Today is my day

PHP - Day 2

I've got about twenty minutes before lunch, so let's see what sort of an entry I can shape here... By the time I left yesterday, I was too overwhelmed and reeling to make sense of anything that had happened or form a cohesive entry, so I didn't bother trying. Today I've not got much time, but I'll give it a shot.

The rooms and halls are rapidly, gratefully, growing familiar to me. Each face is no longer a complete stranger - I've eaten meals with them, seen them cry, heard them expose quiet fears and secret hopes. It's amazing how a program like this can bond you together so quickly... I mean, for nothing more than sheer numbers, you're spending a good eleven hours together each day, eating all your meals together, and when not doing that, engaging in deep, serious, heartfelt conversation. I guess it'd bond any group quickly.

....God, that was about the shmaltziest thing I've ever written. I'm gagging on the saccharine.

I'm in our little breakroom/cubby/coat room, on the computer (duh) while Courtney and Erica perch on facing couches behind me. My group let out a little early, which is why I have this long break; half the patients are still in a different group. (Aggravatingly enough, the sack which has my chapstick is in that closed room with all of the others. It's driving me batshit.)

My morning's been a little scatter-brained, as I took the light rail for the first time today and it took quite a bit longer than I'd anticipated... I got here a half hour late, right as breakfast was about to start. I ate %100 of my breakfast, even though I seriously didn't think there was any way I'd be able to do it... A cup and a half of raisin bran, a cup of milk, and one carton of yogurt. It was more of a breakfast than I've eaten (barring special occasion brunches) in years. But I did it!

As an interjected aside on meals, we prepare our own breakfasts but have lists from which to choose things. Everything has to be portioned out, left in the cup measures for the millieu therapists to verify, before we can eat. Lunch and dinner are brought to us pre-prepared and pre-portioned; all we have to do is reheat them and select a fruit and a drink. I successfully ate %100 of my dinner last night, too, but yesterday's lunch (my first meal at the center) was a lot harder than I'd anticipated. I uncovered the plate to find half of it mounded in pasta, the other half portioned by a chicken breast and some mixed vegetables. Those I was fine with. Pasta... Not so bueno. I only managed about %75 of that meal, and ended it in tears unable to choke down another noodle because I was so overwhelmed and ashamed and fearful.

Back to today.

After breakfast, I was bundled off into a cap to St. Somebody-or-other's Presbyterian Hospital for labs. Normally they would have done them yesterday, I was told, but since it was MLK Jr day the offices were closed. My arm got stabbed, I oozed three vials, I pissed in a cup, and all was well. I meet with the doctor this afternoon to discuss the lab results.

When I got back, I went in for the last fifteen minutes or so of group. The title of today's entry came from that: we talked about how making the distinction between our own thoughts and desires and those of the eating disorder can make a huge difference. One girl, Stephanie, mentioned her wedding day and how she was pretty much free from the disorder for just that one day. When asked why, she answered, "Well, I guess because I just woke up that morning and said, this is MY day - not my eating disorder's."

That kinda resonated with me. We also talked about eating disorder-imposed "deadlines" (lose this much by this date, eat this little by tonight, do this many crunches in this amounth of time) and how they never can be met, only expanded. When one deadline arrives, none of the qualifiers seem to make it good enough and there's just another, harder one put in place.

That made me think about the fact that claiming the day as my own, purposing to be more present-minded, can help both those aspects: if I'm in the present, deadlines lose importance, and if the day belongs to me and not the disorder, its demands mean nothing anyway.

Aaaand have to go in for lunch now.

I'll see if I can update again later; otherwise, peace!

Blather.

Sorry for the lack of posts... I'm at a constant level of baseline panic as the days until inpatient narrow to hours. It's making things really difficult at home, at work, online. My words are all stunted as my fingers freeze in anxiety and... whatever else I'm too freaked out to think to say right now. I'm treating Crystal and my friends horribly, snapping and mouthing off way more than is even usual. I can't concentrate at work for perhaps obvious reasons.

