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Some documents I found on my computer
I was “filing” a couple of things in my My Documents folder and found a bunch of documents I’d written and saved. There are 13 of them, or more if I find more that were labeled unclearly. The first of these documents was written May 5, 2011, and the latest I wrote today. This latest one contains a copy and paste blog entry I wrote and decided not to publish. It is saved in my drafts folder.
Let me make it clear that these documents are part of a historical record. Most of them are in the form of letters to my T, and many of these letters I read aloud to her. I wrote the official letter to my T stating that I was firing her on March 11, 2012, my dad’s birthday. I saw her once more and now she is out of my life. Of the documents that are not letters to my T, three I labeled “Dying Wishes” and put them in a separate folder. These were written last July, last October, and then again in December. There is a letter I wrote March 6, 2012 and CC’ed to a number of people regarding how dumb it is to put me in the state hospital. There is a statement in July I made not addressed to anyone in particular about refusing to have a feeding tube put into me and refusing to be hospitalized for the purpose of weight gain. The document I wrote today has two components: a copied and pasted letter to a friend, and today’s unpublished blog entry I mentioned a second ago.
I was thinking of putting these documents, in chronological order, up here and thus made public. I believe the last one, written today I will put up here in a bit. But maybe not.
I have to think about how people are going to react to these documents. Though I do like to stir things up, I think putting them up here is going a step too far. It would be irresponsible for me as a writer, specifically, blogger, to portray such a grim picture of despair and hopelessness worse than I already have. What if it rubs off on someone?
I mean, what am I supposed to say? That there’s hope for you folk out there but no hope for me?
I don’t think it would be right to say that there is hope for everyone, you can do it, never give up, the way a lot of websites do. Why? I’d be bullshitting. It is my responsibility to be honest. I don’t want anyone to become anorexic and the last thing I want is to encourage anyone to do the things I do. I think that this is clear if you read what I say. My desire to be thin is destroying me. I don’t want to see you destroyed or on the destructive path I’m on.
That said, I don’t want anyone else to think that because I am driven to die, that anyone else should be. And if you are, please read this page:
http://www.metanoia.org/suicide/
And check out this list:
http://unsuicide.wikispaces.com/Online+Suicide+Help
I have never seen this second page before, but I notice that the first link I provided recently updated their page. I’ve gone there a few times and read it, and it helps.
I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve “changed my mind” at the last minute. A lot of it was had something to do with my dog, Puzzle.
My dog Puzzle loves me unconditionally. Let’s face it, humans never do, and never have. Never throw yourself into the arms of another person, because it will either totally suck, or they will dump you and leave you raw and bleeding.
I had a “wake up call” recently, thanks to Puzzle. I’m not sure what to make of it. The problem was that once I woke up, I had to stay awake, and I can’t do it anymore. I have had more wake up calls since leaving therapy mid-March than I had in the entire 31 years of being in therapy.
What I saw in these documents, all stored in My Documents folder, all labeled by their titles, is a steady pounding of making myself die.
I don’t want to be this way. I didn’t ask to be this way. I’m not doing it to control anyone else or play games. There are a lot of “normal” people out there that have a death wish. Everyone has one, but most people’s is so tiny that it only appears in nightmares on very rare occasions. My death wish is fucking huge.
It would be one thing if this lasted a couple of weeks, or a month. But no, it has been right here and of unbelievable intensity for a fucking year. More, actually.
I have heard of four-year-olds that are suicidal. They are wired that way. What do you do with these kids?
And so I am 50 years older than these kids. What do you do with me? Is there such thing as non-retractable suicidality? What the hell do you do with these people?
Well, most therapists won’t take them on, for one thing. Liability. You can discard them by putting them into the state hospital. I suppose that’s where many end up once their insurance runs out.
Again: unwanted, unloved, rejected, excluded…which feeds into the suicidality. Lovely.
The rest are dead.
I am not dead. I am running for my life. I am scared of the state hospital. I repeat, these places are not hospitals. They are dumping grounds. They are prisons. Buried alive.
The state hospital systems were built as humane alternatives to imprisonment. People with mental illnesses were being housed in prisons and put in chains. Someone decided this was wrong. But the state hospital systems went astray long, long ago. They are being closed down for this reason. Condemned. But people still end up there. What do you do with the disposables?
Some, the lucky ones, run for their lives. I am running. Many are still running. Some ended up in a safe, positive place. Not a hospital or institution. They found a safe place to build, or rebuild.
I have no clue how to do this.
So I guess I’ll just keep running. I’ll run out of steam eventually, and then whatever happens, happens.
Hello, month of May
I must say, I am still feeling fairly decent, knowing that the hell I went through in April was not “me being sick” but something done to me by the chemicals meant to treat “me being sick.” And now, I’m doing less chemicals, so I’m happy about that.
I just did my budget and found out I’m more broke than I thought I was. I went into the red last month. At best, it will take not a few months, but two years to pay off my credit cards. Every time I board Puzzle, it wipes out all my progress and then some.
So I showed up at the gym Sunday, anyway, and I was going to re-do my membership, and now I’m relieved that the membership person wasn’t there. The guy let me go in and work out for free.
