You Are My Candy Girl

I'm severely addicted to the white stuff - and it ain't crack - it's sugar, baby.

For as long as I can remember, I've used food as a comfort.  It was innocent enough - mum always tried to make me feel better with something sweet when I was down... and my mum was a professional baker!  I think most people find this to be true.  Trouble is, I became severely depressed, and the only comfort I knew was food.

It became a problem when my weight went up and despite a lot of effort, I still had the strong compulsion to satisfy my inner pain with food.  And I developed an eating disorder.

I didn't realize I was trying to stuff the hole that was inside me.

After participating in an intensive DBT group, I had new skills to use: I learned the healthier ways to tolerate distress - the ones that don't do any damage the way drugs, alcohol, over-eating, over-shopping, gambling, and promiscuity do.  So I thought I was okay.

But I still had this problem with food and could not figure it out.

I then participated in an eating disorder group, which helped tremendously by emphasizing meals 2-3 hours apart all day long so that you don't get hungry - hunger in a binge eater is like setting yourself up to fail.  It also emphasized that we do not stigmatize any food as being "bad" food.

I improved. But I still had the problem. I still used food for comfort.  And it wasn't salad either, it was always sugary carbohydrates in some form or another: cookies, cakes, ice-cream, chocolate, breads, etc.

Not only could I not figure out why it was so hard for me, but I also became complacent - it was so normal to me to eat these kinds of foods when I was feeling bad (and I felt bad a hell of a lot) that I didn't think about it - The compulsion was too strong and when I ate the food, I went numb, and then I felt better for a bit.

Of course, health is really important to me, and I'm always trying to make sure I eat well.  I gave up animal products, processed foods, gmo foods, etc. in this pursuit.  But no matter what, I eventually reached for the sugary treat when things got bad enough.

I didn't know I was that depressed.  I thought I got depressed sometimes, but looking back, I think I was just trying to cope - and sugar helped me.  It also made things so much worse.

And now I'm sure that the reason I don't reach for a healthier method of tolerance or comfort is because I've never tried anything that has worked as fast and as well as the food.  Sex works well too, but food is easier to come by.

Last year, when I got into the Nutritarian diet (Joel Fhurman), I learned that when you eat any processed foods, it makes it harder to follow the diet - he strongly suggests refraining completely for best results.  And I pretty much did just that.  Then one day, Brian's daughter came to visit and I thought it would be nice to make some banana bread.  So I found a really healthy recipe and made a loaf.  And I ate a piece. And after that, despite being perfectly content and satisfied without that stuff for months, I felt so strongly pulled to have more... and I did.

And after that, my healthy diet went downhill.

Trying to get myself back on track felt impossible - it seemed that no matter how much I wanted to be healthy, the compulsion to eat the sugary carbs was even stronger.

As I finished off my third? (I don't even remember how many) honey bun, feeling disgustingly sick and full but still needing to finish it, I realized that this was an addiction.

And I don't mean that I'm addicted to food - I'm sure that may be possible, but we sorta need it to live.  I mean addicted to sugar.

I know an addictive behaviour - I've had it with cigarettes and still struggle.  Why I never realized I had the same relationship with sugar as I did with cigarettes, I don't know, but my guess is that it was such a part of my life - right from childhood, that I'd no reason to suspect.  Everyone eats. Everyone needs to eat.  Therefore I just had an eating problem, not an addiction.

The reason I suspected it was sugar and not something else?  I needed sweet things, the sweeter the better - those were what I went for, those are the foods I couldn't stop eating, those were the foods I craved obsessively.

So when Brian came home, I had a talk with home and told him my discovery.  He agreed and said he'd help me in any way he can.

Then, after doing some reading on the topic, I decided to cut out the sugar completely and for good.  This meant any sugar, even honey and maple syrup.  And I had to closely monitor my starchy food intake as that is the type of food I have the problem with.  Starch converts to sugar and ends up having the same effect.

I learned a lot about sugar, and why it is so addictive.  It reacts in the brain the way drugs do.  It's process directly through the liver, like any other toxin.

I learned that Queen Elizabeth was so addicted to sugar that her teeth turned black.

