Tag: Eating disorders

Posted in About today

Thank you from the very bottom of the bottom of my heart

Posted on by WeeGee

One day in April 2012 I decided to start a blog. I called it ‘how do you eat an elephant?’* and I had no idea WHATSOEVER how much it would come to mean to me.

When I started writing I was in a pretty bad place and I was trying to find a way – any way – to put my life back together. Here’s the thing…. 26 months later and I’ve managed to put my life back together and them some. In your face my broken brain: IN YOUR FACE.

Blogging has taught me all kinds of things – perspective, and how to be engaged, and how to reflect on the things in my head. Starting my blog has been the single best thing I’ve ever done for my mental health. Ever, ever, ever. I’d recommend it to all of the mental people….

Anyway – it’s late and I don’t have an awful lot to say apart from the fact that I woke up this morning to discover that FIVE HUNDRED whole people have clicked the follow button on my blog since I started writing.

500 followers

FIVE HUNDRED!

So yeah, thank you to each and every one of you from the very bottom of the bottom of my heart. I’m feeling very proud of myself tonight, and very grateful to each and every one of you for your support. My favourite thing about blogging is all the wonderful, super, brilliant and AWESOME people I’ve been lucky enough to get to know because of it. That’s you lot, by the way. So thank you, lots of love and hugs and…. did I mention you are AWESOME?

blogging5

Normal service will be resumed shortly….

Love you all lots and lots like at least a million jelly tots

WeeGee xoxox

 

*Bite by bite

Posted in Some thoughts about my journey

Guacamole

Posted on by WeeGee

Since the last time I wrote I have mostly been being wide awake.

To be fair, insomnia and I are pretty well acquainted – it’s been part of my life for as long as I can remember. I suppose it started during my late teens and took firm root when I was at University, but I’m pretty sure it was present even before that. Then again, I’m not sure how much of that was only a little girl who loved her book so much that she didn’t want the story to end just yet….

Insomnia 1

Sometimes being wide-awake when the rest of the world is asleep is whatever the opposite of AWESOME is. Sometimes it feels like the biggest injustice that you’ve ever been dealt. Sometimes, most notably when your brain is in “I know, let’s jump out the window” mode, it feels pretty bloody dangerous. But sometimes, insomnia isn’t really as bad as all that. So long as you manage to get enough sleep to function* being awake in those silent, threadbare hours can actually be something of a blessing in disguise. Then again, maybe I’m only saying that because I’m a seasoned insomniac who knows the wide-awake club drill inside out.

Over the years I’ve learned a lot about dealing with sleeplessness. Warm baths, cool rooms, calm and quiet bedrooms: there is NOTHING I can’t tell you about ‘sleep hygiene’. And of course there’s self-soothing and mindfulness to throw in to the mix because is there anything mental that doesn’t need a spot of self-soothing and mindfulness throwing at it already? Sometimes one of those things, or a combination of those things will work but other times there’s only one thing for it – you just have to accept that you are awake and put the time to good use. Which is what I’ve been trying to do these past few days.

My brain is busy at the moment. I’ve got all kinds of things swimming around in my head – stuff about the move, stuff about work, stuff about the past, and stuff about the future. Stuff, stuff and triple stuff. And as much as I know that it’s the stuff that’s keeping me awake, I also know that I’m not going to sort the stuff out during the day what with the people, and the noise, and the life going on around me. So, when you’re tucked up in your bed sending up the zs? I’m busy putting my head in order and lining up my ducks. Trust me, the thinking time insomnia gives me is what’s keeping me sane at the moment. Plus, if I run out of thinking to do, there’s always the Internet.

Insomnia 2

Anyhoo….. Apart from the whole chronically awake thing, I’m doing remarkably well. The move is now ONE WEEK AWAY, there are still a million and one things to do, and it’s just starting to dawn on me that I’m leaving my beloved Kingston behind. I’m still monumentally rubbish at endings, and I still feel slightly tearful every time I remember that this particular chapter in my life is coming to an end. I came to Kingston to put myself back together so it does, and always will mean an awful lot to me. That said, I keep reminding myself that I wanted to put myself back together again so that I could go about living my life again, and this move, is the first big step on that particular journey.

