The Mom Effect

I just had a really good talk with my mom. It amazes me how much closer we've gotten throughout the past couple years, especially after how furious I was with her and my dad when they made me take a medical leave from school my sophomore year. Our relationship really suffered then, and I've always had trouble talking about ED/depression/anxiety/any emotional stuff with her—I just simply couldn't articulate it. But things are a lot better now, and we just spent about an hour talking about how I'm feeling, what steps I need to take to get back on track physically and emotionally, and I hung up feeling much more optimistic and okay than I did when I first answered the phone. Go Mom.

Basically, I'm overwhelmed about all the events happening this week. I feel like there's a ton of pressure to have fun and be festive and, like, live it up pre-graduation. Have fun, dammit! Just be happy! And in some ways, all that pressure is making it harder to actually enjoy myself. It's a fine line between keeping myself busy and engaged and social versus letting myself get totally overwhelmed by the flurry of activity and lack of routine. I'm having a lot of internal conflict about how this should be one of the happiest, most exciting times in my life—about to graduate from college, tons of free time with my friends, my family coming into town to celebrate—but at the same, I'm in a crappy place health-wise and risk letting that overshadow everything else.

Something I just said to my mom: "My life would be pretty perfect if I just weren't in pain." And I really believe that's true. It wouldn't be absolutely perfect, but it'd be pretty close. And it's not fair to myself to let the physical pain outweigh everything else I have going for me.

On the food front: things are going better. I'm upping my calories, which has gotten easier since I'm off the painkillers and actually have an appetite back. I gave myself a stern talking-to the other day about how there's no way in hell I can let myself go backwards, and how all the health issues will only multiply if I head back towards Anorexia-ville. So.not.worth.it.

I should've titled this The Mom Effect and The Blog Effect! Writing always makes me feel better. Thanks for reading, love to you all.