Wow. Where have I been all this time? Sitting here doing literally nothing for a month you’d think I wouldn’t be able to do a darned thing over at the gym, but I kinda surprised myself. I had a good time on the treadmill and then did the elliptical for a bit. I can’t even begin to describe what it was like to be exercising again. I walked on the treadmill faster than I can walk with Puzzle, and the exercise on the elliptical, I must say, is much more vigorous than walking. I wondered if I’d really experienced any joy at all since I was told to stop running, period, last May. Maybe that’s why afterward, I crashed real bad, just thinking about the fact that it was maybe a year ago that I was running up to five miles a day.
The acupuncturist said that they can do things to help me with my knee and I might be able to run again. You know, I never got a second opinion last year. I resigned, threw in the towel, gave up. It was completely horrible when my T told me how great is was that this had happened, because it would slow me down.
I never, ever justified what she said. Looking back, when I was running in the fall of 2010, preparing for my first (and I hope not only) 5k race, I felt damn good. I ate fine. I ate a lot, in fact. Go back and read my entries, things I said about how proud I was to have a strong body. The T I had didn’t force me into these babyish “weekly weight checks,” in other words, I was treated like a responsible adult…say what? I am an adult. Then I switched therapists. My new T didn’t understand my running, and immediately went under the assumption that I used my running to overexercise. I guess “running” equals “overexercise” and “yoga” equals “recovery exercise”? How cliche. I don’t like yoga. I took a yoga class once and felt fat and bored. To each his own. So when I had to stop running, she kept pushing the yoga and “healthy exercise” on me.
So, let me get this straight. She, and a lot of other ED specialist types, claim that yoga is something you do after you are recovered, and running is something you did when you were sick and burning calories. This is a gigantic assumption and blanket generalization on their part, don’t you think? If I had a therapist who was a runner herself or himself, it would be a whole different ball game, don’t you think? Only a runner understands the magic in it. When I was running, I left behind weight, body size, and calories, and spent about thirteen laps kicking ass in the sunrise.
So in December, when I ran my 5k, my T never, ever understood. And then I crashed. How could this relationship have possibly worked at all when there was such misunderstanding right from the start?
I used to bring my lunch to her office and eat it before our sessions. Nice timing, cuz the sessions started at 1pm. I found out later that she assumed I was being deceptive and that I was throwing up in the bathroom right before our sessions. It took ages to straighten this one out. No, I wasn’t overexercising, no, I wasn’t throwing up, in fact, I was doing damn well until she started not trusting me, not respecting me, putting me down, and treating me like a child. I started therapy with this woman in November 2010, and even in March and April of 2011 she still accused me of lying about being unable to vomit. So now I get why this therapist was not much use to me.
As I said in my comment to John (see sidebar) I plan to write an article about “informed consent” in care. This would cover the issue of trust as well, because it goes both ways, don’t you think? “Informed consent” means a lot. It means stuff like knowing why you are being given a med and knowing all the side effects. So if they’re giving a patient Seroquel and telling this patient it’s for anxiety, but behind this patient’s back they’re thinking, “Gee, it’ll increase his/her appetite!” well, the patient needs to know this motive. I’ve thought a lot about this one. If it’s “for my own good” then by all means, I deserve to know. I believe a patient should know what he or she weighs and that this should not be kept hidden. I could go on and on about this. When I write my article, I will present a good argument that treating a patient with respect and dignity means informed consent, honesty, and trust.
So anyway, I’m going to figure out how to join the gym and wiggle my way into paying as little as I can. Or maybe I can find an elliptical machine, that is, one that won’t break down and is okay with my body (most are awkward for me and I can only use certain kinds) for very, very cheap. But of course it has to fit into my postage-stamp-size apartment. Gee, that’s tough. Maybe I can get super good aerobic exercise flipping what remaining pennies I still have.
I’m going to take Puzzle out. Maybe if I put on some Dave Matthews, I can work up a bit of speed.
Remembering last year’s Winter Classic 5k
I have received a few e-mails from the Winter Classic 5k people reminding me to sign up. It’s hard to believe that it was less than a year ago that I ran the Winter Classic 5k 2010 on December 19 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It seems like light years away. I found the post I did December 23, as soon as I could muster up the energy to write about my experience running the race, and I thought I would re-post it now, for history’s sake:
MY FIRST 5k EVER: THE WINTER CLASSIC 5k, AN ACCOUNT BY JULIE GREENE
Tonight, I felt like giving up. I was at wit’s end with myself, my eating disorder, and the world. I wanted to hide and never be seen again. I had to shower, but did not want to take off my clothes and have to see my ugly body. So I kept my clothes on. I cried some. I felt very, very cold. Eventually, I called Frank.
“Julie,” he said, “you just ran a 5k. You didn’t give up then. You didn’t stop running, did you?”
“Uh, no.”
“Well, you just have to keep going on.”
“I’m cold.”
“Then put something warm on.”
I did. I sat at the computer a while, feeling lonely, just thinking, feeling like a complete failure. How could I feel this way, when I had accomplished so much?
