this belongs before last post

Date:   8/30/2007 10:21:24 AM ( 17 y ago)

Please do not reply to this; thanks!

It is Wednesday morning 6:30 and I have been awake 2 hours taking advantage of the computer's being free... fearful of its not being free later... stressed about this... not sleeping enough... but!!!... also not eating!!!, which is great. I have not gotten up compulsed to eat. I can feel my body unable to handle food and I am respecting this. I will go back to bed as soon as this post is done. ... Right now I can feel that I would get hyperventilation and painful worsening of my cold symptoms if I ate. The cold is keeping me sober. I am frightened by this or saddened and frustrated.

How am I supposed to stay sober once my cold is gone?

Well - I hope that I would even if I did not have a cold respect my body and refrain from eating on the grounds that if I ate, I would painfully hyperventilate. Learning to be "food-sober" is concerned with learning to predict my bodily reactions to eating and avoid the eating that causes any dysfunctionality or pain I do not want: bloating, weight gain, hyperventilation, depression, anxiety, brain fog, lack of kinesthetic balance. I am really really grateful right now for being ABLE TO RESPECT myself and not eat, given that eating would cause hyperventilation and interfere with my rest. I am really thankful. I have been trying to achieve this level of self-respect and self-gentleness for about 30 years. Intensively for the past 20 years. I want the sobriety to last permanently, though, and not just be here while I have a cold. Eating compulsively in contravention of my body's signals is ordinarily a matter of feeling I have got to "seize an opportunity" to get high. ("You've got free time!" or "It's justifiable according to the Standard American Eating Schedule!" or "You haven't overeaten in a while!" or "You've just accomplished a fast!") I justify eating by false arbitrary rules and reasons. This cold has enabled me to learn a little respect for my body's inability to handle food and its need for adequate digestive rest. But, again, what happens when it is gone? I can only envision relapse. ... I remember my reaction to my toothache this summer: SO angry at being forced into mini-fasts by the pain, I overate as soon as I could. ... I do not feel frustrated, though, by being prompted by my cold to refrain from eating now -- with my cold's intensification of painful symptoms I would get from this overburdening of my body with food.

I have had an o.k. post-fast day. I abandoned my last fast (40 hours) despite being quite motivated and serious... I did increase my length of fast (up in the 40-hour range again); and I did break it with only 600 cals (though this made me suffer horribly; it should have been much less [it shouldn't have happened at all!!!] [and what has happened to my plan of breaking fasts with watermelon, of small amounts at intervals?] of living food only (sprouts)

... I abandoned this fast around 1:30 am Tuesday. I ate the 600 calories. I went to bed, lying awake in agonies of the overeating-provoked cold symptoms and hyperventilation. I did make a good, appealing, realistic day plan for Tuesday (yesterday). I felt relatively in control. I felt relatively effective and on the right track in my life. I felt some degree of mastery. The fast (brief as it was)of course helped clear a little brain fog etc. I slept a bit. I did not sleep enough but got up early and got straight on line, out of fear of not being able to use the computer as I needed to later on. ... I had really a beautiful day on line. I got up from the computer feeling I had really expressed myself. I had sent out for fasting support and gotten some response, and sent out just for people to talk with on the phone at night, and got a lot of response. I spent such a long time on line that I did not end up eating again until after 6 p.m. My body thanked me so much. I had taken a mini-fast of almost 16 hours. ... I used to know that this was the right thing to do -- to fast a "mini-fast" again following a longer fast. I sometimes naturally was able to do the right thing, especially if I had things to engage in; but I want to achieve this as a matter of regular behavior and not just an occasional burst of sobriety. I want to feel well all the time, and I know I can. I know there is a lot I can be in control of.

This internet story is relevant because support is vital. I have made a plan about my next fast: that I would schedule carefully and sincerely activities to engage and distract myself, and that I would arrange support. ... This arranging and planning of the next fast was to be a task yesterday. I did not overschedule myself but still did not achieve this task BUT still feel in control because I can just do it today. And I feel OK just doing this task today and it makes me feel more prepared and ready and not rushed into my next fast... ALTHOUGH it is really bad to 'wait to fast until i am ready' since that is TRULY just procrastination. I KNOW this is true for me. I am merely compromising on this point cause it seems to increase my willingness and motivation. BUT I am also SCARED to embark on a fast for which I have prepared and to which I have committed. I had the willingness to commit to fasts the other day but do not feel this so much now. I think I had strong support from someone who knew me from forum but she has not written me back. OK, I will write her again. But this is a strain for me: I am not really ready to commit to the extent of trying a long fast under her guidance. i have got to work on myself about this. I will start the process by emailing her again and trying to get a response from her. I can tell her my fear or reluctance or my progress and process. This will bring me closer to a long fast with her. She talked about doing a long fast and it seems why would I get support from someone special for just a short fast but I see how my thinking is perfectionistically inhibiting my progress toward the long fast here by not allowing for intermediate steps. I can commit to writing her.

