Vacationing presents a challenge for me in the sense of taking time for myself to have a moment to process the whirlwind thoughts that spiral inside my head. The sheer intent of putting my thoughts on paper, or in today's technological existence of computers by typing, is a bit of a test to my commitment to address the contemplations that present themselves as a direct result of me letting an addictive disease control me rather than me controlling it. I embarked on a two week vacation with my family, two days packing and cleaning, ten days away from home, and two days of recovering, and repeatedly attempted to transfer my distorted views of myself into words I have chosen to share with the world in attempt of holding myself accountable, but to no avail failed miserably. Let me take a moment now to share with you the result of the few times I actually did start but lost my concentration and never finished...
Day 4 of vacation:
It is amazing to me how many emotions, events, stressors, and moments transpire within me while on what should be a stress free and relaxing vacation. But I also stop and laugh at myself because I am asking in my head, who on earth has a vacation that is completely full of 100% bliss? Not my family! I started to blog the other day and had to stop due to events that presented themselves and I never really got the chance to continue until now. I will share those thoughts in a moment but first I want to explain how I have come to this point of pure vacation exhaustion where my husband has explained it to me in the best words by simply saying we need a vacation from our vacation. I first laughed at him thinking how silly he was sounding but now know that he was completely serious as here we are on day 5 of our vacation and while I sit here blogging, listening to the rain and freezing in our villa, MiKayla is coloring, Tyler and Scott are utterly passed out in the other room and all I can think about is what on earth can possibly be next aside from all the whining, rain, blisters, breakdowns, cancellations and horrid weather that seems to be plaguing this vacation in what is supposed to be sunny California! Really, it is quite provoking my inner furry and within that furry comes the need to purge hoping I can find a way to make things more perfect but knowing that that is nothing but a stupid thought that I need to take and throw out the window. (That is a tool I use for my kids when they have bad attitudes. I tell them to take their attitude and throw it in the trash, out the window, over the bridge, etc. depending on our location at that precise moment. It seems to work for them so I guess maybe I should start heeding my own advice...)
We first embarked on this wondrous adventure heading to Las Vegas for my sister-in-laws wedding reception. She had gotten remarried last month, to a fantastic guy in Jamaica, resulting in us missing out on the event due to the fact that it is almost impossible to come up with the funds to take my whole family out of the country with only a couple months notice. Although, right now as I sit here in this rainy weather I find myself wishing we had been able to sit on the sunny beaches of Jamaica with the picture perfect scenery, being pampered with drinks and relaxation, enjoying a bit of heaven. Now that I am picturing what I perceive as the scenario of perfect bliss, I let out a sigh, glance out the window at the amazing view I was lucky enough to have, and continue on with my reality. And I must point out that it is an amazing vacation that I am blessed to be having, and I honestly would not change it for the world. We are together as a family, the four of us, and we are being adventurous. There are many hiccups but we still manage and we still smile and we still find ways to make unforgettable memories. It's just right now, I am exhausted and I find myself wanting to release my stress of the previous days.
So back to our beginning. We had gotten up at 3:15 in the morning on Friday, loaded up the kids in the car, and headed out to Las Vegas. It turned out to be a long trip once the kids could not watch their movies since our converted crapped out on us and, what seemed like an eternity later, we finally reached our destination. We only had a couple of hours before we needed to meet everyone for dinner and I found, as I started to unpack what I thought was a brilliant planning of outfits, that I didn't pack half of anything I really wanted but instead had packed my clothes that I used to wear when I was puking all the time and was a scantily size 3. I finally had my first REAL emotional breakdown. Still, when I think back to it I am embarrassed but this is what I wrote...
(Day 1 of vacation)
"My family and I are finally taking advantage of a rare occasion of vacationing for absolute pleasure. I guess it really isn't complete pleasure as the instigator to this rare event would be the wedding reception of my sister-in-law, in Las Vegas, some 7 hours from home. But the formalities of taking family obligations at the beginning of our vacation open the door to the wondrous journey we are about to embark on to the happiest place of all time, Disneyland. For some, me included, vacationing sometimes does not equal absolute pleasure. I say this because of my current condition of struggling with food, control and body image, and now I am out in the world where for the first few days I am surrounded by people who judge, analyze, and criticise my decision making skills. This in turn creates quite a bit of uneasiness and opens the door wider to my self sabotage. Vacationing in my opinion, is where most people get away and enjoy without thinking of how many pounds they might gain and where is the nearest gym or the thoughts of "holy crap I didn't pack the right jeans that fit me best". For me that actually happened yesterday which led me to have a complete utter breakdown of throwing my clothes against a wall, towels that draped my body after my shower falling off resulting in me seeing an image in the mirror that was much more disturbing in my mind than probably exists, and then tears that forced me into the fetal position because I was feeling like I actually was better off when I was throwing up 10 times a day and only weighed 113 pounds. I was yelling at my husband that I was happier and looked better when I could put on anything and it fit loose on me and then I went completely insane by blaming him and everyone else for making me become fat and ugly now. My mind had gone from this happy and healthy outlook to a point of sheer illusion of a distorted reality. My husband left me alone for a few moments while going and making sure the kids were preoccupied and when he returned I was sitting on the bed, halfway dressed, still in the fetal position. He calmly came to my side, put his arm around me, kissed me on the head and simply said words of encouragement that consisted of the normal, you look great now, you were too skinny then, you looked sick then, your beautiful to me, etc. and then said "You have a choice. You can choose to sit here and let this ruin the day or we go get in the car and buy you a new pair of jeans. Simple. Easy fix". Then he left the room and left the choice up to me. I had to take a moment and process what he was proposing and then it hit me that he was right once again. I got up, fixed my hair, took my xanax, tried on another 20 outfits finally finding one that was decent enough in my mind, and we left. Now, I did find a pair of jeans that fit, but the emotional breakdown was still weighing heavily on my mind. I was struggling to look at myself in the mirror for fear of how I would see myself. I spent the rest of the day quietly punishing and yelling at myself for the temper tantrum that I had actually presented to my family over a stupid pair of jeans. Let me tell you a little secret. I knew then and I am saying it now, it was never about the jeans. When is it ever actually about the clothes? It was me giving into that evil little voice in my head that I have always had telling me that I was powerless, and when I see the people that we are here to see, they will be looking at how much weight I have gained, silently laughing at me, and EVERY time they will look at me they will be judging me..."
Now, I know that those thoughts were a mere reflection of the disease that has plagued my conscious soul and I did manage to pull myself together with help from another source of poison, alcohol, which really is not OK, but I showed up, had a good time, made a new friend, and continued on with our vacation. I sat down numerous times to try and write but they all ended up with me staring blankly at the computer lost in my thoughts and not finding a way to read my inner voice that was bogged down with emotions desperately needing an escape. So here I am, finally home from that vacation which was wonderful, uplifting, exhausting, long, fun, monumental in family time, full of so much activity, that I almost feel I am ready for that other vacation away from my vacation, but thrown into a whirlwind reality that I wasn't quite prepared for, and finally catching up on my sharing of what I experienced as a direct result of this horrible disease, with the rest of you. I went through horrible emotional roller coaster rides that I am embarrassed for and I think I am still punishing myself in my head for events that I cannot change but I guess I can learn from. It taught my kids that we all have moments of weakness where we make bad choices and it is OK as long as we grow with the knowledge that we can choose better the next time we are presented with a challenge. I am not proud of my breakdown but I feel I gained a little more insight into how fragile my state of mind really is and I cannot continually suppress it. I need to deal with my thoughts and emotions as they come to find a sense of serenity within myself.
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