The Child

Recovery represents a new life, a new beginning. I knew this all along, but now, this concept takes on a new and profoundly beautiful relevance.

For not only does recovery mean a new life for me, free from the shackles of the eating disorder. It also means that, from my body, new life may be brought into the world.

Me this Summer

I've been with my boyfriend for almost a year now. Something I haven't really talked about on my blog; for at first I didn't discern a connection between my relationship and my recovery.

For through this extraordinary and beautiful boy I have found both life, and beauty, in a place where there once was only barrenness. Being in love has taught me alot about recovery. It has showed me what recovery should be like, and could be like. For when I am with him it is like I almost feel normal. Normal and more alive than I have ever felt, in the whole twelves years of my illness.

He has made me realise just how badly I want to be free.

Free, to make our own life together: and, perhaps in time, to create new life through children.

There was once a time I was repelled by the thought of having kids. I love children and always have done; but yet, when it came to the thought of having children myself, my whole being would recoil with fear and abhorrence. Because being a mother meant being a woman. And being a woman meant gaining weight and leaving my thin, stick-limbed child's body far behind.

For me, once; a distant possibility.

For me, now, a close and fundamentally life-changing new reality.

For now I no longer have a child's body: my body is that of a young woman. Just yesterday, I bought my first  D bra. Having been wearing B bras since March this year, it did not escape my notice that my breasts, over the summer, had continued to grow.

Hard to believe that once even my tiny little A bras were much too small for me.



I now have the body of a woman; the body that the person that I am was meant to have, long before now. Now all I need to do is accept it; and perhaps, in time, I will learn to embrace it.

And it is through love - the love of my boyfriend, my Mam, my best friend, and my readers - that I have come to realise that I need not fear being healthy. For being healthy will enable me to fulfill all my dreams and aspirations; for being healthy, I know, will enable me to live my life to the full. A life free from restriction, irrational fears, and obsession about my weight and my size.

It's began, now. And I am near the end of the road. Not there yet; for there is still much to do; still a hill up ahead, for me to climb. But the light is shining, strong and true, through that little chink in the wall; like a beam of golden sunlight pouring forth from the cloud-shrouded heavens.

Now all I need to do is dismantle the bricks that encompass that hole, and step through, into the light.

Breaking the Mould

Hopped off the bus, pulled up my hood; scurried along at a somewhat breathless trot along the rain soaked streets of Portlaoise. Across the railway bridge I pattered along, my little black rucksack bouncing upon my back, my hair, having long escaped my hood, fluffing up around my face in messy wet ringlets that held on to the tiny beads of drizzle in the air.

My little red bike with the pink basket on the front was patiently awaiting me at the bike racks. I slung the handles of my bag across the handlebars, wheeled it out, whipped one leg over the saddle, and away I go. And as soon as the rush of the wind roared in my ears and my legs began to turn the pedals, an enormous smile came to my face. It was a sensation of which I would never tire of; a thrill that no matter how many times I had felt soar through my veins before, I wanted to relive, over and over. Faster and faster we go through the streets, past fogged-up windows within which soft lights glowed, past spluttering chimneys and enclosed little gardens.

I soon left the town far behind me to enter the realm of which is more beloved to me than any other. That being of course the countryside, shining and bright despite the drab drizzle and the thickening rain clouds. Everything seemed to glow and glisten like a multitude of scattered diamonds. And in the hedgerows, newly budding primroses; golden and glorious, their paler outer petals framing centres fringed with a slightly darker shade of yellow. The fields, too, were bejeweled with early spring's offerings: tiny daisies, dainty and delicate, peppering the rich green grass with the plentiful abundance of a mellowing fruit tree; alongside fluffy-headed clover and eye-bright golden celandii; and then, flanking the edges of the fields like a guard of honour, stood the blue-green shoots of the germinating daffodils; their trumpet like flowers yet encased within the protective layers of papery buds.

To see all these things caused my spirit to soar till it felt like my very soul was flying above the stars. To see this, and feel it. To be alive today. And to feel the strength in my mind and body which was not there before.

Because I am stronger now; physically and mentally, to the way I was before. I recall the days that I would feel so weak and drained it was almost as if my knees were going to give way beneath me. When I felt so light-headed I could not focus on the glaring words upon the white sheet in front of me. When I felt so lifeless, that all I wanted to do was to crawl feebly into my mam's arms and just lie there and just...die. Yes. There were times when that impulse was there; that longing to put an end to it all, to escape the limitless suffering. But how glad I am that I did not succumb to that impulse. Now, I look back and shake my head in incredulity: not only at that, but just how deeply enmeshed in ED's web I was. And along with that incredulity there is the bitter, poignant recognition that so many others out there are trapped in the same shackles that I once wore.

Ambitions. Do I have them? As regards a career, no, not really. But I have other ambitions; other goals which, in the world of business and profits, might not be worth very much. Not that that matters to me, of course. No. What matters is the fact that my ambition is something which I would willingly put my whole heart and soul into achieving. It's to help others break free from these chains. But to be able to fulfill my ambition I need to first break free myself.

And now I can clearly perceive, feel the changes in my mind and my body; changes which, at one time, would have served to appall or frighten me; but which now I embrace with the exuberant joy of a girl who has just reached a goal which she never thought she'd even be able to brush with her fingertips; who has discovered a beautiful place which she did not know existed, but which delights her, nonetheless, with its newfound delights of wonder and mystery.

The other day, about two weeks ago, now, I got my first B bra.
No, I'm no longer an A.

Now I know all too well what sorts of thoughts, feelings this alteration in my bra cup size would have once evoked. Disgust. shame. self-loathing. and most of all , smarting, pulsing fear. My head would have played host to a massive battle drum; a timpani upon which anxiety thrummed its heavy iron drumsticks. And how that timpani would have rolled. Rolled until I could not take it anymore. Rolled until it was all I could do but to turn abruptly backwards; to sprint, in a wild panic, back into the darkness from which I had only just tentatively, warily emerged. Currents of anxiety, submerging me in fear. Back then I was not strong enough. Back then the enlargement of my breasts would have inevitably led to relapse.

But not now.

When I was in M&S and the lady who measured me told me I was a B I nearly could have hugged her then and there. The soaring joy I suddenly felt right then stemmed primarily from two sources: one, the fact that they had grown in itself; and secondly, the simple fact that those feelings that I described above were so conspicuously, blissfully absent. And if felt like I was running through a summer meadow. Soft moss cushioning my feet and my hair flying free like a horse's floating mane. Because at that moment when I put my new bra across my breasts, I realized just how tangible this was; the feeling that is that when you are really, really breaking free. I'm getting there. Slowly, slowly I am breaking free from the mould. ED's mould. I no longer want to be the skinny girl with the beanpole frame, the gaunt, tired face, the stick thin arms and legs. That was who I used to be; that was how ED moulded and shaped me. But no, not anymore. Now I am breaking free and loving the feeling. Now I know how it feels to be able to make strides, and to be able to relish the freedom which comes in doing so.

So now I'll keep on running through the meadow: a meadow which, at the time, is like that of the early spring; so discernibly similar to the field I passed while cycling home from Portlaoise yesterday. Not everything is in full bloom, yet. Summer has not yet come.  But up through the ground push the tender new shoots which, despite their seemingly fragile appearance, conceal a tactile inner strength.
And now I know that I am at the germinating stage of my recovery journey. All I need to do now is keep pushing, to let myself grow ever upwards. To finally let myself bloom and blossom, and shine in the sparkling sun.

The Adventure

More than anything, my recovery journey once closely resembled an uphill battle, a struggle.

