But I just kept breathing. My M later said she wants to help me pay to file for bankruptcy and i'm all about it, I already wanted to. I just want a fresh start. Credit is already trashed.

But there was that moment before when I signed for the papers (first time they showed up panic because I thought my F had come up here to hurt me, took three times to answer door when I knew who they were). There was that moment when I the SI crossed my mind, and I could have spun out. But instead, I told myself, my life is work so much more than any amount of money, and also so much more than destroying myself so abusive people feel good. That too. And it was a victory. I didn't get me down that long. I'm proud of that.

I'm finding it easier to focus on what I'm doing right lately. I think it's helping to get support here.

Thanks guys, yes I love the Goddess and the moon. Connecting to her has been very helpful in my spiritual recovery as a woman. Sort of a reclamation of a loss of the feminine aspect of the divine and acknowledgement of the subsequent devaluation and oppression of the all things 'feminine' (not necessarily male or female) throughout most of 'civilization'.

Yeah I'm at the point where I'm just going to stop sharing with people who don't get it. It's much more helpful to get support here or from professionals. Although the support here is consistently better than most professionals. There is so much of this 'just let go' attitude to be found throughout society and I consider it ignorance and victim shaming. The intentions aren't always bad, of course. But it's like, oh well we can't fix you, so we will blame you, instead of the violent and abusive perpetrators that did the damage in the first place. I've had enough of the 'stop playing the victim' rhetoric.

Thanks rocket,

I was thinking about what normal meant to me, and I think I just mean functional. Able to have a job and keep it, able to take care of myself, able to live on my own, able to have relationships with healthy people and better boundaries (actually I've done a lot of work on this part and am getting better, although isolated now). Maybe I should say 'independent' instead. These are long term goals but some days they feel like I will never attain them. I know I'll never be like some kind of image I have in my mind of untraumatized people, or people who got through trauma and didn't develop CPTSD, or just had a lot less of it and were able to heal more quickly perhaps. I imagine them with careers and mortgates and families and that seems really unlikely for me at this point. Obviously this issue is me judging myself and comparing myself to hypothetical 'others'. I'm not too hung up on it.

Trying to accept that life right now is my normal and just keep calm as I can.

Time to start one of these where I can just ramble.

I realized today that I was feeling badly about feeling good yesterday (and today). Like it's not allowed. I'm sick and just have to be sick and miserable all the time or I'm lying, I'm making it up. That's how my M treated me as a child. She would take me to Dr eventually most of the time, but always treated me like a 'hypochondriac' because I had tummy problems at age 4-5 and the doctors didn't find anything. I know now abused children often have this symptom. She never wanted me to take meds or get treatments. This was negligence abuse and gas-lighting. I still struggle today to go to the DR, or to believe my illnesses are real.

I'm having a bad bout of CPTSD, understandably, rn and many days I feel shame about it and I'm just making it up. I'm reading as much as I can to remember this is a severe illness that is very debilitating, to validate myself. I had to drop AA because of the invalidating platitudes and victim blaming stuff. I realized my sponsor who claimed she has PTSD, doesn't think it's even real. She runs the AA groups in this place where severely mentally ill individuals (majority are legally 'conserved' so their guardians have rights over them) live. I remember her saying in a meeting that, 'they choose to be there'. Most of them were put there without consent. Looking back, uhhh WHAT. No, they don't. RED FLAG. I'm glad trauma seems to be in public eye now, but I'm starting to get a little annoyed with how everyone who has experienced trauma thinks they have PTSD when I mention that I do. They don't, or they wouldn't be telling me AA will cure it.

And I'm happy for them if they don't, it's not something that is enjoyable. It's not something I 'choose' to experience, I am not 'playing a victim role'. I'm not just 'being negative,' I'm not just lazy and don't want to work, I'm not doing any of this for fun, it's excruciating. I have a very real neurologically and somatically based disorder because of what I survived and how my brain and body developed because of that and it's very difficult to overcome and just 'let go', thank you very much! It's a threat to my life bc of persistent SI and attempts, because of highly dangerous retraumatizations that have occurred. Because I am disabled and not able to work or care for myself much of my life...

It's a wonder I'm alive and so it's not always easy to know how to feel good, or even to feel allowed to a good day. Just coming out of horrific DV, I'm scared. And I'm scared of being kicked out on the streets for having a good day at my M's house, and I have no one to enjoy it with so I'm sharing it here.

Thanks Blueberry and Kizzie! I cried cause I forgot who I was for awhile, man that was hard. And since I had a breakdown and failed, and then was with abuser who made sure I didn't succeed at this, and now my mom who any time I bring up the little amount I need to finish it up, magically becomes unsupportive, it means SO SO much to me to be validated and shown that I am a person who has something to contribute. That I've just had a setback and put it down again. I've been thinking lately how I don't have to give up forever, I just have to get back up at some point. I let people down, I felt so much shame. I want to be done with that. This is really important work and as many of us can contribute to us as possible are needed.

