The Panic

There is nothing I can say that describes the panic I feel when I binge on something and it doesn't come up. Obviously, the number of times a day I binge a day, this is going to happen at some stage. WHich it does. Some days, it happens with each binge, and some days just once. It's very difficult to get it to come up sometimes. It makes me feel sick with worry and panic knowing that that food is in my body and I feel physically unwell with panic and fear about the consequences and how fat I'm going to get. When I think about it, my binges are probably only about twice to three times the size of a normal meal, and my eyes are far bigger than my stomach is. I don't even eat that much before I have to go get rid of it...

I shouldn't be writing this. actually, it might give people ideas if they read and and there's nothing I can say that describes the panic I feel thinking that someone might thing I am 'pro-ana' or 'pro-mia'. I HATE that shit. It is disgusting. The girls that set up those websites don't have eating disorders, they have a death wish and they are sick in the head far greater than anyone I've ever seen in all those hospitals. They don't even have eating disorders or have the problems and histories that most people with eating disorders have. They prey on people with genuine problems and it's not even immoral, it's amoral.

One of the sickest ones I ever read on one of those sites amongst a whole big long list of tips and hints for losing weight and hiding the eating disorder, was one that suggested putting money in a piggy bank every time you felt hungry and didn't eat, and then use that money to buy a smaller pair of jeans. How fucked up is that. In theory, for someone really overweight who have real weight problems (which by the way is the same as anorexia, the same feelings are there and there is a lot of similarities in the relationship with food, which not a lot of people know as it happens) and were trying to get in to smaller jeans, then it's actually a really good idea, fair play to them, a reward. But for an anorexic, it's just one step closer to death and life - long health problems, and that to me is just fucking disgusting.

Do you seriously want to end up looking like that? Please GOD tell me no. I have great fears for anyone who ever wanted to look like that. I'll be totally honest, and this is hard for me to admit to, but that is a picture of me. And that wasn't at my worst either. I'm sorry for putting that there, but this is the truth and it has to come out. I am NOT proud of this. At all. I admit though, I used to be. Losing weight was like ecstasy, and I was addicted to it. But there's nothing to be proud of here. There never was. I used to get a sick sense of pride when I skipped a meal or made it smaller, and felt a thrill when the scales went down. I used to feel superior when other's ate and I didn't, and something else I used to do, was feed other people. I used to make meals laiden with fat and calories and then watch them eat it, feeling so proud when I wasn't eating it. I'm not proud of it, but I know this is quite common in people with anorexia.

Being back at college is helping things a lot. There is nothing I can say to describe the panic I feel when I think about how much work I have to do this semester and how badly I'm going to do. What if I can't keep up? What if I fail? I'm a fraud, and I don't belong on this course, and I shouldn't be allowed because as usual, I'm not good enough. I've never felt good enough for anything in my whole life, and this is no exception. 

Just looking at this quote above, and it seems like that was a good one to put there. I DO confine myself to things. and I set the bar so high that it's impossible ever to reach them. So my walls are infinite and unreachable, so I'm permanently trapped by my stupid walls. Will I smash them down and make new ones, closer to home, where I can stay safe in a bubble and not fail. But then I'm still trapped in a box, and that wouldn't work. How do I let people in? How do I get out and meet people and have a life beyond food and exercise? I need to know there is more out there. I need to know people want to be my friend and love me for the real Pippa that I am, I have to believe that there's more to life and that people in college want to talk to me. I hope they do. I feel like an outcast because I'm a bit older. 

Still though, I love college. I have a non - zero day every day without even trying and that's awesome. It makes me feel so so good, and I love having a purpose in life. Something to work towards, a career, a future and a life. A life full of positive things and great work. I just hope I can step up and be the best that I can be, while at the same time being 'average' and being OKAY with being just okay, and not perfect. Cos let's face it, none of us are. Everyone is different and thank God for that. 

The Hospitals

I’ve decided to throw some positive quotes or pictures in to my blog so it’s a little less boring and not so much block text to read, cos I do have a habit of rambling on a bit about things. Especially when there’s so much to say.

What follows, it has to be said, put my family and friends through hell, and this blog post is a plea for forgiveness to those I hurt during these years. Some friends, I have lost, because of this. Those still with me, I thank, endlessly for staying with me and sticking by me through some of the worst, difficult and most painful years of my life. I have decided not to use any names on this, but the people who truly stuck by me and remain my friends know who they are. I cannot thank you enough. I know I put you through so much pain and angst and worry and for that I give my truly most heartfelt apology.

Those who didn’t stick by me, I don’t blame. Situation reversed, I don’t think I could watch someone slowly kill themselves time and again. I could now, because I have learned patience and empathy and I could now spend time and energy helping that person. That’s why I started this blog, so that others with this problem could reach out to me and talk to me and hopefully with my help get through their difficulty. So this post is also an appeal to anyone with a problem to come talk to me. I am a friend and I understand. Anyone who wants to talk even if it’s just to bitch about life, that’s fine with me, I’m here whenever, just to chat, as a friend. Doesn’t have to be anything more than that if that’s not what you want.

Anyway, the hospital years. It started in England, where I spent ten months as an inpatient in a hospital in Preston, which is in the North of England, relatively near Manchester. The cost of it was astronomical and the effort my parents and doctors and family put in to get funding for it was amazing, so thank you for that. What sickens me is that not everyone in my position would be able to get funding for it, what happens to them? Do they just struggle on and eventually die of this illness? What are they supposed to do? It doesn’t bear thinking about. I had intensive therapy there, and a lot of physical care and slow, very slow refeeding which has to be done very slowly not just because of the emotional struggle there is to an introduction of food but also because of the physical dangers. Re – feeding syndrome can set it and it can be life – threatening. I got it once, later on, in hospital and it was really dangerous.

I spent ten long months there, followed by six weeks doing day – care, which meant my dear mother had to move over to England to be with me, and we lived in a cottage where I gradually began to lose all the weight I had put on in the Priory. As I write this, I am battling the urge to get rid of the small dinner I just ate with Kegan, who patiently sat with me as we ate together. I made something, and ate it. I find that almost impossible to do. But I did it. I deliberately didn’t eat my banana today so I’d feel better about it but I don’t. I really want to get rid of it. So I’ll keep writing this until I can’t bear it anymore. It might not be very long, it might be an hour. I don’t know.

By the time I got back to Ireland, the first doctor’s appointment I had required a weigh – in, as I was well used to, since I got weighed every single morning at half seven in a special robe that weighed nothing. I used to drink loads and put weights in my knickers so they wouldn’t increase my calories again, which they always did. I dreaded seeing the dietician because she always put my calories up. By the time she was done, I was eating over three thousand calories a day and not putting on weight. When they weighed my in the surgery, I was exactly the same weight that I was on my first weigh – in in the Priory. I was shocked and horrified. All that effort, all that money and all the time everyone spent putting in to getting me better had been for nothing. All those star charts I made… six stars a day, gold if I ate and didn’t cry, silver if I ate it and cried like a baby, and none if I puked it up or refused it. Eventually I had a week of gold stars and I was so, so proud of myself.

Getting back to Ireland was difficult. I came back to a broken home. My parents were in the middle of separating. I hadn’t seen it coming, because I wasn’t there. Within weeks, I was weighing 33kg and dangerously ill. It was hospital time again. This time, a general hospital, where they were by no means equipped to deal with someone in such an emotionally damaged person. This was medical, not mental. I had a brilliant dietician this time and she called on my adult side to eat what she prescribed and not make a fuss. I did this, every time, and I made more star charts and kept to it. Mainly because the consultant threatened me with a naso – gastric tube if I didn’t. I didn’t want that. It meant taking away all my control. I was adult enough to not require that. For 8 weeks I stayed there, and I felt safe. I got to 38kg and they decided I was ready to face the world.

I did okay for a while, and lived with my boyfriend who I re-united with. Not the banana guy, the other one, who made me happy. It worked for a bit, I was away from my parents, away from the fighting. Eventually, my mum moved out. I stayed with my boyfriend, but he was more like a nurse. We became like brother and sister and it didn’t work. He broke up with me, so I got a tattoo. Fuck it.

After that I spent about a year out of hospital. I did a fashion and sewing course, after deciding that music was the worst thing I could possibly doing with my life. Loved that. I was seeing a therapist once a week, and a psychiatrist who I had met in England, she actually flew over to meet me in the Priory. Didn’t like her much really. Eventually the weight fell away again as the exercise increased and the food got less and less. I ended up in St. Michael’s Psychiatric Unit in Clonmel, Tipperary. I was warned. Rightly. It was hell, absolute hell. I couldn’t have been in a worse place. Paint peeling off the walls, and it was, and this sounds fucking awful, but it was a nuthouse. I FELT crazy in there. Ok, I was fucking crazy, and I belonged there because I was insane. I spent three months there. It started out in what was called the OB, high obs, where there were about six or eight beds, all in one room, and the nurse’s station in a glass box looking in at everyone. There was a smoking room and a lock away quiet room where you went if you kicked off and went crazy. I’m not kidding. I only went there once in all the seven times I was there. Once, I was only there for a day (I checked myself out), another three month stay over the years as well. There was no bathroom unaccompanied, no shower without a nurse, and I was in a wheelchair to preserve energy. Not that I ever stayed in it.