Meanwhile in other news I’m pretty sure that once I’m all moved and settled** I’ll finally have the time and space to get back to regular blogging. At the moment I only manage to pop up every once in a while to let you know that I’m still here, that I’m still mental, and I’m still doing an AWESOME job of coping with stuff – there’s SO much else I want to share with you but right now, I just don’t have the space. Nothing else to report today save that I’ve been struck by how FANTASTIC and AWESOME my SUPER LOVELY blogging buddies are:

Insomnia 3

Oh – and just in case you’re still wondering where the title of this post comes into it I refer you to this song. It’s about insomnia. Sorta:

http://youtu.be/uGdpBZOv5gU

Love you all like lots and lots of jelly tots

WeeGee xoxoxox

*And believe me, you’d probably be surprised how little that is

**Next to no time, I’m sure :-/

Posted in About today

Down but not out

Posted on by WeeGee

Since last I wrote I have mostly been being down but not out. Truth told there is one hell of a ginourmous mess going on in my head. My brain is loud, and chaotic and out of control, but somehow, I’m still managing to put one foot in front of the other, because that’s what the WeeGee does when the chips are down….

Everything really ought to be fine and dandy but perhaps the fact that I know that is the biggest frustration of all. Instead of planning, and hoping, and getting super excited about our shiny new flat I wake up in the morning with that huge ‘NO’ surrounding me. My thoughts flutter around in my head, resting on one thing, and then the other, and then another thing entirely. I can’t seem to make them settle on one thing for long enough to do the slightest thing about any of it. It – if IT’S not one thing IT’s another thing.

One thing is what happens in my head when the big guy doesn’t play fair with the little guy, when someone says one thing and does another, when people hide behind the men in suits. In short, it’s what happens when there is an injustice of one sort or another. I’m facing a choice – do I take on the big guy, even though I am the little guy, and even though this particular little guy isn’t exactly the most adept at dealing with the kinds of stresses the fight is likely to bring with it? Which is really just to say do I stand up and insist that I’m right, and that they’re wrong because that’s what I believe you ought to do OR do I take care of my mental health at all costs because that’s also what I also believe I ought to do.

As you can see, I’ve thought my way into an impossible conundrum there.

Another thing is what happens in my head when a political party comprising entirely of idiots, racists, sexists, homophobes and every other kind of unpleasantness is somehow and suddenly viewed as a mainstream political party on the country I live in. It bothers me. And I mean it really bothers me that we’ve somehow come to the position that significant portions of my compatriots think it’s okay to say they’d prefer not to live next to a ‘migrant’ family. It’s under my skin and it’s making me dismayed and angry and hopeless. Mr Awesome Thing Number Five thinks I’m stressing myself out about nothing. And who knows, maybe he’s right. Or maybe I’m right because you have to care, and you have to stand up to it. UKIP stand against EVERYTHING I believe in. I can’t ignore it, but I can’t think of anything sensible to do about it.

That there is impossible conundrum number two.

Yet another thing is the absolute chaos that is my living room at the present time. I’d post a picture but I can’t bring myself to acknowledge it. Now – on the one hand it’s an inevitability that there will be a certain amount of chaos when you’re moving house but on the other hand I can’t seem to find a way to deal with chaos. When things are messy my brain gets messy and when my brain gets messy it starts to think about giving up on me. I’m managing to keep myself out of the pit, but it sure does feel inviting. I could pull the covers up over my head and hide from the world in a heart beat but I’ve got stuff to do and I’ve got my regular life to go about living and I know only too well that once you’re in the pit you have to stay there for a very long time.

It all feels a bit doomy and gloomy doesn’t it? That’s just the way my brain works. Some days are better than others, and I know that all I really need to do is put one foot in front of the other and hold on tight for the better days. I know that they always come, eventually, in their own good time. I know that I want to be ready for them when they do.

