i don't want this to be the way that you see me

Whose eyes am I behind?
Two pale lifeless souls that do not light her sky,
sees everything in an unfamiliar light,
a film of frosted glass hides what is within.
Reticent blinking over tears that run dry.


Whose lips surround this line?
White and weak pilgrims that do not blush or stand. 
Tasting everything is cardboard, no variety.
They are undefined, continuous with skin,
unloved guards of her body, uncared for, bland.


Whose skin is this design?
Rough like a snake’s, with a similar pattern. 
Translucent sheets can’t hide cracks papery.
So delicate, so vulnerable, her body
tries to protect itself against itself uneasily.


Whose ears hear these sounds so fine?
Voices whisper all around, the paranoia.
Gossiping lies no one else detects at all,
but she is deaf to protests and arguments,
not answering, refuse to acknowledge her fall.


Whose scents are these I find?
False perfume disguising, enshrouding her,
permits her escape, not realising the truth.
She has a problem that won’t just go away,
mistakenly she believes they’re lies, there’s no proof.


Whose face is etched in time?
This stranger with no expression regards her,
mocking and laughing, crushing her self esteem.
Blank mouth, unsmiling eyes face her in the mirror,
she closes her eyes, forgets what she’s just seen.

i don't recognise anything that i see

1 // 2 // 3 // 4

"there is no sincerer love than the love of food"

In Psychiatry, there are elements of various psychiatric presentations in many patients.  I have seen a few who have eating disorders.  The criteria is various, and this is the ICD-10 criteria.  These criteria are one version that psychiatrists use (as well as DSM-IV.  These will be updated soon to ICD-11 and DSM-V)

For a definite diagnosis, all the following are required:

1. Body weight is maintained at least 15% below that expected (either lost or never achieved), or Quetelet's body-mass index is 17.5 or less. Prepubertal patients may show failure to make the expected weight gain during the period of growth.
2. The weight loss is self-induced by avoidance of "fattening foods" and one or more of the following: self-induced vomiting; self-induced purging; excessive exercise; use of appetite suppressants and/or diuretics.
3. There is body-image distortion in the form of a specific psychopathology whereby a dread of fatness persists as an intrusive, overvalued idea and the patient imposes a low weight threshold on himself or herself.
4. A widespread endocrine disorder involving the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis is manifest in women as amenorrhoea and in men as a loss of sexual interest and potency. (An apparent exception is the persistence of vaginal bleeds in anorexic women who are receiving replacement hormonal therapy, most commonly taken as a contraceptive pill.) There may also be elevated levels of growth hormone, raised levels of cortisol, changes in the peripheral metabolism of the thyroid hormone, and abnormalities of insulin secretion.
5. If onset is prepubertal, the sequence of pubertal events is delayed or even arrested (growth ceases; in girls the breasts do not develop and there is a primary amenorrhoea; in boys the genitals remain juvenile). With recovery, puberty is often completed normally, but the menarche is late.

I got these from http://counsellingresource.com/distress/eating-disorders/anorexia.html, via google, so apologies if they are not correct.

It's a bit harrowing.  I have had preoccupations with food in the past, and I took the Eating Attitudes Test.  I originally found it via the wikipedia article for anorexia nervosa a few weeks ago, but I could not find the link for it on this page, but this link has the same questions.


My score worried me slightly :(


Carol


(quote by George Bernard Shaw)

NaBloPoMo #1

I've been meaning to do this for a while actually, if we use the word "a while" very loosely.  I saw Tia do it on Clever Girl Goes Blog (her blog was featured on blogger aaaaages ago).  Basically, it's an attempt to write a blog post every day for one month.  As April only has 30 days, I thought it would be easier (by one day) and inflict people with my rambles a bit less.


The theme is "big"... although, I might not stick to the theme often.


So.... the word itself.  I am afraid of being big, as in size wise.  I always had it drummed into me to eat enough food for my daily activities (i.e. sleeping) otherwise I'd get ill easily.  I think that this is partly the reason why I am so afraid of putting weight on.  Sometimes I go through phrases of being okay with my weight, and others not so much.


As silly as it sounds, I compare myself to other people, and I know what my natural body weight is/should be.  I know we're meant to put on weight during our lives (~1lb a year, according to the Framingham Study) and I'm still in line with this normal weight gain.  I just don't want to gain any unnecessary weight for no reason.  I feel unhealthy when I weigh more than I normally do (think of it like an inbuilt thermostat/centre of knowledge) and I know that sometimes when I feel tired, I am drawn towards processed sugar containing foods, like chocolate, for an instant energy boost.  And that's bad.


Because there's so much media influence, I am reluctant to admit that I am susceptible to the media.  I do think I could be thinner.  People like me often sometimes have a distorted image of themselves (body dysmorphic disorder?) and they don't realise their actual size.  So maybe I don't realise my size either.  I try to dress in a way that doesn't accentuate my body shape (and thus it's probably no wonder I think there's no skinny jeans that'd fit me out there!) so people aren't bothered by it.