I learned so much that I can't even begin to explain it here and so I'll share some important links/information in future posts on the subject.

The day after I had my realization, I obstained from sugar of any sort.  I didn't even eat bread for the first week... I made Brian hide his bread from me.  I didn't drink coffee because I usually liked it with copious amounts of sugar.

Let me tell you, that first week was horrible!  In all the times I've tried to quit smoking, I have never gone though withdrawals anywhere close to what I went through with the sugar.  If I wasn't addicted to sugar, why would I go through such a bad withdrawal?

My skin wouldn't stop crawling; I was sweating; I couldn't stop clenching my jaw; I was nauseous; I was miserable, moody, depressed, and tired - completely void of energy (even more so than usual and that's saying a lot); and oh my god was I hungry!  All the time.  That deep hunger pain you get when you're just starving - well I had that almost constantly.  I was still eating, but it didn't matter. I later learned this was the body trying to regulate itself since it's been so accustomed to regular doses of sugar my entire life.

During that first week, I felt like I didn't know what to do with myself - like something big was missing inside me and that I would not know how to live without the sugar - not because of the cravings, but because I felt like I was walking around with a giant gaping hole right in the center of me and I just couldn't comprehend feeling that way for, I believed, the rest of my life.

I'd been filling that hole with sugar.  I didn't know any other way.  And now the hole was no longer being filled, and I had to deal with that, I had to deal with how that felt.

I want to touch on that more, but in another post.

I don't remember all my withdrawal symptoms, but I remember what happened after just a few days of no-sugar: food started to taste sweeter.  Just natural food, like vegetables, so much sweeter and more delicious. Everything tasted better in a way that quitting smoking could not even compare to.

Don came over with coffee and so I decided to try it without sugar anyway... the coffee tasted almost as sweet as it did when I was drinking it with a crap-load of sugar!  I thought this was amazing.

I also plan to make a post about the effects of going off of sugar, so look for that one if you're curious.

In the meantime, here's a list of behaviours that someone with an addiction portrays (taken from various sources), all of which are true of myself when it comes to sugar:

• Inability to limit use of a substance or activity
• A craving or compulsion to use the substance or activity.
• Recurrent use escalates to achieve the desired effect, indicating tolerance.
• Attempts to stop usage produces symptoms of withdrawal
• Becoming preoccupied with the addiction, spending a lot of time on planning, engaging in, and recovering from the addictive behavior 
• Secretiveness
• Lying to hide the addiction
• A pattern of avoiding and binging
• The person takes the substance and cannot stop - in many cases, at least one serious attempt was made to give up, but unsuccessfully.
• Addiction continues despite health problem awareness - the individual continues taking the substance regularly, even though they have developed illnesses linked to it.
• An addicted person commonly feels they need their drug to deal with their problems.
• Obsession - an addicted person may spend more and more time and energy focusing on ways of getting hold of their substance, and in some cases how to use it.
• in many cases the addict may take their substance alone, and even in secret.
• A significant number of people who are addicted to a substance are in denial. They are not aware (or refuse to acknowledge) that they have a problem.
• Excess consumption
• Dropping hobbies and activities - as the addiction progresses the individual may stop doing things he/she used to enjoy a lot.
• Having stashes - the addicted individual may have small stocks of their substance hidden away in different parts of the house or car; often in unlikely places.
• Taking an initial large dose. For example, the individual may gulp drinks down in order to get drunk and then feel good.
• Relationship problems
• Feel guilty or ashamed.
• Have friends or family members who are worried about your addiction
• Need to partake in the substance in order to relax or feel better.
• Regularly consume more than you intended to.

It's been over three weeks since I've had any sugar.  I don't regret it.  In fact, I feel so much better.  But I'm going to have to be diligent about it for the rest of my life because it is so easy to stray, as I've learned.

<3 M

 

I Am Exactly The Person That I Want To Be.

I should talk about how I'm on my fifth (or is it fourth... feels like fifth) day of detox from sugar and most high-carb foods/grain, but inspiration doesn't work cohesively so...

I was just in the bath and it occurred to me how I generally seem to be doing well in one area of my life and kinda so-so on most other areas at any given time. 