I am reminded of many of the times when I had accomplished great things in my life. Depression had frequently followed. Often, when a writer such as myself completes a major project, he or she becomes depressed. It is like letting a baby out into the world. You just have to let the child go and make her way into the larger universe.
So I went back and opened the file that Frank had sent me. He had so cleverly created this document: It was a listing of the 5k race results, with my name highlighted, with ribbons around it, and my photo next to it–the photo of me, crossing the finish line. And whenever I opened the document, I heard the theme from Chariots of Fire. I keep on going back to it, and opening it, and scrolling down to my name, and listening to the music, and crying, and crying, and crying.
I feel a great sense of loss now that it is over. An intense feeling of sadness. Over a month of building up my guts to do this, and a month of running 5k daily to get ready, and a week of a bad case of “nerves.” And then, 34 minutes, and it was over.
I am reminded of the stories about 16-year-old boys who go out on their first dates. Only theirs lasts less than 34 minutes.
I remember when I first decided to do this race. I first Googled, “How many miles is 5k?” I came up with roughly 3.1. The Winter Classic 5k was 3.12, so when I practiced on the treadmill, that was how much I ran. On the track, I ran 3.25, or 13 laps. But when I realized that I could actually run 5k, 3.1 miles, I Googled “5k races in Boston” and came up with the Winter Classic 5k in Cambridge, Massachusetts (which is right near Boston and one bus ride away from where I live) on December 19, 2010 at 10:30am. Perfect, I thought. Frank thought it was perfect, too.
I told a few people. Some were skeptical. “Are you sure you’re eating enough to do this?” they asked.
Yes, they had reason to be concerned. It had been only a few months since I had started eating again after a long period of self-starvation called anorexia nervosa. Surely, they thought, wasn’t I just finding another way to keep from gaining weight? But yes, I was eating enough, and gaining. Slowly. Bite by bite.
My therapist, too, was less than thrilled. She wanted to discourage me from doing this race. I had to reassure her that I would eat, eat, eat and that I was not “overexercising.” As therapy proceeded, she forgot about the race, and I stopped talking about it, only because I didn’t want her to bum me out about it anymore.
You see, I run for many reasons: I run because I find that I enjoy it. I run because running is being kind to your body. I run because running helps you live longer and gives you strong bones and builds your muscles and cardiovascular system, and every system of your body. I run because it improves my mood and my self-esteem. I run because it helps me feel better about my body, this vessel that I have treated so badly for so long.
For you see, I have had this eating disorder for 30 years. Sometimes, it has been very bad and other times it has been only there a little bit. But always, there has been this relentless desire to be ridiculously thin. It simply does not go away. I can choose to strive for thinness, or I can fight the urge to starve myself. At different times, it has gone either way. But the desire never stops. It is like running a race with someone following you–close behind.
Last summer, I only wanted to starve myself to death. I had no will to live. Then, I found Frank. Suddenly, I didn’t want to die. Frank and I started eating together via Skype. I gained back some strength. Whereas in August I was struggling just to walk across the apartment from room to room due to starvation, by October I was walking the dog for miles and miles, and my heart was filled with joy.
Frank encouraged me to try running, something I had done in my 40′s (I’ll be 53 in a couple of weeks) so I did. I found that because of all the walking I was doing, running came easily. Right away, I could run a mile. The next attempt I made at running, I ran a mile and a half, and then two and a half miles. The next time, I ran 5k, and have been running 5k ever since.
So when I found out about the Winter Classic, I made a point of running 5k daily. Even now that the race is over, I plan to run 5k daily, possibly increasing my mileage now that I am faster. I found that as I ran, my speed increased once every couple of days. It was amazing that this was happening. I kept turning the treadmill up a notch. On the track, my speed would increase on the third mile. I have logs of my daily progress in my journal. Sometimes, I timed myself. Other times, I didn’t. I tried out different music, and wrote about some of my runs.
Race day was rapidly approaching. I began to get very, very nervous. I practiced everything. I watched the weather obsessively. I wrote down what clothes I wore at what temperatures, and what worked best. I tried to pretend it was race day, and ran at 10:30 on the nose, waking up a the exact same time, eating the exact same foods I would be eating, and drinking coffee at the exact same time. It worked. I had it down. I knew exactly what to do.
I received an e-mail instructing me to go to the Asgard, a bar in Central Square, Cambridge, to pick up race materials, on Saturday, December 18th. Great. This would be my practice run. The commute over there. I took the same bus in there that I would be taking in on race day, the #71, and transferred onto the subway. Once I got off the subway, I found that I was walking in the wrong direction somehow, but got headed the right way, and found the Asgard okay. Fifty minutes. A bunch of drunken Santas walked out of the Asgard as I arrived.
The race folks were very nice. They handed me an envelope, a bag, and a white race shirt, size small. In the envelope is a hat that says “Winter Classic 5k” on it. Inside the envelope, I would find out later, are a bib with the number 167 on it, and a computer chip, which looks like an arm band. I assumed this was supposed to be worn on my arm. The computer chip is used to measure the time it takes to run the race. They also gave me some pins to attach the bib to my jacket. The envelope even had my name on it! It was official!