A vertical climb upon an exposed rock, with nothing to protect me from the the rain that came pouring down, and the harsh, relentless blasts of cold air slapping against my cheeks. It left my hands red raw and freezing, rubbed and scrapaed at the delicate skin there till it took on the texture of harshly abraded sandpaper. In its wake the icy wind dotted my face with beads of icy precipitation, beads which would remain, suspended there, like frozen tear drops halted in mid stream. They complemented the ones which had already escaped the ducts in my eyes.

I used to cry alot, those days.

Sometimes, the battle was so hard, so exhausting, so bitter. And so, so long.

So wonderful, being back here; to walk upon the endless golden sands of West Cork's breathtaking beaches; to let the sea wind stream out my hair and pull insistently at my clothes and skin. A silent message is conveyed, through words that noone else could hear except for me. Let go of them, em. Cast those worries, those fears to the wind. Let them blow away, to be dispersed upon the sea. Let them fall upon the waves like lightly strewn petals from a wilting plant.

And to look out to sea and whisper the recognition that at so many points upon this journey I thought I'd never, ever be able to say.

I'm glad I kept going, back then.
All the tears, all the wounds that tore and bled, all the times I felt like throwing up my hands and crying out, No, no, please stop. This time I cannot go on.

I'm so glad I did. Because it really has been worth it.

And now in many a sense I am like Daisy on her quest upon the beach yesterday. Watching her when we embark into the wilds has always been a source of enormous pleasure to me, though in the past I don't think I was able to identify with her feelings as much as I do now. She's never still, loping from place to place, brown eyes filled with curiosity. She's like the intrepid explorer, setting sail into unchartered waters; embarking into the spectacular rainforest in which no human has ever trod. Every sight and every smell, every sound, ripe for discovery. It's as if the location of our walks represent for her a marvelous kingdom in which weird and wonderful things grow, and it is her task to discover them for herself.

But I remember the time, back then, not so long ago, when I first met my beloved Daisy. And in many respects she was a shadow of the dog I see now.

But I and Daisy have made a journey together, one of discovery and growth, in which we have both struggled and suffered and fought demons that noone else could see. I remember so well the day when I first saw her, a thin, scraggly little thing with a drooping tail and eyes which spoke of untellable loss and suffering.

It was in November, well over a year ago, now; back in 2016 when I had returned to trinity for what was to be my final year of university. And with that return came the usual flood of doubt, the fear, the constant feelings of inferiority. The relentless labelling of my own self as the misfit and the odd one out, who doesn't deserve to be here. And, alongside all of that. Ed was waxing, waxing and spreading himself out, like a malignant fungi snaking up the tender new roots of a developing sapling, choking out all life.

And I knew that I was relapsing. It was as predictable, really, as the falling of the withered leaves still clinging desperately to the cherry blossom's shivering branches; to the wilting of the last remaining summer flowers, now drooping their mottled heads to the ground as if bowing down in surrender to the triumphant, advancing winter. This had happened every autumn of every month everytime I started back at trinity. And try as I might to resist Ed's pull, I was as defenceless as the faded flowers; the brittle leaves. And just like them I began to fade and wilt away.

But then came the day in November when I first met Daisy. And I recall looking into her brown eyes and feeling a sense of heartfelt empathy, an identification. Hey, it's ok, I whispered silently. It's ok. I'm going to take care of you. Whatever your past, whatever you've been through, I'm going to be here for you. I'm going to help you get through this.

Daisy - how she once was

I soon discovered just what the nature of "this" really was. As a result of her abuse, most likely, Daisy had (yes, this is bizarre, but true; dont they always say a dog is just like its owner?) serious, serious issues with eating. Amongst other things. She was painfully shy, startling at her own shadow, and would run a mile at the slightest noise or provocation.

It was a hard and often exasperating road.
But every time I felt like giving up, every time she yet again turned her nose up at  the carefully prepared meals I would do for her; everytime I felt like screaming in frustration when she would simply refuse to come when called by her name. I reminded myself of that one core truth. Remember what's shes been through Em. Don't give up. Don't give up. We can do this. She...she can do this.

And then a tiny voice, no louder than a breath, whispering softly from the very back of my consciousness.

And you can do this, too.

Daisy and Me on the beach this weekend.

So together Daisy and I embarked upon this journey. For Daisy, it was the first time she had set foot upon that road, I am sure; her previous life of abuse had not permitted her that.

And for me, it was the next of many. For so many times had I stepped upon the road only to fall off once again, months along that beaten, grueling track. Many times I had tried and failed. But having Daisy by my side gave me a renewed sense of motivation. We were going to travel this long and bumpy road, together. And we had eachother's backs. If one of us slipped and fell, then the other would help her to gently get back up.

And looking back now, I can clearly see just how much both of us have changed, and grown. How far we have come.

She no longer lingers close to my side when we go for our walks together, as if there are monsters waiting to pounce on her at every turn. She no longer regards her full dog bowl with disinterest, before turning away as if it contained something vile instead of food. No. Now instead she sprints across the rugged terrain of the bog at the speed of a bolting hare, her paws beating against the soft soil of the ground for the fleetest fraction of a second before lifting upwards once again to alternate with another. Now,  where once was only skin and bone and dull hair, there is now powerful, strong muscles and flesh, and a soft, jet black coat which seems to shine like a blackbird's plumage captured in a shaft of sunlight. And oh how far has this beloved friend of mine come. Yet I know she is not quite there, yet. But she is getting close. So close. We went away for the weekend and instead of refusing to eat in this strange, new environment of the apartment (a situation which always presented problems for her in the past), only once did she not finish her dinner during our stay.

I can't say that we are there, just yet. For both of us the road leads on. And at times it may be an uphill battle. But. At times it is also like an adventure, a quest. A quest in which ultimately, if we both persevere, we will, some day, succeed.

And Daisy and I can lope together through that sweet green meadow, of the soft brown soils and dewy, glistening grasses. Trees grow there, their branches laden with blossom and fruit, and dainty flowers of dazzling colours cluster on the ground in glorious thick masses. There are streams of crystal clear water, in which silver minnows dart and spin in endless, exuberant circles, mirroring the freedom which beats in my heart like the wings of a captured bird which has finally escaped from his cage.

And that is the object of my quest, I know. To break free from Ed's cage. And once that quest is over, another adventure begins.
The adventure that is life without Ed.💓

💙💚💛💜

Out of the Darkness

Why.

That one word has long span rotations in my head, like a loosened dandelion clock caught in a squally autumn wind.

Why. Why do I listen...still? After everything we've been together? After all he's put me through?



Sometimes I feel so, so strong. As if I could swim through the most volatile of oceans; as if I could ascend the steepest and most treacherous of mountain paths. Recovery is very much like both of those. A sea of violent, churning waves which toss about the brave swimmer, relentlessly trying to push him or her down below that broiling, ceaselessly swaying surface. So hard to stay afloat, it seems. So much easier to just stop kicking and surrender yourself to that mercilessly cold water.

It's very much like the mountain, as well; an analogy which I return to more than any other. The summit is shrouded in cloud; mysterious, and as yet, unfathomable; just like the golden shore which awaits at the other side of the sea. You've been told that it's beautiful beyond comparison, but you still won't know for yourself until you get there. And there's the thing. The uncertainty. How do you know that they are right? Is it really quite as beautiful as it is fabled to be? What if you get there, only to be greeted by a barren, bleak waste, a waste which is no better than the place that you left behind you? Is it really worth..the effort, the fight...?

Recovery is a daily battle. A fight to stay on the right track and not stumble and fall backwards; a fight to stay upright above the water and fight the urge to cease kicking your limbs, to succumb to the delicious, easy lull which wants to pull you under.



