It's 12:30am, and for the third night in a row I am having the hardest time falling asleep. My body and my mind are so tired, but at the same time, my brain is running a thousand miles an hour. And my breathing exercises, my distractions, are not working. I have my iPod in right now, listening to Goo Goo Dolls "Black Balloon". It's definitely a song of memories, the first time I heard it was my last stint at a psychiatric hospital back in 2005. Anyway, I decided to get out of my bed and come downstairs and write a blog. I feel like maybe typing out what is going through my head will put my mind at a little bit of rest.
It's been an intense, overwhelming past few days. Ever since my big breakthrough at the RR event on Friday night, my emotions have been...all over the place. I feel happy, I feel sad, I feel scared, I feel frustrated, I feel alone, I feel excited, I feel hopeful, I feel renewal, I feel loss, I feel...I feel. It's just everything you can think of. I have a tape of memories playing on repeat in my head. Memories of my whole life. Memories of growing up, of gymnastics, of the abuse, of the eating disorder, of my hospital stays, of Remuda, of school, of everything in the past 22 years I can think of. It's overwhelming, to say the least.
I'm not very good at dealing with so many emotions at one time. I tend to do self destructive things such as, not eating, purging, cutting, self medicating, etc. I made a committment to myself on Friday night to fight my eating disorder, and I am standing by that. My eating has improved since then. Even though I have urges to binge and purge, urges to skip a certain meal, or eat as few calories as possible...I am abstaining from those destructive urges. The urges to cut are so, so intense. But, as with the eating disorder behaviors, I have abstained from that as well. It is so very difficult, but I think so worth it. I keep thinking to myself how shitty I will feel if I decided to resort to destructive behaviors. So, I guess I am doing a good job of dealing with so many intense emotions. Although, I feel like a mess. The tears just want to keep coming. And honestly, crying is what I do when I'm not using my eating disorder or cutting. And I've learned over the past year that I need to feel my emotions, and not numb them. And that is exactly what I have been doing lately...letting myself feel. It's hard as hell, let me tell you. It's exhausting and I feel crazy almost.
I don't know how to describe what is going through my head when the tears start to come. It can be a song I hear, something I remember, a kind word or smile from a stranger or someone I know, the way the leaves are changing colors, anything really. I just feel...emotion. And I'm not numbing it. I don't know which is harder? Numbing yourself from everything, or letting yourself feel it?
Today I was numb, due to my poor decision of taking double the dose of my sleeping meds. I was basically high all day long. I'm not going to lie. I sort of enjoyed it...not feeling the tears sting my eyes, not having a tape play in my head. I was very disconnected and just going through the motions. "You're a mess", my friend said to me. Maybe jokingly he said it. Whether he was joking or not, he's right. I am a mess.
Yes, Friday night I made a very important committment and decision in my life. But I am not taking that back at all or saying I don't feel that way anymore. What I'm saying is...it has opened a door of memories and emotions. Which...I don't think is such a horrible thing, it just feels like SO much.
I want sleep to come easily. I want to give my body the rest it deserves. But how can you do such a thing when your brain doesn't want to rest? I need to constantly remind myself to take each day as it comes, and not worry and worry about tomorrow, and the next day, the next week...which is what I do all the time. Today is today. I need to deal with that now, and that is all. Period.
Deep breath in, and deep breath out. Close my eyes, and feel the peace and tension relief wash over me. I am going to do this.
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