I've always assumed/hoped that one day in the near future, it would somehow all come together in a beautiful balance and I'd be this "together" person and no longer struggle with mundane things like making sure I do my laundry/pay the bills/take my meds/eat healthy/etc,/etc,/etc,... and I'd be awesome and be free to rock all the creative (or other) pursuits I wanted.

I don't think that's how it works, though.

I think it's possible that I (and many other people) am too hard on myself when it comes to expectations - that I believe most of my happiness will happen to me when I'm that other, future person.

I think, for the most part, we all just try to do our best and that is (has to be) good enough.  Happiness happens now.  Interesting how both those words begin... happiness happens when something is happening.  And that's true. Anyway.

I want to remember this so that I don't waste my days putting too much pressure on myself instead of focusing on what is happening in the moment.

Amanda Palmer puts it perfectly

Fuck yes
I am exactly the person that I want to be 

<3 M

Too Afraid

And I'm not sure how to change that.

I know how to change my social anxiety and I'm sure that will help, but this seems to be something else as well.  I hadn't really thought about it before now, not sure why, maybe I wasn't ready for the truth?

If I get excited about something, I will talk myself out of going for it.  There are dozens of reasons I give myself to rationalize not doing something.  This is what I've been living like.  And now look at my life - I'm not living it.  I mean I'm not experiencing and pursuing things and that makes me feel stagnant, useless, and pointless.

But enough about what it has done to me.

I don't want to focus on the problem - the problem has had enough time to thrive.  I want a solution.

Last night on Facebook, I saw the Hamilton Conservatory For The Arts was giving classes.  I thought about taking the beginners photography class because I've lately discovered taking photos is kind of enjoyable - don't know why I never felt that way before, but anyway...  I thought it would be a good thing for me to do to expand my horizons, learn some things, meet some peoples, etc.  The place is really close to where I live and the money isn't a problem.  Aside from the fact that I don't think I have the right kind of camera, there was nothing stopping me from going for it - except of course, myself.

I didn't know what happened in that moment between enthusiasm and deciding against it, but I believe it kinda went something like this:

Me: ooh exciting!
Myself: scary.
Me: It's close by!
Myself: Still far enough.
Me: I can learn a lot and have fun!
Myself: You're not a photographer, you have more important things to attend to before you go taking classes on subjects that won't even help your livelihood.
Me: This would be really good for my social anxiety exposure therapy.
Myself: That's too much to handle right now.
Me: I never do anything.
Myself: you can't handle it.
Me: okay, I guess you're right.

*Sigh*

I've been "disabled" for basically my entire 20's.  My issues changed me and the way I live my life tremendously.  But unfortunately, I allowed it to define and devour me.  Being enveloped in health problems for long periods is a great way to neglect every other thing in life.  I wasn't able to do so many things I wanted to do or used to be able to do so I guess somewhere along the way I stopped trying and reinforced the belief that I can't handle things, even though I consciously know/or at least think I can handle many things, I block myself from living the life I want to live.

Sure, I have some challenges that make it hard to do everything I'd like, but that doesn't mean I can't at least do some.  I'm afraid of social situations but I can fight through that.  I am way too easily overwhelmed... so I don't have to do everything all at once... I am in pain a lot of the time... so take it easy?  So why doesn't "myself" understand that?

And I know I have a lot of fear about being really far out of my comfort zone, and imagining that discomfort can be enough to make me do nothing.

How can I change this pattern? (not a rhetorical question).


<3 M

Waking Up

Excerpts on realizing you're on a roller-coaster ride and didn't even know you bought the ticket...

...I’ve been really low, lower than usual, in a really dark and confusing place and no idea why.

Then I had a strange experience: when I looked around me, I could see underneath things, like under the surface kind of thing and it made me realize a lot of it was an illusion – an illusion of things being okay, an illusion of control/manageability, an illusion of a true life. I know it sounds crazy, but it was pretty powerful and shook me up but I had no idea what to make of it at the time.