But seriously, there is just no way to even describe this place. I was hit, slapped, kicked and had my stuff stolen from other patients. People were really ill there, as was I. I don’t think people realise how unwell you can actually get when you’re mentally ill. People have no idea how bad things can get, how literally ‘out of your mind’ one can get. It can be horrific, believe me, I’ve seen it.

After these stays, I stayed out for a while, and went to study childcare in Cork. While I was there, the girls I was living with decided I couldn’t live with them, because of my eating disorder. They kicked me out. In fairness to them though I was stealing their food and God knows what else. I did not have a good time in Cork. It was very, very difficult because I wasn’t ready to be living away from home, I wasn’t well enough, and it just went so badly.

After this, the weight began to fall away from an already very low weight. At the time, I was spending one week with mum and another with dad. I was the only reason they had any contact, which is a difficult position to be in. Probably not as difficult as it was for them though, I can see that now. They did a sort of ‘handover’ on a Monday morning, like the nurses did in hospital. I got away with murder at mum’s, walking like crazy and bingeing and all the rest, and then was on a very tight lease with dad. He didn’t let me do anything. The amount of food I hid and that got found every single day was unbelievable. He searched me every day, and I wasn’t even allowed to go to the bathroom alone. Aged 22. On the other hand, mum offered to take me to the bathroom after meals, so that I wasn’t tempted to throw up. She was helping. We got in a lot of fights though. To this day, the only thing we fight about is food. I love my mam.

Eventually, I ended up back down at my lowest weight ever, 31kg. That’s a BMI of less than 11. I was naso gastrically fed for eight weeks. I threw up that tube so many times, and I also used to turn down the amount of calories on the machine so I wasn’t getting as much. How they ever put up with me I will never know. I wasn’t even allowed out of bed to go to the bathroom, and was supervised on the camode.

I moved out of home away from mam and dad, which was really only so I could binge more. We began writing letters to the HSE to get funding to go to an eating disorder unit in Dublin. I got it. Only one person in Ireland has ever been awarded it, and that’s me. I went there, and lasted ten weeks of the twelve week stay. Eventually it got too hard for me and I went back to my binge house. Within weeks I was at my worst ever…

The last hospital stay was also in the regional in Limerick. Again, I went down to 30kg. I spent the night in HDU (high dependency unit) but refused naso gastric feeding. I was old enough now and wise enough that I said I would feed myself under supervision of the dietician. It seemed to work, the plan. Except it didn’t. I binged at every meal, and put the nurses through hell. How I got away with it for so long I’ll never know. I was on one to one nursing, which meant having someone with me at all times, day and night. It ended one night when I had a binge on cereal and a loaf of bread and butter, which actually, is tame when you think about what I do every day now… anyway, I was dragged back from the bathroom before I had a chance to get rid of it, so I puked on the floor like, everywhere, and I mean everywhere, as I was dragged back to bed. I was screaming. It was torture. At one am, I was convinced that I was going to die, that this was the end. I no longer wanted to be alive and did not see a way out. I phoned my mum and asked her to come and say goodbye. I had two nurses by my bed the entire night.

Since then, it’s been uphill. I began to eat better, and was released. Well actually, I fell out with my doctor and discharged myself, but I haven’t been in hospital since. I’ve said in a previous post I haven’t weighed myself since I was 24, which is nearly two and a half years, about two months after that last hospital stay. I met Kegan and moved out of the binge house. We moved in together and I am so happy now with him and our two cats. Ok, I still binge, but I don’t starve myself anymore.

Now all I have to do is stop bingeing and eat full meals like everyone else does. The next few posts will be my attempts to get better and beat the bulimia. Words of encouragement greatly appreciated!

The Past

It started when I was about fourteen. I began experimenting with bulimia, and I think the first thing I ever threw up was chocolate ice cream. I remember it so well, and will never forget it. I ate some, with my family, and I remember feeling overwhelmed with guilt at what I had just eaten. I know everyone else had eaten it, but I felt fat and disgusted with myself. I had already had dinner with my family after promising myself I'd only eat a tiny bit but then I got hungry and it was served and I felt so guilty after eating it. I started making all these meal plans with low calorie and low fat foods like rice and soup and beans on toast without butter and stuff. But it never worked, and I always ate anyway. 

