I’m not sure how I ever used to stick to a schedule with anything – seriously.

I lived for planning out my weeks on Sunday and deciding which days I would exercise or write; now, I’m in this place where nothing is ever planned in advance anymore. It throws me off a bit because I want to be writing consistently yet I don’t want to do it because I have to. I want it to come to me naturally.

I keep almost signing up for work out classes again, but part of me is afraid of going. It’s been roughly five months since I’ve exercised besides yoga and while I miss it, the break was 100% necessary. I needed to see that my body was going to be okay without it. I needed to see that beating myself up for missed workouts was nothing but a detriment to my mental health because as of now, I’ve had 20 weeks of missed workouts and my appearance has hardly changed. I actually eat a lot more junk than I used to and drink alcohol once or twice a week. The fact I used to put myself through such hell over how I looked is unsettling but I wouldn’t change it.

I still find myself wrestling with my appearance which is something I barely talk about on here anymore. I’ve been so focused on my relationship problems that everything else on my mind took the back burner. Now that I’m relaxing a bit with my relationships, I feel that I can dive in to other topics again.

I’ve talked about my eating disorder and body struggles over the years, but not so much about what goes through my daily mind, so let’s go there.

 

I definitely don’t hurt in all the ways I used to.

 

I used to never have a good body image day – mostly in 2015 and beginning of 2016. I would wake up and the only thing on my mind was food or exercise. I didn’t have many friendships during this time so my sole focus really was on myself. I had no one to distract me or people to confide in really. I wanted to be the best version of myself and back then, I thought that meant getting super in shape and detoxing my body.

I always preach about how going vegan saved me from my eating disorder and while it did at the time, I see what happened much differently over two years later.

My binge eating was physically making me sick all of the time. My body couldn’t handle the amount of food I was putting in to it nor could it handle the constant starvation/binge cycle I had it on. So, going vegan seemed to answer my problems. I could eat as much as I wanted of ‘good’ food. I watched vegan documentaries so I understood the ethical impact as well, but I’d be lying if I said that was my motivation.

Up until October of 2017, I was very strict about the vegan food I put in my body. It was only oats, potatoes, rice, veggies, hummus, berries, peanut butter, bananas, nuts, and ‘clean’ veggie burgers a.k.a only veggies and no other additives. Anything else wasn’t clean enough for me and I thought if I stepped outside of my comfort foods I would gain weight.

I wrote a post last year after I bought vegan junk food for the first time and looking back now, I can’t believe I used to deprive myself so severely. I never allowed myself to truly eat even though I preached how much veganism ‘saved’ me. It didn’t save me. It gave me an excuse to only eat clean foods because many people believe that’s all vegans eat anyway. It was easy to say I was doing all of it for ethical reasons and let others buy in to the fact I only ate fruits, veggies, and grains.

Most people don’t realize that for some, only putting health foods in your body isn’t being dedicated, but more so an obsession. I traded my binge eating for orthorexia.

Once I gradually started to let myself have chips, cookies, dipping sauces, ice cream, vegan cheeses/meats, and so on, I’ve felt so much more at ease. There’s no desire to binge on anything anymore because nothing is off-limits. I can have as many cookies as I want or watch a movie with a bag of popcorn. I can have those silly Zevia drinks if I want something soda-related.

While the beginning of my vegan journey wasn’t the healthiest mindset to enter in, I still have no desire to go back to animal products. There’s legitimately a vegan alternative to every food I once loved and a lot of foods are accidentally vegan (Oreos!!) so I don’t see a reason for going back. I still believe in the ethics behind it all even though that wasn’t my motivating factor.

It’s crazy to me now that I can eat out without an issue. A chef at work the other day brought me a vegan pizza and a mocha frappuccino which would’ve tripped me up before, even just one year ago. I ate that whole pizza and most of the frappuccino and funny enough, my stomach looked even flatter than some nights where I eat a totally nutritious meal. It truly is about the energy you approach your food with.

I touched on this before, but if you believe something is going to make you fat or harm you, it will.

 

Our thoughts control our entire lives and I will preach that until the day I die.

 

I still have my tough moments with food though, don’t get me wrong.

Some days I wake up, look in the mirror, and completely shit on myself. I still have a few insecurities I wish I could get over, but I realize it is a day by day process.

