{what the heck is health?}

there is an insidious aspect to eating disorders

 they are portrayed as chains, when in reality, they are far closer to tawny rope vines. 

the sweet-pea clingers which twist wrap themselves in whispers through your bones, around your soul. 

it goes from 'i will eat normally and everything will fall into place' to 'clean eating makes me feel better/stronger/energized' to 'carbs/sugar/fat is poison and i live just fine on salads and apples' to 'black coffee and fruits and vegetables' 

and hey, i dropped two pounds in two days, but it is getting harder to get out of bed in the morning (and let's be honest, it was pretty difficult to begin with) and my smiles grow more strained, less frequent 

in the space of days it goes from 'i will just exercise enough to wake myself up/give me energy/make me feel strong' to 'wake up, work out, walk for hours, wall sit every available moment, plank for warmth, work out, sleep, drag self out of bed in the morning and start the cycle all over again'

my mother notes my 'health kick' with approval, especially the beginnings of a six-pack and wiry arms, exactly .6 pounds heavier than February 2, 2015, my release date from the hospital, over a year ago. 

yet now i am slimmer than i was then, all my clothes slipping off my frame, unable to be held up with belts because the smallest loop on the belt is still bigger than my waist. 

and i am growing to see that the problem is not salads. the problem is not exercise. the problem is not going for a bike ride or an hour's walk/run after dinner. 

the problem is i want to live

not just survive

not just scrape by on what my brother lovingly refers to as 'rabbit food' because when you eat half a cucumber and raspberries for dinner.... he may have a point.

and my mother told me this morning that i should be happy, because 'you finally have the body you've always wanted' and yet i do not have losing weight as a goal. 

i want to be strong and i want to eat clean and i enjoy the feeling of health which comes from eating greens and i am rediscovering raspberries and cucumbers and even zucchini and yet... 

why do i feel as though i should feel like something is fundamentally wrong? 

i browse pinterest at my kitchen desk, flip through beautiful lattes and espresso, listening to the sound of a little boy breathing as he sleeps in the living room and i ask myself why.. why, when finally the body i have always wanted, the enviable, the tiny perfect... i feel as though i should feel as though something is missing. 

i want beauty

i want to create beauty and enjoy beauty and beautiful things and beautiful food

like the brownies baked for the co-op bake sale today, which sit in their pan, perhaps a bit too liberally sprinkled with powder sugar, which i smiled and said 'no thank you' to this morning, pouring myself another cup of black caffe verona

like the pancake creations i fed my littlest brother. we made them together, measuring out oat flour in wild experimentation, allowing myself two, three, four bites. no more. 

what am i so afraid of? 

i think i know. i know what i am afraid of... 

i am afraid that my body will stabilize itself at a weight above what i am currently at, which makes me feel skinny, and that, when/if it does, i will not know how to love it or appreciate it. 

my father is on a no-carb diet for his diabetes (but don't ask him, he will deny both the diabetes and the diet...we as a family do not discuss things like that)

my mother is discontent and disgusted with her homeopathic remedies which while they 'work', she claims they have increased her estrogen levels to the point of fattest she has ever been. 

and i want to live and enjoy life and enjoy things like warm chocolate and caramel and fresh pancakes and cold ice cream laughing late nights with siblings hearing recaps of their days. 

but what if.... what if, as always before... i attempt, i gain, and my self-loathing grows with each pound added? 

what then? 

my brother with the deadly dairy allergy, his chocolate bars say 'enjoy life' on them. because, after all, what else are we to do with life but live it?

life consists of Christ and life is meant to be lived, and if i was never objectively 'fat' to begin with, will it matter in eternity whether or not i weigh 10, 15, 20 more pounds than i do now?

because, after all, add 18 more pounds and that is what i weighed at the beginning of this year, add 11 to my current weight and you have how much i weighed in Virginia late January, and what i weigh now is roughly what i weighed at the beginning of camp last year, and if he who saw me at camp and saw me in January saw no real difference between the two... then what does it matter? 

i know what it matters. 

it matters because i walk differently, talk differently, act differently, am different when i am confident, when i think i look good

and now i talk confidently, walk confidently. because i have suddenly realized that i lose nothing by comparison with others. because i like my body best this weight. 

i do not walk as though i am afraid or ashamed of myself, do not exist in public as though my sole aim in life is to take up less space because i feel that i take up too much space already. but that is the way i have always walked...flabby thighs, stomach rolls, do not look at me. 

i am mostly content with my body, its shapes and curves. i almost like it now. i like sitting down without sucking in my stomach. i like the noted approval my extremely-toned-without-even-trying brother gives me upon examining my bicep. i like being skinnier than my sister, stronger, sans stomach fat. i like pulling my legs up to my chest, and watching the sunbeams dance on the hardwood floors through the space between my thighs. it is more socially acceptable. it is social media and teenage girls and i do not miss my cellulite. i do not miss the lumpy hips and never finding jeans that flatteringly fit and i do not miss the feeling of stripping down before the brutality of a dressing room mirror in tears yet again. 

but.... there are things i do miss. i miss the obvious curves in any dress. i miss hot chocolate and ice cream and i miss being able to plank without elbow bones grating against the floorboards. i miss not hiding away in my room every night after dinner because the temptation is too great to bear. i miss whipping up deliciousness - caramels and toffee and cupcakes and brownies, and i miss wrists which do not look as though they will break at the slightest pressure. i miss the curve of calves and forearms. i miss being able to sit comfortably without bone-bruises. i miss ordering more than salads, miss tastes of dad's plate across the table because now i only eat vegetables.
i miss mental concentration, clarity, hands that don't shake. i miss not always feeling on the verge of passing out.

and although i balked at the well-intentioned clueless one who once told me, around this weight, that i looked as though i was 12.. if i am honest, i do look older when i am not this skinny. 

but... will i be able to appreciate my body if it gains belly rolls and a muffin top and all the squishy parts it had before? 

will i be able to walk confident even with the bouncing rolls and always feeling as though bursting out of my clothes? 

i don't know. 

gaining weight is never considered a good thing unless you are skin and bones and i am not skin and bones, therefore losing weight is considered a good thing, and they really don't care about your health so long as you conform to a socially accepted standard of what they sell you as beauty...acceptance...worth. 

and i bought myself a plaque because it made me laugh, which says 'i'm pretty sure chocolate tastes as good as skinny feels' because it does. but it only tastes as good, and not better. never better than skinny feels. and so i pick my good, which turns out to be skinny...

but what if health tastes better than skinny will ever feel? what if self love is actually possible? 

but how, when i am so afraid of gaining weight? it is not really the weight which scares me anymore, though, if i am honest. it is the fear of not being able to find anything beautiful about my body if i do gain weight. 

i am afraid that i will not accept me any heavier, and i am afraid others will not, either. 

and i thought at one point, a couple days ago, that i was eating salads for my own sense of recovery and my own desire to do what my body works best with, instead listening to other outside opinions on what recovery looks like, or better is.

but now i see that i was wrong. i am listening to other sources. 

not the 'gain weight' voices, nor yet the 'you're too fat' ones, but the voices of society, the voices of social media, and the terror that i will lose what little modicum of self-acceptance i have discovered if i gain weight. 

and this has been a ramble, and i know the solution isn't salads... or caramel, for that matter... but is seeing myself how He sees me really enough? how does one become truly comfortable in their own skin?

this stage is so many open-ended questions, and He is giving me peace, promising to show me in time, but i am impatient and overthink

and so...i am learning to trust... i am praying for sight.