It felt like something woke up inside me and was pissed off and confused. It felt like the real me had been trapped or asleep inside of me and now it was waking up and wondering why she was living someone else’s life – like the person I am now is not the person I really am inside – I’m not living the life the true me wants to live. I felt like the real me had been possessed by someone/thing and didn’t realize it until now, and that upset her because she wasn’t sure how to free herself.

...it felt like the universe sucker punched me in the stomach and I started to cry and to mourn myself... I read about how having a partner with ADD can make you a shell of a person (for various reasons but mainly because of how crazy it makes you trying to deal with it), how it gives you the ‘frog in the pot’ syndrome, how it makes you isolate for various reasons, how it makes you accept so much unacceptable behaviour that you no longer know the difference and start questioning your own boundaries and expectations for proper treatment ...about how being in a relationship with an ADD partner is not much different than being in a relationship with an alcoholic... about no longer having goals for the future because you’ve been too busy dealing with the craziness.

All the work... all the sacrifice and tolerance, it did help quite a bit – in the more recent months the roller-coaster has stopped taking so many turns so often – life has become bearable – but I also realized we’ve been stagnant. I spent so much energy getting to this point that once things started improving enough for me to relax a little bit, I became too afraid to rock the boat by expecting anything more than tolerable. And that isn’t good enough. We stopped working on things as actively and became stagnant - not going forward at all, just existing. 

I got terrified and it jolted something in me.

It woke me up.





<3 M

Hats

 It's an interesting thing to think about when you're just waking up in the morning, but "career" has been on my mind and when I think of a career, it always flabbergasts me - gets me all twisted and confused until I end up pushing the thoughts to the back of my mind, again.

As I've said before, I think of a career for myself as an extension of my passions and how they can be utilized to do something in the world - no matter how big or small.  It's not about money so much as purpose, creation, and healing: I want purpose, I want to create, and I want to heal.  And I know I can do all of those things... it's the specifics that screw me up though.

I've read about multi-potentiality and know I fit into that category, but it still leaves me unsure of where to go from here - what am I to focus on in order to actually fulfill my three goals rather than spend/waste the rest of my life trying to figure it out?

I did figure out one option, but it seems so big and complex that it takes away from it being about passion and turns it into more of a "job."  And jobs are for paying the bills.  I want to actually care about what I do.

I don't know how to reconcile wanting to be an artist, a writer, a natural health practitioner, a life coach, an art therapist, and goddess know what else.

But it occurs to me that maybe if I stop worrying about it so much and just focus on doing some of those things, it will somehow eventually come together.

I guess the issue is more about focus: I'm sure there are ways to accomplish that... I'd sure love to know what they are.  I'd love to know what other people like me are doing/have done.


<3 M

Climbing Out Of My Skin

All my life I've been interested in many things, some of which have become passions of mine. This has made it seem impossible to figure out what it is I'm supposed to be doing with my life as far as purpose and an actual career.

When I was a little girl, I wanted to go to "Universary" and become a teacher.  When I got older and discovered I could write as a career and not just as a hobby, that's exactly what I was gonna do.

There have been a lot of hiccups.  In my late teens I became severely depressed and it completely stunted me.  I went inward and left life behind.  It immobilized me mentally and emotionally, and consequently socially and psychologically.

When I started to really pick up the pieces in my early twenties, I had to leave a promising job due to unexplainable physical and mental problems.  I was diagnosed by doctors and deemed unable to work.

When one spends several years in stagnation, trying skill-lessly to get better, apart from 'normal' life and 'normal' schedules, it becomes increasingly harder to get your head above water, and keep it there.  Life slowly but surely becomes purposeless, unnecessarily hard, and farther and farther out of reach.

It feels like I've been fighting forever and for the better part of those years, not getting very far.  I've learned a few lifetimes worth of lessons and gained a lot of skills and wisdom.  I just kept chipping away at the big boulder and after a long time, began to see it take some form.  For the longest time it just seemed like it wasn't ever going to budge.

But for the past few years, I've been able to see the difference of then and now - how far I've come.

When I was younger I was extremely ambitious and I had goals and dreams, plans for the future.  After years of living the kind of life I was living, I slowly stopped dreaming.  I didn't even notice it for a while but one day I realized I had no idea what I wanted my life to look like anymore, just that I didn't want it to look like it did.