Kizzie, I'm proud of you for bringing it up. For so so many of us food was our only comfort as children so it's no wonder we return to that old friend. They've proven that sugar soothes anxiety. Food is calming to the body, especially when we make these associations in our early programming. I could understand why your IC doesn't want to give it up. When I've worked on this myself with mine, I try to do gentle reparenting.

I think the first thing with food stuff though that totally takes the shame/fear out of it and can even change the whole behavior is total and utter permission. No more dieting rules, no more restrictions or strict programs. Small, gentle changes. Telling yourself you can have as much ice cream (or whatever) as you want sounds crazy, but now try telling yourself it's your last bowl ever...hahah. I find when I just allow myself to eat emotionally or however I want or need to it takes the shame out of it because we remove the 'shouldn't'. I was taught that it's time to decriminalize food. No good or bad foods, all food provide some nutrients, some just are more dense in nutrients than others. I tell my IC or self I can have as much of it as I want, and sometimes i eat a lot and then gradually, magically, I can enjoy different amounts.

The body shame and the mirror is what it is. It's ok to not feel good about how our bodies look. Blueberry mentioned in her other post, fat is a 'feeling'. We really call it that now. What does it even mean. We aren't fat, we have fat. Lately I've been complimenting my body on it's ability to store excess calories SO efficiently. lol. Like wow what a wonderful thing we have been given, to have a body. We almost all have forgotten what it does, instead are hyperfocused on how it appears. I made this beautiful free body love meditation but the sites down at the moment. But shoot I need to hear it.

Also, I can and will highly, highly, highly recommended some great books.

1) Eating in the Light of the Moon, by Dr. Anita Johnston (for women). Fabulous...uses myth/archetype to digest this whole subject. For women, specifically. Most of us have forgotten we are naturally round (not all, and every body is perfect and beautiful thin or round or whatever), but this has been robbed from us. (this book is my favorite).

2) Health at Every Size by Linda Bacon - Easy to digest about all the research on how weight does not equal health and so on. She's a personal hero and leader of this movement in the US nutrition world, it is really picking up traction despite the media.

It helps me to help you. A read something a wise woman wrote that said something like sometimes a sister just needs to help lift up another sister to remember who she is (mama gina), substitute whatever gender pronouns but yeah. It's real. 

Blueberry, I can total relate to feeling like you don't get to exist and wanting to take up less space in the world. I do this thing where I gain weight and use it to shame myself for taking up too much space, I've done it weight weigh loss as well. I'm so glad that you've made progress with yours and body size. That's amazing progress and not easy to fight the stigma that surrounds all of us about weight and health. We have become obsessed with this, globally. Its a many billion dollar industry and they generally just make more and more money because we are doomed to fail at dieting and there is always something else to pick at that's not this or that enough. It is totally understandable that other ways you are less comfortable with taking up space in the world can trigger SH. I tend to self destruct before succeeding at something, without even realizing it.

When dealing with other's opinions of or reactions to my body, I (eventually) try and see it as a mirror of their own insecurities. Sometimes those people are just downright mean. Like this one 'friend' who always comments on my body and it's always triggering. I just avoid her now and I know how unhappy she is in her own and that's sad. We all do the comparison thing and it can drive us to insanity. I would say that I don't know why or when we all needed to look the same when we are a diversity of colors, shapes and sizes (and that's normal), but I do know and it was extremely political. Actually, as soon as women's lib hit in the US, the culture shifted to the 'twiggy' ideal. That's a fine body type if it's yours, but only 5% of women posses it naturally. Since you have had a full on ED you know what it's like to spend that much time thinking about food and your body, doesn't really leave much for anything else...like joy or creativity. That's a long story anyways.

Keep at the taking up more space thing as safely as possible. When I started making videos I nearly panicked every time I was so uncomfortable with the whole thing. And other things I did, it was rough but it gets easier with practice. But thanks for sharing about this. 

So proud of you Blueberry, it's a not an easy step to take. Way to go. And I like how you are dealing with it in little steps as well. Enough is enough. You don't have to play that role anymore, no one should. I'm sick of it. We all are. They may never take responsibility for their stuff but we can put that bag down and walk away.

I was thinking about this last night, like, why do I feel so disgusting all this time? And it hit me, I feel disgusting for other people who are behaving in disgusting ways. I'm sick of it too.

You're very inspiring. Keep posting about this, it's a process! We hold onto toxic family for different reasons that, for me, became, even more apparent than the letting go ones when I left/went nc. We are here for you!