The title of course is misleading: the following subject is not the only thing I want for Christmas. In fact, there are quite a few things that I'd love to get for Christmas (not the least of which is financial stability, but that's a whole different kettle of fish). However, this next item is something which I've been thinking about increasingly over the last month or two and am now trying earnestly to obtain.
If you're reading this entry chances are you've read some of those preceeding it as well. This being the assumed case, you've probably caught on to the fact that my eating has not been nearly as good as it could be lately. A big thing I've been noticing is that even though I'm eating at least a meal a day and am trying to at least eat something when I'm hungry, I may be doing the actions but mentally I'm deteriorating again. Distorted body image has been again growing more distorted, obsessive thoughts more obsessive, calorie counting once again almost an unconscious act.
And all that makes it sound like it had ever totally gone away in the first place.
I've never once willingly addressed my eating issues in therapy. This may sound surprising, considering I've been in and out of therapy since I was seventeen, but if you think about all the other issues I've got to deal with (depression, DID, etc) and then take into account that I haven't wanted to talk about my eating... Well, it's been easy enough to steer conversation into other areas that I'd rather deal with. Perhaps that's one fault with the therapy styles so far used with me: it's been way too easy to just change the subject when I don't want to talk about or address something. But now I'm really sick of it.
The therapist I've seen recently (Chris) has next to no experience treating eating disorders. Aside from that, she only sees clients once every other week. Out of all the therapy I've done, the only time that was really intensely helpful was when I saw someone twice a week. Once a week was pretty much just enough to keep me from getting worse, but I didn't see a whole lot of improvement.
All these considerations in mind, I've decided (and have talked this over with my psychiatrist, who agrees) that intensive outpatient would probably be a really good idea for me at this point. After looking into it some, I've found a treatment center in Denver which appears to have a really good program, great treatment team, and should hopefully be able to work with my insurance. It's through the Eating Disorder Center of Denver. (Fitting name?)
The program I'm most interested in is their Extended Intensive Outpatient Program. It's twelve weeks, three nights a week, four hours a night. You work with a nutritionist, psychiatrist, therapists, etc... Dinner is eaten together with group therapy immediately following. There are a lot of the things you'd pretty much expect with an outpatient program... Group, one-on-ones, body image workshops, art therapy, etc. But, from what I've read on the site, it sounds like they've got a really solid program set up.
The center offers three different levels of care: inpatient, EIOP, and a weekly group follow-up thing. I'm sure that I don't need inpatient care (for one, I'm not in a serious enough place medically) and the last sounds like it really wouldn't offer enough. Sooo I've sent an e-mail asking for more information about the program and admissions procedure. Mostly I need to know about the cost and how much my insurance would cover...
...Well, I think that's actually about all I meant to discuss. At least, I can't really think of anything else... I'll keep you informed as I find out more and if/when there's anything else major to report about this. Cross your fingers!
