That really sucks :( Can you bring your own food with you to work? Like a nice big salad or something? I can't even get myself to eat in social situations. I just end up not eating, or ordering a black coffee or something like that, so I'm not one to talk about what to do in a work atmosphere like that...I haven't eaten "out" for about 3 years now, and have even skipped my family's last 3 major holiday meals, or just didn't eat at them. I just can't eat in front of people...

if i didn't eat with them that would be viewed as "weird" so i kinda just gotta, it's not really an option... i can just order a salad or something, i usually bring my vegan ranch to work during this time so i know i will for sure at least have a salad to eat with some good dressing...

i don't really care that much about eating in front of people... i do sketch a little around boys, especially if i like them cause i feel like a slob when i eat...

danni, don't you feel like not eating makes you seem weirder? not trying to be mean or anything! i feel like if i don't eat something (and i am pretty skinny) people freak out and make an already annoying situation ever more annoying... or think i am some weird vegan who never eats... i dunno

I support this thread.

I started seeing my therapist again. Felling overwhelmed with finances, work, no work and not being able to keep my house.  She feels I've experienced a fair share of trauma and make decisions accordingly.
Brief history:
bad relationship
quit drinking
assault
car accident
5 jobs five years
losing my home

I am just at a loss what to do with my place. I have a low cash offer that can be processed through a short sale or hunker down and ride out the foreclosure, which after 7 months the bank has not done a thing legally.. my credit was once over 800 and now lucky if its 550. On top of that there is a serious foundation issue that affecting my apartment, nothing is being done about that. It will not pass a home inspection in current status and the responsible parties (condo board and management co) are surely dragging their feet.

I tried real hard to keep up with my mortgage co, but they got nasty and demanding after I fell into default. Ive interviewed a number of lawyers, ok advice but none want to represent me. I have gotten a lot of misinformation on financial advice.

On the positive side, I have money (not paying the mortgage add up).
I am also decent with other debt, I had aggressively paid off all my other bills previous.

According to articles the right thing to do is help the courts and the banks by finding a short sale buyer.
This saves them time and money in court proceedings. It gets me out of the house with a shorter but semi defined schedule and the grand satisfaction of doing crooks good(?)

I took up smoking weed to ease back problems and migraines, but think I am just
self medicating traumatic experiences. So I finished what I had an sticking sober, free and clear.

  Some days I think of packing a bag a taking a walk with the dog and not returning.

i have been coming back to the realization this bulimia shit is taking up my time, my life, my money, my health, my spirituality... i have a lot of "unsafe" food in the house that can spoil if not eaten... my game plan is to eat some, freeze some, and sell some as lunches to coworkers... then i really want to get back into making myself better... eating my "safe" foods at first, letting my body get used to it, and then eating more normally, baby step by baby step...

i am glad to hear you girls and boys are realizing there is a problem and making solid steps to change it... thank you for helping me realize i need to start trying... instead of being in zombie mode

well courth,

i can say that i am happy in a way you don't have your blade and looking back, you will be too... if you already feel loopy then you probably won't make the best choices, ya know? <3

i'm sorry your friends dad said that to you, i wish you would have invited me along just so i could dropkick his ballsack as hard as a possibly can... how does he know if your hungry or not? it just pisses me off that us women are never or should never be hungry... total bs

i hope you get your meds soon and enjoy the rest of your trip <3

I like this thread, thanks for creating CW.

Has anyone tried emotional freedom technique (EFT)? Also called "tapping." Link below....

The reason I ask is that for years I tried to quit smoking. Tried everything - patches, gums, pills, hypnosis, books, etc. Mar 2010 I also started doing acupressure on many pts related to addiction and smoking/respitory system and lung health, etc.

Was still using a good book, acupressure and hypnois but also still tortured with the addition to smoking, when last Oct. I came across the video below (well similar vid by same guy but specifically targeting smoking). I liked the sound of the guy's voice (find it soothing) and background music and it seemed like an interesting therapy. So on Oct 4th I did this session in the video repeatedly, for many hours per day, 3 days in a row. After 3 days I was like, "hmph, it doesn't work...." But I noticed I was very relaxed with my smoking and I was VERY accepting of the fact that I would probably smoke till it kills me - like it has killed many family memebers, incl my dad.

Then 3 days later BAM I quit smoking after 15 years and never looked back; haven't had one and barely craved one since; and am very grateful to be a non smoker. I wanted to share it to get ideas or perhaps cause someone to have a look at it for things plaguing you. Warning it could be just voodoo science, and I am not saying there is a 1:1 relationship with my quitting and EFT. I was just tossing it out for consideration/conversation.

