About a month ago, we added a new medication to my plan, with the goal of helping reduce the number of really low moments I have and lessening the OCD-ish tendencies I have (mostly regarding my weight). In the past, medicines have helped with a lot of things, but they haven’t really touched the eating disorder.
I feel like things are different this time. Which is good, right? But it’s scary, too—it’s new. I still see myself as being somewhat significantly overweight, and I still feel the desire to lose weight. What I need to do is clear when I look in the mirror. But it just doesn’t bother me quite as much as it has for so long.
And honestly, I’m kind of terrified, in a somewhat removed way. I feel like my emotional response to me being ‘overweight’ has been turned down, and I both hope and worry that that will continue. What if I gain even more weight and don’t care enough to do something about it?
On the one hand, I guess I wouldn’t care, so maybe it wouldn’t matter. But what if I didn’t care, gained weight because I had lost my habit of restricting, and was then told I had gained too much and needed to lose weight? Could I handle that??
Or what if I gained weight, and then was accidentally told “the number”? I haven’t known my weight in a long time, and I haven’t looked or asked for the number in seven years. An old BMI somehow showed up on an after-visit summary, which I’ve worked hard to not convert to weight, and the BMI seemed so high. I’m sure it’s higher now. I know BMI is a worthless measurement and that it and weight don’t take into account muscle mass, but it’s still one that should be low for me! One accident where I found out either of those numbers could push me over the edge. I’d rather hate my body moderately all the time than suddenly realize I really ‘deserve’ to hate my body and panic.
I guess I’m not sure why I feel like I’d ever deserve to hate my body, though… nobody else should hate their body, no matter their size or shape. So even in the worst-case scenario, I wouldn’t really deserve it.
I trust my support team, both in terms of my friends and family and in terms of the professionals I work with. I’m going to stay on these meds and see how things go. It’s scary, really scary. But maybe it’s progress. Maybe I can work toward hating myself less, toward liking myself more. Maybe it’s worth the risk.