Most of all I know that at some point in the future I’ll read this post and wonder what all the fuss was about. This is how I feel today, these are the things that matter now, but the future isn’t very far away at all and in the future feelings are different and things have moved on. I can’t help thinking that the future isn’t anything more than the past that happened yet which means you’ll survive the future, because you’ve always managed to survive the past.

Nothing else to report today save that I love you all lots and lots like jelly tots and flower pots.

WeeGee xoxox

 

Posted in About today

I didn’t expect perfect….

Posted on by WeeGee

Hello there you lovely people you – how’s it all going? I hope it’s all happy and shiny and sparkly, or, at the very least, calm where you are?

Before we go any further I suppose we should get something out of the way. It’s the middle of the night where I am as I write. I’m guessing that all the sensible people in the UK are already asleep, or at least if they’re not, they’re probably not writing blog posts but hey – nuts to convention. Insomnia does as it pleases and I’m not in the mood for arguing.

I think it would be fair to say that I’m a little bouncy and excitable. I also think it would be fair to say that my bouncy and excitable demeanour is playing at least a small part in the fact that I’m still awake. On the one hand I know that’s a little bit of a problem. On the other hand, if you’d been to see this guy tonight, and you loved him as much as I do, you’d probably be just as bouncy and excitable as I am. Forgive the crap acoustics:

My last few posts have been a bit miserable haven’t they? Thing is, as miserable as I might have been at the time of writing those posts I don’t think ‘miserable’ gives an accurate representation of what’s been going on. Not really. I mean I’ve been up against my brain, and things changing, and some kind of massive and irrational fear of being happy….. But then there’s the other side of the coin to consider.

Looking at things now I think that maybe there are things to worry about* and things to be unsure about** and maybe even things that I wish I’d done differently*** But all of that aside there are many things to be glad about, and to look forward to, and generally not get all bloomin miserable about. This by the way is me looking on the bright side and ABSOLUTELY meaning it.

The exciting news is that I’m moving in with Mr Awesome Thing Number Five. I know, right?! Of course it’s scary to go from where I am, in my own little flat, with my own little cat and with no-one to interfere to actually living with another human being. The thing is I really feel like we’re building something together. We’re not just getting ready to share a place, we’re kinda getting ready to share something bigger than that. Thing is – I’m easily scared and so that seems very scary, but before that, if I can just let myself it feels very exciting.

I suppose that sort of sums up the other side of the coin. I really am struggling to find my way through the fog but I’ve a reason to get through it and so I’m definitely going to do my best. I think I’m learning that when it comes to being alive perfect really doesn’t exist. But actually, that doesn’t matter too much at all anyway.

Perfect is something you didn’t expect it to be.

Meanwhile in other news – oh bums I’ve got nothing. Nothing else to report save that I love you all lots. Like jelly tots.

WeeGee xxx

*aren’t there always

**which is just the same as worrying.

***as is this

Posted in About today

Fade away

Posted on by WeeGee

Evening chickadees! How’s it all going?

We had one of those miserable little posts earlier in the week, didn’t we? It had been a tough day, during a tough week, at the end of a tough month and I’d been doing my best to pretend none of it was happening. When I put it like that it’s no real surprise that I popped up with one of those miserable little posts…..

I’ve been blogging for a while now, and I’ve written an awful lot of posts where the most sensible start seemed to be “I don’t know where to start”. I really don’t think I’ve ever meant it more than I do now. So many things, so many feelings, so very many squillions of things I ought to say and not one single clue about how to get the ball rolling. In case you haven’t noticed I’ve also been blogging for long enough to know that when you don’t know where to start, writing about not knowing where to start is a perfectly acceptable way to get the ball rolling.

Now the ball is rolling I can’t help thinking that the best thing to do is cut a long story short, mainly because it’s a VERY long story with lots of ins and outs and bits in the middle but also because the whole story doesn’t belong to me and, when it comes to telling stories, I’m pretty careful to stick only to my own.

The only way to make the story short is to say that it really is ALL CHANGE here in WeeGee land and that’s making for confusing, if occasionally exciting times. Everything is up for grabs: where I live, where I work, what I do for a living and how I go about living this little life that I’ve carved out for myself. It feels like a tall order because I’d only really got back to the straight and narrow after what I now know, with the benefit of hindsight, was a pretty major attack of the mentals.

