The Woman with the Words is absent again and the words and feelings we need to express lie helplessly mute. Help me understand. Things are so chaotic and confusing. And I’m listening to music which i shouldn’t be.

School today was a bitch and I so almost ran out of that room but didn’t want to draw attention to us, not like our blubbering wasn’t bad enough. We had an “I remember” piece to write where we took a memory from childhood and wrote about it. Everyone wrote happy things except two other girls. I wrote about the time I ate a chocolate chip cookie and did 100 jumping jacks out of guilt. I deviated from the story, and we are allowed, but even the deviations are truth. I spoke before the feather circle that I felt detached and disconnected from what was written but as I read it allowed in class (which we have to) I started crying. I was upset with myself because I said I wouldn’t cry on this one. Now that I have, it is like a light bulb has gone off inside the head and given a life, an entity, and a huge identity of its own to an eating disorder. It’s looked at in a different light now, like a persona with a name. I hope it kills me.

So we have a similar writing piece assigned for next Tuesday. Instead of “I remember” and creating a Memory Map, we are to write out the significant aspects of our lives on a continuum. I am very upset at these assignments. I don’t remember things and feel very angry that I’m being put in a position to recall information that is admittedly uncomfortably buried, but buried nonetheless. Randy would say it is good for us but who cares what he has to say. i’m coloring my hair pink.

The continuum can cover all time frames of our lives. i remember that we got married, which i could share with the class. i remember significantly the first time we were hospitalized and the paperwork and the strip down and where we were “supposed” to eat. I remember the halfway house but I’m not going to share that crap with them. The point is I can only recall a handful of things and most I don’t want to share with classmates. Most feel sad and that hurt me today because everyone was talking about how fun and lighthearted this assignment was compared to the last assignment. It didn’t feel that way to me and made me feel lower than low because my piece wasn’t “happy” and b/c I cried. So now I feel untrue to myself and that I have to come up with happy pieces for the next writing.

I wanted to work out tonight but was tired. i came home from school/work and lay down and didn’t get back up until two hours later. i was exhausted. i did a CoreCycling class yesterday that works the abs, hams, glutes, and quads. it was INTENSE!! I loved it. It was up at the school and I can’t wait to do it next week. It’s a really great work out. Sweated like a pig. I can tell I’m not taking in enough calories b/c my energy and stamina is waning. It’s getting hard to cross campus again and when I take the stairs to class I feel like I just exercised. It’s a good feeling. I know I should take in more calories but I won’t and don’t care.

Did I mention the anonymous the other day that inspired me to get better more than all the comments totaled Randy has ever given me. I did do my BMI on the Internet today. It said I’m fine. I’ve made an appt. with the Wellness Center at my university to get a Body Comp done where they check my weight, blood pressure, and body fat. Last time I was 104 pounds and 8 percent body fat. I’m hoping to break that this time and get lower numbers. Call me crazy…

I spoke with an old professor today that I will be taking again in the Fall. It’s for teacher eduction and the classes are worth nine credit hours. She will be a major influence on whether or not I become a teacher. Anyone reading this would suppose I shouldn’t be a teacher but I’m a much better teacher than I am a person/survivor/multiple/whatever. Tina argued with Randy the other session that nothing had ever happened to us; even as I type that images of the uncle and the grandparents’ house cycle in the head. the bank of knowledge. there are no other explanations. we fight it because the memories are so far hidden and it would seem if we are aware that they are hidden then they can’t possibly exist. it makes sense in our mind. why i think of this analogy i don’t know but i think of ship salvagers. they know there is buried treasure or a shipwreck but they can’t see it, they just have evidence (symptoms) on their radar and other fancy equipment. Our equipment says it happened, even though we literally don’t’ know what “it” is. In one breath I’ll say I want to know but I realize at the exact same time there are other who don’t want to know and it hurts my heart because i know the children should be allowed to tell what has happened to them. are they not the healthy ones and we the sick ones.

i’m sorry to the littles for every bad thing i’ve done. again, would i take back throwing up tonight if i could? no. i threw up 2x last night. would i reverse that? no. so how sorry can i really be? how much do i really want to get better? how much do i really want to let the littles vocalize what happened to them. someone is playing with them right now. it’s not tina. i can’t get inside the mind good enough to see. Christine was just picked up under her shoulders in her blue dress to go play.

the above is another reason we’ll never get better: we need to straddle the fence. we need to be sick while wanting to get better. that is the safest place in the world to be. it isn’t always comfortable b/c sometimes we get a glimpse of something else and we want it. right now the line is hard. we see things that make us happy but know it’s not good. trouble will brew if it remains. yet if we stop, we will be empty, lonely, sad, usual, unOlympic in our efforts and abilities. we are manipulative, egocentric, maniacal, and worthless.

all i can say is that, as so many times before, we are unable to make ourselves get better. it always feels like outside sources have to chase us to get us better. others have to be more invested in our recovery before we can be. a simple pep talk falls short. we need need need for others to do for us what we can not, absolutely can not, do for ourselves. it’s always been this way. we dont’ have it within us and need someone to take control. we will die given our way, if we haven’t died already.