Pearls and Dreams
I saw my psychiatrist today.
He said he worries about me. He said there are two types of patients he worries about the most. Those he expects to see in patient at any time ... and those he knows he'll never have to worry about seeing in-patient.
I'm the latter.
He knows I'll never 'give it up' enough to have to go inpatient. In some ways, he'd prefer that.
He mentioned my hair and how becoming it was. I thanked him, and said that I liked it longer, but longer just wasn't good with how thin my hair had gotten. He asked me if I'd always had thin hair. No ... I haven't.
Which ...came down to the question of what brought me to him to begin with ... the eating disorder.Dadgum I hate it when we get on that topic!!!!!
He asked me a question ... I don't even know what he said ... I couldn't answer it ... it didn't make sense. He asked me if I even knew how unhealthy and twisted that thinking was. I couldn't even begin to see how to get to an answer of the question, much less see how to straighten he question out ...
Something about body image and loosing weight ...and it not being tied in with who I am ..and ... I don't know ..what he said didn't make sense at all. AT ALL. It was like he'd strung a bunch of words together that didn't belong together. I don't remember ever being so confused.
I don't understand ...even after 5 years in therapy ..I am not at a healthy weight (you can see that in any picture of me) ... how will getting to a healthy weight ... NOT improve my self esteem? Why is it not tied in? And why do I have to accept my body at 100 lbs overweight before I can say my self esteem is ok?
ARGH!
We got into a discussion of the difference between compliance and healing ...and that most of my work in therapy has gone toward my spiritual growth ... and my relationship with God, and a surface relationship with people ... and allowed me to do some introspection ... it's opened a few doors ...but I'm still holding too many things close to the chest ...and too much of the eating disorder is too close to the door ... while the behaviors might be discarded ... the idea's are still there. Within arms reach at any time. The mindset is still there ... and the way I look at the world is through a distorted veiw ...and one that is based on if I'm good or bad today ... and that isn't acceptable to him ..and that makes him worry.
I'm not sure my post means anything to anyone ..especially me. I may wind up deleting this. Right now I just needed to write out some ramblings ...
Dr. Suess
"And will you succeed? Yes indeed! Yes indeed! Ninety Eight and Three Quarters guarenteed!"
it makes sense to me but I am also a good 50 pds overweight myself so... i think i get where your coming from...
ReplyDeleteI have watched your weight drop over the last couple years. You look great. I know it hard for "us" to see the improvements, but you are getting there. With health issue it just take longer. You know Dr M. cares about you and so do I! You are going to make. Your faith makes you strong. Hold on to that and it helps with the "other stuff" ((hugs))
ReplyDeleteI think everyone is addicted to something-food, drugs, alcohol, porn, cigs, gambling....we just do it for a fast fix to feel better....I learned that from Dr.Phil! the only show I ever watched in its entirety (sp?)
ReplyDeletebut, seriously, Ive been thin and overweight in my life, both many times. People treated me a lot better when I was thin, not the people who really cared for me, they could care less is I was fat or thin, but the general world out there is more accepting of a thin person, I think that had a lot to do with my self-esteem.
I think it has a lot to do with values when being raised...I wish you luck with your weight loss!
I think I understand.
ReplyDeleteAt least I hope I do.
I also think I hear what he was saying.
Here's a thought that might clear things up a bit:
How can you love your neighbor as you love yourself if you really don't love yourself?
Until you can really, really, really love yourself then you won't be able to truly love your neighbor.
If you can't truly love your neighbor then you can't really forgive them.
If you can't forgive them, then you can't never seem to forgive yourself.
Does that make sense?
Or is it even relevant?
Maybe I just needed to write too.
later...
It makes sense to me too PK. We are also over weight...about 60 lbs. It's kind of a double whammy for us; lose the weight and the diabetes might reverse, continue taking psych meds and the diabetes meds (one in particular) and losing weight is nearly impossible. I think a lot about weight and depression and self-esteem...before starting therapy for severe depression, we had spent about 8 months losing a serious amount of weight, we were within 15 lbs of our goal (which is at the top end on the height/weight scale for our height). We had major abdominal surgery and gained weight rapidly and sunk into depression equally rapidly. Of course there were other factors involved, some very big factors...loss of job, loss of ability to ever have children, visit from parents etc. But I do think that when you are not happy with your appearance, it is very hard to have good self-esteem. I really wonder how much of the initial depression had to do with the weight gain after working so hard to get the weight down.
ReplyDeleteI understand, I think.
ReplyDeleteI've been working through some similar issues. I spend a lot of time delineating good and bad and trying hard to be good. The problem is that if I am not perfect then I perceive that as bad. Only perfect is good enough for me which, of course, is too high a standard to set for anyone.
Don't know if this helps you at all, or if I've just run off on a tangent.
NIF