Thin lines

I have so many ask me what lead me down this path again? What was I thinking? How did this happen?  First and foremost it was a lack of faith.  A lack of faith that God wouldn't give me any more than I could handle.  So, I took matters into my own hands.  I search back through my journals and I do find a point of demarcation.  Some where back in June I wrote that I do feel as though I am walking a fine line between stepping back or moving forward.  I had set up great boundaries with my family, but somehow felt lost in my abilities to defend those boundaries.

I remember thinking that if I could just let my family "think" I may be struggling with my eating again, that this would cause them to leave me alone.  The reality was that in doing so I found myself dabbling in behaviors that dew me in like a moth to a flame.  It kind of numbed me to the uncomfortable parts of my life.  It also numbed me to the good parts of my life as well.  I was going through the motions of life, yet I wasn't living at all.  After working so hard to feel, how could I let this happen again?  Where as initially I was slowly enticed into the eating disorder, this time I knew better.  Yet, I heard its gentle call.  I have been here before.  My hope was, like always, to pick myself up (quickly) and not let it seduce me.

So, what did I give into?  Well, I was training for a half marathon and it began to serve 2-3 purposes for me. 1- to prove to myself that I could still set a goal and achieve it.  That includes running farther than I want on days I don't want to.  Running where I don't want to go ( HILLS)  2- Stress relief.  3- A sort of purge for a binge that I din't have.  In other words, I knew I was trying to create a calorie  deficit.

I am hardly starving myself, but I know I have ever so slightly cut back on my food.  I blame it on the heat.  I blame it on the stress, but I know......I know that I am walking a thin line ( pun intended ).

And then I cross it.  I try just once, then twice, then three times to purge, just to make sure I still have this available to me.  I have been here before, but three consecutive days...Really?  Again I fall ever so slightly, but like a cat I am hoping to land on my feet. So far I have always righted myself for the past 20 years.  But something about this time feels different and I am scared.

And I am packed and ready to leave to our cottage for the summer.  I hope it breaks the spell I have put myself under!  I ask myself if I am weak of character that I need to escape the trials of my everyday life, or am I wise in knowing that my tank is empty and I need to re-fuel?  Needless to say, somewhere along the way I chose to be weak rather than re-fuel.  Instead of filling my tank.  I began to empty it body, mind and soul.