When I was unwell I felt that I was constantly on the edge of something – usually a cliff. I feel a bit like that now and if I’m honest it isn’t a feeling I much like. Right now I think I’m feeling a little scared because I’m going to have to face up to a lot of endings in the coming weeks. Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while will understand exactly where the fear is coming from. WeeGee doesn’t really do endings and I think I’m learning that that doesn’t change when WeeGee is well and medicated and not in the frame of mind where jumping out of windows seems like a good idea.

Earlier in the week I wrote that I didn’t really know which way was up at the moment and I think that was the only part of my post that made any sense. On the one hand I’m in a place in my life where opportunities are around every corner. On the other hand reaching out and taking them is going to mean saying goodbye here and there. Every time I think I’ve got that figured out in my head it all unravels again….

Anyway. I think that should just about do it for today. I’ll be back once I’ve had another one of my little thinks – they are in plentiful supply of late.

I leave you today with a song from my past. It’s one from my teenage years when I was angry and optimistic and cynical and hopeful all at the same time:

While we’re about it, we might as well have a sweet little acoustic version of the same song because it’s nice to mix things up a bit isn’t it?

Meanwhile in other news I have nothing else to report today save that I love you all lots and lots, like JELLY TOTS,

WeeGee xoxox

Posted in About today

Not the post I thought

Posted on by WeeGee

I can’t quite believe the amount of time that’s passed between today and my last post. I didn’t mean for it to turn out this way – I’ve had so much to say. I just didn’t know how to say it. I think we might have arrived at the story of my life.

My head’s pretty jumbled up right now. I’m a little bit AWESOME insofar as that I’m full of good ideas. And what’s wrong with being full of good ideas? I sorta know the downside….. And I’m scared of myself. Of course I am. Awesome is exciting but I just want the steady life.

This isn’t the post I thought I’d write.

Okay.

I’m better than I’ve ever been. I’m not jumping out of any windows, or hurting myself, or trying to get away.

Truly though? I’m not okay. I’m not coping and life is tough and my brain won’t play.

But I don’t know what I wanted.

Hmmm

Posted in About today

Not ready yet

Posted on by WeeGee

You can usually get a pretty reliable sense of what’s going on in my head by looking at the music I’m listening to. Right now I’m on Radiohead, The Smiths, Jeff Buckley and Elliot Smith which is really just to say it isn’t exactly jolly o’clock here in WeeGee land. Here’s a song that sums it all up at the moment:

On the face of it, it all started last week but now I come to think of it I can see that this has been sneaking up on me for a long time because you can only turn the other cheek for so long. There’s no good to be found in trying to pretend.

I’ve been trying to pretend that everything is okay but everything is not okay. The worst of it is that I don’t know how to go about making everything okay again. Running away might help, but it isn’t exactly a sensible option….. Maybe things aren’t meant to be okay, not for me anyway.

I can’t tell you too much about what’s going on – it wouldn’t be fair on the people and the things that are involved. All I can really say is that I find myself in a situation, which circumstances aren’t helping. I know that if the circumstances went away the situation would be better which, by the way, seems to be what everyone wants. But nobody seems to want to help me with the circumstances and so we’re stuck with the situation. There is no help and there is no end.

For as long as I can remember I’ve been a ‘problem’ What with one thing or another I’m always the difficult one, the one who does things the long way round, the one who doesn’t quite ‘fit’. I’m tired of being nothing other than a problem. It doesn’t seem to matter where I manage to get to – there’s always something waiting to pull the rug from under my feet. It’s usually my brain. Why isn’t my brain on my side?

I frighten myself when I feel like this mostly because I don’t want to feel like this. But what do you do when there’s a war in your brain, and you’re always the problem, and when there is no help and no end?

How do you eat an elephant? Bite by bite…..