I mean, I dislike it when people tell me what to do with my body, like they know what's better for me than I do.  It's all very well for someone to say, "eat more", but they don't know why I feel like this.  To be honest, half the time, neither do I.  I'm scared of becoming fat, scared of reaching the next stone in weight.


Apparently, I look healthier with more weight on (as in, 1/2 more kilos)... people who've not seen me in a while say this to me sometimes.  I don't want to be curvy.  I don't want to be built.  That's not my style.  It wouldn't fit how I look.


Ooh-er... this is what it says on wiki!

The DSM-MD defines body dysmorphic disorder as a preoccupation with an imagined defect in appearance which causes clinically-significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning. However, BDD may involve an actual defect that's slight, but the sufferer constantly obsesses over it. The individual's symptoms must not be better accounted for by another disorder; for example weight concern is usually more accurately attributed to an eating disorder.

That doesn't sound fun, does it?


PS.  Not much going on in my life.  Not feeling all that well :'(

why i don't eat sugar

I've only done this once before in my life, around November/December 2008, and I never really appreciated why I did it.  It was more for moral support rather than wanting to be any healthier.


I read somewhere that cutting out sugar will allow me to lose excess weight.  And so far, it's sort of working.  I've lost 3 lbs in 3 weeks.  Which for normal weight loss is actually really good.  But the reason I am doing it is because I noticed I was eating lots of junk food, i.e. cakes, chocolate, biscuits, cookies, fruit pies and the like and it was making me gain weight (to a weight heavier than I have ever been before) and it was making me upset.  So I decided one day, "today's the day I will stop eating sugar".  So I did it.  I had cravings for two days, then it subsided and now I don't miss it much at all.


Since then, I have only had sugar once, in cake form, because we went to the V&A and R had owed me and so we're now even in cake-buying debt.  And I didn't have sugar throughout the day, just that one time at lunch, and that was all.


But fear not, it's just processed sugar.  I still eat fruit.  It's unnatural to eat processed sugar.  I think it links in with my fear of being fat, and is related to my dislike of obese people.  (Don't even get me started)  Two of my close friends voiced the opinion that they were worried about me.  I'm almost probably not fat, but I know this is an issue I need to work through on my own.


I feel a lot healthier, but also a lot more tired, as I used to rely on sugar to give me energy.  Sometimes I find it difficult, like when I get stressed, I want some chocolate, but for the most part it isn't too bad.


Via experimentation and past knowledge, I know that my body cannot fall below a certain weight unless I make hugely drastic changes which I could never do.  So please don't worry. I only have a few more pounds I would like to lose.


And don't blame the boy - he probably has the most influence upon my eating habits when I am at university but he knows that when I get on the scales in the morning and see that the figure is higher than what I would like to be makes me feel really really upset.

found via google images

PS.  Check out this website: http://www.thisiswhyyourefat.com ;; it makes me feel very ill :(

sing like you want this

 Sorry about the slacking on posts about my life.... there have been some things I've wanted to talk about, yet not really had time to do.


new things in my life:
1. History of medicine has now finished: kinda sad that it has.  It was really interesting and I would have been happy to have 5 more weeks of lectures.  Now we have to do a research project.  The assignments we had weren't so bad.. the first one was, as it was 1000 words but the other two were fine (ish).


2. I've been walking lots and lots, 'cos I live near college.  So I feel a bit healthier, even though I'm still sleepy a lot. (Slept 12 hours last night though....)  It's nice to see people out and about, and I get to see all the cute schoolkids being taken to school.


3. I've lost 3 lbs :) (of excess weight)  For a few years now, my weight has been pretty much stable, within a 1kg range, but these past few months it's been increasing, probably due to a very bad diet (seriously, I used to eat fruit pies and huge muffins and chocolate A LOT) and lack of exercise due to need for revision and using public transport a lot instead of walking.
 
4. My flat is full of boxes, and it sort of has that "very lived in" look that it never ever had before.  I've never really shown people around my flat, or invited them back, as it's too small to entertain people, and it's always been messy.  Now it's tidy (I threw a LOT of stuff out last week: I realised I just wasn't using it or didn't need it and donated a lot of books to charity) but it's maximally using the space that I do have, so that I am not getting out of bed and tripping over a bag of clothes.


5. Been OSCE tutoring... it's weird to think how much I have forgotten, and yet what random things I do remember.


6. P only has a couple of weeks left in the UK, and in a way, it still doesn't feel real that he is going.  It saddens me, because I realise how much I have come to rely on him.  I feel like I'm one of those people that requires some looking after to make sure I eat properly and needs someone to listen to me.






Looove this song....  Youtube wouldn't let me embed the official video, so here's the acoustic one.

♫ just for tonight, just maybe we made it...