All I can think about is how scared I am to do this, how badly I want to back out, how desperate I am to be healthy. I obsess over every detail of the things I'll miss about my anorexia. This obsession makes me think I 'like' my eating disorder a lot better than I know I do... But there are still many things I'm going to miss about it. It's strange how integral grieving is to recovering from an eating disorder.

That's all I can think to say right now, guys, I'm sorry. I'm sure that once this thing actually starts I'll be so much calmer and better able to function... I know from experience that nine and a half times out of ten the dread is so much more insufferable than the event itself.

Where things stand

Well, I never thought it'd actually happen, but... Unless something weird and sudden comes up, I start PHP Monday morning.

The assessment went really well this morning. I loved everyone whom I met at the center, and their facilities were pretty awesome. I was expecting them to have their own building(s), but they're actually just on the tenth floor of a big, fancy executive complex thingy. I think they have pretty much the entire tenth floor of the building, though, as their offices certainly weren't cramped.

I met a few of the girls who will be in PHP with me, although sort of indirectly. Since PHP runs seven days a week, they were obviously there for their standard treatment days and I ran into a few of them on session breaks. The place was really laid back and the girls seemed nice; the extent of our conversation was nonetheless limited to sympathetic smiles.

.... Kinda running out of things to say. I'm still a bit overwhelmed by all this, particularly in light of the fact that it's actually going to happen. Hypothetical PHP stays are scary but still easier to handle than real ones.

As a slight aside and final note, I cried today for the first time in any therapy session to ever have taken place over the past five, six years of outpatient care.

A quick note from work

I love that there's a Comcast kiosk in the mall lobby, right outside Cheesecake Factory... I'm blogging while on my half hour break. ^.^

I'm starting both to align myself to the idea of PHP and, in some ways, get excited about it. (I usually refer to it as 'inpatient' in my head and to others, since PHP is too lengthy to explain and it is essentially inpatient anyway. Inpatient without the hospital bed at night.)

I've been writing obsessively, to the extent that when I was stranded yesterday without a notebook while waiting for Crystal to get off work I went out and bought a new one. When I'm this stressed and anxious I can't function without writing. Urban Outfitters is my favorite store and happens to be right down the hall from Cheesecake, so I go there a LOT. When I put my purchases on the counter yesterday, the girl knda pursed her lips, looked at me, and said, "You know, I swear to god you're in this store every other day and every time you're here you're buying more notebooks." Hee.

The newest notebook acquisition is probably going to serve as a recovery journal dealie, to be filled in the hospital and out of it. I'm sure that I'll put parts of it in here at some point.

Word is starting to get around at work about me leaving to go inpatient. Servers are some of the most notorious gossips in the working world, so once one person found out it was a matter of hours before eveyone knew. It's not that I mind this, per se... I mind the way people react to the news. Most of them don't have a decent concept of what anorexia is or how it manifests. Maybe I'm the first person they've known who has and ED and is open about it, I don't know.

To this end, every time I put a morself of food in my mouth now, I'll catch some coworker or another giving me this sideways expression. You know the one: How can you be anorexic? You're eating right now! Several people have come up to me and said as much, ignorantly declaring, "You aren't really anorexic. I've seen you eat before."

God, if being healthy were really as simple as eating that one meal that someone happens to witness. It would certainly make my life a lot easier!

I wish I were as fluent in conversation as I am in my writing. Believe it or not, I'm a pretty damn awkward conversationalist. I write well, I'm great at speeches, have good poise, but only when it's rehearsed. If I'm put on the spot about something uncomfortable, like anorexia, I stammer like Jimmy on South Park. Okay, not quite. But I blush, utter far too many 'um's and 'uh's, and more often than not will totally evade the question in a string of nonsense, however unintentionally. It makes explaining something like why-I'm-eating-if-I'm-supposed-to-be-anorexic incredibly arduous.

Aaand it's just about time for me to head back in. Hi, my name is Tina, how are you guys doing, I'm going to be your server today, just to let you know a little about tonight's specials....

To expound upon earlier thoughts...verbosely.

Ex post facto, as is so often the case, I'm thinking yesterday's post may have been made a bit rashly. By which of course I mean that yesterday I was basically freaking the f-k out and somehow had the misfortune of getting my fingers onto a keyboard, thereby spilling a noxious pile of disjointed, jumbled, frenetic words. Contrary to popular belief the best writing is made with a level head, not one stressed and emotionally charged.