Love you all lots like jelly tots,

WeeGee xoxoxo

Posted in About today

An irritating post

Posted on by WeeGee

Good evening gentlepeople of WordPress. How’s it all going? I trust that you’re all AWESOME and stuff like that? I thought it was about time I reported for duty. It’s been a week or so which seems to me to be a reasonable blogging interval for a busy WeeGee. Anyway – to cut a long story short by repeating myself – here I am, Reporting For Duty after a short blogging interval.

To be perfectly honest I still haven’t figured out what I’ve mostly been being since the last time I blogged. On the one hand I think I might have been irritable but on the other I think I might have been irritated. I’ve been thinking about it for most of the day and eventually it turned into one of those impossible, hurty-head, chicken and egg things so I decided to tell you that I’ve been both irritated and irritable and that I don’t exactly know which of the two came first. More to the point I don’t suppose it really matters to anyone apart from me……

Ever since I can remember things have had a tendency to get ‘under my skin’. For my part, I see this as an integral part of my personality but the headshrinker-type-people often cite it as one of my ‘difficulties’. Apparently thinking about things until they are under your skin in such a way that you are so irritated (or irritable) that you feel physically unwell is just one of the many Great Fun Things you have to learn to live with when you’re mental. And yes. I’m well aware I could have done a better job of constructing that last sentence but I’ve written it now and if you read it slowly enough I think you’ll get the gist anyway.

The list of things that have either made me irritable or irritated me in the past two weeks feels pretty much endless. It all started with a whole load of nonsense on WordPress, then there were the stupid celebrity scales which were (bafflingly) linked to the prevalence of eating disorders, then there was the sign that said “You would be pleased to know that our coffee is only made with organic milk” (which implied to me that it WASN’T), then there was my upstairs neighbour BEHAVING LIKE A DICK, and then there was this, which one of my ‘friends’ kindly shared with me on Facebook:

WTF

I don’t know about you but when one of my light bulbs stops working I don’t fix it I BUY A BLEEDING NEW ONE. And I really don’t think that’s much of an analogy for a relationship.

Harrumph!

Anyway – before I started getting irritated (or irritable) about all the things that have irritated me (or made me irritable) I had a serious point to make: I got genuinely bothered by two things (nastiness and irresponsible coverage of eating disorders) and then the bothersome things got under my skin, and into my head, and before I knew it EVERYTHING IN THE WHOLE WORLD WAS DEEPLY IRRITATING. What I’m really trying to say is that I think I might be looking for the off switch again because if my brain is busy being irritated (or irritable) I get irritated (or irritable) ABOUT EVERYTHING IN THE WHOLE WORLD.

And no – there isn’t really a moral to this particular story because I’m too irritated (or irritable) to think of one but I did wonder if you might like to hear a bit of Frank Turner because that most definitely WON’T be irritating:

Meanwhile in other news some of the things I was panicking and worrying about seem to have subsided. Of course, that may well be because I am preoccupied with the irritating stuff but the main things is that for now, I am feeling much better thank you very much. Nothing else to report today save that I have run out of things to report.

Love you all lots like jelly tots.

WeeGee

Posted in About today

Days like these

Posted on by WeeGee

I’m doing my best to keep on top of things at the moment, I really am, but the things I’m trying to keep on top of seem to be getting on top of me instead and it’s all starting to feel a teeny tiny bit heavy for my liking. In my heart I guess I knew that there were always going to be days like these because the things that used to be there, well they’re still there and they like nothing better that swimming around in my brain to see if they can’t fuck things up for me again. Yeah – I’m sorry about the swearing but fuck, fuck and fuckity fuck, that’s just the way it had to be….

I’ll tell you what though – let’s not dwell on it any longer, eh? There’s a heap of other stuff I can be writing about and the fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck stuff is boring anyway, right? Here’s a little song called days like these to get us moving along. I chose this one because a) it’s awesome, b) it matches the title of my post and c) why the fuck not? By the way, after this song, I PROMISE not to swear again:

http://youtu.be/EtdDGjApcxc

There we go – it’s all feeling a bit better already isn’t it? Who am I trying to kid?