The night before, I had one last skype with Frank before the race the next day. He gave me his last words of advice, then we had a skype hug goodnight. We made plans that I would call him on my cell phone as soon as the race was over.
The one piece of advice I remember that just about everyone gave me was, “Enjoy yourself.” But this is something you can’t plan on. It just has to happen. I slept that night better than I have in a long, long time.
I awoke 40 minutes before my normal wake-up time, at 3:50am, not realizing what day it was. Suddenly, I knew. I am running the race today! I am running the race today! I am running the race today! I got up and got dressed. Brushed my teeth very, very well. Decided, contrary to plan, to have a morning cup of coffee. I took some aspirin. This was planned. At 6, I had a banana, an egg, and a glass of milk, and my vitamins. I checked the weather obsessively. At 6:30, I got ready to walk the dog, Puzzle. I brushed her teeth. We were out the door at precisely 6:45, and we walked our planned 35-minute walk, listening to the music that I had planned for that morning. I was wearing two layers of longjohns under leggings, legwarmers, silk socks under cotton socks, my race shirt, and the usual jackets I wear while walking Puzzle. For the race, I had planned to wear only the long-sleeve T and a windbreaker over it.
I came back in with Puzzle, fed her, and did the rest of our morning routine. My friend skyped me to wish me good luck. We spoke briefly. Then at 8 I had some yogurt with wheat germ and brewer’s yeast. There was a lot of waiting around and time to get nervous, but everything was so well-planned that I felt secure and reasonably confident that things would go okay.
I had my checklist, and went over it a number of times. Keys. Check. Kleenex. Check. Cell phone. Check. I had to make sure that whatever pocket I put my cell phone in, it wouldn’t bounce around while I was running. I tested this out and worked it out okay. Bus schedules. Check. Bus pass, called, here in Boston, the “Charlie Card.” Check. I checked and double-checked, and refreshed the weather.com screen obsessively. It was going to be about 36 degrees out at race time, or so I thought, 38 degrees at the warmest part of the day. Supposedly. But it was due to be a good bit colder than that at the time I’d be walking to the bus, so I made a trash bag with holes in it, and I decided that I’d wear this to the bus stop. Smart thinking: it worked perfectly.
At around 8:45, I got ready. I had to work fast. I pinned the bib to my jacket, then pulled the plastic bag over me, and I was off. I walked–fast–to the bus stop, arriving at 9:03. The bus was due to leave at 9:10, but I knew it would leave a minute early. This was planned. It did.
As soon as I got on the bus, I took off the plastic bag. I unzipped my jacket’s armpits, and took the caffeine pill I’d packed for myself, and at my race food: a half peanut butter sandwich, a banana, and a small amount of orange juice. All planned. All written down. I even had a reminder beep on my watch tell me to do these things. The bus was nearly empty, and arrived in Harvard Square four minutes ahead of schedule. I disembarked, and headed for the subway. Here, a street musician was playing, but I had no time to give him money, because the train arrived just as I got there. One stop, and I exited the train, and had arrived in Central Square.
Wow, it was colder than expected! Jeez! I was wondering if perhaps I should have put on more clothes. Perhaps it would warm up, though. Weather, especially in New England, is very, very hard to predict. Apparently, the other racers were surprised by the weather as well, or so I found out when I reached the Asgard. People were shivering and rubbing their hands together. But everyone was in good spirits. I tried to talk to people. But nobody wanted to talk to me. People knew each other. Everyone had someone–a friend, a fellow racer, a spouse–someone else to hang out with, and didn’t want to bother with me. So I just hung around and picked up bits and pieces of information when I could. Mostly, I wanted to know where the bathrooms were, and if there were lines for them. I learned that there was a heated tent at the start/finish line. So I wandered over there, and found the tent to be cozy enough. I used the latrine. I had brought my own toilet paper, just in case they had run out of it. I figured I’d think of all possibilities. My major concern was that I didn’t throw my gloves into the latrine by accident.
Announcements on the loudspeaker indicated that the race would start in ten minutes. People seemed to ignore this and mill about. I knew where the start line was, but I didn’t know where to go. Some of the people didn’t know, either. I would have followed everyone else, but no one was going anywhere. At the last minute, I tightened my shoelaces, and tested them out, adjusted them again, tested them, and was satisfied. Another announcement indicated that the race would begin in five minutes. Finally, a formation was beginning. I figured out where the end of the line was. I wanted to be near the end of the pack, where the slower runners were lining up.
How would the race begin? How would I know to start running? I stood there, jogged in place, stopped, jogged in place again, and waited. Then, suddenly, people started running! A horn honked! We were off! At some point, I crossed the start line. I was racing! I was racing! I was racing!
The race starts and ends on Sidney Street, but most of it is on Massachusetts Avenue, between Sidney Street and Harvard Square, Cambridge, and back. I think I had to run about a quarter mile before getting onto Mass Ave. At this point, I was beginning to warm up and get into a rhythm. I am familiar with this “warming up” phase from my frequent track runs, when I run awkwardly for the first lap, and gradually gain confidence over the course of the next few laps. But this was a race. This was different. I wasn’t listening to music. All I heard was the slap of the other runners’ shoes on pavement, and the honking of horns, and panting breath, and occasional conversation. This was a race.
