"Anyway! As you may or may not be aware, anorexia is a lifestyle. Honestly. For someone entrenched, or at least as entrenched as I am, it is a lifestyle. It influences every decision you make. Every thought you think. Everything you see and do is stitched with anorexia. It never leaves your mind. Never ever ever."
This is still somewhat true but on a much, much smaller scale (no pun intended). The thoughts don't really ever go away entirely but now they are more of a soft murmur from somewhere kind of far away than a scream in the ear. My hunger is louder than my eating disorder.
"At the end of every one of those years except 2004, I was hating my body. This year is no different. I have accomplished a lot of things in 2012. Made a lot of good friends. Lost a few friends. Gained some new family. Lost some family. Tried new things. Went new places. Got better. Got sicker. Over all it was a good year."
Overall this year was good too. I accomplished a lot. Made new friends. Found new communities. Got a new job. Tried new things. Got stronger.
"What am I thinking about? I'm thinking about how fat my thighs are and how I can get rid of my love handles that I hate so much and what angle is most flattering for a picture."
While I can't say that I'm 100% at peace with my body, I'm a lot more affectionate towards it than I was back then. Now I've seen what it's truly capable of and it amazes me. Never did I imagine, back then, that I'd be sitting in my room, writing a blog post while listening to my four year old downstairs having her first sleepover with a friend and periodically flicking my eyes over to the baby monitor on the bedside table to check on my one year old as he sleeps peacefully in his crib, while my dog snores at my feet. My body is tired from teaching a class at 5:45 in the morning (which I do three mornings a week) and also from taking a boxing class on Saturday and again tonight (another thing which I never thought I'd be doing).
I mean... wow. I've come SO FAR.
The pictures on the end of that blog post make me feel..... nothing really. I don't feel triggered when I look at them. I don't look like that now, and that's a good thing. Some parts of me I think look better, some parts look worse. But you know what? 9 times out of 10 that's fine with me. My body has grown two children, fed them both and a dozen other babies (either one time or over a period of time) and that is truly astonishing to me. After the years of abuse, my body came through after all.
So here's a few pictures from THIS year. Showing me in my real life. Here's to another year.. let's see what 2019 has in store.
It's been a lot of fun watching your recovery these past few years. You seem much happier!
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