Weekending

It seems that lately things around here have been a strange oscillation of slightly uncertain, a bit topsy-turvy, and relatively quiet. Its almost as though everyone is waiting cautiously to see whats going to happen next but they have no idea what that might be. Then again, maybe thats just the take I am getting from things. Although there havent been any recent arrivals, apart from the new med students starting their monthly rotations, there have been a few departures and pending dates to return home announced.

Right now I am RTU (restricted to unit) for the weekend. This is because I didn’t gain the minimum of 3/4 of a pound between Wednesday and Friday. When I got on the scale I was only off by a quarter of a pound and half-heartedly cursing myself for using the bathroom when I first awoke this morning. It is what it is though and theres not too much I can do about it at the moment. I’m still eating 100% of everything so the slight slip isn’t from lack of trying. All it really means is that I can’t go outside for fresh air breaks until the next weights on Monday. There isn’t any reason why I shouldn’t make that one unless my metabolism goes truly haywire and Wednesday morning is the one I really need to be sure to make anyway.

This coming Wednesday is the Target trip everyone has been waiting for. We are supposed to leave here at 11:30 am, lunching at Applebees first, and then carrying on to shop at Target and it’s surrounding stores. Then we are supposed to be back by 5 pm, just in time for dinner. I don’t plan on buying anything clothes-wise because I’m in such a transitional period as far as my body size goes right now, but I’m still looking forward to the outing whole-heartedly.

There is an Applebees menu floating around here somewhere too because most of us have to preplan our lunch order so no one is caught off guard when we are at the table and only have about 5 minutes to decide. I’m pretty excited about Applebees because the group of us eating there is probably going to prove to be very interesting. I think I am prepared for just about anything to possibly happen. I just need to make my Wednesday morning weights…my fingers (and toes) are crossed for it!

Other than that the weekend looks like its going to be pretty slow. Not being able to spend time outside, art being cancelled, and recreation being held in the gym tomorrow where I can’t go on RTU, theres not a whole lot left on the docket. Oh well, Maybe I’ll be able to get some artwork done. That would be nice and I have been eager to try out the brand new liquid acrylic paints my boss from the tattoo shop bought for me before I left. So thats the wekend – relaxation…its not a bad thing.   🙂

The Griz

Annie, my therapist, has moved on. The med student changeover occurred last week as their month-long stint on our unit drew to a close. I knew from the time I started seeing her that we would be having limited visits. I don’t think the knowledge of her imminent departure hindered our conversations in any way, and I tried to get as much out of our frequent meetings as I could.

What it comes down to is that, with this being a teaching hospital, there are a number of medical students making the rounds as they work in one area one month and another the next. I still have my residential therapist,                     Dr. VanHalen, who oversaw Annie’s work, sat in on a few sessions, and meets with me for a short one-on-one at least once a week. VanHalen is a very animated woman as far as her facial expressions and hand gestures go. Her short thinning hair, wide open eyes, and boisterous personality almost make it hard to take her seriously but “almost” is definitely the key word in that statement. Its not easy to forget just how much sway she holds over the unit and over our individual treatment teams. VanHalen is assuredly a key player and shes not going anywhere any time soon.

All in all though I think I lucked out when Annie left as far as adjusting to her replacement goes. Paul isn’t a medical student with a short month-long shelf life, he is a psych intern. He will be on the unit until December and actually specializes in the psychiatry field which means I wont have to readjust again to someone new at all during the rest of my stay.

Paul is of an indeterminable age. If I was forced to guess I would have to wager between 28 and 34. His longish but slicked back dark blonde hair reveals and only minor hairline recession and the neatly trimmed but full beard he sports only has a light amount of white just in the very front where it comes to a point. To me he sort of resembles a reformed hippie mountain man who decided to try it in the real world for a while. His big teeth and expressive nature-boy eyes don’t fail to reinforce the idea that he would be perfectly at ease camping or planting an herb garden. Before I knew his name I started referring to him as Grizzly Adams, meaning the term in the nicest of ways, and eventually shortened his nickname to “The Griz”.