Would I finish last? At first, many people were passing me, and I worried a little that this would be the case. I stepped up my pace a little. Soon, I was passing others. Eventually, I passed more people than passed me. By the end of the race, many people whom I had passed were alternating running with walking. But it didn’t take long before I stopped thinking about whether I would come in last or not.
No, I wasn’t thinking about that. I wasn’t thinking about anything but what was ahead of me: the road. I wasn’t thinking about my dog, Puzzle. I wasn’t thinking about Frank. I wasn’t thinking about food, or calories, or how much I weighed. I wasn’t worrying about my eating disorder, that silently follows me everywhere I go.
I did, in a fleeting moment, remember, that there was a time that I wanted to die, and now I am running this race, running to celebrate living.
But the road was ahead of me, and I had to concentrate on it. Every bump. Every crack. Every little nuance. Because tripping could mean falling. Falling could mean getting injured, breaking a bone, even. Concentrate, concentrate.
And at once, I was only thinking of that. I had no body. I had no legs. I had no arms. I had no feet. I did not feel them. There was only the road ahead of me. I was totally focused. Zoned in. My eyes were fixed on one spot ahead of me all the time. I never looked back.
And I knew I was speeding up. It was early on that I felt this. I began to feel my body zooming, the way I race around when I walk Puzzle, faster than I knew I should be running ordinarily…but this is a race, I kept telling myself, this is a race! It’s okay to go fast! I felt the ground go by underneath me the way it has never moved before. I felt my muscles propel me the way they have never done in the past. This is a race! It’s okay! And as the race moved on, I moved faster and faster.
I began to recognize the streets. We were coming back to Central Square and near the end of the third mile. The race was almost over.
I didn’t speed up when I realized this. Not at first. I kept telling myself that I wouldn’t, that it wouldn’t make much difference if I sped up or not. But this is a race, and people speed up at the finish line, just to get to the end faster, I suppose, and because they get caught up in the excitement. As it was, I was caught up in excitement tenfold. So I sped up along with the others.
As I neared the end of the race, people along the sidelines were clapping and cheering! For me! I could hear them! Step by step, I bounded down the road toward the markers, and crossed the finish line.
And that was it. They asked us to hand in our computer chips. I took mine off my arm and put it in the bucket. I went and tried to stretch, but there was really no place to lean on. Then I noticed how tired my muscles were. This was no ordinary run! I realized that I had run fast, possibly the fastest I’d ever run 5k. Not knowing what to do next, I wandered into the celebration area, where people were already lining up for beer.
Beer? After a run? Really? The eating disorder in me thought about the calories in beer. I tried to find water, but couldn’t find it. A woman offered me a sports drink I’d never heard of. “Try it,” she said. “It replenishes.”
“Huh?”
“It’s made of pear juice. It’s like Gatorade.”
“Really like Gatorade?”
“Yes, really.”
What I meant was…well, you can guess. I took the can, reluctantly. And at once, when no one was looking, I glanced at the label, and looked at the calorie count. Yes, I admit it, I did just that. And then I drank the stuff.
I was thirsty.
I began to ask around about race times. Apparently, there was a list posted. After a lengthy attempt to find the list, I finally did find it, and searched, and searched, and searched for my name everywhere, and not finding it, began to suspect that something had gone wrong with my computer chip. So I located the van where they were tallying the times, and inquired.
“Are you sure you had your chip attached?” the guy asked.
“Yep, I’m sure,” I said.
“Where did you have it attached? It apparently didn’t register.”
“I had it on my arm.”
“Oh, you were supposed to have it on your ankle. The reader only goes up to your knee. Anything above that doesn’t register.”
“My ankle? My ankle! No one told me! There were no instructions! I thought it was supposed to go on your arm!”
“Sorry. But do you know your time? Did you time yourself?”
“No. But I’ve got a good idea. Thirty-four minutes. Can you write that down? Can you write me in? Can you? Please?”
So as it turned out, I got written in. I will never know what my actual time was, but I’m certain that it was around 34 minutes. That’s just under 11 minutes per mile. Not bad, considering I’m almost 53 years old. I’m sure Puzzle is proud of me.
I phoned Frank, but I couldn’t reach him. I guess he had stepped away from the phone at that moment. But I left a message letting him know that I had finished the race, and how happy I was.
I checked the bus schedule. I had only a couple of minutes to get to the bus, so I ran for it. And made it to the bus stop just in time. I called my brother while I was on the bus home. He races, and he was very proud of me. I told him that I was very surprised at how fast I ran. “Julie, no one runs slowly in a race,” he said. “So, when are you doing your next one?”
And now, a few days have passed. I have run a couple of times since the race. My legs feel good and my body feels strong. I feel that I can now run for longer periods and longer distances. I feel confident about my running and the soreness has worn off.
Perhaps now, as I write these words, and relive the experience, I realize what it all means now. The first 5k for me meant more than just my first race, but a celebration of all the things I can do. After all, I earned my master’s degree, didn’t I? And how many books have I written? Aren’t I also a mental illness survivor? Haven’t I knitted 17, yes, 17 sweaters for Puzzle, and I love her oh so much?