I think, since coming home, I've developed a more heightened sensitivity to the natural world around me. As I noted before, this probably stems from spending just over a month in a landscape in which there was never really any change in exterior environment. Stately spruce trees decked in shrouds of soft white, their branches still and unmoving and devoid of all life. Silent rivers and streams, locked in crystal channels of ice. A watery sun which, for the first week I was there, made a brief and fleeting appearance amongst the lilac sky's trailing, blue-grey clouds; but which then, as December drew on, ceased to even cast a glance upon that land's frozen surface. Winter pulled tighter her icy mantle across the earth's awaiting shoulders, resulting in days which were as raw as the harshest of nights I had ever experienced; more bitter, and more cruel, than the most biting of the westerly winds that unfurl themselves from across the mountains back at home. It was beautiful, it was enchanting, in a way; but so still and silent it almost appeared sterile. It was as if everything there had been imprisoned by the winter: that here, her grip was so tight, that it was choking the land, suffocating all life, resulting in miles upon miles of pearl-white, unblemished nothingness: peerless, in the sense it was untouched; yet insidious, in the sense that it was lifeless. So different to my beloved Ireland; in which soft grasses continued to grow above brown soils; in which brave flowers and shoots could still be perceived and rushing brooks and streams continued to dash their waters towards the awaiting shore.

Perhaps, in a way, what haunted me so much about Lapland's exterior, was that to my eyes there was a close parallel between that pure white landscape; and the landscape that was that of my own mind, back in the days when I found myself so deeply ensnared in ED's clutches. The cold-fingered grip of winter which I perceived in every snow-laden tree; every pitiful sapling clawing desperately out of the ground, brought me right back to that time when ED had me held so tightly by the throat. And everything I did and said was just for him. Like the ice-locked realm of Lapland, I was lifeless: an empty shell of a girl with little fight or life left in her dull blue eyes. The days all merged into one, never changing. The same routine and procedures of behaviour, every hour of every day. The landscape never changed.

But now back, back across the dipping grey rolls of the North Sea, lies a very different landscape; the ever green, moist-soiled expanses of Ireland, that jewel of a island which shines so brightly to my adoring eyes.

So different to Lapland, for here, there is still growth. Yesterday my footsteps were stilled by what for me had always been one of the most beautiful and aesthetic sights one could ever perceive in January: the first few snowdrops, tender green shoots poking from out the ground, one and two here and there bearing forth a drooping, bell-like head, so dainty and so delicate, yet growing strong despite the chill westerly winds spiralling across the puddle-ridden bog.

As is my custom I found myself pausing to peer closer, to just take in this beauty which is so simple but yet so sublime. And then as I raised my eyes to the tree branches spread out above my head, I caught a glimpse of their newly forming buds: buds which I knew, in a few months time, would prise themselves carefully open, to reveal those tiny new leaves of the most wonderful, vibrant, fresh new green. The colour of spring and renewal. The colour that symbolised the end of the darkness and the beginning of warmth and light.

Now I'm not usually into rapping, but at that moment, I found myself singing to Macklemore's Glorious, the chorus of which just always stirs something deep inside me, and makes my very blood sing and thrum in my veins.

I feel glorious, glorious...
Got a chance to start again..
I made it through the darkness of the night..
And now I see the sunrise..

No longer am I content to just let my recovery remain locked in endless immobility; to let it stand, still and lifeless, with not a single fleeting chance of new growth.

Rather, I want it to be like the ever-changing topography of my beloved Ireland. I want to see change and new growth every day. I want to seeds take root and new stems to push themselves free from soft yielding soils. I want to see shoots sprout and buds burst open; delicate blossoms bloom to adorn the trees and scatter fragrant pink petals upon my head. And I want to run barefooted through those forests of change and let me joyful laughter echo above every tree. To let my song join that of the birds', and let my spirit soar with them on strong, beating wings above an artist's painted sky.

I want this. Oh, I want this! Have I ever felt so determined to follow the light....to emerge from out of the darkness? 💖

I know I want this....now, and not later. But like the last time, there is the hesitant, "but how? What do I do?" And now I suppose I have to make my own map to scale the mountain. I need a clear and definite idea of exactly how I am going to do this. For one thing I do not like is stumbling about in the dark with no idea of where I'm heading.

And so I made a plan. Somewhat messy and scatty, for that is what Emmy's rough work usually is. But it is there, it is real, it is of a weight and substance that goes beyond the scrawny resemblance of those letters. It is my plan of how I am going to beat ED. My map which will lead me to freedom.


And so from out of the darkness emerged the most beautiful, beautiful light. A light which seems to pulse like a beating heart; a light which burns gold with the intensity of its own vitality. A light which will shine and shine on through the night, and draw me bravely onwards, like a beacon guiding a weary sailor towards the shore. A golden shore of soft sands, caressed lovingly by white flecked waves. A shore which marks the end of one journey and the beginning of another through a land bedecked in the rich garlands of spring.

Breaking the Law

The Gospel according to ED.

You shalt not have more than you normally do.
You shalt not say thank you for your food, or that you are hungry or that a food looks delicious.
You shalt not do any less exercise than xx amount.

etc. etc. etc.

signed, by Emmy, and also signed and authorised; by ED.



For as long as I can remember, I have lived by certain laws, certain rules. Certain codes of behaviour that I went out of my way to obey, at all times. And God forbid if I ever dared to disobey them. The repercussions of even contemplating doing so were always positively hideous.

Ed would do more than kick up a little fuss. Oh no, it was always alot worse than that. He would scream and shout and tear at me with cruel sharp talons. The channels of my brain would suddenly be overflowing with garbled, tormenting comments. You are fat. Eating that will make you fatter. Oh my God Em!! What are you doing??!! You are going to blow up! Don't you dare even consider it, girl!! 

It was sort of like the equivalent of being imprisoned in a high walled jail. Every failed attempt at escape would be met with torture, and threats of further barbarity if resistance did not cease. For a very long time I simply stopped trying to object. ED would nod, suitably satisfied, as his captive became weaker and more submissive with every passing year. She became too weak and too withdrawn to even think about escaping, again. The walls of the prison stretched higher and ever higher.

So that's why I suppose, upon that day three years ago, when I first made that first crucial, tentative step, onto the road up the mountain which we all know as recovery. That the anxiety, that horrible, screeching Voice, as loud and as piercing as a siren that can not be terminated, was enough to cause me to crumple to my knees with agony, if I had let it. But. There was something there that was just as strong as the anxiety. That being the pain of the guilt I had felt, when I had looked into Mam's eyes and told her I had been lying to her, for so long, about everything.

And that guilt and pain then were enough to drive me forward. Along with the love that I felt for my Mam, and the knowledge that if for nothing else, I could do this, for her.

Years later and I'm a different girl to the one I was those three years ago. A different girl, but in some ways, unchanged. And one of those ways in which I have remained the same is that I still abide by ED's many rules.

To fling wide the gates

and escape from Ed's prison,

once represented, for me, an impossible dream...

And as I walked tentatively forwards in recovery - choosing to gain weight, being admitted to hospital; allowing myself to tell those I loved that I had an eating disorder - I in time began to recognise and question ED's rules; and then - slowly but surely - I began to disobey them. It was not easy. By God, it was hard. But I knew that I had to do it. Whenever I found myself faltering and afraid, I closed my eyes and thought back to that day, the feel of Mam's warm hand on my shoulder. And I used that to drive me on. Because I knew that Mam would forever blame herself, if I died.



But now back to the half-recovered ED girl. Yes, she has broken many, many of ED's rules. She is no longer in medical danger. Some might think that she is recovered.

But she isn't.

