Bulimia Help

that gives a rip? and please tell me it gets better. i NEED hope. i am struggling so much right now with a lot of things.

ok, so i should be happy now, because as of tonight, i'm 26 days purge free. whohoo. i seriously don't care. because 1 out of every three of those days, i binged. at first i was like, yes, i can binge and not purge, i can fight this! but then they kept coming. even though i knew i wouldn't purge, i still had no control to stop. and i still can't. and i should be happy, i'm way passed my record, and honestly think purging might be gone for good. but i hate myself. i hate my body. sorry if this is a trigger for anyone, but i have put on 10lbs. some of it is binge/water weight, and might fluctuate a little. but on non binge days, i'm still about 8 over.

i know, don't tell me, it's not a big deal. recovery is more important. it's just a little weight. well that doesn't make me feel better about what i see in the mirror. not one bit. and the thing is, i was a bit below my weight before. so honestly, i'm only about 5 pounds ish above my goal weight zone. but it's so hard. i'm bigger than i was before i started obsessing about food back in August 2009. how freakin ironic is that? i practically cry when i get dressed. my clothes are tight. i don't want any one i know to see me.

i have tried structured eating the last few weeks. i can never keep more than 2 days without a binge, and i'm lucky if i go every other day!! and this last week, i haven't even been restricting! and i have been confronting the underlying issues and stuff. i honestly don't even think it's a way of suppressing feelings right now. i just can't find a line between a treat or slight overeating and a binge. no line. it's all or nothing. it started today because i had a piece of cake! a small piece of cake after a nice filling lunch.

today is day 17. but so what. i don't feel any better right now. when i was purging i was skinny, but my teeth always felt like crap, my throat hurt like hell, and i was tired all the time. i was always insecure about my looks and paranoid of weight gain. and now, i'm not purging. my teeth and throat are better. but now i'm always bloated. i have officially put on 5 pounds because i'm still binging, and i know it's obvious, because i'm a smaller framed person. and it's all in my stomach. so i still feel insecure. i don't want to go out at all. i'm paranoid that people will notice my weight gain. i can't even go to the gym, because i can't stand people seeing my in any form fitting clothes. i have been living in baggy hoodies and loose shirts for the past 2 weeks. i felt awful then, i feel awful now. it sucks either way. i don't want to go back to purging, and i still don't think i could actually make myself do it again. i have tried. really. i swear it's gone. but i can't seem to control binging. i don't see way out of this. it seems like nothing will get better. i just want to curl up in bed for weeks. and i have these 2 voices in my head. one says just screw it all, you are already fat, might as well just go with it and eat whatever; gain a bunch of weight. and the other voice says no, just starve yourself, you will never find a middle ground, and you don't want to be overweight do you?

i can't find the healthy voice. i think i killed it. someone tell me it gets better than this. i have no hope right now.

I'm so mad at myself right now. I totally just binged. Haven't purged in 12 days. And the thing is, I don't just go and do it anymore, or plan it. It just happens. I'm not going to purge. Believe me, it sounds tempting. But the thought of actually bringing myself to do it, I just can't anymore. I'm so scared I will completely destroy my singing voice. And I can't make myself do it, no matter how bad I actually want to. Which is good. And for that I feel victorious. And I truly think I'm beating this. But I feel huge now. And, well, my stomach is very swollen. Ugh. And I'm going out with friends tonight. Great. I know with good eating and exercise, it will go down in a day or 3 at the most. But this is hard for me. I'm still struggling to eat right. I go from too much restraint to no restraint at all. Like last night, I totally ate a larger than necessary meal. Not a binge, but much more than I needed And as you know, it could have been much worse and turned into a binge. But I stopped there and felt ok about it. But today, I didn't feel quite as thin as I wanted, even after working out. And so I restricted. And it led to me eating my tiny morsel of food for breakfast and lunch. But then after lunch, i was so hungry. I just kept munching. Some nuts, some chips, and some peanut butter. And then I felt like it was too much (even though, looking back now, I know it was fine). I decided I had already failed and was craving cookies anyway, so I made this huge batch and ate tons of dough and roughly around 9 cookies. Drank lots of water. But still, it was a binge. So here I am, feeling fat, ugly, and completely void of self-control. And the thing is, I want to restrict again to make up for it! And so goes the cycle. It's so hard to understand when I'm full. I can always tell when I'm hungry. But never when I'm satisfied. I think I need to start eating very slowly and chewing each bite 10 to 20 times. And sticking with set portions.