But mostly, I eat, and eat enough, and care for my body, and honor and cherish it and celebrate all it can do. And this is why I run this race.
And yes, I’m thinking about my next 5k.
**************
You know, I haven’t read the article. I just went and found it, highlighted it, copied it and pasted it here. I keep thinking of all the tragedy that followed. I just can’t believe the turn my life has taken.
Those of you who have been reading my blog this past year know about the hospitalizations, heartbreak, It, starvation, and everything else that started up almost immediately after the race.
Things were really okay for a couple of months about a year ago, though, and I shouldn’t lose sight of that.
Vertigo….again…and fighting my eating disorder
Yes, this vertigo I am getting is from my anorexia…day after day….Yes, I can stop it. I can stop it if I can get my nutritional state back to normal. All I have to do is eat…all I have to do is eat…all I have to do is eat….
So why don’t I? It is so simple. Toss my illness out the window and eat.
I wish.
Maybe, though, I don’t wish. Because it is the nature of anorexia to hold onto it and hold onto it so tightly that you will die rather than drop it, let it fly away, let someone take it from you, or throw it off a bridge.
Maybe I should just open the window a bit. Open the screen as well. Peek out at the grass–or asphalt–below. Consider everything I can throw out there. Wouldn’t it be fun?
At the ED hospital, we had “keeps and throws” instead of “wrap up.” Well, it was “wrap up,” but it was also “keeps and throws.” You would say what you wanted to keep about your day, and you said what you wanted to throw away. I kind of liked that.
Actually, I’d like to have thrown the ED hospital. I’d like to throw every hospitalization I’ve ever had. Or maybe I’d like to throw being in such a bad state that I require hospitalization. I have been in this condition more times than I can count. This truly sucks.
What do I want to keep? What do I really want to keep? When I think about it, what I really want to keep is my love for Puzzle, and my joyful walks with Puzzle, too. I want to keep the days that I feel like my life is worth living. I want to keep the happiness I feel knowing that my special friend is in my life. I want to keep sunshine on a summer day. I want to keep the melting of the snow at the beginning of spring. I want to keep the crispness and newness of frost in December and the memory of running on the track at sunrise, this memory that I can cherish for the rest of my life. I want to keep my blog. I want to keep solitude. I want to keep on keeping. I want to keep…myself?
Do I? Can I challenge myself to keep myself going? Can I?
My second 5k–reflections on a race not run
I woke up this morning, race day, to face a record-low temperature of 44 degrees here in Boston, meaning perfect weather for the Larry Kessler 5k race for AIDS at 9:50 at the Hatch Shell. My alarm had sounded at 4am. I was getting ready. I had everything planned out for today, everything written down. I dressed, laced up my running shoes, and got ready to walk Puzzle, my dog. Surely, this was her day, too. We would take one of her usual routes, though. I didn’t want to disturb her routine too much, even though today was different.
Yes, today was different. Every day had been different for the past several weeks–since the injury. As we rounded White Street, passing the condo complex, and headed up Main Street, I began to weep. I was walking with a cane, barely able to sustain a half mile’s distance before experiencing problems with my injured knee. I placed the cane carefully along with my right leg, to ensure that I kept weight off of the problem side. I wondered if anyone would pass by and see me crying. But no one did, not even anyone in a car, because it was so early.
Not only was I sidelined with an injury, but I was suffering from infected sores in my mouth, edema, and morning vertigo. All of these medical problems had appeared over the past month or so. Surely, I was not in good shape to be running a race. This was compounded by the fact that I had taken time off over the winter, slowing my pace considerably. I had expected, after the first of these medical problems–edema–appeared, to finish this race in 38 minutes. I finished my first 5k in 34.
The edema I have is called “refeeding edema.” It results from long-term self-starvation from my eating disorder. While my first 5k was a celebration of feeding myself, my second 5k–or, rather, not running my second 5k–is the acknowledgement that I am not feeding myself or treating my body with the love and healthy respect it deserves. Yes, I am abusing my body. Yes, I starve myself. I still have this edema. I starved it away, but it came back after two binges. I am currently starving it away again. Yes, I have an eating disorder.
The sores in my mouth come from cuts in my gums. The cuts come from bingeing on raw vegetables. I can’t eat raw vegetables really fast, because I have missing molars. If I do eat raw veggies fast, my gums get cut up. They even bleed in my mouth. One of my molars is missing because I split it in half bingeing on dog food last winter. It had to get pulled as a result. Yes, I have an eating disorder.
I get morning vertigo after I eat the first bite of food, or sustenance, in the morning. I go brush my teeth and 1o minutes after I’ve eaten, or had a bit of milk, I have the vertigo. It lasts several hours. Several hours of my head spinning. The vertigo following eating is most likely from malnutrition. Yes, I have an eating disorder.
My knee injury is an overuse injury. I used to run and walk a total of 10 miles a day, and I did this for a month. Fine. Then, I increased to 14. Not fine. My body gave out. Hence, this injury. And every time I think I’ve licked it, I overdo it, and pain and regression in healing result. I tend to overexercise. Why? Don’t let me fool myself. I do it to lose weight.
