I want...

I want my life back.
No matter how bad things were, nothing, NOTHING can be as bad as Anorexia.


My weight remains in limbo, my mind in hell.
I am unable to complete tasks I attempt as my brain is just too addled.


I have started taking Pregabalin, despite the fear that its most common side effect is weight gain. 
I don't care anymore.
I just want the illness to go.


I wish that I could be put to sleep whilst my weight is restored.


It occurs to me that I haven't written about The Woman lately.
I have so much to say. 
So many words in a swirling vortex - half formed ideas dance purple shadows in front of my closed eyelids in the early hours.
I resolve to write posts about the nature of Anorexia and my understanding of its relationship with anxiety and depression.
I swear I'll reply to friends, blog friends and world friends, whose words and caring constantly brush soft against my bruises.
And yet, come the morning, I haven't got the mental energy.
It's all I can do just to force the bran through my lips.


I want to go back to work.
I want to live again.
I want to eat without feeling like I'm sinning.
I want to live outside of hell.


I want to ignore the old parental adage that whispers that 'I want doesn't get'.

Fattening Up Under The Cloak

If I think of the chocolate and the jellybeans and the more chocolate and the more jelly beans and the rice crackers and the mini eggs that I have stuffed down me...
An endless onslaught of sugar coated dollops of fat.
My head is spinning in a panic of sugar and heart pounding horror at what I’ve done.

What have I done?

I’ve worked so hard to burn it all off and now, in one evening, I’ve thrown my body into chaos with a purge-less binge.

I want to run and not stop until my bones tear through my skin.

My mouth hasn’t been empty for more than 5 minutes since I left therapy.
Which implies that it was difficult right? But it wasn’t. Not really.

We spoke about a dream.
The bookshelf was a flimsy, wooden frame covering an entire wall. Like some sort of Ikea job, the frame had compartments, filled with rows of books.
They wanted to move the whole unit.
I stood and watched in silent desperation as the thin frame twisted and most of the compartments on the left side emptied crashingly.
I’d warned them it would happen and they wouldn’t listen.
We talked about how it was about therapy. Somehow. I think Friday’s session had some bits in it that felt very much like the shelf would twist and things would fall out.

I can’t remember what she said. Surprise. Surprise.

My heart is cloaked with sadness.
It has been since Saturday evening when my dad recounted his visit to the hospital where my sister is currently sectioned, caged like the animal her illness seems to make her.
He described how, as he sat next to her watching something on her laptop, her head suddenly dropped and lolled.
He'd asked if she was falling asleep and listened to her half breathed response. He helped her climb up on the bed and watched as she immediately slept.

A nurse popped her head round the door, apologetically, not realising dad was there, she called to my sister to say it was lunch. Feeding time. Force feeding.

“They’ve turned her into a zombie”.
Dad does an impression of her that all at once makes my eyes prick with unusual tears.

I don’t cry for her anymore. Not usually.
And I didn’t. But my throat ached and I had to look hard into the bottom of my glass to see the grains of the table.

My sister restrained, and injected with anti psychotics.
Sedated. Unable to run. Unable to rebel against the controlling regime they force upon her.

It’s her fault.
I comfort myself.
It’s her fault.
She’s the one who tries to starve to death.
Again, I am cloaked by a choking sadness.

And I am a desperate teenager again, wanting to scream,

Lethergogetyourhandsoffmysisterleaveheraloneleaveherthefuckalone, tearing at their strong arms as they manhandle my beautiful, frantic, sobbing sister.

In real life, all the books fall out at once.

Delights of Duloxetine

I don't even want to think how long I have been taking the anti depressant, 'Citalopram' for. Perhaps a decade?

I guess that the efficacy of most medications decreases after long periods of time, although I have never heard this theory in relation to anti d's so cannot claim that this is the case.

However, last week, suffocated by a thickening black fog, I stumbled into the doctor's surgery (not a place I frequent unless death feels imminent) and admitted I had no desire to be alive anymore.

I sat hollowed and empty, crying without feeling the sensation of tears on my cheeks.
I answered questions that I can't remember, without being able to form coherent sentences.

A change in medication has been suggested before but I have always felt too anxious about the upheaval of such change. This time, I simply no longer cared.

I didn't care much about anything actually.

Didn't care when a man who had been staring at me in his car got out and followed me to a secluded area of woodland.

Didn't even care when he tried to make a move on me.

Nothing happened and I suppose I was lucky.

Either way, I find myself, a week into stopping Citalopram, a week into weaning onto Duloxetine (more famously, Cymbalta).

The effects have been good in terms of my mood, though at this point, it could well be a combination of factors, not least of which would be my return to work after the fraught Easter "Holiday" where I lived two weeks as a fugitive. Alternating between hideouts in the gym, supermarket car parks, retail outlets and coffee shops... Anywhere to avoid the pressure of food.

The downside is the side effects.
I haven't slept a full night for two weeks.
The pressure in my right ear is, at times, immense. My eardrum seems to oscillate constantly, and I am drive crazy by the fruitless attempts at yawning.
My stomach is bloated and rock solid. I am almost bent double from the acid pain that spreads from one end of my diaphragm to the other.
That kind of thing.

I have a huge amount going on in my mind but I feel unable to express any of it.

So what's new? I ask myself.