ok, so i know we pretty much all have this in common. the all or nothing concept with food, weight, and looks. you know like "i'm thin or fat" "this food is safe or bad." and it's something i really struggle with, because that's how i tend to view myself and food. and i always come up short. i'm working on changing it, i am. but i have problem that i seriously have no clue how to conquer.

i can't eat normally. i have been purge free for 9 days now, today will be my 10th. but i have binged 2 times. i just can't freakin eat right. it's either way too little or like extremely healthy and safe foods, or it's way too much or really fattening stuff. i always try to eat small, healthy meals through out the day, like every 2 to 4 hours. but i can't seem to stick to it. it's like i know i'm eating too little, or my body needs more, so i try to add just a bit more food, or something not so healthy, but then i feel like i over did it, and say what the heck and eat whatever and as much as i want. and normally this is what led to my b/p episodes. but i'm not purging right now. so i have mini binges. or when they turn into real ones, like last night, i feel like crap. i hate myself, don't even want to go out in public. the first binge with out a purge took about 3 days to get out of me, or till i looked normal. today i'm detoxing/fasting. i know it's not the best thing in the world, but honestly i feel so gross, i just want to rid my body of all the toxins. i don't want to start another cycle though.

i just want to eat normally!! how can i get rid of my black and white or all or nothing complex with food?

ugh.

so i have missed this site so much and all you wonderful people. i stopped this site because i got in such a bad spell, that i was basically pretending my ED wasn't there for a while. i kept pushing it away, saying i would recover after Easter...yeah right. seems like that's an ongoing thing for me you know? i'm always like, tomorrow. i will beat this tomorrow. i won't binge tomorrow. i will begin recovery tomorrow...and tomorrow never comes...but something hit me Easter sunday. a group in my church did that skit/interpretative thing to the Lifehouse song "Everything." i don't know if you have seen it before (here's a youtube link if you want http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyheJ480LYA), but basically it's showing how in God we are enough, and the girl is dancing with Jesus, and then things/people start pulling her away. drugs, money, sex...and then she start purging. and i realized that was me. i'm letting this control and ruin my life. i broke down crying. to see it dramatized like that. cutting too...as i used to do that as well...

because i am seriously freaking out right now. of course, it's not like i have been amazing successful yet. only going every other day b/p right now. but that's a huge improvement for me. i'm hoping to go longer now. we shall see. but yeah, i'm so freaked out about Easter! i i know i will binge. i know it. how can you not? i mean, even normal people like binge on a holiday. but i'm thinking there is absolutely no way i'm going to keep it down. not this early in recovery. so should i just plan on it?

and i'm also struggling right now. because, like this weekend i didn't binge at all. but i did have a few oreos. and then all of the sudden i felt like a fat failure. but i couldn't really binge in front of my friend (we were at the beach). so i ate the rest of my sandwich, a banana, and a granola bar. then i went and purged it in the nasty beach bathrooms. i was so ashamed of myself. because i'm discovering a new problem. i'm purging with out binging.

it's like i'm fine if i ate something healthy. you know, fruit, veggies, soup, chicken, or smaller portions of a typical meal. but the moment i eat 2 cookies, or a piece of pie, or a whole slice of pizza, i feel like i'm going to gain all this weight!! even though it's a completly normal or healthy sized portion!! like today i went out to eat with friends at a diner, i ordered a short stack (3) of buttermilk pancakes. and i used very little syrup and no butter. and i only ate like half of it at the most. and i was fine at first. but then i felt like a major fatty. even though it was a completely normal, and perhaps even smaller than normal portion!! and i know this deep down. but everything else kept screaming "get rid of that bad stuff! you are going to gain so much weight!". and i believe it!!! for that moment. so i took home the rest of my stuff, waited till i had the apartment to myself, and has this awful binge.