I was always a good eater. Had a healthy appetite and ate when hungry and ate enough to keep going. More than most of my friends or family did, and I was never fat. Ever. I stayed at about seven stone for all my teenage years no matter how much I ate. Ok, I had no boobs and no ass, until I got to age fourteen. Then I started eating quite a lot of chocolate (not as much as I do now...) and instead of putting on weight, I got boobs and that ass I needed so much. Boys took more of an interest, and my periods started. Around this time, the eating disorder really kicked off and I started self harming, especially when something went wrong. I used to do it in the bath, with a razor or with scissors or anything sharp I could find. Started with a rather blunt and rusty blade I discovered from somewhere. The feeling of release when I finally drew blood was such a rush.

I’m not proud of it at all, just trying to explain that at the time it helped me through the day which I dreaded. I was in Transition Year at school and became deeply unhappy and began writing dark poetry. I dreaded school every day but I knew when I got home after homework, which I did and studied for with a dressing gown belt tied so tightly around my waist I could hardly breathe because it made me look thinner, that I could cut. And it got me through the time. I lay under the covers in the dark with my blade, and nobody knew what I was doing.

Mam asked about the cuts on my arm a couple of times, and I just said it was the cat who scratched me. She knew full well. She’s a good mother, and she knows everything. I don’t know if she knew I was throwing up my dinner every day. Probably.

It all came out in the wash when my sister read my diary because she was worried about me and wanted to find out what was going on. I’ll never forget it. We were on a car journey and she cried the whole way to west Cork. And I was texting her even though we were sitting beside each other, and I begged her not to tell my parents. But she did. I’ll never forget it. In the end, we went to the sea side and I tore up the diary and threw it in the sea and said it was over. It wasn’t.

I stopped for a while, but then I went on the Spanish exchange. Two weeks, and I wasn’t used to drinking and found it difficult to fit in. On the last night, the day before I was due to fly home, the other Irish girl I was there with went off with some guy, and the boys were busy buying dope to smoke and I was left with this sleazy Spanish dude who attacked and raped me in the park.

After I got back, the eating disorder kind of went in to overdrive. However, I got in to a more serious relationship and felt steadier and happier, though I was still unhappy at school. Studied for my leaving cert with the belt around me and was still inducing vomiting a lot and endlessly writing meal plans that I couldn’t stick to because I was hungry.

Then, I got in to music college. The stress to perform and be perfect was unbelievable. I felt totally inadequate, all the time. I drank a lot and partied hard, but began to gain weight from eating crap food after nights out. I felt out of control and frightened of the weight gain. I began going out with a guy who made me feel absolutely useless and pathetic.

Then the bulimia really began. I drank glasses of salt water to induce vomiting, and stole my housemate’s vodka with I drank shots of to try to make myself sick. It was horrible. I began abusing laxatives, up to a hundred a day, and eventually boots refused to sell them to me. I went to every pharmacy in Cork to get them.

I was jogging 4 miles to the gym, swimming an hour and using the gun and then running the 4 miles home again. My college work suffered and I was too exhausted to even pick up my cello bow.

My parents began to notice my lack of eating when I came home at weekends. My granny came to visit and we went out for a meal, and I didn’t eat anything, I think I managed one mushroom. My dad approached me, and scooped me up in to his arms and asked me why I wasn’t eating. I didn’t know what to say. Stopped going home at weekends.

Eventually, the weight loss was impossible to ignore and I was taken to the doctor, who threatened me with a police escort to hospital and diagnosed me with severe anorexia and chronic bulimia. One night my mam rang me and said she’d been talking to the doctor and was worried that my potassium was low because of the vomiting and when I told my boyfriend, he knocked on my door and shoved a banana in my face. I pretended to eat it and threw it away. Inconsiderate asshole. I’ll never forget it.

My first admission to hospital was because of severe dehydration. I stayed a couple of days. Eventually my mam and dad pulled me out of college and brought me home. I was dangerously ill. What followed was a ten month long admission to a special eating disorder unit in Preston, England. The priory, how very rock and roll of me. I don’t think I can write about that, it’s too painful.

Next post, is to tell the story of the hospital stays in the psychiatric hospitals in Ireland. There were so many. I have spent a total of one year in those hospitals, in bits, up to 3 month stays, and some only a day. The tales are horrific.

