I missed a week of blogging. If I don't get to it Saturday or Sunday, it just doesn't happen during the week. The last time I wrote I was having problems eating all the exchanges in my meal plan. That continued through the rest of that week and the food obsessions and anxiety did not wane.

Friday that week it sort of all came to a head and the restriction gave way to a weekend of poor food behavior, an all out binge Friday night and overeating over the rest of the weekend. There was no particular situation that triggered the use of food. Well not exactly anyway. I should say there was no traumatic event that triggered it but what seemed to get the ball rolling was our potluck at work. There weren't any foods I deemed acceptable or good for me so I told myself to go ahead and try a little of the things I wanted. Normally this would be a pretty adaptive approach but I think because I'd been so judgmental about my foods being good or bad, I just sort of let go and went for it after I allowed myself to eat those "bad" foods.

After lunch I sort of decided to give myself permission to binge when I got home that night, it was nearly planned (short of a special trip to the grocery store). I felt so disgustingly full and ashamed afterward. Saturday morning with the expected binge-hangover I felt crappy. I was super anxious and really would have paid money to curl up into the fetal position in my bed and cry all day. Of course I was at work so no deal there. I didn't plan lunch that day so I was very unsatisfied with what I did end up eating which was really more of a snack. The feeling bad about the previous night's binge and not being prescriptive with my meal plan that day lead to some overeating or as I called it at the time, a "mini-binge".

I was pretty amazed at how quickly and comfortably the cycle came back. It was so easy to fall into and so hard to get out of. This was the biggest binge I've had in months. I was completely being willful about eating. I had been so obsessed over what I was eating, what I judged good and bad that I ended up being so frustrated with having to plan and think and care about what food I'm eating I just decided not to care for a day (or so). There were plenty of pauses, opportunities for me to plug in my skills and I ignored those pauses. I knew they were there when they were happening. I knew while I was in the binge that I would have to discuss all this with Amy and Doug, that I would most likely gain weight, that I would feel physically and emotionally terrible after and yet I gave myself full permission to go that route and end up feeling really horrible about myself.

I have stuck to my meal plan since Monday last week. It's been difficult because I feel some guilt for eating what I feel is too much or "bad" even when what I'm eating fits into my prescribed meal plan. I see how important it is for me to stay on my meal plan even though I still want to eat below my exchanges because I feel totally desperate to lose weight. I hate my body.

Doug and I have been discussing body image and basically reprogramming how I talk to myself about me and my life. I will be starting a new group in a couple weeks that deals solely with body image. Once I start that I won't be attending the DBT group anymore. I'm totally freaked out and scared to be in a group discussing ANYTHING about my body. It is so so hard for me to believe there is anything at all good about it. I'm totally ashamed of it and am really not looking forward to concentrating on it with people I don't know. As scared as I am I know this is necessary. It's timely and very important and hopefully I'll be singing a different tune when the group has finished but right now I just can't fathom feeling anything but disgust and hatred for my body.

Geez, this stuff is just so much fun! Ha. I learned a bit from the binging weekend. Staying on my meal plan helps keep me even, balanced and definitely less anxious. I suppose it's worth it to stay with it - I know it is.