My initial shock at the Drs' assessment of my case is still pretty much the same as ever. I still fail to understand how I need inpatient care; to some extent, I'm still questioning whether or not my level of health or illness requires something so extreme as intensive outpatient. Okay, that's a bit of a lie: I know I could do with some outpatient treatment. But inpatient still does seem over the top.

However, since yesterday's phone call with Drs Roberts and ...a woman whose name I forgot... the general consensus among friends and relations seems to be that inpatient care might not be such a bad thing for me.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around this.

For the reasons I listed yesterday, I still believe myself to be in a fairly healthy place. Particularly when I compare myself today to myself two years ago (or even one year ago), today's self looks a world healthier than I was previously. Water and hundred calorie fasts are no longer a routine thing for me. For that matter, I haven't intentionally fasted in quite some time. My periods are regular, my fatigue has lessened; although labs haven't been run for me in well over a year my body feels like everything is working well. When I eat, I don't do well making sure my meals are healthy and ballanced and supplying all necessary nutrition, but neither are they comprised solely of high fiber vegetables and...more vegetables.

My question about what health should look like that proves I'm so far from it still stands. I'm beginning to ask myself if the main reason I think I'm healthy is that I'm comparing myself to a prior, sicker version of myself - not to a normal, healthy standard of existence. Granted, I'm much healthier than I used to be. My life is not in immediate danger from any starvation consequences. But does that mean that I'm to the standard of health that is the goal of recovery? If not, how far away am I really?

Following are my principal objections to the partial hospitalization program:

-FINANCES. Call me a jew if you will, but worries about finances are still the number one concern about this program.
-->Aside from the fact that the program itself will likely cost far more than EIOP, it will be an eleven hour a day, seven day a week commitment. This, simply and unavoidably, will not allow for me to work. Even if I were able to get my work to allow me to come in at 8 each night to help close, that would leave me with a potential for six hours sleep per night. Therapy is hard work in and of itself, even a one or two hour session once a week. Realistically, there is no way I'd be able to go from eleven hours of therapy to four hours of work to six hours of sleep to start over again.
-->Crystal and I work hard to meet the bills each month as it is. She's going to have a much tougher course load this semester, meaning she'll have to work less. If I'm completely out of work (or even on a greatly diminished schedule) there is no way we'd be able to make ends meet. (Although, as Crystal pointed out, our food budget will go down since the center'd be feeding me five times a day. Somehow this seems ironic.)

-Triggers. This may seem silly at first glance, but think about it this way... It's been a long time since I was fully immersed in my disorder, seeking out thin pics, thinking about eating and not eating constantly, obsessing about the possibility of breathing in calories or the calories contained in chapstick.
-->Visually, I'm afraid that being in an inpatient facility would present me with a whole lot of girls who are seriously ill. I'm not to a place yet where this seems unattractive to me - contrarily, it'd definitely make me extremely jealous.
-->Verbally, I know that many girls get some of their best tricks from staying inpatient for a while. I know that this does depend some on 'you get out what you put in', but that doesn't mean there won't be tons of conversation about how to tongue pills or wipe butter off on your slacks or slip food into sleeves/purse/shoes. Even if I'm seriously trying not to pay attention to this, it is probably going to be triggering to be surrounded by it.
-->PHP feels to me like I'd be re-devoting my life to my eating disorder. Crystal says this is stupid and she's probably right, but... Like I said, it's been a long time since I was thinking ED thoughts every second of the day and to jump into such a rigid, complete schedule of treatment feels like I'd be backsliding. Crystal pointed out that it'd be devoting twenty-four hours of my day to recovery thoughts, not anorexic ones, but in my head it doesn't feel that way.

-Perhaps most stupid of all my concerns, I'm terrified to go into the PHP program because I feel like I'd have absolutely no control over...anything. Myself, my time, my recovery. (When I told this to Crystal she shrieked, "EXACTLY!!!" But.. Meh.) I suppose some part of me feels like recovery is a way to teach me self control in a healthy way, and therefore I want to retain control over the recovery process. I feel like I'd be okay with three days a week because then most of my time would still be my own, like I'd have certain time devoted to therapy and the rest of the time devoted to whatever else I felt needed to be done.