Peace and enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3hy3P0W2BU

Actually, I have done EFT, and I think it works really well! I did that a lot when I was feeling good a couple of months ago when I was seeing my old counselor. I kind of forgot about it...perhaps I should start doing it again when I start feeling anxious...it could be a good supplement to my yoga and meditation. Thanks for reminding me of this!

I've been sticking with eating a tiny bit more every day for the past few days, and cut back on exercise a little today. I'm forcing myself to get out and about again (something I'm going to have to live with pretty soon once the new semester starts up...). I'm feeling a little anxious, but I've felt worse. Hope everyone else is feeling well.

I hope all of you are having a good week and finding some peace in your lives.  I have not visited this thread in some time for personal reasons but I do think about you guys and wonder how you are doing, if you are struggling and hanging in there as I have been.  Sometimes battling addictions and/or illness is a lonely road.

I wanted to share about this amazing person I met though.  In December 2009 I was at my very worst point of relapse for anorexia, but I had just begun to turn toward recovery and rebuild my life.  I was still working out at the fitness center all the time despite my health being poor.  I met an older man who I saw often on the machines at the center.  We started to talk to each other, first acquaintance, but then got in to deeper conversations as time went on.  This man was struggling with heart trouble and high cholesterol and was trying to lose weight.  One day I told him about my struggle to gain weight and my eating disorder and he made a comment "I wish I had your problem."  This is a common thing for people to say who do not understand eating disorders.  Instead of jumping down his throat, I began to educate him compassionately about anorexia and about the dangers of being underweight.  I too had heart problems due to losing muscle mass (the heart is a muscle too).  He really listened and then even apologized for his ignorance.  From that point on he would encourage me in my efforts and he would tell me to lay off those machines when I wasnt making progress.  This man has an incredible heart, a soft spot within his rough exterior.  He is a Vietnam vet, has told me horror stories about war, and instead of it making him a bitter man, it has made him more compassionate towards people and appreciative about the reverence for life.  I only recently discovered through a friend of his at the Center that he was a medic in Vietnam.  So I asked him about it, and he told me a few stories about saving enemy lives in combat.  Because the "enemy" were just human beings like us trying to survive and thrown into fighting a war.  He sobbed as he told me about not being able to save fellow soldiers in the field.  We cried together.  Right there at the fitness center.  Wednesday was exactly 40 years since he left that war and came home, and he still gets emotional as the day it happened.  All this hell he went through, all the crap he must carry around inside him, and yet every time he sees me he smiles and asks how I am.  he genuinely cares about me as a human being.  Had I never opened up to him or talked to him I would have assumed he was just another person judging my body.  You just never know what is going on inside a person til you get to know them.  I am fortunate to have that kind of love and support in my recovery efforts, someone who accepts me the way I am.  And to know a person with such compassion who has had such a hard hard life and somehow came through it.  It gives me hope for mankind. 

I have managed to gain a few lbs but I am really struggling with it.  It has caused me to withdraw from everyone, to obsess more and more about my body and about food and menus and control.  I just feel such horrendous guilt.  Always there is that guilt that sits inside me.  I will be starting college on August 22nd (my fourth attempt over a 20 year period) and I do NOT want this d$@%$ disorder to sabatoge my potential to finally finish school.  I have fought too long and hard.  I have forgotten about small goals.  I think I am going to join some of you in taking time out to meditate each day.  I keep talking about doing this but then forget.  Sometimes riding my bike to work early in the morning is meditative.  I saw two deer and a fawn on the way this morning.  It's quiet in some areas, peaceful.  I can live in the moment for a short time. 

Keep trying guys!  I wont be on here for a while as my Dad is coming up from Ohio to visit for a few days.  I havent seen him in a year.  I'm going to try not to think about the guilt inside me.  I am going to really try to just enjoy our time together.  Have a great weekend! 

Thanks guys for the encouragement and the wonderful compliments!  :)>>>  You guys give such wonderful feedback and are so supportive.  vegweb would not be the same without you.

aggplanta congratulations on having only a few classes left!  That is awesome!  I at least have all my generals done so it's just the technical stuff to tackle now.  I am taking three classes and working 24 hours a week so I hope I am not taking on too much.

