Thursday, February 27, 2014

Treatment

With anything in life, we as humans tend to have preconceived ideas of what something, someone, or someplace should look like, feel like or be like. Embarking on the unknown and at the time, very scary path of treatment, I had a million and one preconceived ideas of what this treatment thing was going to be. I thought ‘I am not going to fit in’, ‘I am not sick enough to be in a treatment center’, ‘everyone is going to wonder why someone as fat as me was in a place for skinny people’. All of these thoughts plus so many more swarmed around in my mind manifesting my fear into a paralyzing state. The one tricky thing about Anorexic’s is we don’t realize how sick we really are until it is too late. I knew the doctors were telling me my organs were shutting down, I was fully aware that I passed out in the middle of a busy street in Tulsa while I was running, I was aware the ambulance had to be called in to assist me during a track workout (I blamed both times I passed out on the hot summer temperatures), I heard my therapist when she told me she didn’t think I was going to be able to kick this preoccupation with food and exercise on my own, I was smart enough to comprehend insurance and that insurance companies would not pay for just anyone to enter a treatment center. Yet, I still was unable to realize that I had an illness serious enough for me utilize a resource for help. After all I strived daily for perfection, I could do anything I set my mind to, I wore a cape under my day clothes and when things got hard I pushed harder and made it happen. When my mother and I arrived in Denver the reality of the situation became very clear and with clarity came anger. I was never one to express my emotions well; in fact the only emotion I could express well was happiness and let’s be clear, I was as far from happy as one could get. So when the time came for my mother to leave me at the Eating Recovery Center (ERC), similar to a mother leaving a toddler at daycare for the first time, I believe I said something along the line of “if you leave me here then don’t expect to have a daughter anymore” or something like that. I actually have no recollection of this statement or much memory of the last couple of months leading up to treatment. When we don’t feed our bodies….brace yourself for this epic announcement….our minds are not fed either. Being my brain was not working at it highest capacity when I went into treatment I have had to rely on my mother and her memory to shared with me some of the things I said to her as she left me kicking and screaming, and to be honest I am surprised she still wanted to be mother when I got out. As my journey started at ERC the mountain in front seemed far too great to climb. Everything that I thought I loved in my life was taken away and everything that was uncomfortable was brought to the forefront. Yet over the course of three months the unhealthy life I had lived for years was becoming a distant memory and I surprisingly found myself embracing the new lease on life I had been given. I will be honest, treatment was not fun but it led me to a life that I can now enjoy, it introduced to me to some extraordinary people who grew to be called friends and I looked up to daily for their strength, resilience, and grace. I often times sat in admiration of the fellow ERC patients who surrounded me, the group was so diverse yet so similar. Each person was beyond incredible; I was convinced world peace could be a reality if the heads, hearts, and hands of these extraordinary people worked together. The IQs were off the charts and I was blown away by how inwardly and outwardly stunning every patient was. Those million and one preconceived thoughts….very few were actually accurate.

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