"A horse doesn't care how much you know, until he knows how much you care"

"Got the blue sky breeze blowin' wind thru my hair
Only worry in the world
is the tide gonna reach my chair
Sunrise, there's a fire in the sky
never been so happy
never felt so high
and I think I might've found me my own kind of paradise"
Zac Brown Band



Six weeks ago you couldn't have gotten me to willingly walk up to a horse if my life depended on it, today I received the lease papers for Cheyenne. Life is sometimes totally unexpected and confusing and flat out wonderful.

My friends keep asking me where this "horse thing" came from and why am I so into it. Truth I havent explained it to any of them, because I am not sure I totally get it yet, I think this is an evolving lesson, but the one thing I know is there is more to this than being "into it". I am "into" working out, I am "into" my gun and my shoes. They are hobbies, pasttimes, stress relievers. There is more to this than that.

I wish I knew how to put it into words, but when I walked into Woodloch stables a few weeks ago and put my hands on Snapper there was this feeling, almost like that of meeting someone and feeling like you have always known them, even though you have never met. There was this feeling that came over me of being totally safe and totally at peace, and anyone who knows me knows that is not how I feel about the world. And that feeling only intensified once I rode for the first time. That day I figured it was about Snapper, but I have had that same feeling when I have hung out with Abi, with Kass, with Cheyenne and even with the horses whose names I don't know at Sunnyside. I couldn't explain it, I couldnt find the words to translate it to, until today.

Over the last couple weeks I have heard the term "Natural Horsemanship" used over and over. In short it is a philosophy of working with horses based on communication and tapping into the natural thinking of a horse instead of trying to bend it to the human way of thinking. I started doing some reading on it today, partially out of curiosity and partially because that is how Cheyenne has been trained". And as I read the first few pages of the book, I was struck by how many times the author (Pat Parelli) kept saying that humans think different then a horse, but then he would describe horses..."they are born cowards and with the absolute instinct to flee first and ask why later....despite their size and power they inherently are afraid of all humans.....respect for a horse means an absence of fear....when something happens that scares them a horse doesnt think logically, they automatically go into full throttle, he tries to escape any way he can even if he hurts himself in the process...they give clear communications with no ambivalence". The descriptions go on and on, and as I read it, for a moment, I lost track that he was talking about horses and found him talking it about me!

That moment of realization helped me start to understand what I felt that day with Snapper and what I have felt since around horses. I felt understood, I felt like I fit, probably for the first time in my life I have found a place, at the side of a horse, where I felt normal. That my fears and insecurities seemed understood in a way they aren't with humans. That the look I saw in Snapper's face that day crossing the stream was him telling me, more than "chill out" but more so "it's ok, I get it" and the same with Cheyenne last week, it wasnt just her knowing she had a purpose, but her telling me "don't worry we are in this together and will figure it out".

I know some of my friends reading this will say "yeah right, like a horse can know that much". But it is one thing I have learned very fast about horses. They do sense where we are at, and they do communicate on an emotional level. All I have to do is watch Cheyenne get impatient when things aren't moving at the pace she wants to know how alike we are.

When you read anyting about horse you see the phrase over and over again "Prey Animal". Horses have an instictual fear of their world, they do everything they do to remain safe in a world that they are unsure about and feel threatened in. And while the same texts describe humans as "Predator Animals", that is not the case for all of us. The reality is for myself and many other people who grew up in less than safe homes we have grown up feeling like prey more than predator. We have lived our entire lives the same way as horses do and still do to this moment. We live on the edge, waiting for people to hurt us, expecting the bad in everyone, giving trust only to find it broken and it reinforcing our fears of the world.

My riding instructor Etta made a comment during my last lesson that really hit me. It should have been such a simple comment that went in one ear and out the other, but it has done anything but that. I have replayed it a million times in the last week. She simply looked over at me riding and said "You look so relaxed". I realized as I was processing that. I have LITERALLY never had anyone say that to me at another moment in my life. I live my life on guard, and she was completely right, that moment on Snapper may have been the first time in my life I felt truly safe, truly fearless and truly relaxed. In another word, like I was finally at a place where I truly fit in.