Rather, this girl has a good long way to go, yet. And still many of ED's rules are still in place, and fully intact. She's escaped Ed's gaol but the oppressor is following her trial, coming after her. He steals in front of her and throws bricks directly across her footpath, blocks that collaborate to form obstructive grey walls and block the winding road up the steep sided mountain.

She knows that if she is to have any chance of ascending that mountain, she is going to have to break and destroy every single one of those walls.

But how?

Well I have some tools. These are my weapons of choice for chipping away at the cracks in ED's wall. I will use my own hammer and chisel to prise away the building blocks of ED's walls.

If I could leap straight over them, I would. But this time instead of wringing my hands and hanging my head in defeat, telling myself that I can't get over them...

Instead I approach them with my tools at the ready. Ready to start working on these walls. It's going to require time and patience and effort, and strength. And bravery. Yes, because the gaoler that initially constructed these walls is a fucking scary thing.



But.

I've figured that I have all these things.

I've figured that I've got what it takes. I've figured that I am capable of breaking the Law, and making my escape from custody.

ED's custody.

And I've got something now that I did not have before. Something that has given me extra strength. I'm doing this for me, as well as for mam and all those I love. That crucial, crucial recognition; the actual acknowledgement of which  I have been unable to make for so, so long.

For now I have began to realise that the real Emmy wants to escape from custody, too.

She's now willing and ready to break ED's Law.

What it would be to be flying free,
like those bubbles..💙

ED's rules...

• You can only have the amount set by me of any particular food. 
• At breakfast: no more than 100 ml of milk, less than 30 g of cheese, etc. And minimise everything as much as possible.
• Always take the smallest/thinnest part of everything. The thinnest slice of bread off the sliced pan. The smallest potatoes in the serving bowl. The smallest crumpet in the packet. etc. etc.
• At dinner if I think you have too much on your plate then put some back in the serving dish when noone is looking.
• You must always pick bits or crusts of bread, potatoes, etc.

The rules extend to how I act around food and how I speak about food too. For example.

• You're not allowed to say that looks lovely I'm hungry thanks Mam that was really nice, I enjoyed that etc.
• When you eat you always have to appear as if it's a chore. Show total lack of interest in what you're eating and push the food around the plate. 
• You also have to eat as slowly as possible and cut food into tiny pieces.
• You're forbidden to clean your plate, your bowl, your mug. You have to always leave something behind.

And to top it all off...some more general rules..

• I have to do at least xx amount of exercise a day, and the more the better.
• At all costs you must not gain anymore weight.

I could go on. And on. And on. Because Ed's rules are endless so long as I remain with him.

What Ed says...
I have to do the opposite.

It's time to break His Law.

The Step

A few things prompted me to write my last post; compelled me to speak out about the pain and frustration and the agony of what is the longing to completely let go, but yet, simultaneously, being so intensely, paralysingly afraid to do so. It's a fear which is as numbing and as real as that when you're about to leap out a plane; stepping right out into thin air with nothing but the parachute upon your back. The very thought of that single step is enough to freeze your very blood out of fear.

But it's the mind that's the worst, here. It skips ahead of you and paints such pretty pictures, of you falling through the endless nothingness of the sky's infinity, the scream being ripped from your lungs and the cold air hissing violently through your ears. Imagined catastrophes wrap themselves around your mind's eye, so that you're unable to see anything else. Images of you falling through space and breaking your body upon the awaiting rocks below; of you, just falling and falling forever, with nothing to hold on to save the memory of what it once was like to be upon solid, firm ground.

And so, with these images having anchored themselves like heavy rocks upon the seabed, you suddenly declare to yourself you can't do it. After all your plans, all your preparations, all your courage mustering; all your best intentions. Now all of those just lie in a useless heap upon the floor, reminding you of what you see as your failure.

But I cannot do it. 

I can't overcome the fear.

But, I ask you now, is it the thoughts of the fall or the actual step which bites into you the most?

I'm telling you now, it's the actual step.

There's enough strength in each and every one of us to achieve anything in this life that we set our hearts to.

Including recovery.

It's just the fear that stands in our way. The fear and the doubt.

But doubt and fear killed more dreams than failure ever did.

Thoughts and doubts can kill. My story is living proof of that. I look back now to when it all began. It wasn't any external factors that caused me to move onto that distorted, polluted road which was Ed's; a road full of poison and damp soaking holes, a road which slowly caused my body to break up just that one bit more with every single hateful, yet irresistible step. No. It wasn't any living person, any physical thing that caused me to become ill with anorexia. Rather it was the Fear, and the Doubt, and the Thoughts. The Thoughts that ED implanted within me, and forced me to nurture. Thoughts that I wasn't good enough, wasn't pretty enough, wasn't cool enough, wasn't skinny enough. The thoughts that in order for me to have the slightest chance of making friends and losing some of my inherent ugliness, I needed to lose weight.

Later, the thoughts were of similar lines, and equally just as deadly. Thoughts that I deserved to die and that starving was the best course of action to achieve it. Thoughts that to gain weight, I would be repulsive; and the world would reject me. And many of these still linger with me now. Deeply ingrained beliefs, as obstinate and unmoving as the most deepset, heaviest boulders of sheer granite rock.

But.
I cannot, this time, let the doubt and the fear take any more of my life away from me, for any longer.
I've already lost alot of years to my eating disorder, through the fears and doubts Ed created within my fragile, vulnerable mind.

But.
Now is the time for me to fight back.

Now it's about recognising that those deeply ingrained beliefs which I mentioned above are not so deeply ingrained that I do not have the strength to budge them. To push them away and set myself free. To take that step out of the plane into the Unknown. The Unknown which is true recovery.

Yesterday morning I took one such single, tiny step, one which to many might seem trivial and irrelevant, but for me resembled something more of a triumph. For a good while now I have reverted to being fixated on having 100 ml max of milk with cereals in the morning. But today, on approaching the fridge to take out the bottle. I wondered. I wondered if I could make it more. Whether I dared to push aside the fear and pour that bit extra in the jug.

No, screamed the Voice. No! It'll fill you up too much! Because if you have more milk you'll have more cereals, and you'll blow up like a balloon! You won't be able to have as much later on! Don't you dare, girl! Don't you dare! 90 mls in that jug, that's ALL! Don't you dare!

I won't, I answered, timidly, but then stopped, pausing, thinking of the last post I had wrote.

And that's when I realised..
It's only a fear. A stupid, irrational fear.
What need I fear of just a bit extra milk???

Milk is good for me, right? I have osteoporosis. Osteoporosis = my bones need all the calcium I can get. Ditto.

And before I could ponder it for any longer I had seized the bottle and poured it out and added the cereal and then....

then I ate.

A tiny victory, but at the same time, it felt good. It felt good to be a victor for a change. Becuase for a while now it seems ED has been smirking an awful, awful lot, at my apparent inability to increase my meal plan that wee bit more.

But I know I can't just stop here, now. I need to do a bit more than that. The "milk victory" felt good but that's not where this thing is going to end. There's alot more I know I need to do here.

If I really want to gain this weight...no, let's pause and rephrase that.

If I really want to be healthy. To get my periods back. To silence the Voice once and for all. To give my bones the best possible chance to be as healthy as osteoporotic bones have the capacity to be.

I dug deep inside myself, searching for answers, the iron hard truths, the impermeable facts that neither time or force can change. Why? Why am I really afraid of being a higher bmi? It's not a case of physically not being able for it, after all. I've put myself through the gaining weight process a number of times. True, not with a target of this higher bmi(s) in mind, but it was still very much an intensely difficult, grueling process which takes an exhausting toll on both the body and mind.

I'm afraid to gain and reach this bmi because...

