the best way to keep what you have, is to give it away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vlOJ2-nh-w&ab_channel=KatelynWiersma


This is such a brave thing to do. I respect these girls beyond words. They've put themselves out there to raise awareness and to change our society. It's beautiful, honest, sad and so so so important for everyone to see.

It shows that this problem is in all places, across many ages. We need to change. If we don't every person with an eating disorder is forced to recovery in a society that refuses to. How can we change when the world we live in won't? We will be bombarded with triggering image forever until this changes.

Please pass this on. Continue sharing your story. As she so wisely said, the best way to raise awareness and to encourage change, is to tell your story. It also inspires those still struggling and let's them know that they aren't alone.


"Our flaws are what make us flawless."

i guess you could say i had been having a 10cc love affair.

So I finally had my very first psychotherapy and education group (PTE) with my local eating disorder treatment centre. I've had a few 1 on 1 sessions with my counselor there, but it was sporadic and not as regular as I had hoped. So I'm glad this has finally started so I can get on with making the changes I desire. I'm excited (but nervous) to learn the skills they will teach me and how to put them into action to start my road to recovery.

 I also met with their dietitian and she has given me an ED specific meal plan to regulate my eating. That scares the hell out of me. I never eat. I go all day with no food, then binge and purge at night. How am I supposed to avoid weight gain when I have to eat 6 times a day?!? Now I know that's Jenna, my ED identity, talking. She's the girl in my head screaming at me all day, telling me what to do to be skinny and criticizing when I don't lose weight. Or even worse, when I gain.  But still, eating is terrifying. What if I do gain weight? I can't afford to. Literally and metaphorically. I can't really afford new 'fat clothes'. I'm already at a much heavier weight since getting sober. The methadone and my anti-depressants make me crave sweets. And now that I'm not on the streets and am actually eating (sort-of), my weight has sky-rocketed. And worse, I don't have the dope to keep me from eating. It was my miracle drug. I felt good (or nothing) and never felt hungry. Win-win.

But sobriety has been so much better. I feel good. I feel normal for once in my life. So I'm not willing to throw all this work away over a few pounds. I have hard days with it still. Days when I want to just give it all up. Roxy, my addiction's identity (am I starting to sound crazy yet?), starts telling me about all the good times we had, about how much easier it was. About how happy I was. She reminds me of how many more friends I had. She promises I'll be okay and tells me to just let her out of the cages she's been put in for nine months.

"You have money now. Just take a few days off and celebrate with your left over birthday money. Come on, you deserve it after all this hard work!"

'But what if I get hooked again?'

"You won't. I'll protect you. Don't you want to lose that weight too?"

And with that thought, Jenna's on her side. I may be strong enough against Roxy now, but if they both team up on me, it's almost impossible to say no.

So I make a compromise. Instead of the drugs, I just won't eat. No drugs, no food. How does that seem fair? It isn't. But until I can get them both locked up, it's what my choice is.

So as you see, my life and sobriety is dangling by a thread. Not only do I want recovery, I need it. I just want it to work so badly. I can't live like this any longer. I want to quiet the voices in my head. I want to smile because I'm happy. I want to eat because I'm hungry. I want to look in the mirror and like what I see. I want to see my value as more than my weight and size. I want recovery.

I'm finally ready to take the steps, not just dream about them. Although the first group was pretty dull and only the introduction, it made me optimistic. I felt for once that I can  do this. And I will. It will be a long, hard road. But I've walked those before and ended up stronger than when I started. So it's time to do it again, to raise my head high, lift my feet, and walk this journey to freedom.

the way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.

The thing about me, as you'll come to see, is I'm all talk. Whether it's talking shit, talking myself up, talking myself down, or just plain talking because my ears like the sound of my own voice, that's all I am. Talk. I spend my whole life talking about things, writing about things, that at the end of the day, all my time was wasted in words, rather than actually getting up and doing something about it. I've been talking about recovery for years now, but when it comes down to actually doing it, I always fall short.

And the sad thing is, I'm so shy that most of my deeper talks are in writing or to myself. Anything else that comes out of my mouth around others is shallow, superficial. If there's anything at all. But I'm afraid to let people in any deeper. Like Nic Sheff says in the afterword from Tweak: 'I guess the biggest fear I had in the whole world was that someone would see what's inside of me and discover what an ugly, disgusting, horrible person I really am.'
So all this means that I'm all talk, but most of my talk goes completely unheard. So really what do I have? Nothing, I'm alone.

