That us eating disorder folk seem to fall in to two categories
Those that can't seem to open up at all because they can't bear to face their problems
And those and the other end of the spectrum
Who are impulsive and open almost to a fault
Obviously this is a generalisation and we all don't fit neatly in to one of these boxes
But in my experience it is mostly true
I've seen it in treatment and with my own friends
For a long time I was type one
When I was strictly anorectic
My life revolved around rules and regulations
And God forbid if I ever broke them
My day was always planned out
Exercise
Food
Everything
I struggled to express myself at this time
On the surface I pretended that everything was fine
But underneath there was a massive amount of turmoil and distress
I found it very hard to be open and express myself
I was worried what others would think of me
A huge part of me wanted to be perfect
A perfect person
A perfect size
No flaws whatsoever
It's truly exhausting being this way
I can remember crying at the thought of all the exercise I had to do
Then don't do it I hear you cry
But I had to
My ED said I had to so I had
No matter how tired or sore I was
It was a horrid existence
Over time my ED morphed in to bulimia
And with that came a lot of change
I had been regimented for so long and it just wasn't sustainable
I couldn't carry on any longer
I can remember when it started
It was when I was using drugs and didn't eat at all
When the drugs ran out I would go home to recharge my batteries
My appetite would then came back and I remember going to the kitchen and being so overwhelmed by all the food
This was when I started to binge
Then quickly discovered purging
As well as my ED changing my personality also changed
I became more impulsive and compulsive
It was like I couldn't control myself any longer
I became a lot more open
A lot more willing to talk about my issues
This had probably a lot to do with the fact that my family began to talk about things a lot more openly also
But I was honest almost to a fault
I trusted the wrong people
Let people take advantage of me
And left myself very vulnerable
Where as it's very admirable to be open and honest I think we have to be careful who we trust and who we let in to our lives
I remember when I first started going to meetings
I used to share absolutely everything that was going on in my life
Until a kind stranger took me aside and gave me some friendly advice
That I should get a sponsor
And meetings weren't the place to sort out such issues
I appreciated that because there are a lot of sick people in those rooms
So that brings me to my blog
I started writing this blog two years ago
Reading back on my most recent entries I can see that I was pretty open from the get go
And started posting photos a few months in
My blog has continued in this fashion
I've always written it like no one is going to read it
Whether that is right or wrong I'm not sure
I guess I love using photos as they can say so much more than words
Over time I have become more and more open
And as more and more people started to read this blog I had to go back and delete posts that I thought could come back to haunt me
Recently I received a comment saying that I am becoming increasingly open
And I was
I was being very lazy and had posted photos of other people
I quickly deleted those too
It seems in blogging too there are two kinds of people
Those who give little away
And those who share their entire lives
I think I definitely fall in to the latter
For me I think it's about wanting to be liked and accepted
More than a narcissistic thing I think it's very human to want others to like us
I've always been a bit like this
I was bullied as a child
And since then I've tried very hard to never let that happen again
But then I was trying so hard to be liked that I was forgetting to be myself
When I lived in Dublin I tried so hard to fit in and even acquired a Dublin accent in my attempts to be liked
I guess it is a spectrum and we are all on it somewhere
The ideal I think is to be somewhere in the middle
Open enough to be honest
But not so honest that we leave ourselves vulnerable
I was wondering about you
Where do you fall on this spectrum
Do you think there is such a thing as being too honest?
