Judy2

[went for a hike with dad and felt stressed for 99% of it.] sleep + my bed felt really good, safe, and cosy weighed myself today and yesterday and the numbers i see are good/reassuring no bloating today, more or less flat tummy i like my bum and my arms are okay, slightly toned saw some beautiful flowers in nature saw some tadpoles and watched them for a bit i tried to communicate my stress in a functional manner dad acknowledged that i felt stressed and i can tell that he tries to help me feel more comfortable hiked for 5 hours so even though i felt stressed throughout, at least i got a nice leg workout, basically drove our car for one hour...which was a bit more exhausting than i had expected, but i'm glad i made it and keep practising some progress with my thesis (i hope!!!) fed our family's friends' cat again i really enjoyed taking a hot shower after the hike i am wearing my favourite flowy red dress again now...feels good:)

i feel very selfish around my parents. because i tell them to respect my feelings more, and to take me seriously. and whenever i still feel bad after an interaction, because i remember something invalidating that they said...i take that emotion and send them lots of texts to clarify and express. i suppose i do so in an unfriendly manner...could work on that, although right now i am probably not willing to be friendlier yet. right now it's already a big deal that i talk, instead of hurting myself. but it still feels kinda wrong and maybe i am just being brutal and unfriendly with my parents. it's just that i figured i gotta do something and no longer let people gaslight me. so whatever i feel is valid, and i'll let them know. and if they tell me "don't stress about it" and "what do you mean, chaos?" - i'll say "for me, in my world, in my reality, in my perception, the chaos and the stress are real." they can't take that away from me. (probably goes back to a time in childhood when they were fighting a lot and still pretended like everything was fine, and i had to hide my fear and insecurity concerning all that? not sure. i don't remember any other situation where this could have come from, but maybe there's something else that explains this.)

i'd like to ignore this and just push through with all the exposure therapy until the emotions stop...but i suppose this is not the way. so... not ignoring this: a) i'm triggered because of the thesis, because it's scary and i don't know if i'll manage okay b) i'm triggered because of dad and his idiosyncrasies c) i'm triggered because dad is getting involved in my thesis work without appreciating the degree to which this is stressful to me, and acting super chill about it, and that ACHES and makes me feel super stressed and triggered and hurt, and he doesn't even want to believe it and it brings up so so much emotion and i feel hurt and i don't want him to get so close to me....because now that he's involved, i have to think about him and our emotional conflicts more than i like throughout the day, which leaves me feeling stressed and incredibly vulnerable! (stress level close to 70%...so if i think about it too much it quickly explodes and i want to be impulsive and hurt myself). so maybe the right thing, after all, is to try and re-establish some sense of distance and security again. have more me-time and leave him out of it. cause it's stressing me out to be thinking all day how he's trying to get involved in something that is SO emotional to me, without appreciating the degree to which it is emotional and stressful to me in the slightest. ugh.

drove our car today had a nice chat with my friend went across the street to feed her parents' cat twice made some progress with my thesis (i hope)

feeling scared, unsafe, triggered

...feeling quite overwhelmed cause there's SO MUCH going on all at once, and i cannot even put it all into words here (which would help me cope; to simply interpret and theorise it all). so once again me just being is beyond interpretations and thoughts, which also just are. it's still so scary. that's like the simplest way to describe all that's going on. i am scared, i feel unsafe, it's all so much.

had a really long, exhausting day, and now i am feeling a bit unsafe. i spent the day at the library and met a friend in the afternoon, and only came back home just now. feeling exhausted but the logic of this was that i want to avoid dad when he's home on the weekends. we still interacted a lot because he tried to give feedback for my thesis - but somehow that is hella stressful in and of itself. anyway, so i'm feeling unsafe now. given that this is not an unusual experience for me, i'm trying to tell myself that there's nothing i did wrong, and that it's okay to be "free" and be "alive" (and eat and choose not to restrict) even if life continues to feel scary and chaotic. but i do feel unsafe. it's just that i always feel unsafe, i also feel this way in my apartment when i'm avoiding all of life and all social interaction. so it's okay. it's okay if i'm feeling unsafe now, it doesn't mean that i did something wrong - that's an illusion. but i am a bit stressed out because all of this is pretty exhausting. the combination of dad + thesis + emotional triggers + body image/food as the ongoing background discussion. it really is triggering, it really leaves me feeling scared!!! trying not to let myself be shaken by this. i feel unsafe but i didn't do anything wrong, i am doing a good job trying to live life despite how scary and chaotic it feels. (ah!) ...scary. stressed.