When you are working with horses they tell you the goal is to become part of the herd, for me I think I started a lot more a part of the herd than I even knew and that I have finally after all these years found my way back to the herd and THAT is what this "horse thing" is all about!

I don't really know how I got here, but I'm sure glad that I did.....

"I don't really know how I got here
But I'm sure glad that I did
And it's crazy to think that one little thing
Could've changed all of it

Maybe it didn't turn out like I planned
Maybe that's why I'm such, such a lucky man...

All the fights and the tears and the heartache
I thought I'd never get through
And the moment I almost gave up
All lead me here to you

I didn't understand it way back when
But sitting here right now it all makes perfect sense"
This - Darius Rucker

If you think about all the moments in life that if one step changed our whole lives would be different it can be really overwhelming.

There are so many times when we wish things could have turned out different than they did....I wish I had had a different type of family growing up, I wish I hadn't gotten sick, I wish I hadn't had the nerve damage,  wish I hadnt moved from the East coast, I wish certain people hadn't left my life, I wish I wasn't battling an eating disorder....but then there are days like yesterday where despite your religious or philosophical views of the world, you have to stand back and realize there are greater powers in play in the world and that things always turn out perfectly, even if we don't see that! That things happen for a reason, even if that reason seems to allude us.

If I tried to put all the steps together for you that lead to me meeting Missi and Cheyenne yesterday we would be here forever. The short version, when I moved to MN I met Tina, my cat "Nanny", she introduced me to Kathy who cleans my house once a month, then I met Janet in my Business Analysis class, Janet pushed me to try horseback riding, Kathy is a horse person and I started hanging out with her and her horse Abi after I realized horses were the calming hobby my trainer Nick had told me to search for, Kathy and I talked about me looking for a lease horse at some point, Kathy knows Missi, Missi's daughter doesn't ride Cheyenne as much anymore and Missi mentioned to Kathy that she was looking to lease Cheyenne, Kathy talked to Missi about me and yesterday Cheyenne trotted into my life! And that is the short version *smile*.

Cheyenne has her own story, she was a rescued abused race horse in need of love. She came into Missi's life in almost as amazing a story as me meeting her yesterday....a horse met in the dark and a face from a dream. Cheyenne has been part of Missi's life for 8 years and has seen her through her ups and downs and been her friend, companion and therapist. And now she has journeyed into my life when I needed her most.

The first thing I noticed about this 20 year old Standardbred mare was the look in her eyes. I couldn't put my finger on it until I looked back at the pictures I took of her yesterday, but she knows. She knows she is needed, she knows she has a purpose in life. That she is more than a pet, more than an animal to ride. Cheyenne knows that she fills a special place in the world. She knows that there are humans she is meant to heal. And I believe she knew yesterday she was meeting me for a reason. For having been ridden by a very few people since Missi adopted her she let me ride her as if we had always known each other, something very rare in horses.

Missi kept saying to me yesterday that Cheyenne likes to teach people. I can see in her eyes how much this beautiful Bay has to teach me, about life, about trust, about ceding control. That many of the secrets I have looked for solutions to in the world don't come from us "twofers" and that that many of my fears and insecurities I need to conquer are going to become part of my time with Cheyenne.

I have to admit part of what has been scaring me about the idea of leasing a horse (which is where the owner maintains control of the horse and you are allotted a certain number of days a week to ride) was knowing that I will become attached and fall in love with something that is not mine forever. That at some point Cheyenne and I will part ways, but I think that is one of the biggest lessons for to learn from her. I struggle with that on a daily basis in my life, worrying about losing people, about when they will walk away and getting so bogged down in that fear and worry that I miss out on the time I have with them. That instead of enjoying today I worry about tomorrow. One of my biggest goals during my time with Cheyenne is to not let that become my focus. Up until now everything I have done with horses has beeen a grounding time for me, keeping me in the moment not worrying about the future and what might happen, and I need to keep that front and center during my time with Cheyenne. Her time in my life is finite, and I need to find every moment of joy in it I can.