Even the times I have been inpatient before, I never relinquished control. Granted, I was in a really worthless facility, but while inpatient I found ways to skip meals, self-injure, avoid any participation in group activities; hell, when I was finally fed up with inpatient I found a way to lie so completely and extensively that I got them to release me long before they should have.

I feel as though, historically speaking, every time I've let go and done as I was told by people who cared about me, it only made things worse. Why should I give up my life to total strangers?

Sigh.

So there's where things stand. I suppose nothing will really be known for certain until I talk to them again and then set up the actual intake exam. I'll be sure to keep you all posted.

Does... not... compute...

As I mentioned recently, I've gotten to a place that I'm seriously pursuing recovery. For myself, no one else, I want to be healthy and experience what life healthy looks like. To this end, I did some research into area treatment centers and finally contacted the Eating Disorders Center at Denver, since its programs seemed to offer best what I was looking for. Yesterday, I got my first call back from them. I spoke with one of the doctors over the phone, doing a basic clinical assessment thingy, then discussing the extended intensive outpatient program they offer.

My biggest concern was that they'd say I was too healthy for the program and should probably look into just weekly outpatient therapy or perhaps some of the group programs. After all, I've been maintaining pretty well, I eat on a daily basis, I don't really count calories at all anymore, and on and on and on. From my perspective (and historically speaking, given my case), I feel like I'm pretty much recovered. I just need help to get there all the way.

About an hour ago I had another call from them, this time a conference call between the assessment clinician and the EIOP program head. My initial response was a sinking, oh crap, feeling. They said they'd been discussing my case and given what Dr. Roberts and I had talked about yesterday, they didn't feel the EIOP program is going to be appropriate for me. Damnit. I knew that was going to happen. Crap.

What I didn't in a thousand years see coming was that they said the EIOP won't be enough for me.

They think I need to do the partial hospitalization program. Sdsogiherh?? Geh?? The program is seven days a week, eleven hours a day. I'm not sure how many weeks long it is.

How the hell do they think I need that level of care? Crystal agrees. Wtf?? I can't even get this to enter my schema. I really, honestly, truly, cannot understand what they are saying. I was sure I'd get turned away for being too healthy, not get told I needed partial inpatient!

Reasons I think I'm healthy:
-I've got a good fifteen, twenty pounds on my low weight. I've been maintaining this pretty well for the last year or so.
-I eat every day, usually twice, sometimes with a snack. When I'm hungry, I detect that, respond to it, and don't ignore it.
-I drink regular soda now. I drink 2% milk. I even eat red meat again! I eat butter, cheese, pasta, all those horrible horrible evils I wouldn't allow to enter my lips.
-I've even eaten McDonald's more than once in the past year. For the longest time I wouldn't even set foot on the premises of a McD's for fear that I'd somehow breathe in the calories. And now I've eaten it! Willingly!
-I eat Chipotle. On a regular basis. (And I always get extra sour cream on my burrito, and I like it!)
-I don't visit pro-ana trigger sites nearly as frequently as I used to. I'm no longer a member of the ana elitist comms. I'm not a member of any pro-ED comms, for that matter.
-Did I mention I eat pasta? And cheesecake? And butter? And that I can enjoy them?
-And that I don't calorie count? (Usually..)

What is health supposed to look like that I'm so far from it? I haven't been amennhorhaeic in a good year and a half, and even then my menses were only irregular, even when I was clinically emaciated. I don't exercise obsessively, I don't purge, I don't abuse laxatives anymore, I eat salad dressing... I cannot understand this. I seriously cannot get it to enter my head. I can't wrap my mind around it.

Am I really still so crazy?

Aside from that whole level of cognitive dissonance, let's just stop to look at some logistics right now.

HOW THE HELL AM I GOING TO AFFORD A PARTIAL HOSPITALIZATION PROGRAM.

