Recovered

I don’t need anyone. I am past that stage of needing someone to pick me up when I’m struggling with something. I spent five years in a revolving door of treatment centers, hospitals, outpatient doctors, and day programs. I’m better, I’m recovered, I’m cured, or at least that’s what I like to tell myself. I convince myself I’m past everything that nothing is allowed to upset me because that means I’m not better.

As someone who had an eating disorder, I’ve always thought of the world in black and white, and now is not much different. If I struggle with something, that means I am living a lie, and I never recovered, therefore recovery isn’t possible. Now I know that statement is COMPLETELY irrational but that is what goes through my mind on a daily basis and continues enabling the plastered smile on my face and the willingness to cater to everyone else’s needs. Now as I learned this Spring this cycle of thinking ends me back in a world of depression and restricting my food intake. I DO NOT want that to happen again, and lately I’ve been feeling scared. Scared that I’m never going to get past this belief in my core.

Its crazy how much easier it is to be vulnerable inside the safe walls of a treatment center, where you are expected and even encouraged to cry. In the real world you are told to put a smile on your face, to not think about the things that make you sad, and to remember that other people have it worse than you. Is this really a healthy way to be living? Or are we just breeding a generation of overachievers who are really crumbling on the inside but too scared to tell anyone?

I’ve learned these past two years I’ve been out of treatment that the most difficult thing isn’t following a meal plan, or accepting my body, but learning to use my voice. For so long I starved, cut, and purged to let people know I wasn’t okay, I didn’t know how to say the words out loud, I didn’t feel like I deserved to. Now I’m back in the real world and forget that it’s okay to tell people that I can’t handle something, or that I’m upset. I end up crying alone in my room away from everyone so that people keep believing the façade I present to the world. Why is it so scary to say out loud that I’m upset about something? This is a question I’m going to need to spend some time answering. As an old friend reminded me the other day, people relate to others who are real, not people we perceive as perfect and without problems.

So this is my goal for the upcoming semester. To stop saying “I’m fine” all the time, to ask for help, and to remind myself that no one can do it all.

I’m going to end this post with the lyrics of a Kate Voegele song that really resonates with me right now

Most days I try my best
To put on a brave face
But inside my bones are cold
And my heart breaks
But all the while something’s keeping me safe
And alive

But so many people are looking to me
To be strong and to fight
But I’m just surviving
And maybe weak but I’m never defeated
And I’ll keep believing in clouds with that sweet silver lining

And I won’t give up like this
I will be given strength
Now that I’ve found it
Nothing can take that away