ok, well first of all, i had my first b/p free day this weekend in ages! friday. it was so nice. actually, i was binge free for 2 days. but saturday i purged. just purged. because of 2 stupid oreos. it was ridiculous. and tonight, i b/p. for absolutely no reason. it kills me. no reason! no triggers, great day, i wasn't feeling hungry at all, already knew there was like nothing to eat in the apartment, wasn't even anticipating it. and then a little bit before everyone went to bed, i got a horrid urge and just went with it. i didn't even know why i was doing it. wasn't even food i really like! and i'm wondering what the hell is wrong with me!!!!!! and my glands are so swollen now. and lately purging has been really hard so i freak out. and i'm so tired and sore. and i just want to eat like a normal person!! and i just want to fight this. i'm almost 5 months in now, and i'm really starting to freak out. i know damage is already being done, and i don't want more!! i don't want this to go on for a year, much less 20! but i just don't know how to fight it.

so i'm thinking of getting help from outside. telling a friend wasn't enough. i need someone who can actually help me, who knows what they are doing. but i don't know what to do or where to start. like, do i find a counselor or a psychologist? i mean, what kind of person helps with this? how do i find places? and how much does it cost? because i seriously don't have a lot of money and i don't even know if i could afford it :(.

i also wanted to know if anyone had any books they could recommend? like eating plan, or recovery type books? or a workbook or something? i just need something to follow. me waking up everyday and telling myself that "today is going to be a good day" just isn't enough.

i want to take action. i need to take action. one day clean is good. but it's not enough. i want this to end before it takes over years of my life. 5 months had already seemed like an eternity.

i just suck at this structured eating thing! and it's not even WHAT i eat sometimes, just how much!! like, it's always way less than i need, or i stuff myself or binge. both lead to an eventual b/p. i tried eating snacks in between. before all this, i was eating 5 to 6 small meals a day...i miss that so much. but seriously, it's like nothing at all or a binge. i hate it! i don't know what to do. how can i eat a normal sized meal??? the only thing that i stick like glue to is my breakfast. usually because i feel so crappy from the b/p the afternoon or night before. but i always have 1/2 a cup of oatmeal and some fruit or yogurt. it feels so good, it's good for me. and i feel healthy, strong, and filled afterwords. it's one of my few safe foods. but then i lose it towards lunch and the rest of the day is screwed...and my other problem is speed. i eat EVERYTHING at binge speed. i even drink beverages that fast. my body is used to consuming everything as fast as possible. i feel like these things are blocking my recovery path, but i don't know what to do about it!!

because this time, i actually thought i was going to die. i had a great day. and then after dinner, i just started craving a binge. and instead of trying to deter from it, i baked whole batch of muffins just for it. i waited eagerly for everyone to go to bed. it sickens me now, but i seriously couldn't wait for those few hours to rush by. it was all that was on my mind. even my favorite TV show was taking too long...i sat there for like 3 hours and thought about what i was going to eat and how i was going to do it. ridiculous. i didn't have even a glimmer of resistance. not one time did i even consider fighting it. and the thing is, it's only satisfying for like 2 minutes. then i just want to stop, but i'm so black and white with food that i knew i just had to eat as much as possible since i was going to purge anyway. and i was so full this time. i mean, i usually stuff myself so that it's pretty uncomfortable. but this time, i could barely move to the toilet. barely move. it hurt like hell. and it was the worst purge ever. everything was hurting. sometimes purging seems easy you know, like a habit. but i thought i was going to die. i kept waiting to pass out, really. i'm still surprised i'm conscious. it was like a horrid dream, and i kept hoping i would wake up. like know way would i ever do this to myself and let it get this far. but i did. and i'm scared. scared that i will go back even after this frightening episode. i really realize now that i could die. but i still don't know how to stop. it seems like nothing works. and after my week of freedom, i can't even make it one day now. i feel so hopeless. i don't want to get up tomorrow. i really don't. i wish i could just pop a pill and i would be cured. why did i ever let this happen? i have never hated myself so much. never been so scared for my life. and the daunting question in the back of my mind is asking why bother, can i ever really beat this? or will it always be a struggle? can i truly conquer this?

...but i was just wondering, how do you know when you are completely recovered? or do you ever actually reach a point where you are? i mean like, because i have heard of people being free for like 2 years, and then relapsing...so...i'm rather confused as to how it all works out...and is it easier if you haven't been at it as long? hmmmm....just some things i have been pondering. please share your thoughts or ideas...