I've talked to my family and my dad has said he will help pay for the EIOP, which is incredible and the only way I'd be able to afford to do that in the first place. And with that, I'd still be working full-time so that I could afford rent and loans and bills and crap. I wouldn't be able to work if I was in the hospital eleven hours a day! And I wouldn't be able to afford to live if I wasn't working!

I'm really in an effing pickle here, bitches. First, do I really need this? And second, if I do, how the hell can I pull it off?!?

To sum up the year

Since I graduated from my livejournal days I've avoided doing all those surveys and memes that so thouroughly infiltrated all my LJs... But screw it, I still love those things. Here goes!

1. What did you do in 2007 that you’d never done before? Wow, quite a bit. I dropped out of school, I moved across the country, bought a car, leased an apartment, got baby cats, read an unabridged copy of Les Miserables (a long-time goal of mine), went a whole year without weighing myself daily (which technically has been done before, but not for quite some time), came out to more than just therapists/really, really close friends about my multiplicity, gotten slightly tipsy, gotten blazed, driven to the Rocky Mountains, hand-sewn a stuffed animal... I guess it's been a bit of a bang-up year!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? You know, I don't really remember making any resolutions last year. I was a bit too depressed to think of much that optimistic. My official resolution this year is to get a better job, one not in the service industry and with more regular hours. Any other resolutions are currently pending.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? A few co-workers have had babies, but they're not particularly close to me.

4. Did anyone close to you die? My grandmother, but she was more close relationally than close personally... She was kinda distant toward her grandkids.

5. What countries did you visit? None. Le sigh. Perhaps that should be another resolution...

6. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007? A solid, well-paying job with great benefits. My own pair of skis. A good treatment team who can finally help me to kick this freaking eating disorder. And pet mice!

7. What dates from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? Hmm... April 7th, when we bought our first car, and June 19th, when we moved into our apartment. Oh, and July 5th, the day we got our baby cats!!! It's really nice that this year I don't have any calamitous events to remember! Prior to 2007, many memorable dates involved suicide attempts, hospitalizations, major injuries, surgeries, getting kicked out of places.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Dorky, but probably the table cloth which I finally finished crocheting.

9. What was your biggest failure? Failure to truly devote myself to finding a kickass treatment team. I gave sporadic efforts, but by not committing myself to the search I didn't ever accomplish much of anything.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Not really. 2007 was more about recuperating from mental illness and shoulder injury than acquiring anything new. God, what an awesome thing to be able to say!

11. What was the best thing you bought? Baby cats!!! Although, the car is pretty damn cool, too. ^.^

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Crystal's, for her courageous work at overcoming some serious social anxiety.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Nicole Richie. I will never, ever forgive that witch for the Labor Day crap she pulled. Various politicians. My soon to be EX roommate, Daniel, for way too many reasons to bother with right now.

14. Where did most of your money go? Rent, student loans, and bills. Boring!

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Recovery. Nothing's really happened with that excitement yet, but at least it's here!

16. What song will always remind you of 2007? Hey There Delilah, by Plain White Tees. Primarily because it was overplayed so goddamn much.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? Infinitely happier. Still fighting depression quite a bit, but much improved.
b) thinner or fatter? This time last year... Crap, I'm not sure. I think slightly thinner, but it goes up and down and up and down.
c) richer or poorer? Much better off! Not fantastic, but not flat broke and relying on charity anymore.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Exploring Colorado, actually. I was pretty sedentary at least as far as tourist-y crap goes. There's so much lame, neat stuff here and I haven't looked at any of it.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? Nervous breakdowns. Good god, but when the MDEs hit in 2007 they knocked me flat on my face. Usually literally.

20. How did you spend Christmas? With Crystal's family. It was my best Christmas in YEARS.

21. Did you fall in love in 2007? Hopelessly, with two fuzzy little balls of yowling fluff.

22. What was your favorite TV program? South Park, yet again. House, briefly. American Idol, sometimes.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Daniel. Ugh.

24. What was the best book you read? Undoubtedly The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers. Oh man, but the final Harry Potter ranks waaaay highly up there, too....