Judging from the 3 half-hour sessions I have had with Paul so far I can definitely say that I really enjoy working with him. Our sessions are productive, enlightening, and I actually lose track of time talking with him. Hes easy-going with his laid-back stance during discussions and doesn’t inhibit his colorful vocabulary. The passion he has for his job truly shows almost like his acute interest in what I am saying is so real its leaking out his pores. He just loves what he does and is not at all afraid to show it. It makes it easy for me to be open with him.

In any case it feels good to look forward to the one-on-one time. Its comforting to know that I really will get something out of it. Headway – here I come!

Clickety clack

The scale clicks as one of the nurses moves the little weights around. It takes a minute to get it right. The final verdict has to be perfect, safe, and secure. There can not be room for error. It’s an important process and, after a few minutes, Tiffany emerges from the exam room and holds the door for me to take her place.

I rise from my sitting position on the hallway floor and get a couple of “good luck” comments from Amy, Elle, Benji, and Laura who are next in the queue. Today is the day that I am aiming to meet my 75% of ideal body weight goal. If I can do this I can move up to level three and assume all the privileges that come along with it. There is the ability to go on staff-accompanied outings to pretty much wherever they are willing to take us. There is the emergence of new activities on the schedule that I wasn’t eligible for below 75%. These include some of the more physical things like going to the gym for a game of badminton on Sunday, participating in the yoga group thats held twice a week, and going food shopping off the unit in preparation for coffee klatch. At 75% there is also the cooking group that is immediately followed by a lunch in which we dine on what we have cooked. There is now the Wednesday lunch group in where the unit’s dietician, Sally, takes a few of us out to lunch at one of the many nearby restaurants or delis. Then, at 75%, there is the group that has been my aim for a while now – Menu Planning.

Finally I will get to decide from, limited mind you, list of meal options for each week. I have been here long enough to go through the rotation and try everything they have to offer, for better or worse, and now I can have more say over the composition of the meals I am consuming. I consider this with a slight smile bringing light to my still sleepy 6 am face as I enter the exam room.

The heavy door closes behind me and i start to get undressed. Its just me and today’s nurse in there and she is busy updating and organizing the charts on her clipboard while I lay each article of clothing on the counter as it comes off. The room is not as chilly on my bare skin today and I am thankful for that. I am down to the one thing we get weighed in, my underwear, and she follows me into the tiny bathroom where the scale stands tall and intimidating. The authority this hunk of metal takes on is almost eerie; its extreme influence unnerving.

I am used to the nurses doing double and triple takes when they first see me undressed. At first glance it almost looks like I am still clothed due to all of my tattoos but this nurse has been through weights with me before. It’s not new to her. I step up onto the scale’s platform with determination, feeling the rough non-slip surface beneath my bare feet.  The nurse slides the bottom weight around, first to the 100 which proves too much, and then back down to the 50 pound mark. The upper, smaller weight takes a little longer to adjust, a bit more back and forth. I watch the needle on the side do it’s slow shimmy.

Finally, with one reassuring glance at the exact numbers, I get my answer. In the last 48 hours I have gained the one pound needed to hit my 75% goal. Its just the first of many accomplishments in this arena and I can’t wait to see what is behind the new doors it will open for me. I dress again and head back to my bedroom giving the others in the hallway a thumbs-up as I go.

Life Honey Pie

This was an assignment we had to do for the creative writing group we have once a week here. The objective was to pick a word, an emotion or a thing, that helps describe how we are feeling, want to feel, or don’t want to feel, and write recipe for it. Here is mine…

LIFE HONEY PIE

(Thats a sweet slice of life, Honey!)

1. Start with a pie plate that has patterned edges to give the pie rim some fun texture.

2. Lay the pre-prepared store-bought uncooked crust in the plate so that it forms to the dish. We use this because, with so many other activities to enjoy in the world there just isn’t enough time to make the dough from scratch.

3. As an added secret bonus sift some sweet powdered confectioner’s laughter over the empty crust before putting it in the oven to bake.

4. While the shell is baking you want to mix the filling in a medium-size bicycle helmet. (The helmet adds a hint of adventurous flair to the ingredients.)