One of those insecurities is my arms. If you read my initial eating disorder post, you’ll know that my arms were the trigger for me even starting to track my food. I never wear tank tops or short sleeves because of it. I managed to go out in a tank top for about an hour the other day and while I felt so much less sweaty than normal, I still had to put my cardigan back on after a bit.

I think I’ve found a solution though, or at least the beginning of one.

I’ve decided that I’m ending 2018 with a tattoo and I know for a fact it is going on the upper part of my left arm. I dislike my left arm more than my right so in my mind, if my arms are covered in art I genuinely adore, I’ll want to show them off and in turn, get more comfortable with them altogether.

To some that can seem like I’m covering up my insecurity but in truth, I’m working with the insecurity. We can all talk about how we should love ourselves exactly as we are, but thing is, that’s not the reality for most of us. If something bothers you to the point that it interferes with your daily life, finding something that can ease that insecurity can actually be a viable solution. This is why some people fall in to plastic surgery.

Most people who get nose jobs or boob implants don’t do it for attention or to garner outside approval, but because that insecurity was something they couldn’t get off their mind. Changing it was the only way for them to move on and I don’t see anything wrong with that.

 

So, in my mind, painting across my arms may actually aid in my recovery journey.

 

I see now that there’s never going to be a day where I’m completely over my body issues at once. It’s always going to be little victories along the way. I’m better than I was a year ago and I’m sure I’ll look back on this post a year from now saying the same thing – hopefully with some sick tattoo designs.

I really want this new spin studio near me to open up already. I keep going on ClassPass and almost signing up for classes, but I truly can’t bring myself to do it. I want to exercise again. I really, truly want to. I’m more so anxious about diving in to classes I’m not comfortable with anymore.

I did Pure Barre at the beginning of this year, but I feel like my body lost a lot of the flexibility I gained during that period. I lost my gym key tag, but honestly I have no desire to drive to that gym anymore. It reeks of my past toxic behaviors.

I haven’t spun since January but for some reason, spinning at a brand new studio is something I’m okay with. I think it is the idea that if I go on the first day of opening and continue after that, I’m a beginner just like everyone else. It makes the idea of starting again a lot less scary because no one there is used to the studio yet.

It was supposed to open a few months ago, but as with all grand openings, delays happen.

It’s funny though. The spin studio is opening in the same building as the coffee shop I used to work at for two years. It’s definitely going to feel odd spinning in the same place so much happened for me, but it is also oddly comforting.

That coffee shop brought me my first comfort place when I moved to a new town, my first management position, my first significant crush on someone, and so much on top of that. It’s strange that I’ve been wanting a spin studio in my area for the past year and that’s the building that was chosen. It feels like a massive synchronicity that I’m surprisingly okay with.

Ever since I’ve started going out more this year and gaining solid people around me, I see now that I don’t need to be a perfect individual to have a perfect life. I don’t need the perfect life, I just need a life I’m excited to get out of bed for. A life that doesn’t consist of hours of ‘self-care’ that doesn’t actually help me or saying no to food or drinks because it’s not ‘healthy’ enough for me. It’s being able to drink those Blue Moons and eat those fries with people who care about me regardless of how I look.

 

I spent so much of my late teens trying to be thirty which is why I believe it feels so good to relax now. I can eat what I want. I can go out. I can experiment with whatever I want to try. I can take my life day-by-day and not worry about the future as much.

 

That’s not to say I still don’t eat healthy food, budget finances, show up to my job, and so on, but that I’m not as rigid about everything.

At the end of 2017 and beginning of this year, I had a lot of time on my hands. I was unemployed for two months and I really didn’t have many friends I saw daily, so I spent a lot of time alone. I used to record little vlogs on my phone of how I was feeling to get my emotions out. I actually did this in my car too when I would get out of my old job at 5pm and wait an hour before my spin class started at 6:30pm. So basically, I have a lot of little 20 or so minute videos on my phone of me just letting my feelings out.

I was watching a few last night and it seriously crushes me to see how burnt out I was. I was exhausted in the ones in the car and when I was unemployed, most of the videos only showcased how lonely I was feeling. I saw myself trying to talk myself out of these sad places, but I was nothing but lost.

I saw one in particular from the day before New Year’s that got to me. I was laying in my bed talking about how I was hoping for plans the next night, but I was okay if they didn’t happen. The guy I was in to at the time had watched my Snapchat story for the first time in months that week and for some reason, I was all caught up on the idea that I’d be seeing him again. I had hung out with him the year before on New Year’s and I saw this Snapchat view as a sign I would see him again.