I guess there's still just a comfort in words for me though. Which is really why I even started writing this blog. Even if nobody even knows it exists, at least I do. At least I can write exactly how I feel, and write my way through whatever I'm going through. At least it's not bottled up inside of me, building pressure waiting for me to explode until I have to purge it all out. Metaphorically and literally. Which is why I'm so shocked that I have quite a few page views. I'd be happy with one, but excitingly enough, there's even more people reading than I ever thought. It's scary as hell, knowing people are reading what I have to say, knowing things about me even the closest people to me don't even know. But it's oddly comforting too, knowing someone is there listening.

So I guess the point of this post, and title quote from my beloved Walt Disney, is to say thank you to anyone that's has so much as opened my blog. It doesn't seem like much, but for some reason when I looked into the mirror today, and saw how ugly I'm becoming. How my usually deep brown eyes where empty, hollow. My usually beautiful smile seemed horribly fake. How my twenty year old face looked as though it's aged 100 years. How my reflection just seemed dead, I guess I just realized that something needs to change. But like always, changing for me, is seemingly impossible. It's hard to find the energy to pick yourself up, when you've always just fallen back down even harder. And like I said, I'm all talk.

But then I thought of anyone reading. I thought, what if there's a girl out there somewhere, in my shoes. What if she's reading this, reading my lack of motivation. My lack of any real hope. What if she's reading and starts to lose hope too. That's the last thing I want. And so I realized how much hope this all has given me. Even one reader would give me a sense of support. And because I feel overwhelmingly not alone for once, guess that I've found it in me to pick myself up again, and try.

And in the spirit of changing, I figured, what better way to thank everyone reading who has given me the courage, strength and hope to try again, by than actually trying again? Instead of just using words, just saying thank you, I will use my actions as a thank you. I can't guarantee that it will all work out in the end, but I won't ever know if it will until I stop talking and begin doing.

And as a final word, since this post is just too 'perc-y' (pun and misspelling totally intended) and too optimistic for my taste (I can't totally change overnight, hahah), stay tuned for tomorrow: Day One of Excruciating Withdrawal-Enough to Blow My Brains Out. Sounds fucking fantastic.

moving on is a simple thing, what it leaves behind is hard.

This is what happens every time I start something, try to get better, try to do something with what I've been dealt to help myself, and hopefully to help others. I start, with so much dedication and drive, but within a few weeks, my ED loops me back in, my addiction dictates how I function, and then I eventually give up because I can't seem to tell myself that I can do this, I can beat this. I say I can, but deep down, I don't really believe in myself  anymore. I started and restarted this blog in hopes to write my way through recovering from an excruciatingly long run of bulimia, and to maybe have someone, even if it's just one person reading even just one of my posts, feel like they aren't alone. That there's tons of us out here looking for someone to resuscitate them. But somehow on the way, I've just give up twice. And as soon as things got tough, I cracked. Instead of grieving the loss of my dad the healthy way, I snort drugs until I can't feel any pain. I'm no role model, and I shouldn't even have a blog. What is anyone going to take from me? That I'm a bulimic who tries to recover and ends up with a severe drug addiction on top of everything? I'm pathetic and nobody should look up to me, nobody should read this and think that I'm any example of anything. I wanted to encourage people. I wanted to give girls younger than me, less deep than me, hope that they can beat this. And all I've done is shown how weak I am. How I can't ever do what I set out to do. How I just let my problems walk all over me, let Jenna, the girl who's my reflection, control my life until I'm so beaten down I can't get back up.

I wish I knew why I just can't let go of this. Why I can't say good bye to my ED identity that is Jenna, for good. Is it because she's become so apart of me that I don't know how to live without her anymore? Can't live without her anymore? It can't be because I'm afraid of failure, I'm pretty used to that by now. I think it's because moving on, and letting her go, not living with my ED defining me, is so unfamiliar and uncertain. What if I get better, and I still think I'm fat, still think I'm ugly, still feel so worn down and tired? What if I let go of who I've become, to only feel the same or worse, just without my identity? Lost and alone. Because sometimes the only way I can deal with all of this is knowing that I am here, and Jenna is apart of me, keeping my going, even if it hurts like hell.