Filling Ingredients:

• 1 cup sliced raspberries soaked in a sympathy marinade
• 1 cup blueberry amore puree
• 1 cup mandarin hope segments
• 1 tsp dry crushed irony
• 2 tbsp Karo family syrup
• 1/4 cup brown sugar friends
• 1 tsp fresh cream of the past
• 1 tbsp softened butter of the future

5. Once these have all been mixed pour them into the crust evenly. The crust  should be out of the oven and cooled for a minimum of 10 minutes by now.

6. Place pie back in the oven for another 15 minutes and relax with your favorite pastime and a mug of cocoa as the tantalizing pie scent drifts through your kitchen.

7. When the pie is done baking let it cool for a final half hour while you wander outside and admire the nature around your home.

8. Top your pie with whipped understanding and sprinkle equal parts cinnamon reality and spiced imagination generously over the cream.

9. Serve immediately on neon-colored plastic frisbee dishes with a small scoop of iced faith.

10. Lastly drizzle your desired amount of glistening, amber, sweet, sticky honey over it all and dig in!

Easy as pie in just 10 steps!

Compulsory

Amy is wisp of a girl. At the age of almost 18 she is smart, sweet, and fun to be around when she’s feeling social. Most of the time she seems to look out at the world as though she isn’t sure it’s a place she wants to be visible in. There are instances though, more and more frequently now, that her potential and her inner strength shine fervently in her large brown eyes. She has so much going for her and I can’t help but feel a confident hope for her future. She has only had her eating disorder for a year and a half and, if she’s able to beat it now, it won’t have stolen too much of her life. It won’t have stolen her light yet.

Today, after research group, she handed me a note. It read:

“…I’m sorry for what you saw, or didn’t see. I know that what I did was wrong, and I know I didn’t try to be better about it. I’m sorry that I let you down, and I can understand if that makes you think less of me. I mean, what do I know? I am just a 17-year-old who is fighting against everyone who wants me in a better position, but can’t see it. Please let me know if any of my actions have affected you in any way. You have been a big support to everyone here, including myself. I’m sorry for my lapse and please let me know if I can do something to change.”

Just before the group she had had a lapse in judgement and I had witnessed it. We are both on the same schedule for our twice daily Ensure shakes and, having been cued in by Benji that something was amiss, I was keeping my ears and eyes open while I worked on my crossword puzzle. After a few minutes, with a timid glance around, Amy stood and executed a swift maneuver that resulted in the disposing of her Ensure down the drain of the drinking fountain. She was so hesitant, so already full of remorse and yet, so taken by the insistence of her eating disorder.

From what Benji said this all started yesterday. he had been in my shoes as witness to action and had had a talk with Amy about it after the fact. When he related the story to me as we walked outside it was the air of sadness at Amy’s decision that relayed through his voice. Neither of us wanted to see the bright girl, who was quickly growing on us like a younger sister, turn down that road. Thats the strength of compulsion with eating disorders though. It didn’t matter that Amy was disappointed in herself or that she regretted what she did after the very first time she did it. The fact remained that she hadn’t been caught by any of the staff that first time. She had gotten away with it once and therefore the urge to do it again held strength enough to overrule any part of her that rued her actions.

This is the sickness of it. Its the pit the eating disorder seems to drag us into – this abyss that sucks us up entirely while letting us fall without reaching the bottom.

HOPE. All I can say is hope. With enough hope that falling just might turn to floating and I have every hope for Amy. Now we just have to see what she does. The rest is up to her.

At the table

For some reason we have been processing after meals a lot more recently. Its a basic exercise that really just involves the group of us sitting around the large dining room tables for a chat. After loading our more or less empty trays back into the trolley to be taken downstairs we kill the radio that livens up our mealtimes and settle back into our seats.

With this being an eating disorder treatment center it goes without saying that there will inevitably be some issues surrounding meals. In processing generally someone starts the group off, lately this job has fallen to Elle, and from there we go around the circle and discuss anything from the dining experience that might have been difficult for us. Usually any staff with us at that point remains pretty quiet and we do our best to offer each other support for our various issues.