 

I can't even start to thank all the people who have played a part in this new chapter in my life. I don't really know how to express to those around me how much they change my life. They are words I have never really figured out, I just hope they know! I hope they can see it in my eyes!

 

But there is one little girl I want to thank specifically, who I haven't even met yet, Vanessa, Missi's daughter. Missi shared with me how torn Vanessa is on leasing Cheyenne. And I get that. I can't imagine sharing any of my cats with someone else. Vanessa, I just want you to know how grateful I am to you for letting Cheyenne spend time with me. That I will love her completely and do everything I can to make sure she is taken care of as well as you take care of her. You sharing her with me is changing my life and I will always be remember you for that.

Equines and Escalators.....

"It's not what I've done; It's what I've overcome that defines me, and makes me different from everyone else" (from a friend's FB status)


I am only one of the millions of people in the world who grew up in dysfunctional, often abusive, homes. And I, like many of those "Children who were Broken", have struggled my whole life with trust in others. Too many broken promises, too many disappointments, too many hurts. I learned to live my life believing that the only thing I could truly believe in with complete certainty was myself, that I was the only thing I could be sure of and feel safe in.

And when that belief in my own body was shattered with my diagnosis of PTC and the resulting nerve damage and strokes my world changed. The reach of my world decreased and my body became like a foreign invader to me. It became yet another thing to doubt, to question, to fear.

It is hard if you have never had a serious illness or injury to describe not trusting your own body to be there when you need it, so let me  simply say for the last 16 years not once when I have put my right foot down to take a step have I done it without thinking about and hoping it holds, because many many times it hasnt. I have fallen, I have broken bones, I have been bruised and embarrassed. I have many scars from falls, from burns I didnt sense I was getting (due to the numbness)...I have learned to be cautious, too cautious.

There were a million things I wanted to do or try that I haven't because I didn't have the confidence in my body to make it safe to do them. I have avoided situations where stairs might be involved, I have skipped group activities where I might fall and be seen, and I have planned my life for 16 years around my body. Even with all the accomplishments in the last 18 months, I still pre-think every step I take, I still fear falling and I still limit my life. But slowly I am seeing that falling away.

While balance and core and strength are something my trainer has worked on diligently for the last 11 months, while my body was changing, I wasnt seeing it, or probably better said, I wasnt trusting it. Despite being shown over and over that I was safe doing things I still shyed away from them. I still hesitate before I walk down a flight of stairs, I still panick if I have to step up onto something without a hand hold.

But slowly I see that changing, and I think a huge part of that is my new found passion for horseback riding. I am learning by being in the saddle that my body can do what it needs to if I just let it.

This week in my lesson I was asked to try to ride without holding on to the saddle horn. To me this was the most ridiculous request I could ever have heard. There was no way I could not fall off it wasn't holding on. But for some reason I tried it, I think it was the trust I found in Snapper during our previous trail ride more than anything that got me to let go that first time. I am truly trying when I am riding to stop trying to take control. And what I found when I let go, is that riding was more enjoyable that way, not scarier. That I had more control not less, that I felt safer not at risk. That for all my fear about my balance issues and my legs, my body worked just like everyone else's would on a horse.

That experience really spurred me (no pun intended) to try to push myself this week when traveling. To stop holding on to hand rails so tightly, to get on and off the moving walkways at the airport without holding on. To really begin to believe that all the work Nick and I have put in this past year had changed my body.

And tonight I finally conquered the biggest mountain of all. One of my greatest fears has been escalators, particularly going down. I have not gone near one for 16 years, despite facing them daily with all my traveling. I was scared to death I would step on and go tumbling head over tail.

Overcoming this has been a primary goal for months with the trainer and despite me telling myself over and over I was going to do it, I would always stand at the top of the escalator and freeze. Eventually walking away and finding an elevator (which is often hard to find and time consuming, more than once I have missed getting on an earlier flight because I was futzing around finding an elevator).

