Reaching Out

I "knew" I needed help roughly 15 years ago, but knowing and doing something with that knowledge in an active way are two completely different things.  

My daughter has a progressive neurometabolic disease and we had decided to begin counseling to help her deal with all she goes through. During the intake interview, the psychologist asked me how I was doing. Hmm...how was I doing? That was something I had to really ponder. Honestly, until I had gastric bypass in November 2011, I had pretty much given up on myself completely: my health, my mental health, my sense of self, my goals and dreams, my body, my weight. I guess it was pretty obvious that I was far from OK after discussing a bit of both my history and my current dysfunction, lol. I wasn't seeing anyone for therapy at the time, so she had me schedule an intake for myself.  I will admit that I have many, many things I could/should work on, but we don't have time to list all my neuroses/diagnoses/etc. right now. That list will take a long time to explore, but we'll get there.  

I've dealt with severe depression and anxiety all my life and currently have a diagnosis of "mood disorder NOS" while they attempt to rule out bipolar. In the course of a few meetings with the new therapist, I had revealed my long struggle with ED and it made me infinitely more aware of just what I was doing to myself and how badly I could damage not only my newly rearranged anatomy, but everything else, too. I was absolutely terrified that I was doing irreparable harm inside: stretching the pouch that was my new stomach, causing ulcers, weakening the lines of staples in my "old" stomach, weakening the sites where my intestines were rerouted and joined back together. I had vivid visions of internal bleeding, emergency surgery, and not being able to care for my daughter. But, I couldn't stop the bingeing or the purging. Stress relief, but in a horribly self-destructive form.  

The therapist had me start journaling daily, basically just reflecting on the day and my feelings. Being open and honest and actually facing everything I had pushed down and used food to keep down was incredibly difficult and emotionally exhausting. I really started to feel like I was hitting the bottom, but it felt good...in a way. I knew that it was time to actually do something and opening up (again) in therapy was the catalyst I needed to force me into action. I had an appointment set with a doctor in my surgeon's office for a check-in the next week and I decided to go in and just be brutally honest.  

So, I did it.  

It was nerve-wracking and embarrassing. I was mortified, but I just went in and told the truth. What a novel concept, huh?  I was sure that they were going to be disappointed, even mad at me. I felt like a little kid in trouble. Adding insult to injury, she even had an intern with her that day and I know he got way more than he had planned out of that patient visit.  

To my surprise, she wasn't mad. She was amazed that I was brave enough to admit what was going on and actually ask for help. I can assure you that "brave" was not an adjective that I would use to describe my feelings in any way that day. She had a powwow with my therapist and they found a treatment program close to my home that focused on ED in all its ugly forms:  anorexia, bulimia, bulimarexia, binge eating, EDNOS, night eating syndrome, bigorexia (muscle dysmorphia/"reverse anorexia"), etc. 

Because my life is one never-ending extenuating circumstance, it wasn't feasible for me to do any sort of inpatient program and I didn't feel that that was what I truly needed. I was worried that when I had the intake interview with the program's director that she would think I was "too crazy" for outpatient and would try to admit me. I was really afraid that someone would think I was somehow "unfit" to care for my daughter. But again, like my doctor, she didn't judge me or make me feel bad. I was more honest than I had probably ever been in my life and I'm so, so glad that I was. I needed this opportunity. Desperately.

Tune in next time to see where I ended up and the treatment plan we formed.