Triggered by a book

I posted this in my social group tarvalon.net, I felt the post was insightful enough I needed to add it here before it fell into oblivion of a forum thread and was lost forever.

Unbearable Lightness
by Ajailyn Morrivinna » Fri Jan 07, 2011 11:46 am

Warning: Topic might cause those with emotional or eating disorders to be triggered into unhealthy behaviors. This is not my intent but the book moved me to much to thinking about my own poor behaviors I needed to talk. With out really knowing who to go to I turned to my grays.

Unbearable Lightness is the actress Portia de Rossi’s story of her eating disorder. Not just a typical story of I have this disorder here is how I recovered. She actually only talked about the recovery in the Epilogue.

As I read through the book, reading a her obession with food, exercise and calories grew into a true obsession I definately recognized the ride. While I myself do not have anorexia or bulimia I have a bad relationship with food. But more than just my bad relationship with food, I recognized things in her behavior in my own mood disorder. If I wasn’t dealing with physical illness currently I could very easily have been triggered into a manic episode just simply reading about her own manic type behaviors with her disorder.

This made me think not only of my own poor relationship with food, but my poor relationship with my own self esteem. Self Esteem being the way I value myself, not just if I feel good about myself or not. Because of my poor relationship with myself I have self destructive behaviors I do that continue to create a circular cycle for me. It is a comfort to not have to change, to not have to get well.

I am constantly told how I am so many things and it always amazes me that people truly believe that I am this way, I have had guy gamer friends tell me I am not a typical “gamer” gurl because I do not join a guild and get the attention of every guy in the guild and have them cater to my every whim.. I am not a “needy” female.

Except that I am.

I need and crave attention. I need outside assurance that I am worth something to someone. I “need” to fit in, I “need” to be “popular” or well liked, I can not cope if someone dislikes me. Oh its ok for someone to dislike me, I know this logically, that I can’t be the perfect person to everyone all the time, so I am bound to have people not really enjoy my company, desire to be my friend, etc. But I can not stop this voice inside my head that tells me that I MUST fix it. I MUST find out why this person thinks so poorly of me to dislike me and become a better person so it doesn’t happen again.

I need to be loved.

Not just loved, but wanted. I can not explain why it is this extreme need to have every one I know need me as much as I need them. It is selfish in my own mind, and here is where the cycle gets really bad.

I am not worth the attention or cares of everyone I meet in life. Honestly no one is to EVERYONE they meet. That’s just part of life. But because I am nto worth something to everyone my brain some how messes that up to I am not worth something to anyone at all. Something in me is full of failure that causes me to be even needier to my friends, to my loved ones, but unable to tell t hem how I feel, to reach out and say, I feel worthless today, help. And because I do not feel I am worth it to reach out and ask to be loved, I feel unloved and unliked and the cycle continues. I get clingy and strange to my friends, suddenly demanding attention from them I’ve not asked for, with otu explaining why I suddenly need a ton of time, with out explaining I need something from them. Then I feel they aren’t giving me what I would give them and it becomes me angry at them for not being a good enough friend when they needed my attention I gave them everything I could, I was there for hours of listening to them cry over a broken heart, talk about how awesome something in their life was etc.

Before I talk myself into my own pathetic emotional cycle, let me just say if you are triggered at all by my post do not read the book.. while it helped me think about and recognize some of my own weaknesses it has slightly trigged me into a slightly disgusted with myself feeling. The book is amazing at helping me be introspective but as I can recognize my own faults I am currently stuck in a cycle of just my faults. I can’t even slow my brain down to think about the ways to get out of them, or work on them, or just simply stop. (My brain and thoughts that is).

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This is Aja reaching out …

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I’ve not left the house since Christmas day and only then for dinner, before that I hadn’t left the house in two weeks.

I am not asking for words of love or encouragement.. I’m asking for a friend. Someone to help me get through this moment in my life and maybe the next. I know it sounds strange to reach out and t hen say I don’t just want words of encouragement, but I need more than just moral support. I need to add a friend to my support group, and be a bit needy. I need someone who can put forth the effort because when I get to this point, I don’t put out the effort, I hide… and with draw. I need someone to keep on keeping up with me even when it seems I don’t want it, because right now I really do.