25. What was your greatest musical discovery? You know what? It's kinda been a musically stagnant year. I still love Decemberists and Bright Eyes and Rilo Kiley (although their new album sucked dismally and shockingly), briefly enjoyed Paramour, wondered about Tegan and Sara (only to discover I really didn't like them as much as I thought I would), and lost interest in Rainer Maria and Brand New. Otherwise, lack of money has greatly limited any musical acquisitions. Oh, actually, I guess you could say I became really interested in The Shins. However, I lost the cd promptly after buying it, so I didn't get to appreciate it much.

26. What did you want and get? Baby cats! (Theme? What?) Car! Apartment! Megan got a new stuffed animal (a giant purple unicorn), Katie got her easel, Claire got...something..., The City of Dreaming Books, Harry Potter book 7, HP-OOTP the movie, psych meds. :-P

27. What did you want and not get? "Nothing in particular comes to mind, other than “a new president”." Hee. I really like the former surveyer's answer. However, I can also add skis, my own apartment (though that's coming soon), a really good job.

28. What was your favorite film of this year? Possibly HP-OOTP, actually. No, I'm not a nerd. Seriously though, I was a bit disappointed in this year's crop of new movies.

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? Drove to Boulder for the day, which was simple but super fun. After that I went out to dinner with my girlfriend and best from from MD, who flew out for the occasion! Oh, and the number would be twenty-one.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? A magical windfall of $100,000 or more. I spent more time worrying about finances this year than... Okay, no, metaphors are dangerous here.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007? Briefest way would be to say "Urban Outfitters". Alternative answers would be: hippie chic, urban, bizarre freaky crazy person, tights/leggings/big sweaters (eighties throwback?), and a Cheesecake Factory uniform. The last was the most frequently worn fashion.

32. What kept you sane? Wellbutrin. South Park. Baby cats. Snow. Crystal.

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Angelina Jolie, as always. Scarlett Johannsen, Barrack Obama, and Edward Norton.

34. What political issue stirred you the most? Gay marriage/gay rights. Unsurprisingly enough.

35. Who did you miss? My baby brother. This lonliness for him hasn't stopped since I left my parents house, and probably will never stop until I move into the house next door to him or something.

36. Who was the best new person you met? Either Marque, who has become my best friend in CO, or my manager Kory, who has become something of a surrogate dad to me. Either way, pretty cool.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007. While it may seem like you should save every penny in every way possible when you're hard-up for cash, the little treats and splurges are the only things which keep you going until times get better.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year. On The Bus Mall, by the Decemberists.

In matching blue raincoats, our shoes were our show boats
We kicked around. From stairway to station
We made a sensation with the gadabout crowd.

And oh, what a bargain, we're two easy targets
For the old men at the off-tracks,
Who've paid in palaver and crumpled old dollars,
Which we squirreled away
In our rat trap hotel by the freeway.
And we slept-in Sundays.

Your parents were anxious,
Your cool was contagious at the old school.
You left without leaving
A note for your grieving sweet mother, while
Your brother was so cruel.

And here in the alleys
Your spirits were rallied
As you learned quick to make a fast buck.
In bathrooms and barrooms,
On dumpsters and heirlooms,
We bit our tongues.
Sucked our lips into our lungs 'til we were falling.
Such was our calling.

And here in our hollow we fuse like a family,
But I will not mourn for you.
So take up your makeup
And pocket your pills away.
We're kings among runaways on the bus mall.
We're down on the bus mall.

Among all the urchins and old Chinese merchants
Of the old town,
We reigned at the pool hall with one iron cue ball
And we never let the bastards get us down.
And we laughed off the quick tricks-- The old men with limp dicks--
On the colonnades of the waterfront park.
As 4 in the morning came on, cold and boring,
We huddled close in the bus stop enclosure enfolding.
Our hands tightly holding.

But here in our hollow we fuse like a family,
But I will not mourn for you.
So take up your makeup and pocket your pills away.
We're kings among runaways on the bus mall.
We're down and out on the bus mall.

Lost of stuff!

Today crystle got a really cool letter all the way from Greese! She has a bunch of new pen pals from all over. I dont know her name who sent this one but it had all sorts of cool stuff with it like a C.D. and some buttons and one of them had a picutre of a girl riding on a rinoserus! Megan and i want to send siri a package with stuff like that so that she can have fun opening it like we did. even tho it wasent are package anyway!