I have experience with trauma but as amymylove asks, there is such a broad range of "trauma" that it may look different for each of us.  My trauma was a total hysterectomy and removal of both ovaries (unexpectedly) at the age of 33 six  years ago Monday.  For some this wouldnt be a trauma but it was for me because surgical menopause was and is so terribly hard on my body.  My whole personality and physical appearance changed overnight due to huge hormonal changes that affect the mind as well as body.  It took three years of hell and four doctors and many experiments with hormones and without to find at least some semblance of my old self back and to recover from the fibromyalgia type pain and migraines brought on by the surgery and loss of ovaries. I also still had to have another surgery to remove debilitating scar tissue left from the hysterectomy.  Right away though I had recurring nightmares that I was murdering my baby (I never had children).  I would wake up in a cold sweat and sometimes crying or screaming.  I still have those dreams but far less.  I went through a lot of therapy and finally wrote my former gynecologist that did the surgery a long letter stating my experience after he castrated me and how I felt.  Not a mean letter or accusing, just firmly expressing my pain and voice so that he might consider this the next time he decides whether to save an ovary or take it out of a woman, especially when she is still in her prime.  Of course I never got a response but it was a very healing experience for me to at least get it all out on paper and send it.  After that I was able to forgive him.  I still have not forgiven myself 100% but I am working on it.  The whole ordeal retriggered my eating disorder that had been dormant for 16 years.  The first few years I couldnt even deal with the emotional baggage.  My anger and frustration was too great.  I focused on the physical ailments and trying to overcome them or at least find a way to live with them.  Once my health was at a more stable place then I could focus on the emotional pain.  I believe I still have some uncovered trauma from my past to work through.  I have a terrible fear of loss of control and am repulsed by sex as well as afraid of it.  I have been this way for many years and I don't understand if this is just a genetic trait or something more.  I have never really explored sexuality with any therapist.  Due to health problems my partner suffers and the fact that we still arent married after 13 years (he is on disability and marraige would mean he gets penalized and loses his disability insurance because of my income...sigh) there are some things we simply don't do and it has provided me a good excuse to avoid it.    I do believe that past trauma can manifest as depression or anxiety if not delt with.  Repressing emotions, withdrawing from others, preoccupied with intrusive thoughts or obsessing about something seeminly totally unrelated to distract oneself, unable to enjoy living in the moment.  Or just that feeling of suffocation, not being able to breath, like you are going to jump out of your skin or wish you could.  I dont think I have ever had a full out panic attack myself.  Just anxiety attacks.  My way of dealing with my anxiety and depression nowadays is to spend countless hours obsessing about food and making menus and food lists.  It has a lulling affect but is also keeping me from enjoying life and living in the moment and spontaineously.  I am trying to figure out how to let it go because I wont have time to obsess when school starts.  I even do it at work and I know it has slowed my productivity down.  I exercise to help manage stress but even that can go both ways...it can be positive but can also become obsessive and punishing.  This goal of meditation I hope will be a better way to help manage. 

As usual I have rambled on too long.  I hope this helps.  Those panic attacks sound horrible aggplanta.  I wonder if something like meditation just before bed would help.  Or some time of sleep type medication or antidepressant with a sedative effect.  Lack of sleep can magnify struggles that's for sure.  Also, it sounds like you are dismissing your past experience of trauma as not significant by not considering it as a "real trauma".  You are not giving yourself permission to fully feel your pain and acknowledge what you have experienced.  The more you try to repress your feelings the more they come out sideways in other ways, such as nightmares or anxiety attacks.  I know its much harder to just let go and feel fully than it would seem.  There is no right or wrong way to feel.  I worked with my therapist on this for a while before loss of insurance forced me to put things on hold.  Just giving myself permission to feel like shit some days and good others.  to feel fear when I need to and anger too. Not even question it, just feel it.

I better get back to visiting with my Dad.  Have a great weekend everyone!

Naturebound, I am the king of rambling on, so no worries here. Thank you for sharing that. It took courage. I am not sure I've heard anything like it, but "castrated" helped with my perspective of it, I think.

Exactly, that really helped me grasp, well try to grasp, what happened... So wait, the surgery wasn't like life or death this had to be done?! I am glad you were able to write that letter and let go a bit, I'm really sorry to hear how tough things have been on you hun, wish i could give you a big hug <3

I wonder why the sex thing though, have you been with anyone besides your current partner? I can see at this length in time sex with your current partner would probably not be an everyday event anyways. (If you don't want to answer you don't have to)

Hope you have a great weekend with your dad <3

Charlie, wow, what you said makes so much sense.  You write with such clarity.  You really expanded on what I was trying to get at but took it to a much higher level.  I am going to print your post and read it often because it really challenges me to look at my struggles from a different point of view.

true words... i read his post when i had the morning brain fog going and couldn't really comprehend it... i read it again and wow, yep, gonna print me some of that :)

NB... crap all that is a lot to swallow, i am so sorry about the past and i know the future will be bright for you dear child, hang in there <3

i see that you specified "other christian religion" in your profile... i go to saddleback church where rick warren is the pastor (he wrote purpose driven life)... right now the topic is "the invisible war" http://saddleback.com/mc/archives/ it has really helped me gain some perspective lately, check it out if you want :)

some things rick said tonight that i wrote down were:

- you don't know God is all you need until God is all you got (this is where i am right now)
- focus not on what is lost but what is left -> the attitude of gratitude

good luck hun <3