Long story short, I didn’t. I spent New Year’s alone which I did end up enjoying but nonetheless, I was a little disappointed. I actually blocked that guy from Snapchat, texting, and removed him on Facebook the next day because I truly didn’t know how else to get over him. I ended up unblocking him a few days later, but to this day, I still haven’t heard from him.

It was hard when I was unemployed because I had nothing to occupy my thoughts for two months, so he crossed my mind a lot. Once I got my serving job though, I managed to finally get over him. I found new people and started to see how minuscule of a role this guy actually played in my life. I really only saw him a handful of times and was nothing but uncomfortable around him.

After diving in to my codependency this year and starting to undo a lot of my past behaviors, I see how terrible I was to myself. I would just go along with anything this guy said because of how infatuated I was and even more so, I would drop everything I was doing to go hang out with him, even if he had ignored me for weeks.

I forgot how low my self-worth used to be in relation to men until I watched that old video. I was crying on and off in it and it hurt to witness that because I know how painful that time was for me.

I see where I am now with my relationships and I’ve come so far.

I defend myself now. I speak up if I feel mistreated or offended. I don’t go along with what anyone says anymore if I don’t actually agree with what they’re saying.

I’ve really learned that through the guy at my new job. I care about him, but I see now that I used to just go along with what he said to make him happy. I never threw in my two cents because I didn’t want to disagree with him or be seen as stupid. I see now that I’m not stupid for having different opinions or not liking the same things as someone else. I’m just a different human with different interests and that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with that at all.

It’s wild that we’re already eight months in to 2018 and Fall is right around the corner again, but fuck, this year was everything I needed. I look back at some of my resolutions from January and while some haven’t come to fruition yet, I see such a drastic change in my mental health. I finally see life for what it is. I have my dark moments, sometimes a few in a row, but I actually don’t mind being in them anymore. They hurt, yes, but the insight I gain from them always pushes me to do something I’ve been afraid to do. Whether it is finally saying what is on my mind or biting the bullet on a goal I’ve been putting off, my depression always inevitability lights a fire under my ass.

I’ve read probably only three books this year, all on codependency, but somehow incorporated those lessons more than the dozens I used to read. I honed in on a single topic and it’s changed my life far more than my scattered learning ever did.

Funny enough, this has been quite a scattered post.

It feels good to lay it all out though. Like I said, my writing feels better when I don’t try to turn it in to anything. It just needs to flow as it may.

I’m thrilled that Summer is about to be over. It takes a toll on me mentally every single year because Maryland gets the most disgusting of weather, but alas, the end is near. I love being outside, but the hot and humid days have me never wanting to leave my house. It’s been a struggle having to serve food on a hot patio at work, which sounds ridiculous to most, but this time of year just isn’t the best time for me. Once September hits, I know I’ll start to feel even more like myself again.

 

I’m excited to see how these last four months play out. I don’t know what to expect.

 

I’m just thrilled to have people to be around for all the Fall festivities this year. It sounds silly, but I’m not kidding when I say this is the most I’ve felt belonging since I’ve moved to my new town four years ago. Halloween is my favorite holiday and I’ve hardly done anything for it since high school due to lack of friends.

It scares me writing stuff out like that because it makes me feel like a loner, but I know there are other people who have probably experienced the same thing.

 

I’m starting to see that being transparent doesn’t mean showing off my weaknesses but showing off my humanness.

 

How many times have we seen people share something on Facebook or Twitter that we thought we were the only one that experienced that same thing?

We’re all a lot more connected to each other than we realize, so when you share something you think only you can relate to, chances are you’re opening the door for someone else to think ‘I thought it was just me.’

2018 has treated me in ways I didn’t expect yet had no idea I needed. I’m curious as for what’s to come and even if shit hits the fan, I know there’s some larger plan at work for me.

I’m not who I used to be.

In fitness, my relationships, even how I conduct myself at work. I’m no longer looking to be the best at everything, but to treat myself the best I can in each environment.

With that in mind, I feel at peace with the future.

There’s nothing I won’t be able to handle because even after a few rock bottoms this year, I’ve pulled myself back up again.

I’ve changed. I’ve surprised myself. I’ve gotten comfortable with people and experiences that used to terrify the living crap out of me.

And in the grand scheme of it all, I wouldn’t have it any other way.