Welcome back, everyone.
Today's topic is something that I've heard from many of you,
and I'm sure many of us have experienced in the past,
or are experiencing right now,
and that is:
Why, when I finally try to get better, does it feel like I'm getting worse?
Does that make sense?
And I know that some of you may not even realize
that's what is happening,
but what I'm talking about is when you go see a therapist,
or you finally go into treatment,
and you're dealing with all of this stuff, right,
we all have a bunch of stuff that we've gone through,
or we're dealing with, or we've been trying to
suppress with our eating disorder or cutting, or
whatever we're using, or exercise even,
we're trying to numb out from some emotions, some experience,
everything that's all tied into what has happened in our past,
or what's happening right now, right?
Now, when we start to kind of open up,
I always call it baggage, right, "I have emotional baggage,"
I always say when we open up our first piece of baggage, right,
we open our suitcase up, there's a lot of crap in there.
And it can be overwhelming at first.
Think about when you come home from a trip.
Sometimes it helps for me to visualize these kinds of things
versus thinking of emotions and experiences.
So I open up my suitcase. I've been on a 4-week trip.
There are a lot of clothes that need to be cleaned,
need to be put away, I have to take to the dry cleaning,
I may need to mend something, who knows, right?
There's a lot to be dealt with and it's overwhelming.
So imagine you open that suitcase, it's one of those
that you have to sit on to get closed, you know, and
you zip it, so when you open it - poof!
It's overwhelming. It's too much.
So I like to think of that, when we first go get help,
we go see a therapist, we go to treatment,
we have just opened that first suitcase,
and it is full of crap. And it's a lot to deal with.
All those emotions, all those experiences we've been stuffing,
and as things were brought up again, so,
let's say we have issues with our dad.
And he did something really bad back in the past,
maybe he abused us physically, sexually, maybe emotionally,
and over the years, even though it's not as bad as it used to be,
there are still things that have happened
that have almost affirmed what he's either said or done, or whatever, right?
So all of that is stuffed in this bag.
And when we go to talk to somebody, that's a lot to deal with.
And at first, we're gonna feel completely overwhelmed.
And I just want to let you know that's really normal.
I know it's hard, and I know it's even harder
because we're just trying to get help,
and then we feel completely burdened, like
"I should just stop, it's not worth the hard work, this is too much..
it's overwhelming, I'm crying all the time, I feel stressed out,
I'm triggered even more than I was before.."
And to be honest, that's normal.
And I know it's hard, but this is the time when you need to
use your tools as much as you can.
Yes, you might act on your eating disorder,
you may cut,
you may do things you said you would "never do again,"
but remember, recovery is a process.
It is not perfection. NOT perfection.
Every day is different, everything is different.
You'll have really bad days, you'll have really good days.
You'll have those days where you're kind of on the border
and you think you might but you don't..
It's normal, it's life, right?
Things don't ever just work out exactly the way we wanted them to,
and we can just move along and never do anything bad again,
it's a process, so we have to work through it.
So when you first go to treatment,
or you first start seeing a therapist,
and you're really getting into the nitty-gritty
of why you have your eating disorder in the first place,
it's gonna be hard. But stay strong, hang in there,
reach out for support. Contact me, post on my website,
call your friend, listen to your music..
I really like coloring. I know that sounds very childish,
but it's very therapeutic for me. Just the feeling
of the crayon on the paper, is almost
cathartic in and of itself. So it just feels very relaxing.
Do breathing exercises, take some time for yourself,
maybe getting your nails done really makes you feel good,
maybe, sometimes I even like to put that little hair mask on,
tie your hair up, put a mask on your face,
have a little spa day at home where nobody's around,
you're watching your guilty pleasures on TV,
you know, like who knows, right?
Some reality TV show you don't want anyone to know you're watching,
Take your time and do that. We all need that stuff.
We need to take care of ourselves. It's gonna be really hard.
But hang in there, and let me know if there's anything I can do.
Leave your comments below, let people know
whatever tools work for you, if there's
something that really helps, like
"hey, that one breathing technique really helps when I'm doing ... which can usually be triggering,"
I go for a walk with my dog, I know one of my clients likes to
sit in a hammock, that can be really relaxing,
things like that. So just keep working on it.
I know it's hard, but hang in there,
it's normal to feel overwhelmed,
and we'll just keep working together,
we'll keep sharing our tips and tools so that
we're more prepared when we feel overwhelmed again, okay?
And we'll just keep making this trip and trek,
it seems uphill, I know,
We're working together towards a healthy mind and a healthy body.
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