And tonight was no different, I got to Detroit and was running super late and again nearly missed the flight they had held because I had to find an elevator. I decided no more. When I got to Minneapolis I was determined I was going to baggage claim via the escalator. I didnt. I stood, I froze, I chickened out and took the elevator! But that was my last straw. I made a vow to myself I wasnt leaving the airport til I had done this, even if it meant moving in.

It took me nearly an hour of standing staring at the thing, of lifting my foot and chickening out, of putting my hand on the hand rail and pulling it away. But all the time I kept reminding myself what I have done in the gym lately and what I have done on Snapper. And finally, awkwardly I took that first step. And my body cooperated. The next thing I knew I was down the escalator (truth after getting on the ride was easy, as I suspected it would be). I had done it. I had trusted my body to be there, and it was!!!!!

Just to be sure I did it a second time. I can't say it was a ton easier the second time, and it was still pretty awkward, but again. My body cooperated.

I truly hope this accomplishment tonight is a turning point for me, or a realization of the turning point that happened the first time I got on a horse. It is time to learn to trust my body again, to believe in it to function and to keep me safe!!!!!

The Horse Lover's Bug....

My friend Kathy gave me this today, I believe she found it in one of the "Chicken Noodle for the Soul..." books. It was so touching I wanted to share it.

The Horse Lover's Bug....

All horse lovers know the bug.
It doesn't buzz or chirp or hop around.
It doesn't stare back at you  with big bulging eyes.
It lands on your heart, does its job and disappears without a trace.

You're not left with a painful sting, itch or a welt,
Just an inexplicable passion that shapes your thoughts, your habits and your dreams.

The horse bug is now a part of your fabric!

Four Legged Lesson in Trust...

Another amazing ride today, my first trail ride, again on the great Snapper (or Snapple as we may now be calling him...LOL). As usual I got there in a horrid mood, not wanting to eat at all today and really stressed out, and the second I started interacting with Snapper it all went away and I was only in that moment (a lesson Snapper reinforced by stepping on my foot to remind me he was supposed to be my sole focus *smile*)

After we saddled the horses up we headed out onto the stellar property at Woodloch Stables, I hadn't been farther than around the barns and arenas so had no clue the beautiful scenery on the property. We rode back to the fields and the stream. The stream ended up being my classroom for the day. This was the first time I rode on anything other than basically flat terrain and I have to admit all my fears came back about riding (or more appropriately falling off) and that was slightly heightened when the instructor's new horse who has never been across a stream decided he wasn't doing this and she sent us across with her watching from the bank (she only later told us she normally doesnt do that). Truth when her horse balked I was happy because I thought she was going to tell me I didnt have to go either, but now I am so glad she made me do it.

On the first trip across I was panicky going down the bank and even more so about crossing the water, I wanted to stop 100 times and chicken out (like I do in the gym when I tell Nick "I'm done"). And I think Snapper knew that, because after we got across and were turning around something really amazing happened, Snapper turned his head just enough to give me a look, and in his eyes I could see exactly what he was trying to tell me "relax, I got this one no problem".

And in that moment I realized why it is called RIDING and NOT DRIVING. That riding a horse isn't about me being perfect or knowing what I am doing all the time, but about learning to trust that the horse knows what they are doing, that they wont do something they are uncertain about (as George showed us) and that while trust is not something I have ever been good at and I am certainly not good at trusting when it means my sense of safety, that that is part of what I am meant to learn through these majestic animals. That they are there to teach my what humans have never gotten through to me on!

That second trip through the stream was a moment I will never forget. I can say without a doubt it is the first time in my life I have ever felt 100% safe and secure putting myself in the care of another living creature!

The rest of the ride was just beautiful, we rode through a huge open field with 5 foot tall grasses, the sun shining, it was so peaceful. I could have stayed out there forever (and Snapper seemed to agree, he thought he had found the buffet line *grin*). We also got a few minutes on the way back just him and I ahead of the other horses just for some quiet time, it was a great ending to the trip.

Although I have to admit I was sad when it ended, I could have stayed on his back for days. I knew my stressors and the noise and all of reality were waiting for me back in my car, but at least for that 90 minutes I had my silence and calm that I seem to only find on horseback.

Horses make so much more sense to me...

