Difficult Choices

First, of all, I want to say thank you TORI (and I guess, thank the Gods of Chance) for choosing me as one of your winners in your drawing! It really made my day :-)

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Ok, so, as you know from my last post, things had been weird with my mom. Well, I'm afraid it really isn't much better. We haven't "fought" again this week, but I feel like there's tension. I talked to my therapist on Wednesday about it, and I think I've figured it out: 

My mom is afraid to deal with my eating disorder because of her OWN insecurities. I'm serious. I asked her to read a book about it, and she seemed uncomfortable by the idea. 

Also, I started reading "Do I Look Fat in This?" by Jessica Weiner (who wrote "A Very Hungry Girl", her own memoir about her struggle with ED which I have yet to read b/c it wasn't in the library). I highly recommend this book to women EVERYWHERE, whether you have an ED or not, are young or old, black or white, whatever. Jess talks about the "Language of Fat", and how women are practically encouraged by society to "bond" over body-hatred and "feeling fat". But remember, FAT IS NOT A FEELING!

But anyway, there is a section in her book about mother-daughter relationships, and also about friendships and how women seem to compete and thrive off of one-another's poor body image. It's sick. There are real-life examples in the book, and I realized that my mom and I are a prime example. I know my mom doesn't do it intentionally, but she really is just unhappy with herself and always has been for as long as I can remember, and it has rubbed off on me and my own feelings about my own body. For example, growing up, my mom always warned me that I was going to inevitably inherit her big hips and thunder thighs, and small boobs. It's like I've been "doomed" since I was born!

But Jess's book is about how life doesn't begin 5 pounds from now, and we should spend our time furthering our relationships and careers and living our lives rather than spending all our time obsessing over calories and clothes and images and berating ourselves.

So anyway, last night my mom colored my hair (just blonde again like usual b/c I had some massive roots! Although this time it's a bit lighter for summer), and I was reading the "Do I Look Fat in This?" book while I waited for the color to set. And so I thought, it's just the two of us, dad isn't home, so I'm gonna try to connect with her. SO I say "Hey mom, I think you'd really find this book interesting.", and tried to tell her about the positive message Jess sends about the Language of Fat and how we should cast it aside.

And my mom goes "Oh, come on, honey. That's just how women are. You can't get mad at me for saying I want to lose weight, because I need to lose weight." So I tried to explain that it is hard for me to overcome my ED thoughts about body image when she has such a poor body image herself, and sure enough, she got all defensive. And this is what she actually said to me:

"Well, I'm sorry, but you can't expect everyone around you to change. It's like an alcoholic expecting people to stop drinking around them or something. It's just not realistic." 

And I said that if someone I loved was an alcoholic and they told me it would help them recover better if I didn't drink around them, then I would MAKE THAT SACRIFICE out of love for them. At this point she walked away. And this is after she had already made comments about "WOW! I didn't realize how much your hair had thinned recently. We usually need 2 boxes of haircolor but I think we'll only need one!" and "Jeez, your ends are really dry and damaged!" Gee, thanks ma.

I really don't know what to do. My mom honestly speaks the language of fat ALL THE TIME, and Jess' book is making me realize that, and it makes me realize how toxic that is for my situation right now. My recovery is honestly lacking because of this. For example, we went to Yoga together last night and ran into my mom's super-fit, gym-crazed friend and they were both joking about their "flabby" stomachs and how they need to start working out more.

It drives me crazy. Every time I flip the channel, there's some new diet trick or workout machine or stupid trend involving liquid diets. It's sickening. Truly sickening. It makes me ashamed that I fell into the trap, but also makes me sad because I don't want any more women to fall as hard as I did. I could have DIED. I literally was near-death only 3 months ago. And yet, my mom continues to live her life in a cycle of diet/exercise, lose a few pounds, eat again, gain a few pounds, berate herself, diet again, lose a few pounds, etc etc.

Why can't it all stop? EEEEK.

Ok enough ranting.

Wednesday I had a weigh-in at the nutritionist and it went down 2 pounds. Not good. SO I have been told to lower my activity levels and now I have to drink 2-3 Ensure Plus supplements a day, in addition to my meal plan of a LARGE breakfast, lunch, and dinner, plus 2-3 snacks! Ughh. I've been making interesting creatins w/ the Ensure, though, like the milkshake I had last night that actually wasn't half-bad.

I really need to gain 5 more pounds before school, or I seriously am afraid my mom won't let me go. I know she doesn't trust me and thinks I'm going to fall right back into it again, so I need to prove to her that I can do it. It just makes it really hard for me to motivate myself to gain when she comes home from work bragging about the fact that she had cottage cheese and a hard-boiled egg for lunch. GAH.

Alright, enough of this. I am going to seize the day! I am making a collage at the moment of inspirational words and pretty pictures from magazine clippings. And I've decided NOT to include any pictures of super-thin models in the collage, because that's just stupid. REAL women are SO much sexier.

Also seeing Harry Potter this afternoon! And then going out to dinner w/ my friend Sasha and her boyfriend. A little nervous because I've never met him before and social/eating out situations are always stressful, so this just makes it twice as stressful. Wish me luck!

Have a fabulous weekend! I won't be around b/c I'll be moving things into my new apartment!