Yes, I have an eating disorder. I have anorexia nervosa. I was eating okay since I got off the psychiatric unit in March, but started actively starving myself again May 1st. I have not eaten normally for one day since then. I have generally restricted, but have binge/fasted a bunch of times as well. I am in no shape to be running this race.
And now I sit here, hungry. What am I hungry for? What is missing in my life? What are my desires, hopes, wishes, and dreams? Do I even know? Am I so starved that I have lost touch with what my body and soul need?
What did I dream of when I signed up for this 5k? Did I dream of strength, power, and speed? Did I dream of winning, in my own way? Did I dream of feeling proud of myself for accomplishing yet another goal among the many I have accomplished over the past few years in spite of my eating disorder–graduation, National Novel Writing Month (twice), getting published, and my first 5k? Or did I dream of the race process itself, of concentrating on the road, keeping my eyes ahead, pushing myself, pushing myself, pushing onward, onward, onward, thinking of nothing else?
Perhaps it is in my resignation that I am not running this race that I acknowledge that I am indeed smothered by my anorexia symptoms right now, pulled under, defeated. I cannot run 5k. I cannot even run. I am only now beginning to walk without a mobility aid such as a cane or crutches. But eventually, I will be able to walk a mile again, then a mile and a half, then two–without setting myself back–because I will be healed. Eventually, I will be running. But it will take time. A long time. I know now that I must not attempt to do what I am not ready to do until I am fully healed.
And that goes for my anorexia itself right now, too. I cannot even begin to be expected to gain weight until, in my mind, I am ready to do so–otherwise it will backfire. This has happened time and time again. It is happening now. This is why I am restricting–because I was expected to gain weight way, way before I was ready. Yes, it backfired. I must be ready.
Maybe this analogy won’t work. I know my injury will heal. Of this, I am certain. But I am not certain that my anorexia will heal. Sure, I go up and down in mind and weight, but overall, I am not really getting better. To add insult to injury (sorry!) I had this same injury in 2005, and it improves when I lose weight! So there is a problem here.
Maybe my attitude will change, though. I cannot predict the future. There are other races, lots of them, coming up. November, December…maybe I’ll be running by then. Maybe I’ll be fit enough to race then, which means eating right, taking care of myself, and treating my body lovingly and with respect. That is the key.
So today, as I sit here and write these words, and gaze over at my dog, sleeping beside me, I wonder what she is thinking, her mama laid up…probably nothing at all. Because to Puzzle, it doesn’t matter if Mama raced or not. What matters is that Mama is staying alive to be Puzzle’s mama. Well, I plan to do just that. Not only that, but I’ll sign up for my next 5k as soon as I’m completely ready to race–and not sooner. Promise.
My e-mail to the AIDS race people regarding my participation in the Larry Kessler 5k
Of course, I will not be able to participate in the Larry Kessler 5k on June 5th. I signed up for it about three weeks ago roughly. Kathy Power of the AIDS Action Committee sent out an e-mail to race participants regarding the fundraising that runners have made so far. Here is my response:
Progress with REFEEDING EDEMA following caloric intake reduction–my report as of today
I have anorexia and am experiencing refeeding edema. I am reducing my caloric intake to get rid of the refeeding edema, against the wishes of my treatment team. Here is my progress report, Day Three:
Today when I awoke I noticed a “shifting” of swelling in my legs. My thighs were significantly less swollen. My calves were somewhat less swollen. My ankles were about the same, and my feet seemed larger, but it was hard to tell. I really didn’t notice until I put my shoes on, which was a bit later on. I did notice that my weight was lower, so I have lost more fluid. I didn’t dare look at my face. I haven’t looked at it ever since I saw it in the mirror and didn’t even recognize myself on Saturday, the day I made the decision to eat less and get rid of this horrible edema and massive, continuing weight gain over a period of 18 days that shocked the heck out of me.
I noticed that my food is now moving faster from my stomach into my intestines. Before, my 8:30 snack would still be sitting there in my stomach the following morning. This I noticed toward the end of the 18 days. Now, only a small amount of the snack seems to still be there. Of course, I have no way of measuring this. With the knowledge that my digestive system is still out of whack, and that energy is derived from my food later than usual, I ate my pre-run food early this morning–at 4am. From what I could tell, however, this was not early enough. I left the house at around 5, and I guess I started walking at the track (I am not running right now, which I will explain momentarily) at 5:20, it being a mile to get to the track, though in fact I was walking as soon as I left the house. I experienced a noticeable burst of energy at 6:30, while still walking. I believe that this was when I finally, after 2-1/2 hours, derived energy from my food. I need to eat it earlier. If I am awake at 3, I’ll eat it then, so that it’ll give me energy beginning at 5:30. But of course, as time goes on, my digestion will continue to improve–I hope. Two and a half hours is one heck of a long time.
