learning to dance 2

i saw a therapist for a few sessions in new orleans - funnily, she was a professor in the program i dropped out of, but said it wasn't an issue as long as i never took a class with her. during our first session, i launched into my tale about how i had no clue who i was, what i was going to do with my life, where i was going to live, how i was going to afford my apartment, and basically how to rebuild my life from the ground up after i had demolished it with my ED. she came up with a brilliant idea:

"why not go back to undergrad? when i was a student, i took pottery. i took acting - loved it, but found out i had stage fright... this is why people go to college. you can take classes in anything that appeals to you and find out what you're interested in. they'll take care of housing and meals for you, so you don't have to worry about that. it would be a great way to find yourself."

i was sold on the idea before she'd even finished talking. see, i had gone to college for five years to get my B.A., but for the most part, i was going through the motions. i didn't join one club, attend any events, and only started interning after i'd entered recovery. i went to a commuter school so i could get in and get out. i studied film, and i found it interesting but not particularly challenging. i had dropped out of high school due to my ED, and therefore knew little about what i could handle academically, apart from standard liberal arts classes. i avoided science and math like the plague, because i had little exposure to them and had always assumed i was too dumb to go that route.

now i was rethinking all of this - i was brainstorming like crazy. what had i been missing out on all this time? my mom asked me, "if you could do anything, what would you do?" i had to really think hard about that, because without my eating disorder... there wasn't much left to ponder. but as i thought it over, i did come up with an answer: animals. i've always loved animals. they never fail to put a smile on my face. they make me feel at peace, and i have a natural way with them - many people have commented on how strange it is that their surly fur child likes me. i just seem to have a connection with them, and i feel good being around them. and you know, if it weren't for the fact that i grew up on a farmhouse with a lot of animals, i might have never found this passion - i had NO room for anything else with an eating disorder, so i felt lucky that i even knew this tidbit about myself.

i called up my old therapist, who'd worked with me all throughout recovery, and told her what was going on. she was very encouraging to me, and told me to approach life like it was a science experiment. "you have to find out through trial and error who you are," she said. "go to an amusement park and ride on the rollercoaster. afterward, ask yourself how you feel. was it fun or not? that's one more thing that you know about yourself. every time you have a new experience, you've learned more about what you like and what you don't like. think of it as an adventure."

i followed her advice. i reapplied to my alma mater back home - as luck would have it, they were one of the few colleges that was still accepting applications for spring 2011 transfer students, and they accepted me. they had a number of animal majors and programs for me to look into. they also had numerous math and science courses, and i felt inspired to take some on the chance that i liked them. excluding math and science totally from my college career, out of fear and insecurity, was cheating myself - who's not to say i had a knack for science? what if i loved science and wanted to become a veterinarian? i'd never know if i didn't try. i was ready to start making up for everything the ED had taken from me. i wanted to explore all possibilities, and give myself the opportunity to discover new passions. i also chose to move home because i could not afford to stay in new orleans - since i was an all around mess and not fit to work, it just wasn't feasible.

i drove all the way back home, a 26 hour trip. i did it by myself this time, while on the way down i had been accompanied by my grandmother and her friend. i arrived in november last year, and it was very strange. i had put myself in the mindset of never going back home again, and was used to living on my own. my mother was gone - her alcoholism had escalated horrifically when i moved away, which was my worst fear and why i always remained so close to her and to home, and she had been forced to go into rehab. it was winter, and the days were cold and dark. there was nothing to do for two months until school started. i was coming down from all the recent events, and my ED thoughts were out of control. i had no energy, no appetite, i was depressed, and had lost weight. it seemed that overnight, i had tipped over from perfectly fine to perfectly fucked up.

i knew what i had to do; i got back together with my team. i started seeing my therapist, and i made an appointment with my dietitian. he put me on a weight gain meal plan, and the first few days were tough, though they'd never hold a candle to what i'd experienced during refeeding. in a short amount of time, my appetite was back and i was eating normally again. before i knew it, intuitive eating was also back and so was normalcy. my moods leveled out; i was me again. just as quickly as the thoughts and depression had come, they'd disappeared within the blink of an eye. amazingly, i hadn't even been EDed for that long, and was only a few pounds at most under my setpoint, yet the effects had been powerful.

i felt so much better after regaining to my setpoint and eating normally, and this reinforced my recovery better than anything else could. i was strongly reminded how utterly essential healthy weight and eating are, and even better, how pointless and unproductive my ED is. i was only sick again for a short amount of time, but here's what happened: i was severely depressed, i had little mental and physical energy, i was unhappy, i felt fat and scared all the time... what did any of that do for me? did it solve my problems? did anything good come of it? no. this discovery has made a long lasting impression on me and my recovery. of course, these were things i knew after recovering from rock bottom years ago, but it really drove the point home when it happened in a different context. two years ago, i was almost dead, and recovery revolved around intense gratitude toward my life and health, and fundamental physical and mental healing. this time, being sick was directly related to coping with some trying personal problems in my life, and i was able to witness and analyze very clearly what a useless function the ED served during that experience. it also boosted my confidence that i was able to pull myself out of it so quickly. i felt great!

in january, i moved into a studio apartment at my alma mater and started a new semester. i had high hopes, and they were dashed. i hated the town i was living in, and my apartment was a bit of a nightmare, complete with shady landlords, cop visits to break up constant partying that made my lights blink on and off, and an errant mouse that emerged from my stove burners. i got a job at a sales associate with a moody boss, ridiculous rules, and boring tasks. my classes were a mess; for some reason, i had been paired up with horrible teachers. one of them was just bad at teaching and i hated the topic (equine health) and another made me feel uncomfortable because he was socially awkward. i kept a biology class, two courses on careers with animals, and a course on running a horse show. i fucking hated the horse show class, i hated the stupid horse people, and it's miraculous i got through that class with a B. i spent 13k on a semester that i mostly hated.

even while dealing with all this shit, i was thankful for it. i was learning new things all the time. i was learning how to deal with landlords, apartment living, crabby bosses, and mouse infestation. i learned that i equine health bores me to death and that horse shows are terrible to run. i learned that retail is not for me. i learned that, when healthy, i CAN function at a job, and i kept mine for four months, and actually quit on my own terms. i learned a lot about different animal careers. but best of all? i discovered a burning passion for biology! this is no exaggeration - i had an intense love affair with the subject. i would study for six hours on end, gladly. i poured over the study materials, did tons of research on my own, and even joined some science boards so i could help people with their homework. i was IN LOVE with it! and i couldn't believe i'd had this undiscovered love for science all along. on top of that, i did well at it - even though i'd hardly taken any science classes in my life, i passed with a B+.

i was keenly aware of how recovery allowed me to have these realizations, experiences, life changing events, epiphanies... everything that's happened since i've chosen to get well. if i hadn't gone into recovery, there's no chance in hell i would have earned a B+ in a college biology course. when i was sick, i could barely even read. without a healthy body, i would have died at the horse show. we did a lot of heavy lifting with setting up the jumps, and let me tell you, i felt like a bad ass. enjoying college and getting to explore careers would not be possible - or not nearly so enjoyable - without my health.

yet no matter how strong you feel, you can't control events in your life, and thus your recovery is always open to be challenged. relapse humbled me. i don't hesitate to admit that relapse is tempting in hard times, but even then you may surprise yourself...