This whole new fascination with horses has really confused me the last couple weeks. I was never the little girl growing up who begged for a pony or wanted to be around horses. My cousin had a horse I got on a couple times, but it really did nothing for me, and more than anything it terrified the life out of me. So when I agreed to try a riding lesson a few weeks ago the last thing I expected was to find my "thing". That I would now be considering owning or leasing a horse, that I would be taking any chance I can find to ride, or just be around them was never even something I pondered.

In trying to make sense of this new found interest, it hit me part of why I enjoy being around horses....is that they "tell it" like it is...there is no guessing what they are thinking, there are no games....if the horse agrees with something you know it, and if they don't they make in abundantly clear. There is no having to figure out where you stand or what the hidden messages are!

That makes sense to me. I was with a friend yesterday trying to groom her unbroken horse, Abi. Abi wanted no part of it, he didnt stand and pretend he was good with it when he wasn't, he didn't humor us. He stomped his foot, snorted and walked away from us. When Snapper, the horse I ride up in Hugo, wants to eat, he stops and eats, when he wants to sleep, he stops and sleeps, he doesnt care if we are mid ride, or what I want from him. Clear signals, I know if what I am doing is right or wrong.

And he expects clear signals back from me if he is giving me what I need. I actually confused Snapper last weekend because with the strength difference between my left and ride side my cues to him are unbalanced and unclear. He wasn't sure what I wanted from him, so he gave me nothing. They give what they expect to receive - clear commands and responses.

When you are learning to ride they tell you everything you try to communicate to a horse should have three parts. You should warn them what you are about to ask of them, you should ask it and then you should reinforce it. Imagine how easy life would be if all our commications happened like that??

Beyond the most wonderful part for me of being around horses, the fact that it is the only time my mind seems to be able to so concentrate on one thing that everything else falls away, it is also the only time I dont spend time reading into things, analyzing them and questioning everything I do, because the horse gives me honest, immediate, reliable feedback. I dont need to guess because there is no question.

They also take clear responsibility for their behavior. They are proud of what they do and want. They don't half do anything, they don't blame it on others. They either do something or they don't, and if they do they give it 100% or they don't do it at all.

They also do not lose themselves or their needs in things. I am learning horse are MUCH more loving animals than I ever realized. Spending time with Kass and Abi yesterday it is VERY clear they know who Liz and Kathy are, they are bonded to them, they are loving to them and they accept love back. Abi gives the most amazing kisses. But despite that they are true to themselves. When Abi wants to set his foot somewhere, Kathy better know where her feet are because he is doing what he wants/needs despite his love for her. For them being in a "relationship" doesnt mean having to subjugate themselves. There is mutual respect and admiration, but not at the cost of self. I admire that. It seems to me in most human relationships people end up having to lose part of themselves, albeit to gain something in being in a relationship, to make it work. While maybe a worthwhile sacrafice, that we hide behind the word compromise, it still seems wrong to me. The way a horse loves makes much more sense to me. Love means adding to who they are, not becoming someone or something they aren't. Love makes them more secure not less, and too often in human relationships that is a rarity!

Added after posting....

Kass's Mom Liz just posted this on her FB page, it struck me how much it goes along with what I just said... http://www.facebook.com/pages/Buck-The-Film/175055519187765#!/video/video.php?v=170752506319821&oid=175055519187765&comments

Better Living Through Chemistry....me, PTC and "Magic P"......

This is another one of those posts that I have gone back and forth on, I can never figuring out the line on when I am sharing too much or not enough, but since I know I have many friends in the same boat as I am, here I go again.

I have talked about this before in the blog, but for those who havent been reading that long. I am one of the millions of people in the world with a "hidden" chronic illness. Unless you knew me well you would never know I have lost my sight multiple times, had meningitis twice, had 5 eye surgeries, 4 shuts, and went through a period of time where I was undergoing weekly spinal taps (around 90 in total and hospitalizations every week or two.