Just because I have been tacking each meal with an ease and acceptance thats surprising even to me doesn’t mean that everyone else has such a relaxed time with it. Different meals have different components that create different amounts of anxiety in different people. For some of us its been so long since we have eaten in a natural social setting that we aren’t even sure what a “normal” way to eat certain things might be. Questions, like weather or not you would use a fork to eat a brownie and how many pieces one would usually cut a hamburger into before picking each one up and biting in, do come up. These quarries may seem silly to someone looking on but, to my peers, they are legitimate and the search for the answers is real. We just want to get back to a societal normality because our versions of table manner are so bizarrely skewed.

Elle, for instance, has problems touching her things. The idea of something being a finger food is not a concept that is easy for her to accept. Once she touches a food she gets the feeling that its crumbs, oil, or other remnants are all over her face and hands. In the beginning she wouldn’t pick up any of her meal with her hands. Now, after some time and a lot of encouragement, she still cuts things up a bit more than other people but she will pick up the pieces to eat. She has also been doing a great job fighting the urge to wash her hands of the imaginary debris the food has left after each bite.

Another one of the girls, Carrina, has issues with peanut butter. It’s a fear food of hers and she doesn’t want to be around it because it used to be the main thing she would binge on when she was back home. The other day she explained to some of us that, before she came to Columbia, she cleaned her room and dug up about a month’s accumulation of jar from its depth. She admitted that there were 26 cleaned out peanut butter jars that had been stashed in various spots. Here though she still has to face her fear. She doesn’t have to tackle the peanut butter issue everyday but she’s not allowed to avoid it either.

Other issues surrounding our meal table include things like cutting food into miniscule bites, putting salt on literally everything, the compulsion to eat things only in a certain order, or chew each bite a certain number of times. We are all trying though. Its hard but we are doing our best to overcome these things which can be so baffling to the average public.

Processing after meals helps all this and, although I don’t always have a whole lot to add myself and sometimes people say the same issues over and over, its good to help. As far as providing support goes we are a good little family. I’d be more than happy to have any of these girls on my side when and if I ever need that extra help.

The Confi-dance

It’s the last day of July and in about 48 hours it will have been three weeks since I left home. I’ve talked to Chris on the phone, through email, and via instant message more than once a day. My mom and I chat every few days by phone or computer. And I have kept in touch with the guys at work where everything seems to be running smoothly. I miss home, my job at the tattoo shop, my animals, my life…but not in the way that I’m homesick. I miss it all in the way that I am just so excited to return and have things be that much different in good ways, for me to be that much different because I’ll be healthy.

In my lifetime I have never truly believed that I really was deserving of a change like this. At the same time though I have never been so consciously proud of myself as I am each day with this. I have been proud of random acts, certain decisions, or pieces of artwork in the past but I’ve always been proud of the outcome and not specifically the person doing the deed. It’s almost like, in my mind, I just considered it a fluke that I happened to be the one doing those things. It’s truly different, and for me foreign, to actually have this belief in myself.

Thats not to say that I don’t feel the old pull of tension when I put myself in the place of something I have created. I’m not outwardly boastful about things and I try to keep an air of modesty when I talk to other people. Inwardly, though, I am much more conscious that I am the one who accomplished these goals. It didn’t happen by accident – it was me.

Sometimes my mind will try and tell me the same old refrains about how I don’t deserve to feel good about a deed. It tells me that I didn’t do it well enough, that I should have done more. It speaks to me about how everything I do now thats good is just another thing I owe the world for screwing up so bad in my past. Its like every good action is part of the penance I own for messing things up and hurting others years ago. But how long do I have to believe my every action is part of some cosmic repayment plan for my past? I’ve been told time and time again that I deserve to be happy but it wasn’t until now that I really believed that to be true to any extent.

Now it may not be a recognizable change outwardly but, inside, for once I feel truly good about myself. I’m walking a difficult road right now but I know that I am the one doing it. I am accomplishing things now that I truly believed I did not deserve to accomplish before…and it feels good. I know the potential for amazing new things is that much  more heightened because I am here now doing what I need to do for myself.

Now I just have to keep it up while thinking clearly about the next thing life throws my way. No matter what that may be.