Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

Last year I did the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer and it was such an amazing experience that I've decided to do it again this year. I registered last week and already received the material in the mail to get started. I'm working on my personal web page through Avon so that I can start fundraising. Soon I'll have to start training (I remember that - not so much fun, but worth it in the end).

This year the event is June 6-7 2009 I will be walking with my best friend Regina along with thousands of others who truly believe that we can make a difference in the lives of women everywhere. Please take a moment to consider donating to the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. I know that times are tough, money is tight. . . but even just a small donation adds up and makes a difference.

Home for the Holidays

I was home for Thanksgiving and it's always such a blessing to see my family. I wish I wasn't out of state and that I could go home more often.
It is where I am most happy!
My brother Chris and his kids - Nick, Griffin and Paige

My brother Bill

My dear sweet momMy "poppy" (dad) on his 60th birthday which we all got to celebrate togetherMy very best friend in the whole wide world, Robyn

I love you all and am very lucky to have you in my life!

Finding my way

I'm trying to get back into writing and am having a hard time doing it. I think I need a break from work to get back my life, thoughts and happiness again. I need to find my way and not pressure myself to write or it will become a chore and I don't want that. My posts have been to help and/or inspire and when you don't feel all that helpful for inspired - I don't know what to write. There have been a few posts about when I struggle, but mostly I try to be uplifting or I try at least. Even if I feel down I'd post, but to feel nothing - it's strange.

I have a half day of work tomorrow and am getting to gether with a friend and am off the week of Thanksgiving - hopefully I'll find some inspiration.

Dear Stranger

It sure has been a crazy past few months. Work has been more than I can handle and I've withdrawn completely inside myself. I can't help it when things spiral out of control, I go with it. I can only manage so many things at a time and lately I have fallen through the cracks, well I'm back...I think! In life out of control days are 100 percent guaranteed. So it makes sense to plan for them, make use of them and learn from them. Otherwise you'll end up wasting those days and therefore wasting a part of your life. When that mood surrounds me, the temptation is to take the easy way out, to curl up in a ball and wait for the dark times to pass (not always the best approach). I found that I missed taking the time to blog/journal! It's a way of documenting what I really care about, a mental breathing space to think about what is going on and place to bring things into perspective. Sitting here tonight, in this moment, reminds me of how important it is to check in with myself. This is a record of what I have experienced and a wonderful way of helping myself get out of the shadows and back into the sun.
It's certainly worth the effort.

Needing Something

Needing something yet not knowing what it is
Searching for something yet in all the wrong places
Lonely for someone yet who is it
Hoping for change yet how do I achieve it
Hungry for sustenance yet avoiding it
Full of it all yet can't get enough
Praying for direction yet always lost
LOST inside myself, trapped within my own walls
NO WAY OUT

Sisters on the "web"

I'm a volunteer "big sister" for the organization Big Brothers Big Sisters. My little sister Maddy and I have been together for over three years and loving every minute of it (maddy and me post). Not too long ago I received an email asking for my participation in the filming of a web recruitment video. After a filmed selection process "we" were chosen to be apart of this amazing experience. Of course, we were both very nervous, but accepted the challenge. The film is finally is on the web and is so cool, please check out our debut.


Being a "big sister" is an awesome experience. It's a chance to give your time and love to someone who desperately needs extra support and encouragement in their lives.
What you may not realize going into this is what you get in return:
1) to be a kid again, lots of fun and play
2) laughs
3) love
4) smiles
5) extended family

Practice wellness

Speak quietly to yourself and promise there will be better days.
Whisper gently to yourself and provide assurance that you really are extending your best effort.
Console your bruised and tender spirit with reminders of many other successes.
Offer comfort in practical and tangible ways - as if you were encouraging your dearest friend.
Recognize that on certain days the greatest grace is that the day is over and you get to close your eyes.
Tomorrow comes more brightly...

Even in recovery, we still struggle

This blog has been an invitation.
A reflection.
A mirror.
An intimate portrait of some of my process that have allowed me to separate life as it happens to me and life as I choose it.
They are such very different things.

Recovery, I realize is a process of growth and transformation. It doesn't mean you instantaneously heal overnight, it takes time and patience. There are good days, great even, then there days of struggle. We all have them! It's just when you have an eating disorder, you may/or may not have the tendency to fall into past patterns of self-destruction.I hate falling into these cycles, but then again I'm only human and we all make mistakes. Along with my eating disorder, I self-injured as a way to distract myself from the pain I felt on the inside. I always described it as a pain I could explain. When so much distress was on the inside, it transformed it into something visible that I could identify with outwardly. Most days, I was numbed by the pain on the inside - a walking zombie. By self-injuring I could FEEL something and it somehow made sense of what I felt inside. In recovery I know it's a place I shouldn't go, but on occasion it's an old crutch for me - a comfort oddly enough. I feel isolated when I do this because I don't want others to see what I've done, but then if they do maybe they'll comfort me - or maybe they'll be mad at me.
Either way I'm screwed.

