Change.

I stepped on a scale yesterday. I haven’t posted in a while. It’s not because I haven’t wanted to or that I haven’t been taking the time to reflect, I guess I just haven’t been sure how to write what I’ve been thinking. It’s hard to explain the constant pressure that I feel from everyone that I know is just the pressure I put on myself. It’s hard to write down every swirling thought in my head in the way I want to portray them. It’s intimidating to put thoughts out into the world that I don’t really understand yet. I stepped on a scale yesterday for the first time in months damn well knowing it wouldn’t make me feel better. But I did it anyways. And I don’t understand why, but at the same time I do.

A lot has been changing recently, and while I welcome these changes with excitement, it feels like a constant force tearing me apart with anxiety. I started recovery in July of 2020, and I’m still in recovery in September 2021. I never would have thought that I’d be where I am today, in a place where I can acknowledge what food freedom is, and a place where I’m learning to accept myself with the flaws that I used to hate myself for. But at the same time, the voice in my head that I’ve slowly been blocking out, criticizes me for STILL being in recovery. For not being fully recovered or off my depression medication. If I’ve grown and learned so much then why do I still get the temptations to use my coping skills of numbing out? Why do I worry about relapsing when the other constants in my life are no longer constants? I’m starting a new job, moving to a different part of the country – two things that I can’t even describe how excited I am for – but I can’t get the voice out of my head that tells me to keep the constant that is my eating disorder. To go back into the corner that gives me safety and comfort when I’m scared of the unknown.

And if I’m still in a place where I’m tempted by my eating disorder over a year after starting recovery, what does that say about me? That voice tells me that it makes me weak. That I don’t deserve to be rid of the eating disorder. That I’m no one without it. That’s the voice that told me to step on the scale. That I would feel better just knowing what the number was instead of wondering. But shocker, it didn’t make me feel better. It made me feel numb. It made me feel overwhelmed with shame, guilt, embarrassment, disappointment, and at the same time, control. I consciously made the decision to step on the scale. That was in my control. That was a decision that I made and executed. Was that momentary feeling of control worth it? I’m not sure.

While I was overwhelmed and confused about the way the scale made me feel, it brought me back to reality and brought me back to the voice that I have learned to listen to – my own. Yes, stepping on the scale temporarily made me feel in control, and then made me feel the usual feelings of shame and guilt, but now? Now I can separate myself from what I saw on the scale and understand that yes, I’m still in recovery over a year after I started and it’s longer than I thought it was going to be, but I just stepped on the scale and didn’t let it control me. I separated myself from the number and after a few hours, it was just that to me. A number that I used to value myself by became a number that I don’t factor into my worth.

And while a new city and a new job are big changes in my life, I sometimes forget that this entire past year has been a year of big changes. And I haven’t given into a relapse yet. I’ve felt more uncomfortable in the last year and a half than I have probably my entire life, and I was able to get through it without relapsing. So why would these changes be anything different? If I’ve been able to essentially rewire my brain and become someone I wouldn’t have recognized a year ago, then what makes me think that I can’t handle the changes that are coming? If anything, in the grand scheme of things, these changes seem miniscule to the internal changes that have transpired in the last year. I don’t give myself enough credit for the progress that I’ve made or the changes that I’ve made, because yeah a year ago a new job and a new city probably would have caused me to spiral back into that safety net of the eating disorder, but now I see everything that I have to lose if I were to do that. Everything that I have repaired and built upon would be thrown away. And I know myself well enough now to know that I’m not going to let that happen. I’m going to thrive in this new job and I’m going to thrive in my new city. And I’m going to be uncomfortable and scared, but I’ve been uncomfortable and scared for the last year and look at how much growth has come of it.

I want to be in a place where I don’t even remember what the eating disorder feels like. What that sense of power and control and high feels like. But the thing is, I don’t think that I can forget it. Because if I forget what the eating disorder feels like, I forget the pain that it caused. The pain it caused not only my body and mind, but the pain it caused to everyone I love. Amidst the big changes coming into my life, I need to remember everything that the eating disorder took away and everything that has happened since. Because everything that has happened since has allowed me to re-evaluate who I am and where I want to be. The temptation of my eating disorder may not be 100% gone yet, and that voice in my head may still give its unsolicited opinion every now and then, but I have changed. And I’m going to continue to change and grow and become farther away from this eating disorder every day that I accept these changes.

This was a lot of random thoughts without a lot of structure but welcome to my brain (: