Sabotage

I finish my race well under my 2 hour goal.  I wonder how well I could have done if I hadn't spent the last 2 weeks or so purging and restricting my food?  I finish 5th in my age group.  I don't stay for the award.  Somehow I feel that because I used the training to disguise the eating disorder, I didn't really deserve the award.  Although I don't purge for the few days leading up to the race, I begin to test the availability of it within a few days.  Again, I am not binging, I use it after eating a normal meal, or after joining my friends for some wine and cheese before diner.  So, really I am not bulimic!  I use it just to fall back on.   And I am still eating at least 1,500 calories.  I am certainly not anorexic.  Yet I continue to fade away physically and emotionally.  It is the exercise that keeps me "sane"  that keeps me grounded.  That eats away at me body and soul.

On this day I run along the bay.  Then later I take the kayak out into the lake.  It is beautiful and peaceful. It is quiet and I use the time to think.  There are no distractions.  Just me, God and my own thoughts.  Why do people want to be with me?  How can they love me?  Why does God love me when my own mother seems to think so little of me.  After all, she is the one who tells me that my Aunt and my grandmother, really only want to be with me because of my husband and the fact that they think he has money.  Really?  Is that my only value?  What I can do monetarily for someone?  Could it be that I offer more to them than money.  Could it possibly be that they just love me?  I question my value all the time.

Each peddle stoke of the Hobie just seem to bring more questions than answers.  I am tired of hating who I am, and I am tired of taking it out on my body.  Although I have done well for the past 20 years. I find myself admitting my daily body image directed my day.  Then I begin to question if I had truly achieved any degree of recovery or just a tolerance  of my existence.

The exercise, the restricting, the purging all become a metaphor of my life.  I run through the pain of my I-T band screaming at me.  Oh to just relax and be still!  Am I strong because I push through the pain?  Or am I weak and stupid because I don't listen to the pain searing through my leg.  I take note that I am as good at ignoring the pain in body as the pain in my soul.  I have allowed the pain of my body to numb the pain that exists deep within my being.

Then there is the paddle board.  Although it is physical, moving through the water upon it is the closest thing I come to being still.  It is meditative and void of thought.  My focus becomes the pattern of the water, the direction of the wind, and the power of the waves. I count my stokes. 1,2,3,4 switch, 1,2,3,4 switch.  More on the right then less on the left.  I make subtle changes to stay the course.  My body gives and takes from the energy of the waves.  I am absorbing the energy as I balance and try to stay upright and out of the water.

I love the days when the water is as smooth and glassy.  I love the feeling of gliding effortlessly.  I can look back and see my gentle wake behind me reminding me I was there.  But, then again, I love the waves.  There is something about reading their power and fighting their desire to trip me up; to knock me over.  I strive to conquer their aggression.  Absorbing their energy, I make it my own.  Bring it on! Let me be!

Wow, if only my life could mirror this.  Can I enjoy the smooth water days of gliding through them with the gentle wake reminding me that I was there?  Can I applaud my efforts on the rough water days?  The days I fight with all I have to overcome the current and the waves.  The days I absorb their energy and use it as my own.  I conquer it!  Even though the wind and waves devour my wake, I know I have stayed My course.  I have not fallen into the dark green angry waters.

If only I could have stayed on top of and in control of the eating disorder.  I thought I could, but like a rouge wave it has knocked me into a cold angry place.