@Schizophonia so are you:)

i have a comfortable bed to sleep in i am feeling better now than i felt earlier this week - thank God! i am considering that my face may look alright after all. sometimes i look in the mirror and think it looks okay/pretty. hopefulness: my face will keep looking alright/pretty! hopefulness: i'll manage to write this thesis and write it well; i'm already making lots of progress with it. i have access to supplements that support my health today i am going to meet my childhood best friend again - hoping to have a good time i'd like to buy myself a pretty box for meal prep

I have a history of anorexia and now I feel as though I cannot stop overeating, eating past fullness and satiety, eating when i am uncomfortably bloated, eating despite no longer restricting and eating regularly. I am scared that this will never stop and that I will gain a lot of weight. I have got a number of counsellors, a nutritionist, and so forth. It feels as though none of them are taking this seriously and i am scared of how much more weight i’ll gain until someone takes this seriously and helps me. Also i am incredibly stressed because of my thesis, this is such a hardcore emotional topic for me, i have been procrastinating on this for two years and now i am finally trying to tackle it. It wouldn’t be wise to back down now that i am finally getting started and pushing through, but i am also so stressed to a degree that i cannot handle on my own, and my support system s not taking me seriously/not actually meeting me where i’m at/letting me down. Please say something to help. Also the thing with food is so much more complex than protein and fibre and god knows what. I know a lot about nutrition. I also know how to restrict and make myself lose weight when I have to. I don’t want to be mean to myself anymore, don’t want to force myself into restriction, but it seems as though i can’t just be a normal eater, either. It’s eiter over- or undereating, i can’t seem to find a middle ground. I am incredibly scared that I will never resolve this and that i will get fat and feel even more uncomfortable because of that and then i’ll still have to handle the thesis and on and on... It’s all too much, I don’t know what to do anymore, I want someone to help me. This is all too much to handle on my on. Please, someone help me!

10 gratitudes today: slept through without meds eating went well i made some progress with my thesis i went to the gym taking a hot shower at the gym after my workout in some moments i had tolerable perspectives on my body and face i successfully re-activated my card for the university library here and had no trouble finding the book that i needed dad supported me and took a lot of time to discuss my thesis with me dad and i got along well...no major conflicts and some moments of positive connection and interaction dad and i watched a documentary about mathematical patterns in nature and there was this really cool thing called Conway's Game of Life. i'd never heard of it before but found it quite fascinating. i like the denim blouse that i wore today....made it to 11:)

@Schizophonia thank you:) i've actually watched this video before, a couple of years ago. but it's still a good reminder now.

@Schizophonia i'll think about it, thank you:)

feeling stressed and triggered. trying to let it pass.

i'm okay with my legs and my bum. i'm so NOT okay with my belly!!!

my legs are okay. they've got substance to them, but at least it's all held together by a good percentage of lean muscle mass. my face, i'm having mixed feelings about...fluctuating perspectives. my belly, we don't even need to get started about. i also mentioned this before, but i'm feeling a noticeable difference in how my body holds emotions/how it is shaken by them, having the direct comparison of being underweight vs at a healthy weight. haven't decided yet if this is good or bad, and i can't articulate what precisely this difference consists in. guess it has to do with having more substance to hold the emotions that shake my body...which is something i'm not used to, and sometimes it's scary because i can't let the emotion pass right through me in the way i could let it do before. having so little substance that emotions can pass right through me was also what shook me so deep in the past that i could have spiritual experiences and an ego death/nondual experiences....cause my body couldn't hold onto the energetic separation anymore, so my consciousness just exploded and became evident as one when my body was at its lowest. ...guess there are pros and cons to both, and it'll still take me some time to fully get used to and appreciate the perks of living at a stable, healthy weight. takes some time for my mind to accommodate to this... anyway, dad drove me into town this morning and i went for a quick stop at the university library. going to the gym now. as i was walking through town, it was still incredibly overwhelming for me to be surrounded by so many shops, so much food. whenever i have to make food choices, i'm still quite overwhelmed. so it's a good thing that by now, i've come up with a bit of a meal structure for myself, just to know roughly where i'm at. i also figured that on mornings when i have to interact a lot with dad, i'll simply opt for a protein shake at breakfast to make things easier for myself. in the past decade, being around family always meant restriction. cause i'm smart and know that family life can be chaotic...but not doing that anymore, because i figured by now that all of life is chaotic, and i need to be fully there to live, and to sort through life's challenges in the first place (be fully there, and give my body consistent energy). it's a new perspective, but maybe it can also feel cool to be at a healthy weight, be fit, be allowed to eat moderate amounts, and so on. maybe i can still look and feel cute and pretty even at this weight... i'm trying to believe it. trying to believe that i can even still feel "small" and cute, girly, feminine...even at a healthy weight, while in a fit, lean body...