This past Tuesday I had a really bad day. I blogged about it (see previous post) to reach out, but still did what I did. I'm sharing this to show you that we all have bumps in the road of recovery, but it is how we deal with and move forward that counts. I am a survivor and WILL bounce back, like I do now days. However, if I didn't have these days, I wouldn't see how resilient I am and how far I've come. Years and years and years of this behavior was my past, now it rarely surfaces (thank God).

Recovery is a process and if charted you'd see how far I have come. I am no longer the frail, scared, child-like, isolated, eating disordered person I was. I am strong and easily recover from these moments making myself even stronger than before. So see, it isn't about doing the bad, it's about realizing it and not doing it again. AND if you do, don't be to hard on yourself - tomorrow is another day. I'm proof of that!

Six Details About ME

I've been tagged!

Georgia from jorjah-b, a wonderful friend of mine and to many others, has tagged me!
I have to list six details about myself.

Here are the rules:

1. link to the person who tagged me (above)
2. list the rules (below)
3. tag six fellow bloggers (??????)
4. leave a comment so they know they've been tagged (??????)

Here are six details about me:

1. I am recovering from an eating disorder and it's a battle worth fighting everyday.

2. As I start to matter, so has the passion to help others who are struggling. I'm working on becoming an advocate and coordinator for the cause. It's a slow process, but worth it to me. This is why I started to blog in the first place hoping to help OR helpings of hope (get it).

3. LOVE my family and friends. My family lives in Minnesota along with my best friend and I miss them terribly. I'm blessed for truly wonderful friends who love and support me daily AND are a big part of my life.

4. REALLY LOVE "pickles" always have - always will. As a little girl, I'd be caught in the fridge eating the whole jar. As a teenager I found they went well with Frito's and popcorn and consumed mass amounts of these odd combinations. As an adult I still love them, the odd pairings have ceased - but I eat them when I can and as many as I can.

5. I have always been oddly flexible! As a child I found it amusing to wrap my leg around my head and watch heads turn. At almost 37 - I'm still very flexible, but tend to keep the odd bits of show to a minimum.

6. I LOVE to read. I'm a complete book worm and if I could save a whole weekend to just veg and read I would. It's extremely relaxing to me, yet I have a hard time putting it down to actually sleep. I go to work tired many mornings cause I read way past my bed time.

I would love to tag six fellow bloggers, however I don't have any fellow bloggers to tag.
I have a friend that I'm going to have do this as well, but her blog is private:
Cori :)

"Struggling" support needed!

I had a really bad day today and don't want to get to specific, other than I just wanted to reach out a bit.

The stress at work is beyond what I can handle. I then tend to take it out on myself by using my eating disorder issues as a vise. The wild and unthinkable thoughts racing through my head are uncontrollable - even after I got home. I've stayed in isolation trying to regroup myself and just can't muster the courage to pull myself out of it. I have to - just have to get myself out of my stinking thinking cause it's bogging me down physically and mentally. I don't think things will get much better because if my workload right now (managing 9200 pages) and the fact that I don't get help or support at work doesn't help the matter.

Please pray for me!

Come to the edge

“Come to the edge.”
“We can't. We're afraid.”
“Come to the edge.”
“We can't. We will fall!”
“Come to the edge.”
And they came.
And he pushed them.
And they flew.

Guillaume Apollinaire, 1880-1918
French Poet, Philosopher

You are your own healer

I think that healing is calling out to us everyday. Healing opportunities surround us and sometimes we choose not to heal. Sometimes it hurts too much to peel back the layers and feel what's under there. Yet what we're not healing is hurting us somehow - whether through absence, stagnation, avoidance or bad dreams. Healing can also feel lonely. Especially if we continually feel that we are the "only ones." I believe that the more I share my life, the more I can heal and in return help others heal. Healing can be nearly invisible, agonizingly slow, astonishingly rapid, easy, very difficult and woven into the hurts so we can't tell what's been healed right away. I feel so terribly alone in my pain, yet I know that I am not alone.

I am grateful every single day for my current inactive (somewhat) eating disorder and am filled with compassion for anyone who is experiencing it. I am deeply saddened to see beautiful women live in prisons of fear, fat and food.

