Tx, thank you so much. I am so glad to hear you have a wonderful child. I hope that happens for me too, I really do. We have been going through treatments for over a year and it has been devastating for me every time. I have relied more and more on daily drinking to get through it. I was going to put it off until January as a New Year's resolution, but I realized that would just be wasted time.
Taz, thank you for sharing that with me. I am sorry your daughter has suffered from an ED but I am so glad to hear that she is in recovery. How old is she?
I am not working any recovery program right now. I have to admit that I am afraid of AA because I no longer believe in God. I know I can still go - I am thinking about it.
What I really need is a therapist. It is time that I get into therapy. I need coping skills and don't really have many good ones that are not internally self-destructive.
I have avoided therapy for too long. I had two attempts with therapists that really were not very good. One was a therapist at my college - didn't do much for me. The second was an INSANE social worker who should never, ever been practicing therapy. I quit after it was clear she was in financial trouble and she became verbally abusive.
Since then I have done the best I could trying to maintain recovery from my eating disorder and self injury (which is kind of an accessory to my ED). I have dealt with AN & BN (and resulting mental illness) for 10 years and have made regular recovery attempts which were followed by relapses on an annual basis. I got to the point where my body was destroyed...I have been rebuilding it now for several years and I'm doing well. I am so much more stable than I have ever been. I am on an anti-depressant which has helped me tremendously. It seems that the main thing holding me back now is my alcohol use (which honestly has never been as...severe as my eating disorder, which has nearly ruined my life in multiple ways).
I guess I'm fortunate to know where addictions can lead - have seen it in my family, and have experienced it myself, so I have enough knowledge to know where this will go if I don't stop it now.
The last time I cut was in March after a failed fertility cycle. It scarred up terribly and has deterred me from ever doing that again. I have put on 13 lbs via exercise and diet since June 2008, when my BMI had dipped into the 16's. I am now at a normal weight (though on the low end) and BMI is 18.8. I have purged this year - and guess what, EVERY SINGLE TIME I forced myself to puke I had binge-drank and exploited myself in some way.
This past weekend (coupled with the Harvard article on alcohol's impact on IVF) was enough to make me want to stop. Friday night, I drank way too much. My husband told me I was "glassy-eyed." I came home and purged tons of red wine. Saturday, I felt horrific all day - terrible hangover. I counted the hours until I could drink again, so I would feel better. Started drinking before I went out, then at parties, ate food, went home, purged a bunch of food/beer/wine. At some point I came onto and had sex with my husband, got in the shower, and cried sloppy, drunk tears by myself. I am unsure of when this was. I believe it was Friday night.
That's enough. Seriously. I have had worse experiences - I have had some pretty awful experiences in the past - but this was unpleasant enough to make me want to stop.