• I'm afraid of what my body will be like. I am afraid that I will hate it. I feel ugly now at this current weight and I am convinced that, at an even higher one, I will feel completely repulsive and vile.
• I'm afraid that then, people will see me as completely "recovered" (if they do not do already) and assume I no longer need any help and support to beat Ed.
• I'm afraid that, if I increase my meal plan again, I won't be able to stop eating 4000 + calories on having reached the target weight, and will just keep on gaining and gaining.
• I'm afraid, yes, of facing the physical and mental unpleasantries of gaining weight good and proper again. The screaming anxiety, the horrendous bloating, the constant declarations of "you are fat, Em" resounding through my head.

There are more, I know; but those are the main ones.

So now I have to gather my own weapons; prepare myself for ferocious war, once again. War with Ed. I'll retaliate his list of no you can'ts with a list of my own. Oh yes I f***ing can, Ed.

I'm currently reading Life without Ed by Jenni Schaefer. One of the most crucial aspects to recovery from anorexia that Jenni identifies is distinguishing and constructing your own voice, separate from Ed's.

So here is my own voice. Speaking loud and clear, now.

I need to gain this final bit of weight....because...

• Wake up, Em, and face the reality here. You have serious osteoporosis. And you know all too well that your period ain't gonna come at this weight. No good drifting on and pretending it's all ok, because it's not. You may not have taken your consultant's advice back then. But take it, now. And stop closing your eyes to the truth.
• By gaining this final bit of weight I will be able to fully restore my health. All those other parts of the body damaged from over a decade of anorexia. My nails and skin and internal organs; my concentration, my memory. You might not be able to see the internal damage, Em, but you know all too well that it's there. 
• I won't feel so tired and listless and lifeless all the time. Gaining these final few kilos will give me the energy to laugh and smile again, to live.
• And last but not least. It will be in my best interests to get my weight up for my new job in February. It's by no means an office job or anything like that, by the way - it's quite a physical job in which I will be on my feet alot of the time. I'm not saying I'm an unfit person, but I'm not exactly what you would describe strong and vigorous, either. But, to get my weight up beforehand, will mean I can work at my very best, physically and mentally.

So now I have some new goals, new priorities. Which I am going to fix right in my head, now. Time to step up to the plane door, take one deep long breath, and step out.

That terrifying step...
But one I need to take to save myself.
Because one day this plane I'm riding will crash, and burn; with me, along with it.

Time to go, Ed.

Time to go.

I'm gonna take this jump and you're not coming with me. This time, you stay behind, old friend.

This is my own step, which I alone can take; for myself.

For me and for my life, and for all that recovery stands for.💗

Yesterday I finally plucked up the courage to approach Mam and ask her for help. I told her everything: my current struggles with Ed, my aspirations to try and gain a little more weight and my fears around having to do so, and my difficulty in dealing with people's comments as regards my current shape and weight.

Mam listened as I knew deep down she would. And it felt, right then, that the enormity of taking that huge, overwhelming step had lessened.

I know Mam can't take this big step for me. But to know she is there - ready to give me that gentle, yet firm push forwards whenever I can feel myself faltering - has given me so much comfort and has made me feel both safer and braver. Now I'm ready to jump without once looking back. My courage roars defiance in my breast like a lion facing the retreating hunter with his net. Oh yes, ED. I'm ready, now. I'll be your captive for no longer. 

Thank you, Mam. I dedicate this post to you. 💖💕💗 

Thank you also - SO much - for everyone who has commented and wished me well over the past few weeks. Your words mean so so much. I am honoured and humbled by your sincerity and thoughtfulness. Thank you 💗

Letting Go...

So here are some facts.

Some facts about Emmy Snelgrove that the world does not know, or see.

But these are the cold hard truths that press down upon my shoulders each day, as heavy and as grey as the severe, ice-capped mountain, and equally just as bleak. If not more. There is beauty in that mountain, but every inch of these facts are ugly.

I am 23 years old, though looking at me, some might think I'm alot younger.

Yet despite having the outer semblance of a girl, I have the skeleton of an old woman.

I have osteoporosis.

I don't get periods and I never have done. Sometimes,when I lie awake in the darkness of the night, watching the twilight patterns upon the creamy ceiling of my room, I wonder if I ever will. Whether my ovaries have simply given up, or have been permanently damaged through years of restriction.

And of course. I've had anorexia for 11 years. For eight of those years I was significantly underweight; for the most part of that eight, severely so. And then, for the other three. Consisted mainly of my weight bobbing up and down like a slung yo-yo upon a tight string.

So those are some facts about Emmy Snelgrove.
The facts that she doesnt want the world to see, but yet, at times, feels like screaming out loud. Especially to, well, you know. The oh you look well or healthy comments.

I'm currently maintaining between 41.8 - 42.5 kg.
Meaning that my bmi is around 17.7 to 18.

I suppose, for some people, this bmi's ok.
But I know deep down for me, it is unlikely that it is. As I type, I remember my consultant's parting words to me. On my last meeting with her, within the mental hospital's stifling grey walls.

I would advise you, young lady - given the severity of your osteoporosis and total absence of periods - that you get your bmi to above 19, preferably 20 or above.

I had smiled meekly and nodded my head. I was listening, but not to her voice. A different one inside my own head.One which, as soon as those numbers had left my doctor's mouth, had aroused itself, a restless wraith awakening from a fitful sleep.

19.
19!!
Who the f*** does she think she is, Em??
Don't you worry, Em. You won't listen to her. She clearly doesn't have a clue what she's talking about. 

There's no way on this earth you are going to let yourself gain until you get a bmi of 19...
And 20?? You'd rather die, right.

And I had listened, and agreed.
With Ed, that is. Not with my consultant, with her many, many years of experience and knowledge, working with and treating those with eating disorders.

A couple of years later, and here I am.
Wishing, once again, that I had chosen to listen to someone else; and not the ever-spouting wisdom of ED.

But. At least now I have the strength to say I can get beyond the minimum healthy bmi, if I choose to.

I know I can do it. If I just let myself do so. It's just the letting - the letting go - part. It's just - so bloody - hard.

For me, the fear of letting go now is akin to that I would feel if I were hanging off the edge of a cliff face overlooking the sea: under which, raging waters churn and roar, more fearsome than a wild beast.

My fingers are latched in a white knucked grip to this cliff edge to which I've  been attached to for as long as I can remember. And yet despite the fact that this hostile crag has torn me and broken me countless times, I still have this fear of letting go. The sea below is so dark and terrifying, as unknown and as frightening as the blackest abyss at the furthermost corner of space.

But somehow -

sometime -

I need to realise that it's long past time, to let go.



And so this is the meal plan that I've been studiously following, ever since I got back from Spain in late July.

Your thoughts. What do you think about it? It's true to say I like this particular eating schedule very much - the variety of foods, the frequency of the times that I eat, the inclusion of all the foods which I love and the exclusion of those that I don't. But it is enough to gain the final bit of weight that I need?

Given my current lifestyle, I don't think so.
I walk twice a day with my doggies and go for the odd cycle sometimes down to the local village. I don't sit around. I'm a busy girly. So I guess this is why I am maintaining on this instead of gaining.

Breakfast

1. 100 ml milk + cereal (usually Weetabix or ready-brek)
2. 1 slice spelt/wholemeal toast + spread
3. 30 g cheddar cheese
4. 2 tbsp peanut butter

Morning snacks

1. Half a multigrain/wholemeal bagel + spread
2. 1 egg, boiled or poached
3. Handfuls of sunflower seeds (I dont really measure them)
4. 30 g mixed nuts
5. Milky hot chocolate.

