These past couple of weeks there have been some huge things that happened.
I broke up with the therapist I was seeing.
I read Matthew 26 and 27 (I’ll explain this later).
I looked in the mirror and actually liked the way my body looked.
I’m catching more disordered thoughts and working hard to take them captive and make them obey Christ.
I was genuinely happy most days.
I reconnected with a friend and I can’t tell you how much this has helped me and made me feel like I have someone to do life with.
These past few weeks, I feel like I’ve made a lot of strides. I’m not struggling as much as I was with my eating disorder. I feel more in control of it now the more I’ve given control to God and worked to remember my body is a temple and I need to treat it like one. That means exercising not to lose weight, but to get stronger. That means eating more fruits. That means eating 2+ meals a day. That means watching what I put in it, not just food but things like music, podcasts, social media posts, movies, TV shows, YouTube videos, etc. I’m working really hard at doing what is good for my body because it’s a temple and not neglecting it. I’ve started washing my face again. (That’s why in this picture my face is super shiny).
I broke up with my therapist. Yes I am still going to therapy. I am going back to the one I had before going to the Charis Center. Why did I do it? Did I talk to anyone before doing it? Do I feel like it’s the right decision?
I did it because I didn’t feel like me and the new therapist was clicking super well. I started going to her at the beginning of September. I was really excited when I found out she was an art therapist. I thought it was going to be a great match. And truthfully it wasn’t. We just weren’t clicking and her methods weren’t the best for me. And that’s okay! It’s okay to change therapists. You need to get something out of therapy and you need to work with the right person in order to do that. For the longest time, I didn’t know I could change therapists because I wanted to. I thought you just had to try and work with them. It wasn’t until a couple months ago when tik tok therapists were talking about it did I feel like it was okay.
Truthfully no one knew I was thinking of changing back to my original therapist. This is because I didn’t really know how or want to have that conversation. I didn’t know and still don’t know how to put in words my thought process behind it. I don’t know how to explain how it wasn’t working. I just know it wasn’t working. I did pray and think a lot about it beforehand. The tipping point? My original therapist calling to get a progress update. Just talking to her for a few moments made me realize that I needed to do it. When I told her I kinda wanted to change back, I thought she was going to tell me to keep trying with this therapist. Instead? She told me I can just call and schedule appointments and she’d be happy to see me.
I feel like this is the right decision because I’m not neck deep in an eating disorder anymore. I definitely have more freedom than I did. I know ultimately what is best for me through listening to God and to my heart. Praying about it really helped me figure out if it was really what I wanted to do. And it laid heavy on my heart to change back.
Matthew 26 and 27. Y’all are going to think I’m crazy. I got stuck on 26 for weeks. 26 has 75 verses. I was really intimidated. I just felt like I couldn’t do it. And because I felt like I couldn’t do it, meant I couldn’t and wouldn’t do it. The things about feelings is that they aren't facts. Just because you feel a certain way doesn’t make it true. But those feelings can make you stuck and that’s what happened. I got stuck in my head that I couldn’t do it. It took me weeks to finally sit down and do it. Then came 27. I thought the same thing was going to happen. It was 66 verses. That’s a lot of verses. But this time I knew I could do it because I had just read 26. Some of you won’t understand this, but little things can become hard things. And for weeks, this was a hard thing that I just couldn’t bring myself to do. I am so glad that I finally read it and have 1 more chapter before I’m done with Matthew!!
My body image and appearance in mirrors is something I have struggled with for a long time. The last time I felt truly okay with my appearance was in 2016/17 before my meds made me gain a lot of weight. I had just semi conquered my eating disorder. I felt relatively healthy. My brain was yelling at me every time I saw myself in the mirror. I felt okay. Today I looked in the mirror and didn’t despise what I saw. I actually thought that I looked pretty good. Now I’m not proud of losing the weight through an eating disorder. Would not recommend it. And if you are struggling with an eating disorder, please get help. You are worth recovery. There will be days where I struggle with it, but I’ve had a lot more better days recently which is a huge improvement.
Emotions are fleeting in my life. I don’t generally feel an emotion for very long so when I do, and it’s a good one, it feels pretty good. I’ve been pretty happy recently. Something that has helped that is reconnecting with a friend. This is a friend I made in high school. We both kinda went separate ways afterwards. We were in a small group together but then the small group changed and got cancelled. We stopped talking again. Then she got married and I was worried she wouldn’t want to be friends. But I was wrong. I am so incredibly glad that we reconnected. This has helped me a lot. I struggle a lot with people my age. That has a lot to do with the bullying I got during school. And she is my age. I struggle a lot with letting people in. I also struggle with allowing myself to truly be who I am around people. I am so happy that when I do truly be myself around her, she accepts me for who I am. She doesn’t say I’m too much. She doesn’t say I’m too hyper or talk too much. She accepts me for who I am. And that feels amazing. I am very thankful for her!!
These are just some of the things that have happened in the past couple of weeks. I thought I’d fill y’all in!
Hold onto hope and stay strong.
Madison rae <3
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