Letter to Myself

trying to prevent ongoing urges and ED... trying to remind myself of how things were so terrible when I was in the midst of my ED. I have been recently frantically trying to do whatever I can to lose weight. I have back slidden; but yet still feel I am in control. I am ultimately stressed due to my wedding coming up and I believe that as soon as the day is done and I don't have to stand in front of everyone in a dress on display, that things will get back to normal. A month ago I began to diet, cutting out all carbs and limiting my intake- as well as exercising. It worked. I lost 7 pounds pretty quickly. I then began to feel immediate guilt and shame when eating a normal size portion and began throwing up and using laxatives to ensure that I would not gain weight. The laxative use has become extreme, some days popping 5-7 to make myself feel better- to ensure that all my intake is gone! My therapist encouraged me to write to myself a letter- to remind myself of the feelings and turmoil that I was going through over 2 years ago. I have struggled to do this. partly because I am in denial and partly because I believe I have control over what I am doing. I am not starving myself. I am eating. I am not sure if an exercise like this will even help. I try to write it out in my mind the moments before I puke or down laxatives, but my impulse are too strong at that point. But here goes

Dear self,
     So wanted to remind you of what it was like to be in the midst of your eating disorder and your time through treatment. First of all, I was a mess...emotionally, physically, psychologically. You were extremely depressed with days of suicidal thoughts and longing not to be on the earth. Your anxiety was insane, having to take Xanax daily to fight the overwhelming feelings. You were not in your right state of mind. Daily tasks of driving, working, speaking, writing, answering phones were all difficult to accomplish without melt downs and panic attacks, stumbling over words and no concentration- uncontrollable crying and constant preoccupation with size, body, weight, constantly overwhelmed. Physically you were weak. You looked terrible (well I thought I looked great) but my coloring was gross, you could barely get up enough energy to get through the day. I was wearing the size of my 10 year old niece and my 12 year old god daughter. All you wanted to do was sleep. You had a short fuse and felt angry all the time.
     Medically you were having so many digestive problems, dental problems, and vitamin deficiencies. You went to many many doctors trying to figure out why your stomach hurt all the time and why you couldn't use the bathroom. You had procedures done to try to assist and took different trials of medications- none of them worked. You were trying to fight a battle with the wrong tools.
     Treatment sucked! Having to sit through intensive groups and work on trauma and forced to eat with people! You hated it! When that didn't work going into an even more intensive treatment. The refeeding process was a nightmare. You were in the ER with severe stomach pain, my stomach killed from trying to eat meals, panic attacks trying to be in a restaurant or grocery store, being weighed weekly, having to answer to someone else, not being allowed to make decisions for myself about what to eat or when to eat, not being able to live at home, being away from Kevin, hating myself and having to face my demons.... You told yourself you would never get to this point again! You would never allow yourself to get to the place of having to have to go through ED treatment again. You hated it, it was painful, awful! You did a lot of work and healing and were able to come out on the other side healthy, with new insight and new thought process about body/food/weight. There was so much progress made. You do not want to go back through that! Not even for a wedding.

-Me