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Jane
My Experience of
Eating Distress
Last year I bought an apartment. To
many people I was just another first time buyer but for me it was a
momentous occasion. Not only was it a commitment to the bank but it
was a commitment to myself. The commitment being that I plan to be
around to enjoy this investment, I no longer want such a large
portion of my earnings or my parents earnings to be used on
treatment, I am adamant in wanting to enjoy and experience life.
It’s been a long journey. I’ve chosen a bumpy, roundabout route but
what’s important is that I’m here, alive and kicking, enjoying life
and without regret or bitterness. My destination was recovery but
recovery I’ve found is learning to know and accept myself as well as
experiencing life rather than existing. Fortunately it’s an ongoing
process and the barriers to allowing myself to enjoy the journey
have lifted. It’s been an expensive recovery both for my parents and
myself. I’ve been misunderstood and mistreated and have sunk to the
depths of depression and despair with feelings of such unworthiness
that I’ve wanted so badly to end it all, with death seeming the only
way out at times. I’ve been frustrated at people’s lack of
understanding most of whom have been working in the very treatment
programs I’ve found myself seeking help with. The funny thing is I
don’t know if I would be who I am, if I hadn’t met them. This just
proves to me how unique all our journeys are. I’ve learnt so much
from all the encounters I’ve had with both other sufferers and
therapists. One therapist told me that I needed to leave her program
as I had had eating distress for too long and the treatment wasn’t
helping me. As I had no funding the options given to me were a
public psychiatric hospital or to just go home. At the time I was at
the other side of the world, far away from family and support. The
railway tracks were becoming more and more attractive until I found
the book “Hope” and spoke to Gerry. My gut told me to trust him,
believe in the hope he was sending me and so my real recovery began
when I started in Marino. It was the first time my treatment focused
on me as a person and not my behaviours. My dedicated therapist saw
behind the layers of eating distress that had enmeshed who I was and
has helped me piece my jigsaw puzzle together. It has taken time and
it has not been smooth and the pieces still get moved around. I
continue to evolve and change and learn. I’m human and it’s a relief
to know that life is about making mistakes and learning and I don’t
have to strive for perfection.
I’m not perfect and never want to be….how boring would that be!! I
have made mistakes and I have hurt people but I have also helped
people and brought happiness to people by just being me. But
recovery is really not about other people. The world could love you
and you could tiptoe around people so that nobody has any ill
feelings towards you but as in eating distress it has no bearing if
you hate yourself. I have tried to please people for most of my
life. This way of life turned me into a china doll, fragile and
afraid of moving, in case I rubbed someone up the wrong way and I
broke. I lived for other people and was influenced so much by them
that I lost who I was. My eating distress allowed me to cocoon
myself in behaviours so I wouldn’t feel or be open to hurt. Not only
has it shielded me from life, it has also in the past shielded me
from relationships and connecting with people. For many years I have
walked around numb to the world feeling alone. I often look back at
past events with a hazy recollection.
At the beginning of my treatment and even up to the latter part of
my recovery I have looked to those who are trying to help me for
answers. I have wanted them to take away my pain. Again and again I
have been told it comes from within, that there is no magic wand and
that I need to walk the talk. This has been frustrating and I have
often felt hopeless and helpless being told this. However, through
guidance and learning new tools, through examination of my values
and looking at my goals, through finding what meaning I can get out
of life and being listened to and through hammering at the wall of
behaviours that have in the past encased me, I have realised my own
inner strength and will to recover. When recovery was focused on
behaviours, I was expected to take away the building blocks that
kept me up without being shown a scaffold to replace them.
Behaviours are initially a means of survival, we cling onto them for
a reason and for everyone those reasons are different. It takes time
and patience to realise what you are gaining from having eating
distress. Every experience I’ve found offers an opportunity to learn
something new about myself. The more I’ve worked on my real identity
the less power the eating distress has had over me.
My family sacrificed a lot to get me help. Sometimes the doctors who
they relied on were clueless and left my family and I feeling
hopeless but in a way this also developed my instinct and resilience
to survive. I always had a belief in there being more to life than
recovery being about maintaining a behaviour free existence and
Marino have clarified this belief.
We never got funding in Ireland. At one period when I was in the UK
the NHS paid for me to get treatment at a specialised eating
disorder unit. I have been covered by VHI since I was a child yet it
has never covered the costs any of my treatment. At one stage my
family and I decided on more intensive treatment. As it was abroad
it was not funded. Due to the fact my parents had pooled all their
resources on treatment up to this point I paid for the program.
Money I have to say is a hell of a motivation! I was very depressed
at the time and wanted to hide and cocoon myself. However, any
inkling I had to curl up and hide was dampened by the fact that
thousands of my savings and a loan was being spent on this
treatment. Because I researched and chose that treatment for
myself, because my parents supported me, because I paid for it and
also due to the fact I wanted it to work, it did work and helped me
to move forward out of a rut I had found myself in.
In many ways I have been fortunate but I also have made my own
fortune. My mother said one day recently that my recovery is a
miracle, whereas I see it as something I had an active role in.
There are good people in the world who want to help like the people
at Marino, it’s sad to think that people struggle to get access to
this help and some people never get this help. You have to either
have a family who’ll give up a lot for you and find the resources
from somewhere or you need to be rich to get treatment in Ireland.
The government and health-boards need to fund treatment centres like
Marino and they need to get money to the clients. However, the fact
is, the world doesn’t change in a day and I would hope that my story
shows people that obstacles can be surmounted. We all have our own
unique journey but we can gain strength from each other’s
experiences. It is important to find treatment and it is important
to fight for that treatment. Recovery is for everyone who chooses
it. Even when you feel you’re not budging in recovery I believe,
like a jumper, the pieces of your recovery are knitting together
below the surface. There is hope and I take great pride in myself
for being a survivor!
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