I didn’t run, because shoe fit is still quite difficult. I am learning lacing fairly well. But in order to have them laced without pain, my heels come up out of the shoe significantly. I can’t run like that. But I can walk just fine. I walked to the track, walked 24 laps (six miles) then walked home. Then I walked the dog a mile, and later, walked to the drugstore, about a mile and a half round trip, totaling 10-1/2 miles for the day. I have no leg discomfort or discomfort on the bottoms of my feet, but there is some feeling in the way my ankles kind of spill over the tops of my shoes. I plan to walk my dog one more mile later on. During my six-mile walk, I had no problem with physical energy. I didn’t slow toward the end. My speed improved as I went along. My attitude was great. My body felt great. I felt lighter, and my body, specifically my legs, didn’t feel sluggish like they did before. If it weren’t for my shoe fit, I could have run for sure, not six miles, but maybe 13 laps, with ease. When I was in the throes of the edema, I struggled hard to sustain a seven-lap run, and my speed was horrendous.
Let’s see…what else. Constipation. With all the exercise I’m getting, you’d figure this would be no problem, but it has been. This was resolved this morning after my walk–finally. I hope it isn’t a problem in the future, but I fear that it will continue to plague my body for a bit before this whole thing ends.
My mood has been so-so…but definitely an improvement over Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I had thought my life was over due to rapid weight gain that was out of my control. Now, I’ve done something about it. Still, last night I realized I’ve got a long way to go with this. The swelling is going to take a long time to go down. My digestion is going to take a long time to work itself out. My body has been way, way out of whack for 18 days now. Of course, anorexia makes your body out of whack! But what I have gone through has been an absolute horrendous nightmare for me because of the threat of rapid weight gain and my fears of becoming overweight and everything that goes along with it–physically and psychologically–for a person with anorexia.
I was thinking this morning that what I am doing is the right thing. I am taking care of myself. I am following the contract set up between my therapist and myself, which states that I will take care of my body and treat it lovingly and with respect. Giving it refeeding edema and allowing my treatment team to tell me to accept rapid weight gain as my fate is NOT treating my body well.
So there you have it.
My “vacation” Day One this is how it’s going at 3pm
3pm-my ankles are still swollen. I have cut out a total of 230 calories so far from what I normally eat up till now. By the end of the day, it will be another 120, total 340. I was starving this morning @9am even though I had eaten after PZ’s walk. I kept myself busy until lunch. I didn’t feel up to walking to the supermarket today. Too depressed I guess, so I walked to the convenience store and bought diet cola–my friend–like the old days. Or maybe I was just too hungry to walk anywhere. I walked to the track, walked a mile, ran 1.75, walked .25, walked home, walked PZ a mile, and walked a mile (total round trip, that is) to the convenience store and back–total 7 miles so far today.
Knowing my luck, my weight will probably still go up, up, up. It is my body’s fate right now.
This is ridiculous. I shouldn’t be telling you these things. I should keep it to myself. It is none of your business.
I have signed up for my next 5k!
I have signed up for my next 5k! It will be the Larry Kessler 5k in Boston on June 5, 2011. The run is to benefit the AIDS Action Committee, and is part of the 10k AIDS Walk. These are annual events. The run goes along the Charles River, and begins at 9:50.
It was not as nerve-wracking signing up for this 5k as it was signing up for my first 5k, the Winter Classic, which took place last December. I already know what a race is like, since I have done one now. This will be a much bigger race, I think. I have a personal donation page, but I don’t think I’ll post the URL here. Or maybe I will. It is a private page. I have a personal blog there that is like this blog that talks about my running progress and about AIDS.
I have overdone it over the past eight days since getting over the infection from the infected tooth. I put in 72-1/2 miles on my new running shoes in those eight days. Forty-three percent of that was running and the rest was walking. Imagine that. I have run five miles every other day, and three or so every day off. And I haven’t had enough sleep. It’s the sleep thing that’s the clincher. I need to sleep. Very much so.
It seems that I can’t stop exercising. It’s like I feel compelled to get to the track at the crack of dawn. I leave the house so that I arrive at the track just as it’s light enough to run. This means exiting my apartment at around 5:10 on a clear morning, which means getting up at 4:10. It’ll be much earlier as spring progresses. This is scary. A couple of times, I’ve woken up at 2:30am and stayed up. When I go to the gym, I wake up at 3:35 and leave the house at 4:35 to get to the gym when they open at 5. Isn’t this a bit much? Last night, our washing machine malfunctioned and I was up past 11. Well past 11. Maybe 11:45. And then woke up at 4:10. So you see where this is headed. Pure exhaustion. And I’m going to get injured if this keeps up.
Meanwhile, I’ve got a race coming up. I’ve got to train well. Training well means taking care of my body, getting enough sleep, eating well, and knowing when enough is enough.
Okay, enough was enough today. I admit it. Tomorrow, rest. I promise.
My running is improving
I ran five miles again today. It wasn’t hard. It very well may have been 5.25. When I got to three laps, there was a possibility that it may only have been two, so I added a lap at the end, making the total 21, or possibly 20, depending.
Life is good. The weather is fabulous.
I am getting stronger.
I can run faster.
I can run farther.
My weight is improving.
My eating is improving.
I am taking better care of myself.
I have a life filled with love and goodness.
I look to the future with hope in my eyes, and joy in my heart.
Frank and I will have our cupcake party soon. And celebrate. I have a lot to be thankful for.
Happy Easter
