TALK ABOUT THE DISORDER

[prismaticbleed]

all right I NEED to kick this eating disorder straight in the neck BUT it is LOUD AND INSISTENT and honestly I'm weak, I'm a sinner, God needs to do the work, but I need to open the door.

so here we go.

here are the current addictions:


soymilk = WARM WHITE (wants to be heated!!)
white chocolate = WARM WHITE
eggs = WHITE / AMBER
oats = BEIGE
mushrooms = BEIGE
lentils = BEIGE
tomatoes = RED
carrots = ORANGE
peas? = SOFT GREEN
cilantro = GREEN
seaweed = DARK GREEN

and that's it.

it doesn't seem like much. but it is. it really is.

first off, why the eggs? why the sudden addiction to putting vegetables in them? it's a mindset of "mom does it this way so I HAVE to do it this way"; the combination of white, green, beige, and red together feels mandatory somehow.
but even plain eggs feel "compulsory", done with the oil so they get huge and fluffy. why.
god, please. I need to figure this out.

the lentils are new. actually, it started as yellow peas, which I cooked on sunday I think? and the body suddenly latched onto the taste. it doesn't like beans, but it craves them, however whatever is in beans that we hate is NOT in peas & lentils. they are entirely liked. so it's clinging to them currently.

similarly, our brain keeps thinking of "potatoes" but is readily abandoning them for lentils. which in a way is good, as potatoes are awful to swallow and purge, but that proves that it's the starchy-smooth texture that it's looking for. but the lentils and peas have the protein kick to them that potatoes lack, and which it also wants.

also, my body is inexplicably seeking the mushrooms. when heated in oil a bit, the taste is addictive? somehow? I think it's triggering childhood memories but I can't be sure.the mushroom soup absolutely is. add a bit of butter and bread and I almost want to
cry from the feelings of childhood. but the milk still makes me so sick, and is borderline traumatic even to taste. so it's mentally jarring to get the two at once.

the cilantro is what I allegedly used to live on before NC. I also ate a ton of it out there. but I'm orally allergic to it I think? it makes my nose itch, and it messes up my bowels? it's super fibrous, so it keeps the cucumbers from flushing out my system. but my body is craving the super-fresh green taste of it. like eating the essence of plants. like shoving handfuls of summer grass in my mouth, wanting to internalize the cleanness of it, the vitality of the color. it's really psychological, I think.

I'm not sure if the seaweed is the same.

the soymilk is old, but new. I think I used to eat it a lot in high school, and I know they gave me so much of it at both upmc and haven. so it felt "obligatory." at least it's cutting out the oil+sugar hell addiction that the oats used to have. with the soymilk, there's no interest in the former. thank god.

the carrots are the ultimate purge-base food. sadly. weirdly, I don’t like how they taste cooked in oleo, but I keep making them that way? why?

and the cheese. WHY. why in the world does this body keep looking for cheese? is it upmc kickback, where iscah allegedly loved it? …honestly, checking old UPMC data, and seeing "mac & cheese with stewed tomatoes" and suddenly I'm craving that, this has all GOT to be emotional desperation. "I was happy then, I was good, maybe if I eat that, I'll feel like that again!" but dude… why. like think about it. eating macaroni and cheese is NOW A NC TRIGGER. remember that. so avoid it. as for grilled cheese, that's absolutely a upmc "happiness" tie. but at home, what good will that do? eating it now isn't getting you "good girl" points. it's just making you sick, from the glue-sticky cheese, the clogging-dense bread, and the oily-sick butter. and yet, our body still "wants" it. is that a childhood feeling? what does it want?
ACTUALLY. hold up. I was thinking about this the other day. old upmc writings describing it keep using the words "golden" and "warm" and "orange" and "yellow" and "buttery" and this is ABSOLUTELY A COLOR THING. that and the lentils; it HAS to be.

so. thought one.
body is craving colors. as usual.
it is ALWAYS craving green, hence the cilantro, but suddenly it's after the warm hues? like the cheese, the carrots, the butter spread… but NOT the summer yellows of squash and such. NOPE. it wants AMBER TONES. and oranges, absolutely-- hence the sudden inexplicable craving for orange vitamin water as well, and the seeking of things like acorn squashes and sweet potatoes even if I can't stand sweet potatoes. it literally wants to eat the COLOR.
and it also wants browns? like beigey browns. hence the oats, but NOT chocolate, or dark bread, or anything. no. and perhaps the potato skins. it's looking for soft browns, and amber-glows. WHY.
I know it's not a cold offset, otherwise we still wouldn't be craving peppermint and cucumbers even more. but… it has to be a desperate grab at comfort. it's looking for an emotional, psychological warmth that I seem to be lacking lately, I think.
where else can I get that. what can make me feel that, without forcing it through food-color association?