Sorry this is a bit bleak. More positive stuff will follow. Once my story is out, I can begin to talk each day about the steps I am taking towards recovery, and the struggles I have with trying to get better.

Today, I made it a non zero day by writing this, and by sitting down to have dinner with Kegan (my partner) and keeping it down. I did it! I actually had dinner! Decided that every time I feel fat, which is a lot, I’m going to eat something. Here’s to recovery! Thanks for reading this.

The Non - Zero Day

The Non - Zero Day

Those awful words.... 'You've put on weight' which still, after all this time, all these years, translate to me as 'you're fat(ter)' and I hate it. With a passion. It really got to me today, even though I know perfectly well he meant it as a good thing, telling me I looked healthier and better, and even asked me if I felt better and stronger than this time last year. He was genuinely trying to make me feel better. So are all the people who say it. I hate it.

Honestly, it really got to me. Not enough to not go home and eat a chocolate bar and not walk today.Which I am quite proud of myself for doing. The Pippa of last year would have walked an extra hour or two after a comment like that. I walk a lot. Like, a lot... As in, more than four hours a day a lot. But it was cold, and the weather was typically Irish, so I thought, right, screw it, I'm not going to bother. So I cleaned  the house instead. Good job done! Nothing ever gets done on walking days, and if it does, it's all in a rush because there's nothing more important than those pavements pounding or the road ahead.

The only other thing more important is the Binge. Oh yes. I live for it. It's all I think about.I even dream about it. Food is my life. I'm always hungry, because I don't eat enough and that, I think, is how it all started, the hunger thing. Suddenly eat horrific amounts of food and then feel so guilty and get rid of it all? Not any more. I'm just addicted to doing it. And I hate it. But I crave it, really crave it. The anticipation as I prepare it all, the endorphins rushing through me as I taste it all, and the final rush as it all comes back up, that release. I'm throwing up more than just binge food. Far more. All the feelings come out too, the ones I can't get rid of no matter how many times I purge. They may never go away, and I am going to have to find a way of getting them out before this kills me or ends any good thing I have in my life.

I haven't weighed myself for nearly two and a half years. I never will again, as long as I live. I have no idea what I weight and I DON'T CARE. The day I turned 24 I said right that's the end of all this crap. I haven't been in hospital since, and the scales were smashed on the ground. And I never looked back. I came close once or twice, but stopped myself. I made that promise to myself and stuck to it. Ok, I broke all the promises I made about bingeing, every last one, even though I got rid of all the binge food in my flat, just bought it all again. I lasted four days.

I can't even last one now. But I guess I'll give that up when I'm ready, or at least figure out something good to do instead of doing it. On a walking day, I walk as much as possible and fill my morning with as many good things as possible before bingeing because nothing gets done afterwards. Only more walking and more binges. So I leave it as late as possible. I can go to 7 p.m. now that I'm in college, without doing it. Which is a big change. I've got used to that now and can manage. That's a good thing.

Oh yeah, I was talking about turning 24. I'm 26 now and still bingeing. But those scales never found their way back in to my life and they never will. Girls, there's more to life than just a number on a metal box. Nobody knows that number and nobody cares. How dare these people dictate that we should be a certain way?! How dare they! We are who we are, and we are loved for who we are by those who we love back, and that should be all that matters. I wish all this nonsense would just stop.

The question is.... how? How do I stop eleven years of a habit just like that? I've tried cold turkey so many times and it doesn't work. Do I cut out one binge at a time until there's only one left per day? I know I'm going to have to stop once my teeth are fixed. I'll destroy my new ones if I don't. I have to. But... like I said... How??

I should end this blog. It's long and boring. But before I do, I must refer to its title. The non zero day. I read some dude from America's blog and it was all about making the day a non zero day. That is to say. doing something every day that is working towards your future. And it really had an impact on me. Me, I've written this today or at least over the last two day to make it a non zero day. Because this is part of my becoming a journalist. During my month off college, we're supposed to be working on a portfolio and starting a blog. So here it is. Try to make every day a non zero day! It's worth it! Makes you feel so much better about life. My friend is doing the same thing and we're doing it together and comparing notes. Haven't checked in with her today but I'm sure she's done something too. Even if it's two sentences, half an hour walk, or for me, half an hour walk LESS, or eating an extra mouthful, or spending time with a friend (which I did today instead of walking), anything that makes you feel good. Then it's a non zero day. Trust me, it makes you feel good.

Here's to the future! More tomorrow. xxx