BUT. My food narrative again. When I ate the second meal it was 950 cals and I was sort of having in mind to re-start my fast after this meal. But since I did not eat the meal till evening and I like to start fasts in the a.m. (each a.m. you can then say you have achieved one more 24-hour period fasting, 1 more day) ... I thought I would not restart the fast yet. ... I am sad to leave the positive, sober fasting mindset, in which I am psyched up and positive and spiritual and OUT of my drug of choice (food)... and I now recall I was really positive on just restarting the fast right away, after a 950 cal meal which was to have taken place Tues. am. ... Well, I sensed I was nto really willing to restart the fast. When I feel that lack of motivation in myself I feel so sad. I am powerless. i cannot WANT to fast -- cannot get the willlingness back no matter what I tell myself. Maybe I do not try hard enough. actually I lost the willingness or got tempted to abandon fast as early as 6 pm Monday but hung onto my fast just by making phone calls to support-people, until 1:30 am Tues., when I was not willing to make phone calls any more, though I could have. So I did have some effect with my actions. I so wish I could hang onto motivation and positivity. I think maybe the motivation has to be very gentle and spiritual instead of angry or excited though anger can certainly work. I do not know. I have to get on the task of self-hypnosis and affirmations, affirming I am doing my fast of several days or longer, etc.

So it was good that the 950 cal meal did not occur until 6 pm though bad that I lost the willingness to restart the fast right away. And I should not have had 950, should have had 600. Also: my choice of food bloated me painfully. I did not expect it to. I ate 4 bananas and 3 cups of this terrible result of my raw vegan coconut ice cream-substitute experiment and 3/4 oz almonds. This was less than my plan called for so it was great sobriety that I stopped there but this was not enough to prevent bloating and the incapacitation and mental blowout (inability to think, with stomach out like a beach ball, in horrible pain, every breath painful)... I had not expected this from bananas but know better now. It was a surprise, of the kind I have met millions of times but not become able to predict: feeling basically ok at the end of a meal, I get up frm the bed (where I do my eating)and in a few minutes am stomach-out-like-a-beach-ball and in agony. ... I should have known this about bananas. i should throw out the banana I have remaining and the apple too. This is what I have on hand as far as overeating-triggering food goes. Also almonds. ... So I bloated painfully after the 950 meal (which was dishonestly measured as far as the fruit in it was concerned, by the way: counting each banana as only 80 calories. though almonds were weighed and coconut was from a can, premeasured). And by the way the 950 meal was a project of hours, delayed by having to handcrank the icecream substitute (it never even froze) and about four other car-driving errands and tasks .. spending so much time in preparation of a meal: drunken behavior. This is not OK with me. The whole ritual of going to the store is part of the sick toxic high. I am in food-land mentally when I am on these errands and not in the real world of life. I am giddy and disengaged. ... THEN, AFTER the meal I was ALSO incapacitated by food for several hours... having to take saltwater enema ... being incapable of moving or thinking... being dizzy with bloating and pain. So at least I am aware of it! but you see how food (or, eating when I should be fasting) robs me of a day. ... THEN, I ate 250 MORE calories (though all almonds -- pretty non-bloating, and weighed accurately [though I push the scale to register less but this is ok with me and is not much error so i count it as accurat for now but hey i guess i could change that soon]) .. i ate this 250 cals cause i felt "entitled" to 1200 cals for the day though my body had definitely had enough.. oh and i added in the food i had left over from the 950 meal. I was in no shape to eat ... I had just been wandering around, not able to do anything, taking the enema, the enema helped, i got re-compulsed. A miserable instance of getting high, suffering, being unable to concentrate on anything but relieving the suffering; and ultimately when relief came just getting high again. And I had told myself I would not eat the remaining "entitled" 250 cals for the day though my food plan allowed it. But I new I would be compulsed to. it was sad.

The last thing I have to say about yesterday is: this bloating and incapacitation came with pretty bad depression, disorientation and anxiety. it was remarkabele, like clockwork: as soon as i was about halfway done with the 950 meal, suddenly, as it was growing dark, I was overcome by sadness and being totally lost and not being in control of my life any more. i was scared. I was having a moderate-level panic attack. I really felt in danger and felt unsafe seekign help and felt I ought to call the hospital psych emergency but not being willing to do that or not feeling safe doing that: I was alone: that feeling. ... and I set about the enema ... I recover a bit I guess but I was basically unable to do anything... and ultimately 9 pm my ex calls but i do not pick up the phone ... he wants me to call 10 pm... 10 pm i am unfortunatley recovered enough to be re-compulsed and am eating my 250 + cals in almonds... 11 pm i finally call him... and i am a BASKET CASE ... well i have been worse on neediness and I was handling it OK but I was pretty needy and i was so sensitive and he was pointing this out and now i realize I see it clearly. it was because i got high on food. and getting high on food we can see directly now how it ruins my relationships. I am first of all not there for him 2 x in a row and then when i am there i am in the psychotically sensitive needy mode and so depressed. i need to tell him about this today and commit to staying more functional for others... there is a nice guy i have just met also whose friendship i am really in danger of losing by my dysfunctionality and jsut not beign there for him so i had better learn quickly.

My conclusion: to plan and arrange support for my fast today (i have emailed all my support respondents) besides my tasks (housing interview 1:30 pm) and engagements (my ex, 2:30 pm to 5 pm, when he goes to work) and getting some sleep.

Well, I will have to look at this ... I wish I could just be on internet and arranging life and fast all day dammit. I will have to find a way to have a good self-expressive self-organizing day (i.e. PLAN MY FAST) and also get sleep besides doing this interview etc.

I can commit to:

planning my fast
throwing out my fruit

later if internet avail (have to go to night-opening library):
writing to support person from forum

BUT I NEED SLEEP. How???? (again ,please do not respond to this post.)


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