OH YEAH AND NO ONE HAS MENTIONED THE FACT THAT, STILL, MY MENTAL IMAGE OF MYSELF AS "FEMALE" IS SYNONYMOUS WITH SELF-ABUSE. IF I THINK OF MYSELF AS "MALE,” I IMMEDIATELY STOP ABUSING MYSELF.
and I know for a fact that this is DIRECTLY fueling the eating disorder.
"jay would never overeat," my brain says. and he wouldn't. but he WOULD annihilate his sense of self in terms of sexuality, hence north carolina, where he died because he let oliver do whatever he wanted to him and ultimately it ended up making him realize that he never wanted to be like this at all but his function had become so thoroughly corrupted that he absolutely self-destructed.
so it's like… pick your poison. pick the trauma you want to kill you. if you're a girl, it's food. if you're a boy, it's sex.
where did this come from?

originally, it was the GIRLS that were horrifically sexually abused, by the original Julie. but maybe that's why they have the eating disorder. girls like me desensitize this body and brain with binge-eating, so that we don't remember the sexual trauma? whereas the boys DON'T have trauma tied to sexuality in that way, so they just desensitize themselves with "intimacy," using it like booze practically, getting drunk on romance and flirting and everything. north carolina in a nutshell. they don't eat at all. but they cannot exist apart from another person. the boys exist in order to please people, it seems. weirdly. the boys exist to be toys. they're sweet and kind and beautiful and loving and gentle but they cannot exist in the real world and they will all ultimately fail to survive outside of a bedroom. it's heartbreaking.
whereas the girls cannot exist in bedrooms, only kitchens, and although they, too, exist to please others, it's in the sense of work and chores and service. they spend their time cooking and cleaning and eating BUT the girls are suffocating beneath self-loathing? I have realized, with great horror, that as a "girl" I find it almost impossible to be genuinely caring and loving and affectionate and gentle with people. like I don't know how to be in love. I can't, maybe, with this current mindset.
HOWEVER, lately I've been feeling maternal emotions for the first time in my LIFE. like, I cannot be in love, but maybe I could feel love by serving others? by being a housewife? by cooking and cleaning and doing chores, again. and yet I honestly don't know if I've felt any emotion behind it.
it's heartbreaking and disturbing. I can see the clear differentiations between male and female roles in this mental system. and I can see how lethal it is. if I, as a girl, am forbidden from feeling love because it got tied to trauma, meaning that if I want to be loving I have to be a boy, then it's NO WONDER I was previously so desperate to be "transgender"-- I erroneously thought that was the ONLY WAY I COULD BECOME A GOOD PERSON.
and now that I've realized I'm not a boy, I'm just mentally ill, and am happily living as the girl I am… I've realized also, with existential terror, that I cannot be as good as I was as a boy.
what in the world do I do about this.

but it's a huge door of hope, somehow. it's possible to heal if I untangle this.
if I think of myself as a boy, IMMEDIATELY my wants and focuses and obsessions shift to typing, to listening to music, to talking in headspace, to playing games, to dreaming, to writing, to drawing, to internal things. to snow and christmas lights and hours worth of introspection and love, so much love it's like a bottle of champagne dumped into your heart.
and if I think of myself as a boy, the very thought of going to walmart in the morning and buying more lentils and cilantro and stuff is reprehensible. as a boy I DON'T WANT HEAVY FOODS. like I think jay could only eat light green foods and up, cool colors only. but the instant I think of myself as female, I feel filthy. somehow. but it's true. I feel dirty and heavy and sad and ashamed and I want to go to walmart and binge on mushrooms and oats and eggs with tomatoes because something about the vibe of those things is what I need? to bury what I'm feeling? what is it?
the real part of me, somehow STILL a girl, wants the cucumbers and lettuce and cilantro, to feel clean and happy and fresh and new and good, but that part of me also wants to eat like thirteen buckets full of vegetables. it's desperate. it's like drinking the ocean and still being thirsty.

…and it's the biggest sign of both hope and shame, to admit that typing that sentence sent a shot through my heart.

I'll talk about that later.
but today, "chaos zero" showed up when the sext bells went off for divine office and he insisted we pray that hour together, immediately, and we did. and it was so synchronistic. and the whole time I could barely concentrate because I kept thinking about food. and I felt my internal self weeping and wanting to become a boy so that I could IMMEDIATELY STOP EATING and just go pray for hours.
except the boys didn't pray. their obsession with romance somehow also led to a pagan sort of self-idolatry and moral relativism and "good feelings are all that matter" and so they didn't pray and weep like the girls do.
that's the other bizarre and heartbreaking split. the girls, girls like me, can cry. I can feel remorse and regret and sorrow and anger; I can go to confession and beg God to forgive me, I can admit how sinful and horrible and weak and disgusting I am, and I can be so sorry for it I could die. I can self-abuse if I get the guts, if I get red enough.
the boys can't do any of that.
the boys are all fluff and sparkles and soft pillows and snowflakes and angel food cake and fairy lights. they're all so sweet it ultimately kills them. the boys cannot feel anger or sorrow or remorse or it DOES kill them. they turn plagued, they calcify and die.
but the girls DON'T GET THE PLAGUE. ever. the girls get the tar.

holy crap. how did I never notice THAT before.

so. tomorrow. what do I do?
do I get all these foods, once more, and try them? do I see what happens?
maybe. the more I learn, I have to test this.
BUT I'm so disturbed by how BADLY the girls WANT the food. like I personally don't. but… I must still be multiple. the realization is bittersweet, but it's backed by BLAZING hope, like the nativity star itself. (CHRISTMAS ;____; I CAN'T WAIT)
there's a dirty-haired, weeping, rumpled-clothes, fumbling self-hating sorrowful angry confused lost scared girl part of me, the one that still looks like my reflection, who wants to eat so badly and yet she HATES it? like, she still wants to eat those lentils, but… oh geez this is an alter situation. it has to be. let me feel this out.

