I thought having “boobs to pubes” cancer surgery, including the removal of several organs, followed by hot chemo being poured into my abdomen, was going to be the most difficult part of my life. Turns out I was wrong.
For the last year my personal relationship has been imploding and I no longer recognize myself. It’s as if I started off as a colorful, vibrant painting and have been reduced to a black and white sketch. I’m also not the partner that I would normally aspire to be and that makes me feel horrible.
To deal with the pressure I’ve developed two new coping strategies, though they’re not ones that you’ll find in self-help books:
compulsive cleaning/organizing and binge-eating.
By eating disorder standards my binges may appear small – think ten cookies eaten really fast while standing up. But since I don’t have a normal gastrointestinal tract, (due to the boobs to pubes surgery), this is equivalent to eating about 25 cookies. I don’t purge – I hate throwing up, it scares me – so I usually end up in bed with a horrible stomach ache, hugely bloated like someone filled me with helium. For me it’s not so much about eating to fill a void, as it is about eating to extinguish a raging fire. A fire whose accelerants have been self-abandonment, extreme passivity and fear. It’s self-harm, but with cookies instead of cutting.
The compulsive cleaning/organizing seems to be in part about exhausting myself so that I’m too tired to feel anything. At my parents’ house there are endless projects to be done, though they are projects that no one is asking me to do. I spent one whole day organizing their chaotic garage, forgetting to eat and only stopping to bring my dog Lexie out for her regular walks. Lexie watched me work for awhile: breaking down boxes, putting all the tools together, tossing out dead ferns. She gave me a pitying look before leaving me for her favorite couch to snooze. By the day’s end I was absolutely ragged – too wrecked to feel any of the emotions that I needed to feel in order to create change in my life.
Last week the cleaning lady came and there was virtually nothing for her to do except vacuum and mop the tiles. I explained that I’d gotten a “little compulsive” and I think she understood. I mean the house was immaculate, like it had just been professionally staged by a real estate team.
I intuitively knew to tell my loved ones right away about my behaviour, I wanted to avoid the vicious cycle of shame and secrecy. My close friends know what I’m doing and they put up with my dark humour: “if I don’t start purging soon I’m going to gain weight!” Obviously there is nothing funny about eating disorders, but we all deal with our emotions differently.
I’ve been through therapy before and I’ll do it again if I continue with these destructive behaviours. In the meantime I’m trying to give myself one break each day to just feel and not do anything.
sparkledame 