I still had my many interests and passions, but no direction and no real idea of how to go about getting it.  It made me so sad to think I had no goals other than the same few goals I'd had for all these years: basic goals for my health since my health problems had weighed me down so much.  You could go through my journals throughout the years and see the same exact themes, year in and year out, struggling with myself against the same obstacles and never seeming to get anywhere.  It was really sad.

The good news is that I am mentally out of that place - I am now able to conceive of and institute plans, goals, and purpose in my life and for a while now I've been on a journey of self-discovery to figure out what that means for me.

Most recently in my journey, I came across an apparent stumbling block - the same damn block that has been there my whole adult life when it came down to deciding on a purpose/career: I don't know what I'm meant to do because I'm passionate about many things!

If my only true passion were writing, that would be easy.  But that isn't the case.  And I struggle with trying to figure out what path to follow.  What if I choose the wrong thing and waste too much time before I figure that out?  And I know I wouldn't be satisfied with any one thing (yes, I'm difficult).  I've been all over the place as far as my pursuits in life go and though I need a direction, I don't wish to ignore my passions as purposes in exchange for just one.

Obviously I've thought of choosing one and doing the other things as side projects.  But that hasn't seemed to fit either: the reason I'm so passionate about the things I'm passionate about is because they are all vehicles to the same end, and that end is my purpose.

I've always believed anything is possible and so I haven't given up on figuring this out.  I need to figure this out.  And then last night I learned a few new words:

Multipotentialism

A term defined in 1972 by R.H. Frederickson for people who, “when provided with appropriate environments, can select and develop a number of competencies to a high level.”

(from puttylike.com)

A multipotentialite is a person who has many different interests and creative pursuits in life.

Multipotentialites have no “one true calling” the way specialists do. Being a multipotentialite is our destiny. We have many paths and we pursue all of them, either sequentially or simultaneously (or both).

Multipotentialites thrive on learning, exploring, and mastering new skills. We are excellent at bringing disparate ideas together in creative ways. This makes us incredible innovators and problem solvers.

When it comes to new interests that emerge, our insatiable curiosity leads us to absorb everything we can get our hands on. As a result, we pick up new skills fast and tend to be a wealth of information.

Polymath/Renaissance Person.

A polymath (Greek: πολυμαθής, polymathēs, "having learned much") is a person whose expertise spans a significant number of different subject areas. In less formal terms, a polymath (or polymathic person) may simply be someone who is very knowledgeable. Most ancient scientists were polymaths by today's standards.


So I'm not alone.  *phew*  So now what?

Well now I feel less stressed out about it, for one thing.  This is not a bad thing!  I've never been comfortable in any box and I don't see how I could ever be happy trying.  And why bother if that's not what I'm meant to do?

So what I need to do is figure out how to take my passions and turn them into a career - into something fulfilling, something that aides people in some way, and something that allows me to be financially independent.  This is now the journey I'm on.  I now feel I have permission not to be pigeonholed into one specific expertise.  I just need to figure out what it will look like.

I had an awesome brainstorming session with Brian today - we listed the main things I'm passionate about doing.  One thing is for certain, there is a very strong theme that runs throughout all of those things and that is healing... in all aspects.  Health and well-being is what I want both for myself and for others.  This seems to be the epitome of what I need to offer the world in whatever ways I can.

Brian and I came up with a pretty good idea that I am definitely going to develop though I can't be positive yet if that is the exact direction I'm going.  It is very promising though.  One sure way I can tell it is right is that it immediately brought up a lot of fears as well as a feeling of a huge weight lifting off my shoulders.  We shall see.

But there are some things I have to do before I can get where I want to be - getting over my social anxiety is the most important one and the balls are already rolling on that.  That's a huge one.  Huge fears and huge discomfort.  That will be an interesting journey.  But I'm eager to get on with it so I can start doing more with my life.

My next step, aside from the above and doing more research on my possibilities, is formulating plans for my various goals - something I've learned is essential to do if you want to accomplish ANYTHING lol.

I have a lot of work ahead of me - I couldn't be more excited or terrified!


<3 M