WHO WANTS WHAT.

lentils = that sad brown girl. the warm heavy soft-protein texture of the lentils really comforts her somehow, as does their color. they are the epitome of comforting brown. like that's REALLY important. so I must get those tomorrow. "two of each," she says, sounding like a drug addict, desperate and scared and sad and a nervous wreck. seeking that fix just to feel safe. "not the soup, that… get one soup, actually," she adds, touching the memory, remembering the lentils at the bottom of the can. "just one." self-loathing spiking at the word "can," the thought of eating canned food filling her with a sense of filth that fuels the self-abusive binge drive even more, to numb it all, to lose herself in despairing to that ugly feeling, that hopeless judgment. "one can of soup." hatred at the word soup.

someone else, younger, suddenly LEAPING into utter blissful sparkling joy at the mention of SNOW on the radio, for thursday.
"I hope she gets it," the dirty brown girl adds, genuinely, tears falling from her eyes. that love of others, without feeling it in herself. "I really hope she gets it. I hope it makes her happier than she can ever describe." and that weird warm glow of wanting her to be happy, that love of another, while still feeling utterly unworthy of love and ugly and wrong and bad herself.

so what about the lentils, I ask, gently.
"two cans," she says. "one can of the… the soup." a wince, a tear, despair, surrender to the ugly feeling. I'm the kind of wretched pig that eats soup out of a can, she weeps, the emotion almost intolerable. "two, three cans… three cans of the actual lentils," she says, the word beans being another horrifically triggering thought. "two packages of dried lentils." bags is also awfully triggering, nauseating. tied to trauma in a screaming ammoniac sense. "one, two, and three." she smiles at this. "yeah. that's good."
someone else, an OCD feeling, freaking out and demanding four of something.
"four cilantro," someone else interjects. and five mushrooms, I think? or no? four mushrooms, split three and one. four cilantro, split three and one. okay, that's good.
one soymilk. two oats. one eggs. one oleo. ones are always good, I hear.
one carrots? someone cringing at the thought of more carrots. that's new. "yes," I hear. but just the one.
how about the white chocolate? no decision on that, surprisingly. someone doesn't want it anymore. immediately I realize it's the word chocolate, which is hated. what about the peppermint truffles, I say. the white peppermint balls. that gets a yes. geez, wow. words are IMPORTANT with this. phrasing makes all the difference.
(lots of self-hatred, vitriolic, at speaking this way; it sounds pretentious and asinine)

as for seaweed, what is that rooted to? is it because it's a sea vegetable, or because it's asian food, the latter of which is allegedly tied to our early teenage years?
"no," I hear. "that's oliver's motivation and we HATE it. it's stupid." but there's a regret to it-- a regret at a rejection of something they weren't ready to reject yet, due to trauma ties. needing to feel out the "asian" draw before dropping it entirely. wanting to know why it has roots at all before taking them out of the garden, so to speak.
"get some," a faceless voice says, greenish. "we'll figure it out realtime."

how about tomatoes. why are we suddenly wanting tomatoes anyway?
"it's the red," someone says. "it's red without being traumatic," like tomato sauce, "and that's interesting. we want to figure it out." why. "because we keep resonating with the color and we don't know why. strawberries and cherries too. you know the compulsions. I want to understand this. red is such a dangerous color. I want to know what it feels like clear. so no canned tomatoes, please. that's a cheap way out but it's not what we're looking for. it's too orange and that's feeding the color addiction you mentioned earlier."
geez this is complicated. "I know. but we're getting there. we're making progress, more tonight that we have in months. so thank you." genuine. gratitude and joyful warm deep affection. that's new. and thank God. I thought we had forgotten it.
"never. not us. we'll never forget how to love. we're built on it."
and yet no religious feeling. that murdered us before. we cannot have love without Christ and that NEEDS to be fully integrated, not just through me, but through everyone in the new system. no more selfishness. no more self-idolatry.

the last thing on the list is… soymilk. halfway we don't actually want it at all. both the words "soy" and "milk" are nauseating and frankly the taste kind of is too? sugar in general is. like right now our body does NOT want sugar at all, not even the white peppermint balls. (it wants CHRISTMAS, not candy!)

do we want to get peas?
no, that's triggering? the word is, and so is the taste, somehow? it's giving me shivers.

I'm also getting brain burnout. I don't know how much longer I can type tonight. it's 8:20.

get what we need. figure it out. let it go.

good night ♥

detached from anyone that sentiment is genuine and pure and loving
but it's too selfish somehow.

we'll type more in the future, I promise.

may God grant us a quiet night and a perfect end