Unexpected Effects of Recovery

Hello there :) 

I've noticed that on Instagram I tend to only show the positive side of my journey and while I'm not doing that on purpose (I just don't feel like sharing pictures when I'm not feeling OK) I don't want to give people a false image on what recovery is. Because, yes, recovery is great, but it's also hard and unexpected things happen to you while you're at it, and I want to be honest about it. Maybe you won't get pictures of me while I'm on my bad moments, but in this post I'm going to share with you some unexpected things that have happened to me during my treatment.

I don't understand how time passes. Somedays I feel like I started my treatment yesterday, on some other days I feel like I've been recovering for months. However, it's been 40 days. 40 days in recovery, 40 days without binge eating, 40 days taking medications, 40 days doing psychotherapy. When I look back, I can clearly see all the progress I've made. Of course there's up's and down's, and sometimes I can't help listening to my ED voice, whispering all those nasty words on the corner of my mind. Thankfully until now it has remained just as that, a voice. Annoying, potentially harmful, but just a voice. There's no bingeing, no purging, and no restricting. And that is a great improvement. So most of the time I'm doing well. 

But there is something strange that I never considered would happen to me when I decided I was starting the treatment. Since my binge eating worked pretty much like an addiction, I had moments that felt pretty "adrenalinic", sometimes I felt kinda high when I binged. While I don't miss it emotionally (or at least consciously) I do feel a little strange. At times I feel like I am waiting for something stressful to happen. I've realized it is because I was so used to the diet-binge cycle. When I had my "good" period, and then the "chaos" when I couldn't resist anymore and I ended up bingeing. 

It's like I have more space in my head for my emotions. Hidden thoughts and feelings that I used to suppress with my binges are resurfacing, so I find myself having some very emotional days which are not necessarily bad, I just feel more sensitive than I usually do. 

Now I'm adapting to this new way of living, where my worth is not tied to my weight and food isn't the main topic of my life. I'm slowly learning to use the energy I used to put into all my obsessions into other things, like my studies. Seeing how I'm slowly regaining my life is one of the best parts of recovery.

After accepting the fear of a possible binge eating relapse (I may write a post about it later) and starting to accept that I deserved getting better, and understanding that it was real! I started to have calm days. Those days feel peaceful, as if all the stress my eating disorder and my obsessions used to bring me are completely gone. I feel calm and empowered, like I am the one who rules my life now. 

Even when it's not all rainbows and butterflies, I am who chooses. Because I chose to get better.

So... Recovery has pushed me out of comfort zone many times, and at first I was eager and scared at the same time of all the challenges I had in front of me. There have been tough moments, and at times I've thought that I just can't do it. But then I've remembered that nothing else has worked before, and that the mistakes I've made before have only brought me pain in the end. And in only 40 days I've had so many little satisfactions, that I can already say that this is definitely the path for me. 

Thanks for taking the time for reading and visiting my blog! I hope you found this post useful somehow. If you have any questions don't hesitate to leave a comment :) As I usually say, this is my experience, but if I can help somehow I'll be glad to do so. Stay strong, you got this.

Pol