i fear i’ll always relapse

[zhongnanhai]

i guess at some point i made the decision to try to get better, but it's so hard to follow through. just two weeks ago i relapsed in self harm and i've been doing it daily since.

then yesterday i made the mistake of stepping on the scale and saw i went from 99 to 113 lbs, which should be a good thing. i don't want to have an eating disorder. i don't want to throw my life away just to be skinny, i don't even want to be skinny, but my brain hates the numbers going up. now all of a sudden my food doesn't taste good and my body looks huge. i literally didn't have this problem the other day, i had stopped tracking my weight for months and felt good. now all of that is gone. it doesn't help that money's been tight so eating enough has been hard enough anyway.

i don't understand my brain's desire to suffer. if i don't want to cut myself, and i don't want to starve myself, why do i have to do it? why can't i be like a normal person and never think about that kind of stuff? i'm so envious of mentally healthy people who think all of this is absurd and crazy. people who just don't get it. their ignorance is bliss.

i know people say recovery isn't linear, that relapses happen... i just don't understand why it has to be this way. why can't i control myself? why can't i stop myself from always going back to these things i don't even want to begin with?

 

[theboy]

recovery is difficult
People who say otherwise are wrong.
I hope you feel better!

 

[never mind me]

I feel you, I was and sometimes still am in a similar place. I struggled with bulimia nervosa as a teenager and after recovering I instead started cutting myself, because without cutting myself I felt sonhorrible. It was my way of dealing with self-hatred. Things improved drastically when I didn't expect it, because at some point I started understanding how my past influenced my way of seeing the world and seeing myself which caused my self-hatred to mostly vanish. However, I still need to cut myself sometimes (I'm not really bothered by it though) and after commiting the error of stepping on a scale yesterday and discovering I gained a few pounds during the last few months I started getting mad at myself for being so fat. (although according to BMI my weight ist normal and I have some muscles due to plenty of sport).
I'm not sure how, but while being on ketamine yesterday I realized that it doesn't even fit my values to define myself by my weight. Generally I don't care much for my appearance and I care even less what strangers think about me and I don't adhere to social norms, if I think they serve no purpose or are harmful. My boy-friend and my friends wouldn't be mad at me only because I am a bit fatter and my weight makes no difference whatsoever for my job. Somehow this thought managed to reassure me, I hope it stays like that.
Try to keep going, if you want to get better, eventually things will most likely improve, although I agree that it is extremely tiring.

 

[deathlamp]

im proud of u 4 choosing recovery!! i hav heard eds b compared 2 addiction a lot in terms of how dey work and i feel at least 4 me its very accurate. i often wind up back in restriction even tho i kno i looked horrifying at my lw and i kno in my heart i feel so much better in recovery. i think its like dis bc da true function of restriction is jus being a thing 2 focus on so one can ignore evrything else in life. in dat context it makes sense how one relapses even tho dere is nothing 2 gain frm it. in addition its also tied 2 gender dysphoria 4 most trans ppl who hav it which makes things extra difficult but keep going! i am rooting 4 u:)

 

[Regen]

It's okay. Tomorrow is a new day.

I had many non-substance addictions, one of which was definitely cutting.... I'm still amazed today that I managed to get away from it. You can do this. Just keep trying again and again. And again and again. Every day anew. Without thinking about yesterday.

In the beginning, I just tried to push it, sometimes just by a few hours. Then I tried not to cut today. And the next day I tried again not to cut today. And if it didn't work once, then there was a new day and I tried again not to cut today. Imperceptibly, the intervals became longer. There were sometimes relapses after years. Then I started again with today.

Stay with it! It is worth it. Today I can no longer imagine cutting. And I did it really long and excessively. I am glad to be rid of it. Keep at it for today.

And if it dont work at the moment, it will work for you in some month.