Lunch

1. Chicken/tuna mayo salad with spinach, vegetables, tomatoes, roasted peppers and dressing.
2. Banana/apple/melon

Afternoon snacks

1. Cereal + 50-75 ml hot milk
2. toasted crumpet + spread + 1 tbsp peanut butter.

Dinner

1. Main course: varies depending on what we cook but it's usually the basic protein + carb + veggies
2. My all-time favourite dessert: chopped banana, lots of hot custard, and a bar's worth of chocolate on top with the odd cadbury's chocolate finger or whatever's going begging.

Bedtime

1. Milky hot chocolate.

I have a few ideas of what I could do to make it better; if you have any, please do feel free to share them here. Hearing the advice of my readers really has helped me so, so much in the past and continues to do so, every day.💗

But for now, I'm going to sign off, and focus on what I have to do. The thing I want more than anything else in the world, but yet of which the mere thought of strikes real fear into my heart like a knife blade been thrust through flesh.

Letting go. One of the hardest, most painful parts of recovery. But let go, I will and must.

I have to face the pain and the fear now, or spend a lifetime having to cope with a different pain; the pain of regret.

The regret of knowing that I could have changed things, but chose once again to hold on, and put off.

But now it's time to let go.

Let go I can, and must.

The Final Autumn.

How I have always loved this time of year.

Walking in the forest through carpets of leaves; carpets which are richer and more breathtakingly beautiful than anything ever devised by the human hand. A treasure trove of natural, unspoiled beauty; ripened and matured like a perfect mellow peach fruit in high summer.  Coppery leaves interspersed with gold. Blood red berries and primrose yellow needles upon every sprig of the larch tree. Autumn swirls around like a twirling dancer, bringing vibrance and colour to everywhere she touches.

But she's a different dancer to Spring. Spring lingers to gently nourish her craft, to tend the delicate buds and make them open, to caress the dew-soaked ground in order to make the sweet new flowers grow. Autumn, though, does not pause for a breath. She breezes through those woods to the tune of the winds that she makes blow, winds which are no longer warm and raise a goosebump upon unprotected skin, or which make the scraggly flowers that remain upon the ground shiver and curl further in on themselves, as if striving to protect those petals that remain. Delicate. Oh so delicate, like me. Like the flowers I watch and wait for the inevitable. The transition which is long awaited and dreaded at the same time.

By and by the last leaf will drop; branches, once so bountifully adorned, will be bare and skeletal, clawing a clay-coloured sky with their bony, outstretched fingers. The rich copper carpet will become brown and dull, littered with tiny, broken flower petals and stems. The Change had to come. It was already here. And now Winter has solidified that change, meaning that what was once so beautiful and sweet, is now gone.

And now that is how I feel now as I prepare for the Inevitable Change.

For what was beautiful and sweet to me will now soon be gone. The life at home which I loved; the life at home, which I knew one day must end.

But maybe this is for the best.
I knew that, one day, I would have to leave my beautiful, sweet home.
The home where the conifers grow closely together, their branches forming a tunnel of jade-green branches.
The home where the ebony blackbirds call their sweet songs.
The home where the leaves of the maple tree fall and grow. Grow and fall, in an endless cycle of change.

And for so long, this was me.

I'd grow a little, but every time I'd always fall down.
Over and over and over again I'd repeat this endless cycle.


Home. The home that I loved. But it was here where I did something wrong.

For home is exactly where, for years,
Instead of noursihing my body and allowing myself to grow,

I nourished and sustained a monster.

I've made my decision, for now.

I'm going to go to Shropshire in February. I'm going to go there with an open heart and an open mind because I know - deep down- that there's a good chance that this is going to be a job I love. And if I get there and find I'm really struggling, then I can always come back home. At this point in my recovery, I know myself well enough by now to be able to tell when I'm relapsing.

I've also decided that I'm going to seek therapy once I've started earning. Last night I googled therapists in the nearest big town where I will be based (Shrewsbury). I was pleasantly surprised at the availability of counselors in the area there. And I felt an unfamiliar sense of power and control. To know that once I was there I would be taking steps to tackle ED right where he stands. To know that this time, I would not be alone, and would be given further tools to help me win this fight.

But, even until then, I know that it is imperative that I give this battle every single thing that I have.

I've got a few ideas about how I'm going to do this...

• Talk to Mam about how I'm trying to gain a bit more weight, because I know then she will help me and give me a boost of support when I need it.
• As of yesterday I started my beautiful new recovery journal, which I am going to set aside a designated time each day to write in. Opening up the brand new hardback yesterday to examine page upon page of unblemished, unmarked whiteness gave me a refreshing sense of renewal. It seemed to signal the beginning of something new; the rekindling of renewed motivation. With a few things. Motivation to gain weight and motivation to recover. To get myself fully and completely back on track. And to have courage and be more positive, and fight the depression as hard as I am going to tackle ED.
• And of course..I am going to blog a bit more regularly and write out all my thoughts, goals and endeavours on here (regardless of whether they're successful or not.) Hearing from my readers has always been a source of enormous help and comfort to me. I can't even begin to thank you enough for all the comments over the past few weeks. You might not think that they were of any great significance, but I can honestly say that your comments and support mean the whole world and have got me where Im standing today. <3 
• I also am going to try out some other forms of self-help, namely meditation, which I have never properly done before and really want to try out for myself, and also reading recovery-focused self-help books. I've a list of a few which I really want to try out. I'll make sure to post my thoughts about them on here about each one.

So now I have to look forwards, beyond the winter, beyond the cold and icy pain.

Because beyond the pain and sorrow at having to leave my home behind, I know that there is a new chance, of a new and beautiful beginning. A chance to find myself in a new place. A chance to grow. Like the tiny flowers laid down by the winter's cold, I know that I can grow upwards. I just need to seek out the sunlight, let it pour over me, allow myself to be strong and whole.

And like the darting swallows that return every Spring, I know that I will come back here. The good bye need not be forever.

But I have to give this new seed a chance. A chance to grow, and blossom.

The Hunger for More...

And so, it's back, again. Back again like a fluttering moth, one that refuses to go away, no matter how many times you flap your hands in a vain attempt to ward it off. Ignoring it doesn't help, either. But you don't want to hurt it because it's not there to harm you, exactly. It's not like a wasp with its malicious sting, or a blood-sucking fly which wishes to prey upon your blood. Both of those insects make me think of Ed: remorseless, predatory, parasitical. But this moth is slightly different. My old friend, the "extreme hunger". I groan and sigh and bemoan its presence in my life, once again. But yet I cannot condemn it. Because I know that it's there for a reason.

Since coming back from Mas Banyeres, the extreme hunger also returned, and in force. It was with some gloom that I duly acknowledged its presence, having naively assumed that Barcelona had seen the end of it: that niggling, yearning desire for more and more, even when I'd eaten enough to be physically stuffed. It's something I only really get in the mornings, but this is a fact that I have quickly started to hate, and deplore as much as its actual existence. Because the mornings are the one time when I like to write Morokia. Since coming home, I've barely written anything. And one of the main reasons for that is the fact that in the mornings the EH is proving slightly more than a bit of a distraction.

Take this morning for example.I woke up and then about half an hour later I had sat down to breakfast. The bowl of weetabix was quickly consumed, followed by a slice of toast and a load of peanut butter. After a portion of cheese I decided that it was time to stop and try to write for a while. Give me the next item, please, the hungry voice screamed in desperation, already eyeing the next food on the list which hangs in my mind every day, the all-too-familiar meal plan. Half a toasted bagel with seeds and spread, and then a soft boiled egg or some baked beans. No, I shouted back at it, in frustration. Just wait a couple of hours, darn you!! I want to write, I don't want to spend all of my wriitng time just eating....!!