I feel my calling is to seek out people and listen to what they're saying - to help in some way. I hope that you share and circulate your own healing stories. We need them! Let's take all our masks off and see the soft, teary, wistful faces that lie underneath.

Ask yourself these questions:
Am I making my most alive choices?
Am I signing up for change?
Am I intimately engaged in my own life?
Am I creatively fulfilled?
Am I surrounded by a healing support system?

Any healing you do affects us all!

Letter to self

Dear Sandy,
You are feeling so overwhelmed right now. You are feeling completely out of control. The only thing that I want to tell you is: YOU DO HAVE A CHOICE. You do not have to turn to Ed. Yes, I know that in the past, Ed has been your escape from the feelings. And for the moment, Ed seems to work. But in the long run, YOU WILL REGRET GOING TO ED. He makes you depressed and miserable. He makes promises that he never keeps. Sometimes I am on the verge of relapse, I have thoughts of Ed and wish for him to take care of me again. But, I say NO and YOU CAN TO RIGHT NOW.
Love,
sandy

The fear of succeeding

The fear of succeeding is actually scarier than failing AND sometimes it feels like writing is the only thing that saves me.
Sharing my truths opens doors for healing and intimacy with others.
Still, we at times withhold the truth, fearing loss or conflict or judgment.
We dance with deception and half-truths and hope we can evade "having to tell the truth." If we live in truth, we will be closer to our actual experience and therefore open to more joy. If we let ourselves be truly seen then we can be truly loved.
The truth hurts and heals. Hurts when we fear and resist it, heals when we allow it to speak and change how we see. Our emotional lives are messy and filled with half-expressed feelings, unexpressed needs and withheld truths. Checking in is a simple way to navigate through feelings with others. So many times, I'm lost in my head with fears and I am not emotionally present. Learning to check in with myself is another step towards emotional wholeness.
This is why I blog...to share my truths and to open doors to healing.

INNER CRITIC FOOD FOR THOUGHT!
Learn to fight your inner critic as fiercely as you would an attacker.

I guess I didn't acknowledge "you"

During my eating disorder many friends have come and gone, specifically GONE. They either couldn't tolerate my isolation, the fact that I belittled myself and oozed self-hatred or that I was just plain killing myself. Well, with recovery has come the need to reconnect with a few of the friends lost during that time. The long-standing friendships prior to Ed. I've spent alot of time and energy this year tracking them down and making an attempt to rekindle the friendship we once had. A few have been happy that I'm well and we've been in contact while recently one had responded in this way:

Hi Sandy,
I'm glad for you that you're taking the steps you need to make your life better-I have been doing the same thing and as you know, it is very difficult. It's difficult for everyone...
After some long thinking, I fear that rekindling the relationship we once had would not be healthy to bring into my life again.Having listened to you over the phone, I still don't hear or feel that you have acknowledged how your illness/addiction/disorder affects other people, who are/were in your life. It is/has been very painful, very difficult for me & I simply do not have the energy to deal with it.

I need to focus on myself for the first time instead of others and take care of me-

I wish you the peace, joy & happiness in all that you do...

?????


So, needless to say I am a little hurt by the response and upset by the lack of feeling towards what I was going through. I know many people felt helpless seeing me torture myself day in and day out and fearful that I was literally killing myself. But, no one has ever said "I don't think you have acknowledge how it affected me." I thought constantly about those I was hurting, but there was nothing I could do about it. Believe me if I could have stopped vomiting, abusing laxative and causing self-injury I would have - dah. Unfortunately, the disorder had control and there was no stopping the daily self-inflicted pain caused - even for you - but mostly for me.

I am going to say I'm sorry here, but to me instead.
I am sorry that I hurt you so badly for so many years.
I'm sorry that you had to endure more pain inflicted by me that most people go through in a lifetime.
I'm sorry you went hungry for weeks at a time without food.
I'm sorry I made you eliminate everything you ate as a consequence of my controlling behavior.
I'm sorry that you were burned and cut because of my self-hatred towards you.
Scars are present for the years of torture I've put you through and I'm truly sorry.

Please forgive me -
love your inner child

I think I'll use my wings today!