I think I'm just afraid that when I finally just simply let go, what's left after that will hurt. The process after will be hard, and long, and tiring. Afraid that it will all be for nothing.

So since I have nothing better to give to you, take this: don't look up to me. Don't read my posts and think I'm strong and can influence you to get better. You have to get better on your own. You have to pick yourself up and stop living and doing things because and for others. Because if you only try to recover because you read someone's blog, you're not doing it for the right reasons, you'll end up falling back down because you weren't ready. And in the end, pleasing other people is the whole fucking problem here anyways. So when you're ready, when you can finally accept that it's time to let go, don't be afraid, just do it. You only get one shot at this, and not going for it isn't benefiting you anyways.

Sorry about the gloom, have a good rest of the night (or morning? ahaha, drugs).

an optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in, a pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves.

So which one am I? (I know it's only 4:35am on New Years Eve, but I'm starting this year's celebration alittle earlier. Or I suppose, due to my new found habit, continuing the celebration from the night before).

I guess this year I'm a bit of both, as much as I'd like to be only an optimist, I'm also realistic (at least in some ways) and understand that I've never been much of a positive person. Plan for the worst, hope for the best.

See, this year, of all years has been a bit unusual for me. And mostly in a horrific way. Not only has Jenna taken over my life significantly this year, I've also lost alot of people that mean the world to me.

It all started fairly early in the year. My grandma, who was elderly became sick. The next thing I knew she was in the hospital, and a day later, she was gone. Over the last few years, as my disorder took over my body, I haven't been that close with my Grandma. This was the first lesson I got in making sure you always save time for those you love, you never know when you're going to lose them.

Next, and thankfully (or not, depending on how you see things) not as sudden, was my best friend, my brother, and my amazing dog Rogan. As a vegetarian, and an animal lover, I did see my furry friend, of eight years, as one of the closest people to me. I loved him so much. He was with my through thick and thin (literally and figurativey) and unlike everyone else around me, he loved me unconitionally and unjudgementally. He hit me harder than my grandma did. And unfortunately, his death was overshadowed, and didn't get the attention and greving it deserved.

But nothing, and I mean nothing hit as hard as the day I lost my dad. He was only 55 years old. With so many years ahead of him. My heart sank getting a text from my mom, telling me to come home immediately. I knew somehting was wrong, but she wouldn't tell me. I got a ride from my boyfriend, Ryan. There were five cop cars outside my house. No ambulance. I couldn't possibly imagine what could be going on. Was someone in trouble with the law? Was I?

I never in a million years guessed that my aunt would say, "Jordyn, your dad's dead." I could see sick, a heart attack or stroke (he'd had both in the past). But nothing prepared me for "dead." He was the most important person in my life. One of the only men I'll ever love, along with my brothers, and hopefully one day when (if) I'm married, husband.

The last few months since October 26th have been a blur. Filled with funerals, calls from collection angencies about my dad (news to everyone), crying, anger, eating, puking, drinking myself sick, and now, my newest way to forget. I can't see myself healing from this anytime soon. I don't know if I ever will.

And see, through all this I've really only lost myself. Through all this pain, self induced or death induced, I've moved towards ways to make me forget, make me not feel the pain I feel. I don't want to hurt. I've always hurt enough without everything else I've been through this year. I thought I couldn't recognize the person I saw in my reflection, but I was wrong. Now I see that I've just been seeing me disapear, as Jenna comes into view. But now, when I look at myself, I definitely don't know who's staring back at me. And this new girl, she scares me to death. I thought Jenna was scary, but this girl takes it to a whole new level.

And so I wonder, will I ever get Jenna back? Will I ever get me back? ANd this is why I'm both a pessimist and an optimist this year. I will stay awake all night, to see this horrible year leave me, and to welcome the new year in, hoping it will be better for me. For everyone. Hoping I'll finallly get everything my life put back in place.

So happy new year everyone. Enjoy your last night of 2011, and your first day of 2012.

Let's just fucking hope it isn't the end of the world like everyone says. Wouldn't that just blow.