About half an hour later - and with one sole measly paragraph done - I finally gave in, and ate. And was very quickly not just full, with food, but with self-disgust and and self-hatred, as perusual.

At the fact that I couldn't hold out and wait until everyone else ate, as a normal person would, insert quotation marks here, as that's what the voice in my head says in my brain. Not to mention at the bloating of my stomach afterward.



In Spain, the EH was still there, though, of course. Just not as sharply prominent; or rather, I was more effectively able to ignore, even defy, it. In the mornings I gladly thrust myself into jobs and tasks which would divert me from it. I did not eat as much there as I do at home at breakfast. And weirdly, by doing so, it was almost as if the EH was suppressed. Whatever the case, I was not eating as much, and didn't experience any cravings to do so, either. But now I am back home, on my meal plan again, and now this. What's going on?? How do I respond to these cravings and mental hunger?

No point trying to deny it, there's a hunger...for more.

But also there is a different sort of hunger. A hunger, a desperate need, to defeat ED once and for all.

So does that mean giving into the extreme hunger...and actually, really doing it, this time. Not just eating that wee bit extra, but actually making a conscious, concrete effort to increase amounts throughout the day.

But there's so many challenges and obstacles preventing me from doing this. People's comments spin in orbit around my head. You look well, Emmy. You look the picture of health. You look so much better now. And then, last year, one evening in my library, the stranger there. What chubby cheeks you have. That one still lingers in my memory, slowly twirling on a sharply pointed axle.

My heart's telling me I should try to gain a little more weight, to go beyond this...minimum. But doing that is so, so hard, when the world tells me that I look "healthy" as I currently do.

But can they see what's happeneing on the inside? Can they see my weakened bones and nutrient-deprived ovaries??

Having a hunger for true recovery might well mean....ignoring everyone's else's interpretations of me, the way I look, and behave. It's not about them, after all. It's about, well, myself. And my body, which I alone know more than anyone else.

But the path ahead is dark and covered in shards of ice. I step upon them, and a shiver runs through my body, at this pitiless, icy coolness. And I am afraid that that ice is going to crack, and that I will crack, along with it.

Catching dreams...

This morning I feel as if I am floating beneath fluffy, dove-white clouds. Clouds which may be thin and transparent; others, thick, solid, almost tangible. I drift between them like a pollen grain, suspended in the summer wind's soft breath.

All these clouds represent different things to me. Some seem fully formed and others, not so much. They represent to me my dreams and hopes. And how I long to alight upon each one of them.

But landing upon a cloud is a very difficult thing. Some may look solid but I know that they are not. If I were to reach out with my hands to catch one of them, I am afraid it will break apart in my hands. Disperse into a million tiny pieces, leaving me with a heavy heart and the remnants of a broken dream.

Is it really worth it to chase your dreams? Will they not escape you, evade you every time?

But that's not what I am willing to allow myself to believe.

My dreams. True recovery. To free myself, wholly and completely, from the Voice inside my head.  To conquer every single one of the demons which are still holding me down.

There are other dreams, dreams which I have held for a long time, but which I have never been able to catch hold of, since they are directly linked to the first one. To complete Morokia and to share my story with millions of readers worldwide. To find a job that I love and that I am good at, and to be at the healthiest that I could ever hope to be. Perhaps even to write my own story, one of recovery and strength and hope. And then there are dreams of being in a relationship and newfound love. Of places  I want to go to, sights and wonders that I want to see.

But I know that to achieve these other dreams I need to seek out the first one. Because without true recovery, I know I will only ever be able to brush the mere lining of those other clouds with my fingers.

But how will I ever be able to catch that beautiful dream? It seems to always just escape me , to hang just that little bit out of reach. Sometimes, it seems so close I can almost touch it, to taste its sweet delicateness upon my tongue, to feel its soft touch against my burning, yearning skin. Other times, it seems as cold and as distant as the snow-adorned mountain, a mountain so harsh and icily hostile that I recoil from ever attempting to reach its summit.

But I know that it has been long since I started to climb that very same mountain. I may only be halfway, but I am there, instead of being at the bottom. At one time I could only stare in wretched wonder, wishing that I had the courage to begin that long ascent.

And then I did.

But now I am halfway again at the point which I as never before able to cross. Just where does the path lead from here? The clouds are still far above me, shrouding the mountain peak with their billowy, feather light forms. But it's such a long road, to keep going along. And at times it seems so relentlessly, bone-wearily hard.

Both mountain peak and dreamy white clouds are still so far away, from me.
How can I ever hope to reach them? Catching them in itself now seems like such a beautiful yet impossible dream.

But I have something now which I did not have before. A new determination to give this fight all that I have got. To go into this battle with courage and hope aflame in my heart like a flaring torch. I am going to beat you, Ed. I am going to beat you, or go down still fighting.

Recovery is my new priority, my mission. And, if I fail, then at least noone can say that I did not try.

My Barcelona experience has helped me pinpoint my course of action in a number of ways. It's helped me to realise several things: about myself, my recovery, and what steps I need to take as I strive to move forward. It's reminded me that I still have so much work to do, yet. There were countless challenges and obstacles lying in wait for the girl with anorexia there, all of which reared their ugly heads on my wary, hesitant approach. Some of these challenges I managed to beat back down, overcoming them with the strength of my own purpose, my determination. Yet there were others which I fought against and lost. There were times when my attempts at fighting back were simply just not good enough, leaving me weakened, with only enough strength to vainly bang my fist against the unyielding surface, before being knocked to the ground and cast aside. Recovery was harder, there, away from the comforting, familiar surroundings of my home. I had to constantly keep my guard up high, and there was certainly more than one time when I let it slip and fall.

But. Aside from that. There was another thing that Barcelona reminded me. A fact that somewhere sometime I had realised, before, but did not nourish enough to fully acknowledge. above all Barcelona  reminded me that I truly have the power to do anything. Anything, if I set my heart and mind and soul to it.

Did I not climb the Via Ferreda, having not done anything remotely like proper rock climbing before? Did I not get thrown in at the deep end on my first day of teaching, having not been given any proper training or induction, only to walk into that classroom regardless to greet my pupils with a smile as if I had been doing this for all of my life? And did I not take the greatest leap of my life, by stepping onto that plane in the very first place? That step was so much more than a literal step, for me. It symbolised strength and resolution and enormous courage. It meant that I was facing my greatest ever fears, but yet despite my trepidation and terror, I was still going ahead and doing it, anyway.

And it is in this light I should see my recovery. My recovery, and the seizing of my dreams in trembling, exuberant hands.

I know deep down I have the power to do anything...

Anything, including this battle, and this long, long climb to reach the clouds. 💗xxx

A battle that I fought and WON..xxxx

Barcelona. I knew the word and I guess I thought I knew the city - or did I? What defines to know a place? I had heard of it, of course; had claim to a somewhat scanty knowledge about where it was and what it was like there.

But never did I once consider that upon a day in June, approximately three years since I embarked upon the journey which is recovery from an eating disorder, I would be setting off on one of the biggest adventures of my life, to exactly that place - the golden glowing jewel which is Barcelona. And I've been here for over four weeks now, and this beautiful place has already stolen a piece of my heart.

I say Barcelona but perhaps it would be more correct to say Catalonia. As I'm not based in the actual city itself; but rather, in the countryside some little way inland. I'm just outside a little town called Centelles. It's small and quaint and full of that quintessential Spanish charm, with its narrow streets and ornate, high-towered church, the many bakeries whose windows are adorned with shelf upon shelf of tantalising delights, and its scattering of ice cream parlours which the Ganache Elf has frequented quite often of late. ;)

Making the decision to come here was one of the hardest things I had ever done in my life. I had so many fears and so many insecurities. What it would be like, would the other people like and accept me, would I cope being away from home. And then of course there was Ed, hovering in the back of my mind like a malignant wasp which refuses to be swatted away.