To the outside world I look normal, but in 1991 I was diagnosed with Pseudotumor Cerebri (PTC) also known as Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension or Benign Intracranial Hypertension. Essentially for some reason my body make or retains too much of the fluid around my brain, spine and optic nerves and when it is out of control it results in the same symptoms as a brain tumor (without really having a tumor). I think I have had it since I was at least 10 or 12 but it was diagnosed at age 21. The cause is unknown and I truly believe there are a bunch of different causes for different people (that it is more of a syndrome than one disease) which is why one treatment hasnt worked for most and why there are so many possible causes documented.

Luckily for me in 1996 I was in a position (my first career was in bio-med research before I got sick and once I did I switched to actually studying PTC) to accidently find the answer to my PTC. Long long story short, I have a set of enzymes in my liver which dont work right. When I take the wrong medication or eat the wrong food it kicks off a whole series of problems which cascade into decreasing the serotonin in my brain...resulting in too much cerebrospinal fluid production and also often depression (serotonin is one of a group of chemicals our body uses to regulate our moood, sleep, hunger and a ton of other things).

That finding in 1996 led to me being treated successfully with a drug called Parnate (Tranylcypromine). Parnate is a monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI) which is an old class of anti-depressants that actually work at the liver level instead of the brain level and work well at stopping the chain of events that sets off my PTC. When I started Parnate in 96 within 3 days the symptoms I had lived with daily for 5 years disappeared. We started calling it "Magic P" because of what it did for me, and later other PTC patients.

Parnate, all MAOI's, are not without HUGE risk (which is why they arent used much). Being on one means sacraficing eating many foods, and taking many medications and being very vigil to my blood pressure - simply eating a bite of the wrong food can send it to a lethal level!!!! But for me the risk and costs were worth it. Total remission almost instantaneously. I stayed on Parnate until 2002. When I was able to successfully come off it and manage my PTC by avoiding certain foods and medicines that cause my enzymes to go off kilter again. I have had essentially 15 symptom free years!

Unfortunately I was not careful enough this year, and started 2 supplements in February without fully researching them, and my PTC flared. It wasnt too bad as far as most of my physical symptoms, but it was enough to know it was back. But the worst part was it sent my mood spinning again.

Now dont get me wrong, PTC is not the cause of all the current stress in my life. But the reality for me, even if I dont like to face it, is that I am prone to chemically induced depression and when it is out of control (when my Serotonin is too low) everything that I might normally struggle with, like my eating disorder, is magnified 10000000 times over and becomes much bigger than it should be.

That is where I have been the last month or two. Not only fighting my ED but also the emotional effects of my PTC being back. And I was sinking deeper and deeper into it.

Despite logically knowing all that, I fought a medication answer. As much as I know that for me taking this medication is no different than taking an anti-biotic for an infection or taking chemotherapy to treat cancer, I get very hung up in what will people think of me if they hear I am on an anti-depresant. I find myself being VERY quick to defend it being for PTC not for depression. I also fight medication for as dumb as it sounds, it feels like a cop out to me. It is treating something I should be able to fix somehow myself without the help.

But luckily I am surrounded by some really good people right now, who have figured out how to kick me to do the right thing when I dont want to. This past week we restarted the Parnate, and I have to admit now that it has kicked in I feel like a fool for struggling this long when there was an answer out there for me.

I feel better in the last couple days energy wise and mood wise than I have in a long time. Looking back I almost wonder if something spurred my PTC months ago, before the supplement issue, and it has been out of wack at a low grade for most of the last year. I know I havent felt like myself in a very long time, physically or emotionally, and it has been nice this weekend to see shades of me again.

I still have a lot of work I need to do, none of this erases the mess I have with my eating, but I do feel like it is helping me at least be better able to face that and at least consider the help of the people around me!!!!!

Today was the first good weekend day I remember in a long time...I got my hair done, went for a walk in the park, had a massage, came home and cooked and froze some meals. It is the first Saturday in a year that I didnt end up on the couch vegging. It felt really nice to be part of the human race again!!!!!!!

