MENTAL HEALTH UPDATE
I feel as though my entire blog is a series of mental health updates, shedding the light and shadow of my day-to-day and the world as I experience it. But never before have I specifically laid myself out on the table for you, at a marked point in time, Dolls. So? This is me. This is my life. This is where I'm at.
Some days I experience the world, admiring its nature, sunshine, love & warmth and I feel like a stranger who's out of place, who shouldn't be there, someone so ugly existing in a place so beautiful. Recently, I've been experiencing the world like that a lot. Recently, I don't want to leave my bed to see my family and see my friends. Recently, I don't want to be kind to myself. Recently, I don't feel excited to be here, on Earth, and so everything I love about Earth, like singing, sitting in the sun or playing with my dog, I don't do. And it hurts me. It hurts me that my perception of the world around me... inevitably myself... is the reason that I'm hurting.
It's difficult when you think you've been doing one thing and somebody else says their opinion is to the contrary. Factually, you can't tell the other person that they're wrong because their interpretation is theirs and that's valid. I thought I was making my family proud. I had started finding bravery and challenging anorexia by introducing more variety, flexibility and independence. But I was wrong. I see my world through anorexia because, for me, my foot is never dipped in water. When I'm sick, it's submerged. For my family, I'm a small part of their world and I hoped that I was more but in reality, I don't play as big a part as I thought I'd played. Selfish. A word that cuts my tongue when others speak it. A word I'd never want to be. But I didn't want you to notice me from a place of self-obsession, I wanted you to notice me because I was trying so hard for you. Because I love you. Because I wanted you to have more of me and less of anorexia. But maybe, anorexia is too much of me and maybe, I am too much of anorexia for you to find me, wholly, entirely, unselfishly.
I don't often share the specifics of my eating disorder... my weight, whether or not I'm in recovery, relapses etc. simply because most of the time, I feel these questions that strangers ask me don't come from a place of authentic love and concern but rather judgement and prying. Recovery, for me, has never been something that I can just switch on and off like a switch. It's a process. And sometimes I take a lot of steps backwards before I take any forwards. I still view those backward steps as recovery because often, they teach me something I didn't know about myself. It's like that phrase 'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger' except what does kill me makes me stronger. And recently, my eating disorder has been killing me. It wins a lot, it bullies me a lot, and it forces me to be unkind to myself a lot. Whilst some may not classify the place I'm in as recovery, I do. Because amidst the battle, no matter if it's anorexia or me who 'wins', I can recognise the tactics of anorexia and find the strength to confront it instead of surrendering to its orders, without question at its first command.
PS. My final mental health update, Dolls, is that my new song obsession is 'Evergreen (You Didn't Deserve Me At All)' by Omar Apollo. If I'm not crying along with the heartache in his voice, I'm feeling comforted by him questioning his place in the relationship or in my case, the world. I hope it can be a source of comfort for you too, Shopaholics.
I'm not okay, Shopaholics. But that doesn't mean I've last hope that one day, I will be. The main thing I've learnt from my mental health update, Dolls, is that help is often seasonal, offered when people are willing to give it. Take it from me, Dolls... Take it whilst you can.
Kisses,
COS x
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