But I took that leap and threw myself off the cliff into the deep. A deep so unknown and so terrifying in its immensity. But then I discovered that instead of being drowned by that fear, of being borne away by that rushing tide, I could learn to master it, to ride those waves. And the waves would touch my face and skin, soaking me to the bone, but that cold fear need not touch my heart and soul. I could be like the graceful silver dolphin, cutting through those waves; I could be like the shooting white star, slicing through an infinite, ink-black sky.

This trip for me has been about so many things. Pushing myself beyond my comfort zone, and learning to learn that I could cope with being away from my beloved home. It's been a learning experience and an adventure. I've done things which I've never done before, met people who I know I will remember for the rest of my life. I've taught my way through four classes of bright eyed children, each one with their own story to tell, each one with their own different personality and different smile. Faces and names which have been inscribed on my heart. I know as time passes, the concrete images now fixed in my head will begin to fade. But I know that the memory of them will be with me forever, as will the joy that I found came hand in hand with their identifying of me as their teacher.

I have discovered that it is with children I want to work with, for my future. The sense of fulfilment I have derived from this job - the way the children's faces light up when I praise them for all their hard work; that sense of pride and fondness I feel tugging at my heart when I look through their homework and marvel at the progress they have made - is something like which I have never quite felt before, and want to feel again, once I return home. I only have one week left now - I've been four weeks here since yesterday, a fact that amazes me in itself - and my time in Catalonia has almost come to an end.

It has been hard. So hard , in many ways. But one thing that I know is that I do not regret anything about my decision to come here. It has changed me in ways which I know I needed to be changed. And now my life's path will bring me back home, home to that rugged little island perched on the edge of immense Atlantic Ocean, to that cream-walled Dorma Bungalow at the island's very heart. Mid summer in that bungalow's emerald-bright garden, where the eucalyptus tree rustles its aromatic, papery skinned branches and the sweet peas flowers stir in a soft summer breeze. And it is here where my recovery journey continues on. And I know exactly what I am going to do, and how I am going to achieve it. ❤

I'm so sorry for my blogging absence over the past few weeks - it's literally been so so hectic I haven't had a chance to write at all! Over the next few days I will hopefully get to fill you in on the stuff I've been doing while I've been here, and normal blogging will resume once I'm back in Ireland. Thank you so, so much for sticking with me and thinking of me, for all the comments and words of encouragement, the advice and support. It means SO much, it really really does! 💗

She learned to conquer the Fear...

It was the Tuesday after my birthday that I got the Skype call that changed everything.

I was sitting in the lounge - or the "sun room", as I like to call it. My writing room. The frontermost room of the house which the sun's first light spills into every morning. As that golden orb ascends into the sky, it casts golden shafts of sunlight through the brooms' enormous east-facing window, illuminating the faces of my loved ones' pictures upon the walls, causing the polished oakwood of the little oval table to shine and gleam with an almost fairytale-like quality. It's one of my favourite rooms in the house. It's here where I retreat to every morning to immerse myself in my own little world; that being, of course, Morokia.

But on that morning I was not sitting there with such a purpose in mind.

Besides me were bundles of Morokia notes I had brought with me to look at while I waited for the Skype app to ping. Pages upon pages of dog-eared A4 sheets, covered from top to bottom in my messy, scrawly handwriting that noone can ever decipher apart from me. Truth was I was unable to really read them, of course. The words would float like thin, wispy clouds in front of my eyes, drifting away whenever I tried to grasp them tightly to my quivering, pulsating consciousness. Yet at that very moment I wanted to be like on of those clouds, in the sky. Graceful, airy, suspended in that blue infinity forever, without any duty or obligation, any pain or regret.

A few months ago I had done something which I had never, ever done before.

I had applied for a job. Not just a local parttime job in a cafe or local store, all of which I've tried to get into before. It was a summer camp job, based in the renowned city of Barcelona on the South Spanish coast. It still makes me smile at the randomness of the way in which I found out about this job. I was walking out of Trinity through Front Arch, wrapped up, as usual, in the comforting folds of my daydreams, when a sudden chilly gust of wind reminded me that I hadn't got my gloves on, so I paused, slipping out of the way of passerbys to stand directly by the Arch's Wall. As I scrabbled in my bag for the gloves that I hoped I hadn't left in some random place as I am often wont to do, I suddenly realised I was standing by a billard plastered in dozens of small, typed notices and adverts. And I don't honestly know how and why, but one particular slip of paper called out to me. Spanish summer camp seeking young English teachers for July. Apply with cv. There were other details, all of which I read and committed to memory.

The old Emmy would have just smiled, and walked on. The Old Emily would have thought to herself how wonderful that would be, but that she would never be able to do it.

But this Emmy applied for that job. And a few weeks later, she had her first Skype interview.

I remember the feelings which coursed through me while I waited for my interviewer to call. Self-doubt, and disbelief, and scorn. You honestly think that you, of all people, are going to get this? As if they'd pick you. You'd be absolutely hopeless!! And alongside that there was the slimmest glimmer of hope. Please, may it go ok. Please may I get this job.

But alongside that hope throbbed a beating vein of fear. That fear wrapped itself like a snake around that thin thread of hope, crushing it in its heavy, suffocating coils. No no. Please don't pick me. I don't want to go to Spain, on my own. I would be useless at that job. Please God may she not pick me.

And then the Skype pinged and my trembling hand went to press accept. Then I remembered. There was another time, when I accepted a phone call. One that I knew would change things, forever. The one of the day they told me my bed was ready at the hospital.

And hadn't I felt fear and trepidation that day? Hadn't I felt surrounded by vast currents of terror; currents which tore at me with the ferocity of hunting lions, ready to bore me away and tear me apart?

And yet I faced that fear and thrust myself into that current, felt it ripple and surge around me, its power. And I realised that I was stronger and more powerful than that fear, if I chose to be. I need not be anymore the girl who drowned in her fears. Rather, I could be the one who fought those tides of self-destruction.

And this time neednt be so much different.

I could learn to conquer the fear.

And yes, I was offered that job, much to my shock and disbelief. And yes, I did accept it. The months passed like young damselflies skimming on the surface of the water, and before I knew it, it was time for me to go. To leave my beautiful home, so beloved, so familiar, so precious to me.

If I had felt fear at that day of the interview, the terror I experienced that Thursday when I left for Dublin Airpot, was that multiplied tenfold. What it would be like, would the people there like me or not, how would I cope in an actual proper working environment for the first real time of my life. And then of course there were the ED fears, forcing themselves insistently to the forefront of the others to blare out at me like high-pitched, wailing sirens.

But yet this time I refused to submit to them.

2017 has been the year of the change for me. This year I have overcome more thn I could ever have thought possible, or imagined. I gained weight by myself for the second time, nd this time found a level of acceptance for my new body which I never could put claim to before. I put my recovery first even though I was at college, and struggling to get through the finl last curucial term of that degree which had caused me so much heartbreak.

And then there was this. Barcelona. Another thing I could never have thought of as being possible.

I am learning to conquer my fears, not give in to them. And I know that I can use this strength to beat every single last one of my demons and let my light rise like a diamond bright star into a ebony black sky. And one day the clouds of depression which remain wrapped around me will part and fall away, and the final few chains of ED. They will weaken and I will take them in my hands, snap them like brittle kindlewood between my now strong and capable fingers. No longer a prisoner. No longer a girl with an ED. ED will become a thing of my past, a thing that was fought against and overcome, just like those fears which I faced.