We got lots of cool things for Christmass. Like a coat which is wite and soft and has bird fethers in it to make it relly warm. and a cage and stuff so we can get mise! and a relly relly relly fun book calld the city of dreming books its about a dinasor and the dinasor is a riter like tina and it gose to this place calld the city of dreming books and it has lots of advenchers. And thers pictchers in the book so its even more fun becose you can see what happens to him. His name is optimus yarnspinner and its the longist name iv ever herd of!

O yea and we got other stuff like candels and bubble baths and girly stuff so we get to be more like girls i guess. crystles mom gave us so much stuff.

O and the best part was that on Christmas it snowed ALL DAY LONG!!!! It was snowing when we woke up and there was like four inches on the grownd and then it kept snowing and snowing! and we got a flat tire on the way to Crystles cousins house but some peple stopped and helped us to fix it. We got are gluvs all dirty becose we let Amber use them when she was fixing the tire becose it was so cold. But it was okay becose then we got new gloves for Christmas!

Okay I want to go read more about optimus yarnspinner so were gonna go now. Happy christmas everyboddy!

Love

Lacie and Megan

Mistletoe! (...or something title-like.)

Crap, I guess it really has been a while...

Between work and Christmas preparations I've barely had a scarce minute to do anything lately. They're so short-staffed that they have me serving again a few days a week, which is actually nice as it means I've got a better income on a more immediate basis. Yay Christmas spending money.

I've got the day off and my body decided hey! what an awesome time to get sick. Sooo I'm spending my time off planted on the couch with Nyquil and a box of Kleenex and an overwhelming supply of South Park. It's getting old pretty fast. My mind is occupied with drugged up thoughts of all the things I should or could be doing....if only I didn't feel so crappy....

The latest updates on the medicinal front would be warranted, I suppose. I stopped taking the Abilify after three weeks, because I started getting these really bogus nightmares every time I'd so much as close my eyes for a catnap. Additionally, I started noticing weird bruises appearing without any known cause. I chalked these up to possible anemia or something, but as soon as I stopped the Abilify the bruises went away, so I'm thinking that must have been what was causing them.

Currently, I'm still on Welbutrin XL 300mg, although I'm not sure how much benefit it's giving me. I brought that up with the psych when I saw her a few weeks ago but her decision was to keep me on it for now.

She also started me on Prozac, which I find ironically funny: Prozac, oldest of the anti-depressants, last resort SSRI for me. I started that on the 26th of November, so I guess it's been about three weeks. The majority of the nasty side effects have gone down, thank crap. I was getting some mad, miserable sweats, headaches, and serious anxiety the likes of which I hadn't experienced in a few years. Again another Prozac irony, that it should be the mildest SSRI but have some of the worst side effects. I've honestly experienced more grief from this than I did Effexor or even Lamictal.

It's hard to say if I'm noticing any benefits yet. My depression has certainly alleviated over the last few weeks, but whether that's due to medicinal workings or the Spirit of Christmas is impossible to determine. I've got more holly jolly this year than a pack of festive elves riding reindeer through a wrapping paper plant. The reason for that would be that this is pretty much the first 'real' Christmas I've had in about three years - last year I'd dropped out of school and made an abrupt cross-country move to live with my girlfriend's mom, and the year before that I was fresh off two hospitalizations, a suicide attempt, and spent the start of Christmas break looking for a homeless shelter to stay at when the dorms closed.

This year I've got my own place, my own car, a good income, two baby cats, and a loving family to celebrate with. Things are pretty much AWESOME.

So, like I said: Christmas Spirit or Prozac? Who the hell knows. (I'm hoping it's both so that once Christmas is over I'll still have the happy.)

Ummm what else. Nyquil's wearing off so I feel groggy but sick again...

My latest reading conquests have been Only Revolutions and Wicked. Yes, I know, I'm basically the last person in the world to read Wicked. Meh! Both kickded ass. I want to get some of the other books by the Wicked guy, whateverthehell his name is.

...thinks...

Okay, I guess that's all. I'm too busy hacking my lungs out to come up with a decent entry.

All I want for Christmas

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!