Prayers ARE answered

I can't even tell you how much better today has been. I wasn't kidding when I said I would be praying that our sleep situation would improve and though I didn't necessarily get much more sleep last night I feel 100x better. Johnny still woke up at 3 am but the second I heard him I bolted into his room and got into bed with him before he got to the point he was REALLY awake. I spent the rest of the night in his room and every time he'd start waking up I'd just pin him down in the bed with a big bear hug and it seemed to work...and then he slept in until almost 10 am AND took a nap from 2-5 pm! I told you he was tired!

Hannah must have been pretty tired to because after she woke up at 7 am to nurse she went right back to sleep and slept until 10:15 am! I can't even tell you what a little extra sleep and happier kids has done for my mood. I know I'll probably still have some pretty extreme ups and downs the next few days (because I often find there's a lag time to sleep deprivation and sometimes it hits me several days after it actually occurs) but it feels good to have some of my motivation and energy back.

The frustrating thing about recovering from an eating disorder (and really overcoming any bad habit or addiction) is that it takes days, weeks, months, even YEARS to climb UP the mountain---yet the slide back down the hill can happen in the blink of an eye. I definitely haven't slid all the way down, but like I mentioned in my last post I think I've been losing some of my forward momentum. It's also frustrating because I often find myself on this teeter-totter where I do better in some ways but worse in others and then vice-versa.

For instance, lately I have been working SO hard on cutting out the purging, but I've noticed I've become extremely careful (borderline obsessive) with what I do eat. It's hard for me to know if my healthy eating is good (because it makes it a lot easier not to purge when I eat healthy foods and not too big of portions) or if I'm just holding on tighter to another part of the ED by under-fueling and over-exerting myself. Sadly, after so many years of eating habits that have been all over the board I have a hard time knowing what my body really needs. Some days I think I do really well...like last week while I was up in Boise with my parents there were times when I didn't even think about what I was eating. I didn't worry so much about the portion size or types of food I was eating, I just ate until I felt satisfied. But other days it's like I have NO concept of what real satisfaction feels like. I may take two bites of a spinach salad and feel like I'm going to pop or eat a huge meal and feel like a bottomless pit that wants to devour everything in sight (which scares me to DEATH!).

It's especially hard when I'm tired and emotional because both fatigue and anxiety make me lose my appetite AND my sense of fullness. So even if I force myself to eat when I know I need to (despite the fact that I'm not hungry) I have no idea when I've had enough because I don't feel FULL either.

I know I'm probably way over-thinking this and that in reality it's not that complicated...I just need to follow the recommendations I've been given to eat 3 substantial meals and 2-3 snacks at regular intervals, whether I feel like it or not. But just because something is SIMPLE doesn't mean it's EASY. This may not make any sense and some of you may think this is total baloney, but I actually get a high--an energetic drive and also a calming effect--when my stomach is empty and I'm running on fumes. Eating (and I'm talking substantial eating, not just salads and fruit) makes me feel lethargic, anxious, depressed, and unmotivated. I know this logic is completely twisted and I think it's actually the restricting/purging/ED that causes me to be lethargic, anxious, depressed, and unmotivated once my eating improves--it's just that I've been numbing out with the behaviors so I don't realize that those things are actually there. And I KNOW that the longer I stick to a healthier lifestyle the more REAL energy, happiness, and best of all PEACE I will find. Because that is one thing that the eating disorder will NEVER provide---real, lasting PEACE.

It is WAY past my bedtime and I'll probably be shooting myself in the morning for staying up until 11:30 pm blogging when I need sleep so bad. I just wanted to get some of these things off my mind and it is hard to find more than 2 minutes of free time during the day with two busy kids who never seem to simultaneously sleep!