Uncategorized – Page 10 – I Quit: Giving up Bulimia

Guilt

I grew up in an incredibly conservative religious denomination with a narcissistic mother and bipolar father. So, I’ve experienced a lot of guilt over the years. I legitimately feel guilty right now, which just brought out a realization: I haven’t suffered from lingering guilt in a long time–at some point, it stopped being the normContinue reading “Guilt”

Raw

I have struggled to find appropriate words for what I’ve been feeling lately: “depression” seems to severe and official; “low mood” sounds dumb. I am feeling irritable and sad more often lately, but those too seem to common descriptors to assign to this, which feels decidedly uncommon for me. I feel like I’m suddenly anContinue reading “Raw”

Mom X

I’m angry. My mother has again taken an important or exciting thing in my life and made it about her–or twisted my feelings about said event unfairly. This time, it was the news that I’d made full professor. She called and said in an angry tone, “Well. Congratu-LATIONS. I wish I would have known aboutContinue reading “Mom X”

Dates

Some dates just seem to leap off the page–happy dates and sad dates. We have collective dates like this–September 11, for example. Yesterday was one of those dates for me–my estranged brother’s birthday. I couldn’t stop my thoughts from flitting to him throughout the day. I didn’t necessarily have any associated feelings–I didn’t feel angerContinue reading “Dates”

Replacement

I was talking through my recent sadness with my therapist, and she asked with what I had replaced bulimia. I didn’t have an answer. While bulimia was obviously not a healthy stress response, it was a response. When stress and anxiety started to overcome me, I would binge and purge. The relief was immediate. Now,Continue reading “Replacement”

Gold stars

Today, I found out that I’ve received tenure and promotion to full professor. It wasn’t a surprise—I mean, I spent the whole last year preparing my portfolio and the last decade bolstering it with work and service. But, my first feeling was sadness. While college teaching is in no way glamorous or lucrative, it’s allContinue reading “Gold stars”

Binge

Yesterday afternoon, I binged. I didn’t call it that in the moment, but that’s what it was. I tried to convince myself that it wasn’t REALLY bingeing, because I WAS legitimately hungry, and I didn’t eat the WHOLE package of frosted raspberry loaf… just two big pieces (maybe three?) and then the frosted tops offContinue reading “Binge”

Not Normal

The other day, I wrote a post about how some food-related things make me feel almost “normal” (whatever that means). On other days, some things are decidedly not normal. Last night, I felt a weird, prolonged rush of anxiety that I haven’t felt in awhile. I’m not really sure what triggered it–maybe the stress ofContinue reading “Not Normal”

Dress

I am wearing a dress today that I hate. I keep it because it’s a color that I need for academic functions, but it’s a plain jersey dress that doesn’t feel flattering when I’m bloated. And, guess what? PMS central over here. I can feel the dress clinging on my back where I feel aContinue reading “Dress”

Normal

Who knows what “normal” means, but sometimes I find myself thinking, Hey! That was something normal person might do! And, it feels good. The other day, I had a meeting cancellation ping on my phone while I was driving to work, and I stopped for my favorite thing–a grade chai latte with almond milk. ThisContinue reading “Normal”