You've got wings, and God has given you a clear open sky.
Wings are not only those feathered things that sprout from
armpits. Wings are ideas nurtured with love. They are the
fears you face, and dismantle. They are are the kind things you do
for yourself, and for others when no one is watching. They are
the positive things you say to you, about you.
Wings are not flying apparatuses that are reserved for
heavenly beings. They are attached to those who surrender
secret hurts to forgiveness. They are nurtured by tears cried
in the silence of the night. They are groomed by a broken
heart. They are expanded by adversities met with faith. Your
wings are strengthened by the uncomfortable, unpleasant
experiences you are willing to face each day. But, before you can
fly, or even think about soaring, you have to believe that you
have earned your wings.

Faith in the Valley - Iyanla Vanzant

Tyranny of Size

I feel horrified by the expansion of my flesh, ashamed that it matters to me so much and pissed that I don't feel comfortable in my own body. Most days I'm OK with the weight I've gained because with it has come clarity and peace of mind. Today, not so much! But, I know that I'm smarter than Ed and all the games he plays. Daily, I live under siege from the inner critic, the judge and the "pusher". Now, I plan on studying these selves of my personality and giving them new jobs.

I think the problem is, this morning I weighed myself before work. I try not to do this anymore as it usually upsets me. I tend to base my self-worth on the number and it messes everything up. Tomorrow I'll put my best foot forward and step away from the scale. NEVER use a scale! If your clothes keep fitting, you weigh the same.

Somehow we connect our various sizes to our self-worth. We have mental images of ideal sizes - even if it's not in our heritage to be that way. We compliment weight loss, monitor our appetites and shrink ourselves to fit some kind of standard. I wish we could all the the size we actually are. One size does not fit all - because there are as many sizes as there are women. Let's look closer at the size of our hearts, the width of our souls and the lengths of our spirits.

Choosing Succulence

Being "positive" is a choice. I am flooded with the same doubts, terrors, insecurities, rages, worries and critical inner voices as everyone else -- maybe more! Sometimes I go overboard describing my faults or flaws, to the extent that I see people cringe and wonder, "why am I listening to/reading this person if she is so riddled with stuff?" We are all riddled with stuff. Being positive does not mean being accepting of the negative, or ignorant of the issues or anything else. It means seeing the grace in as much as you can see. I resist my dark places and try to hide them from other people, but mostly myself. Sometimes I just skip from one addictive behavior to another -- whatever is loudest and will most quickly fill the emptiness. I will list some of my faults and weaknesses in the hopes that it might inspire you to do the same. Letting it be seen takes away its power. I'm codependent, a eating disorder survivor (almost), obsessively compulsively driven, overly sensitive and highly sensitive, subject to paranoid thinking and I live largely in a state of denial. I'm also very gifted, a good friend, occasionally wise, curious, outspoken, opinionated, quite brave, very flexible, powerful, a believer and creative. I am often seduced by struggle. It's as though it's painful to feel "too good". I'm used to the effort and sometimes confused by the joy. Working with the hard parts and not against them will create movement. I choose to remain positive, unlike past years of negativity. It is a constant struggle to remain positive and happy, but I will continue this journey as it is better than the alternative.

A day at the beach, Ed free

Today I spent the day at the beach with my roomate. Not for sunning myself, but to just enjoy the day. We took off our shoes and walked in the sand, let the waves wash upon our feet, collected pretty rocks and I played in the sand. I had a blast, I felt like a kid, playing and drawing in the sand -- not a care in the world.



Here are a few of my drawings. Very appropriate don't you think?


"Ed Busters"


My sentiments exactly!


Maybe not Ed free, but definitely working on it


Greg, helping me fight Ed every step of the way


Ready for adventures without Ed, I'd rather be on my own


Scary thought, but better than any day with him

Things I Love

My journey is full of fear, pain, love, shame, wonder, luck, daring and marvelous imperfections. I invite you to travel along with me as I share my stumblings, astonishment's and discoveries. It isn't easy for any of us to transcend the past or pain we might have suffered. Yet, there are gifts in those pains and we can choose to let light into the dark places. After many years of self-healing, therapy and investigating my interior, I bring you this collection of stories, memories and simple truths.

Today is full of reflection: a look at the things that I love and that bring me joy on a day to day basis.


I love butterflies, they symbolize hope to me, new life


I love the word "hope" it's what I cling to as I recover


My favorite journal, it went with me on my journey today


A painting done by a friend, several years ago, to let me know who she saw me to be


A button I received at an eating disorder workshop, I have it with me almost always


Sunshine, what more needs to be said


My shadow, sometimes it's not so scary


Me, yes me! I'm starting to love myself, yeah!


Pepper


Blacky

I'm sharing my journey so that you can be a part of my exploration. I am continuing to self-heal the wounds and holes left over from earlier life. I cry more, feel deeper and have more tools to navigate through tough times.