Nightmare

I had an eerie, vivid nightmare last night. I woke up in a cold sweat, clinging to my boyfriend in terror, adrenaline coursing through my body. I could recall every disturbing detail:

In my dream I was at my house except it was a house I had never seen before. It was old, run down, decaying. Everything seemed to be dead. The grass and trees and flowers, all a red-gold brown in the dying light. I was moving my couch into the garden. The couch was dirty, full of holes and worms, all manner of creeping things slithered across it. I seemed to be there for a long time, unaware that it was night and I was alone.The house stood forlorn behind me and I heard whisperings of a presence which I tried to deny. Then the gate opened and something beastly and menacing came in uninvited. I couldn’t describe this presence as it was more a sense than a sight, unlike everything else in my dream which was sharp and in focus. I can recall how everything looked in minute detail, but this was demonic.

I asked it to leave my garden, to get away from me and I started to back away from the threat emanating from it. With a startling speed it pounced and enveloped me. I started fighting it, but it overpowered me like a cloak of darkness. I flailed and railed against it. I was lashing out, but it held me. I started to panic and then I started to beg to be set free. It would not release me. There was a moment where everything froze, I stopped struggling against this evil thing. There was a hiss and a sizzle like a candle being snuffed out. Except it wasn’t a candle, it was my life.

In the moment I realized that my life had ended so mercilessly, abruptly, the only thought I had was to call on God.

***

After I woke up, my boyfriend asked me what my nightmare was about. Usually I tell him that I am being chased of pursued by something I can’t see. This time I was shaking with fright, on the verge of tears. It was so real and so horrifying. I knew without a doubt that the demonic presence was my eating disorder. I couldn’t go back to sleep because I was so distressed by the dream, by the overwhelming feeling of being tormented by a demon. My boyfriend held me, after I had been pushing him away all night, but I was too scared to close my eyes. It seemed to be hovering there, waiting for me.

All these hours later, it is as haunting as if it had just happened. I feel a dread within me that I cannot explain.

NEDA 2015

For my sufferers and survivors: I wish you strength to fight for health every day; to choose life; to find the freedom that is possible and to hope for it. I wish peace for you in your distress. I pray that you love yourself gently, then fiercely and without question. No love is merely deserved. It is necessary for our very existance and God gave it freely to the undeserving. Remember this every time you hate everything about yourself, when ED whispers lies that you hold as truth or as you recall the gospel of starvation to mind. I hope you find the perseverance to fight ED in any way possible: even the small ways are victories within us. I wish you passion instead of numbness. I wish you fullness of mind and spirit and even body instead of this all consuming emptiness. I pray that the demons which dog your soul would be put to flight – that you will have the faith to fight the good fight. I hope you never give up, even in the depths of your darkness. Believe.

10 Days

My 24 hours of madness spiraled into ten days instead. Who could have seen that coming?

Me.

For ten days I didn’t go to the gym, binged endlessly, purged unceasingly and drank too much. Why? There are many reasons: stress, anxiety, a third-life crisis, ballet, relationships, weight gain, pain… At the end of the day it doesn’t matter. I did it because it is what I do. I tell myself I am ‘in a funk’, ‘depressed’ or my favourite, ‘relapsing’ because it covers all manner of sins. My existence has become a joke.

“I want to know how you eat six plates of pasta and stay so thin,” my roommate says half jokingly, half seriously. She is a nurse. She knows my ‘history’ of ED. I have been wondering how long it will take her to figure out that my ‘bubble baths’ are a euphemism for puking sessions.
“I am not sharing my dirty secrets with you,” I laugh and hope she gets the hint.

Later that night we share a bottle of wine while a bad Jennifer Aniston movie plays on Netflix in the background. She brings up eating disorders again and now she is referencing herself.
“You need to admit to the eating disorder you have, but don’t acknowledge,” I insist.
She has talked about how she doesn’t starve or purge but how she does restrict on purpose or binge from time to time, eats in secret and over-exercises. I educate her on Orthorexia, EDNOS, Binge Eating Disorder, Night Eating Syndrome and Compulsive Exercise. Her eyes get wider.
“I don’t think you can ever really recover from an eating disorder,” she muses. “What do you think?”
“I think God can heal you, but that doesn’t mean he will. How many people do you know who have prayed for healing from cancer and never got it? Some people just get sicker and sicker and die no matter what they do.” I respond. “But I do believe you can be totally free even though I never used to believe it. I just don’t know that it will be me.”

This week she is on the cabbage-soup-and-run-excessively diet. I am on the eat-everything-I-can-see-and-barf diet.
“We should be studied,” I declare as we eat our Dairy Queen Blizzards and sip wine together.
She laughs. I laugh. Tomorrow is another day.

In Despair…Psalm 88

1 O LORD, the God who saves me, day and night I cry out before you. 2 May my prayer come before you; turn your ear to my cry. 3 For my soul is full of trouble and my life draws near the grave. 4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am like a man without strength. 5 I am set apart with the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave, whom you remember no more, who are cut off from your care. 6 You have put me in the lowest pit, in the darkest depths. 7 Your wrath lies heavily upon me; you have overwhelmed me with all your waves. “Selah” 8 You have taken from me my closest friends and have made me repulsive to them. I am confined and cannot escape; 9 my eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, O LORD, every day; I spread out my hands to you. 10 Do you show your wonders to the dead? Do those who are dead rise up and praise you? “Selah” 11 Is your love declared in the grave, your faithfulness in Destruction ? 12 Are your wonders known in the place of darkness, or your righteous deeds in the land of oblivion? 13 But I cry to you for help, O LORD; in the morning my prayer comes before you. 14 Why, O LORD, do you reject me and hide your face from me? 15 From my youth I have been afflicted and close to death; I have suffered your terrors and am in despair. 16 Your wrath has swept over me; your terrors have destroyed me. 17 All day long they surround me like a flood; they have completely engulfed me. 18 You have taken my companions and loved ones from me; the darkness is my closest friend.

Quitting

I have decided to quit my twelve step program. I joined Freedom Sessions (a Christian based 12 step program), in September 2013. At first I had a lot of (misplaced) hope. Like any other time I have tried to “recover”, I was full of enthusiasm and faith. Four months later, I have had no break throughs, miracles or epiphanies. My faith has worn thin and is fading fast unlike my lard arse which has continued to grow immeasurably as I have (somewhat) tried to give up ED.

The idea behind Freedom Sessions is not just recovery, but healing from the pain that causes you to use your drug of choice. Apparently Step 4 (the inventories) is the worst time to quit. We are supposed to get sponsors now and should be seeing results but, I have seen nothing except the inside of a toilet bowl as I heave up yet another meal.

I feel bad for making this decision but I have come to realize that God does not owe me anything. He certainly doesn’t owe me healing or the strength to keep going when I am at my lowest. He doesn’t owe me freedom from ED or the miracle of recovery that I have begged for. He doesn’t owe me thinness or sanity or both. And because I do not like being insane, I will stop repeating the same behaviour (going to Freedom Sessions) and expecting a different result (freedom). On the other hand, starving and purging will give me a result (of a kind), and for now, that is better than nothing.