Thank you:)

@Natasha Tori Maru thanks:)

i'm so much cuter and more beautiful when i'm skinny

weighed myself just to have a reality check and i'm still in a somewhat reasonable range. but GOSH i hate how i look and how i feel at this size!!!

also, body image this week is BAD. i feel extremely uncomfortable in my body. especially my belly and face are making me worry. if truth must be told, i personally feel quitw bad about this and from one perspective this is just HORRIBLE and i'm FREAKING OUT. i know there's also another perspective from which i could sort of try to see that this body is still cute. more feminine, etc. more mature. but ouch! really hurts to be in this body, i'm really uncomfortable, i feel WAY too big!... it feels really ugly and bad to me to be in a body of this size and shape. i could totally beat myself up over it...but we're trying not to do that, right? but if that was the sort of thing i was still doing, NOW would be the time to do it. hell, i **** this body.

Life, food, my body - they all felt so much more beautiful when i was restricting. actually living life feels so stupid, because there's all the "bad stuff" i find myself completely vulnerable to, and having to accept in order to still be able to live instead of wait. i feel so vulnerable, so ugly so stupid, so uncomfortable, knowing this. i hate myself for living now. it's not right. i was supposed to wait for a perfect world until i'm allowed to live. if i really live now, that just makes all the "bad stuff" so much more real, and this is it. and if this is real life and i'll fail at times and not be good enough, that'll be real, too. ah! massively uncomfortable. i don't want this. this is not okay! this is too much! i'm not supposed to live Life, because look!, there's too much ugliness in it and i'm just fully exposed to that now. this just can't be.

...i guess on the one hand it's helpful to understand all this, on the other, it's quite a disillusionment, which hurts. leaves me naked, leaves me susceptible to all kinds of things that could go "wrong" in life. most of all, it makes me feel stupid for leaving fantasy world behind. fantasy world was smart. and beautiful. even though Heaven never came, i feel stupid for throwing away any prospects i had of ever reaching it through my constructed, my intricately, intelligently designed methods. it's sad. leaves me feeling low, leaves me feeling disgusted at the self, the humble, ordinary self i'm having to live with now. in the humble, ordinary, Godless world i'll be left with once all the things i so neatly separated and divided into two lose their power over me, lose their divinity. i suppose it sets me free, but right now it's just sad. not sure if anyone understands. i find this mechanism quite genius...but i'm on the seemingly disadvantageous side of it now...takes some accepting, some learning, some getting used to. moderation is boring, dull. i want excess, in whatever direction. i want extremes - otherwise, what is there? i think i wrote about this before, a few weeks ago, mentioning how it all takes on a very "ordinary shininess" - cause stuff loses its glow, the glow it had when i believed in God and the devil. basically. it was a constant struggle, but at least i had the thought of something Divine to hold onto. that's gone now. sad.

whatever this resolution is that i'm looking for, food won't give it to me. undereating won't give it to me. overeating won't give it to me. eating just the right amounts won't give it to me. it's not to be found in the food. it's probably not to be found anywhere. i don't even know what i'm looking for...i only ever know what i'm running from. i just want to be safe. i just want life to be good. i'm always scared that Life's not good and perfect enough, and that i'm not good and perfect enough. which is usually quite disappointing. cause if This is REAL, if existence IS - and that's crazy - shouldn't it be beautiful?...

so....part of me resists the idea that i want food to become normal or something i have a regulated, balanced relationship with. cause it's sad to let go of that whole HUGE paradigm, of all the meaning i have projected onto it for so long. like there's probably real grief involved, because of my beautiful divine fantasy world and the ways in which it emotionally protected me from difficulties in life. it's hard to let go of that. leaves me really naked. i also feel really guilty and stupid for attempting recovery. if my illness is so ingenius and recovery leaves me naked and susceptible to all sorts of painful emotions...i shouldn't be doing it. it's especially evil of me that i am handling all of this on my own again, breaking all these rules on my own, without a therapist. God, i just want to be Safe. and Beautiful. please. i'm never sure about that.