If I set all the fuckity you know what stuff aside I’m left with this: Whatever happens to the WeeGee, and wherever the WeeGee gets to the WeeGee will be a THOUGHTFUL little creature. I’ve been thinking about my thoughts a lot recently which is actually quite a difficult thing to achieve because as soon as you start thinking about what you’re thinking about you clean forget what you’re thinking about and start thinking about something different instead. And if reading that made your brain hurt you should try thinking about what you’re thinking about for a little while and see if you can manage for your brain not to EXPLODE while you’re doing it.

Anyway. When it comes to WeeGee’s thoughts, I think I’ve identified two different kinds: spare brain thoughts and busy brain thoughts. They sound kinda like they’re going to be the opposite don’t they? The thing is, they actually seem to be boiling down to exactly the same thing and that thing is this:

There is simply not enough time in WeeGee land for WeeGee to think all the things she needs to think OR to do all the things she thinks she wants to. Or put another way WeeGee is still very easily OVERWHELMED by the WHOLE BLOODY* WORLD and everything in it and if the WHOLE BLOODY WORLD could just stop for long enough for WeeGee to put her thoughts in order that would be just FINE AND BLOODY DANDY thank you very much.

The headline is that I’m fine, and I’m safe, and I promise I’m not going to jump out any windows but I’m also still searching in vain for the off switch. Or maybe the pause switch, I guess that’s it really.

It’s all very well to be MINDFUL and to SELF SOOTHE and to BE KIND TO THE SELF. I can do all of that and I can do it all pretty damn good. But while I’m doing it all my brain is still in there going ‘oi, oi, I’M STILL FUCKING** HERE and if you’re not going to listen to me and THINK I’m going to make you sick so you have to stop and think even though migraines and stomach cramps and sleeplessness are the LAST THING ON EARTH you need right now’.

Still. Tomorrow is a new day, and my body is feeling well again, and it’s only a matter of time before my brain gets the message. And I always knew in my heart that there were going to be days like these. Upwards and onwards for WeeGee. She’s got elephants to eat…..

No meanwhile in other news today because that is all I’ve got. Nothing else to report save that I love you all lots. Like like lots and lots of Jelly Tots.

Jelly tots

WeeGee xoxo

*I don’t consider that a swear word

**Okay you got me on that one. I couldn’t help it.

Posted in Moving forwards

A very particular kind of post

Posted on by WeeGee

This is a very particular kind of post. It’s an ‘it’s pretty late, and I’ve been faffing around all evening, and if I don’t get this post out now I don’t know if I’ll ever find the time’ kind of a post….. Like I said, a very particular kind of post.

I have to start with an explanation, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say, I have to start with a clarification. I need to make it clear that when I mentioned the unpleasant stuff that’s been going on on WordPress in my last post I WAS NOT passing any judgements, or taking any sides, or professing that I knew better than anyone else. All I was really trying to say was that I’d been bothered by the whole thing – by what happened, by how it unfolded, and the by way it ended up.

All any of us can ever do is what we think is right and, for the most part, it’s perfectly okay for us to differ. I did receive one comment on the subject which I chose not to approve – but that choice wasn’t about censorship, or not allowing other views to come to the fore. I just didn’t feel that it was necessary to have the discussion, and I certainly didn’t feel my blog was the right place to do it.

And that REALLY is all I’ve got to say about the matter. This is me drawing my own little line under it:

_____________

Anyway – did you all notice that my blog has A BRAND NEW THEME? I kinda like it and I hope that you do too…..

Thoughts? Comments? Indifference?

It was always going to be a short one what with it being late, and it being a very particular kind of post and all. The headline is that WeeGee is a chipper WeeGee again and I’ve got some VERY EXCITING blogging news to share with you VERY SOON. It’s properly exciting. You’re going to love it. This, by the way, is me TRYING TO HYPE SOMETHING UP so you all get as excited as me……. Are you excited yet?!

Meanwhile in other news since last I mentioned minor TV obsessions I’ve done five seasons of 24 and fallen a little bit in love with Jack Bauer. Nothing else to report save that this is the end of the very particular kind of post.

Oh. I almost forgot to mention. It’s penguin awareness day today. So you know, be aware and stuff:

images

Love you lots and lots like jelly tots and tots,

WeeGee