I know many people are like me, we fight the use of medication, particularly when it is for mood issues, but the lesson in all this and why I decided to share...is that depression IS chemical, it IS an imbalance in the body, it IS a disorder/disease and getting help is no less valid than going in for a broken arm or stitches. Society has marginalized mental health care, but the reality is there really is no difference between "regular" medical needs and psychological medical needs. It is not something any of us has done wrong, or any flaw we are responsible for. Our moods are a reflection of what is going on in the chemistry in our bodies!!!!!!!!

Real life barbie....

Just got back from a long chat with the therapist about my eating and why I am having such a hard time with it all today, and ironically a friend had posted a story on Facebook about a lifesize Barbie that was made to the proportions of the doll.... http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/42595605

The bust is...... 39", the waist....18" and the hips....33". The picture is quite striking....

This be the verse - Thanks Thom....

My brother shared this with me as a response to my earlier post, and it made me smile so I am sharing it....

"This be the verse"
Philip Larkin


They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

For Children Who Are Broken..

I was given a copy of this poem 15 years ago, and havent thought of it since. But a conversation today reminded me of it and I went and hunted it down. It explains me better than I ever could...


For Children Who Are Broken...
Elia Wise


For children who were broken
it is very hard to mend......
Our pain was rarely spoken
and we hid the truth from friends.

Our parents said they loved us,
but they didn't act that way.
They broke our hearts and stole our worth,
with the things that they would say.

We wanted them to love us.
We didn't know what we did
to make them yell at us and hit us,
and wish we weren't their kid.

They'd beat us up and scream at us
and blame us for their lives.
Then they'd hold us close inside their
arms and tell us confusing lies
of how they really loved us
-- even though we were BAD,
and how it was OUR fault they hit us,
OUR fault that they were mad.

When days were just beginning
we sometimes prayed for them to end,
and when the pain kept coming,
we learned to just pretend
that we were good and so were they
and this was just one of those days
...tomorrow we'd be friends.

We had to believe it so.
We had nowhere else to go.
Each day that we pretended,
we replaced reality
with lies, or dreams,
or angry schemes,
in search of dignity ....
until our lies got bigger
than the truth,
and we had no one real to be

Our bodies were forsaken.
With no safe place to hide,
we learned to stop
hearing and feeling
what they did to our outsides.

We tried to make them love us,
till we hated ourselves instead,
and couldn't see a way out,
and wished that they were dead.


We scared ourselves by thinking that
and scared ourselves to know,
that we were acting just like them
--and might ever more be so.

To be half the size of a grown-
up and trapped inside their pain....
To every day lose everything
with no savior or refrain...


To wonder how it is possible
that God could so forget
the worthy child you knew you were,
when you had not been damaged yet ...

To figure on your fingers
the years till you'd be grown
enough to leave the torment
and survive away from home,
were more than you could count to,
or more than you could bear,
was the reality we lived in
and we knew it wasn't fair.

We who grew up broken
are somewhat out of time,
struggling to mend our childhood,
when our peers are in their prime.


Where others find love and contentment,
we still often have to strive
to remember we are worthy,
and heroes just to be alive.

Some of us are healing.
some of us are stealing.
Most are passing the anger on.
Some give their lives away to drugs,
or the promise of life beyond.


Some still hide from society.
Some struggle to belong.
But all of us are wishing
the past would not hold on so long.

There's a lot of digging down to do
to find the child within,
to love away the ugly pain
and feel innocence again.


There is forgiveness worthy of angel's
wings for remembering those at all,
who abused our sacred childhood
and programmed us to fall.


To seek to understand them,
and how their pain became our own,
is to risk the ground we stand on
to climb the mountain home.

The journey is not so lonely
as in the past it has been ...
More of us are strong enough
to let the growth begin.


But while we're trekking up the mountain
we need everything we've got,
to face the adults we have become,
and all that we are not.

So when you see us weary
from the day's internal climb ...
When we find fault with your best efforts,
or treat imperfection as purposeful crime ...


When you see our quick defenses,
our efforts to control,
our readiness to form a
plan of unrealistic goals ...


When we run into a conflict
and fight to the bitter end,
remember ....
We think that winning means
we won't be hurt again.

When we abandon OUR thoughts and feelings,
to be what we believe YOU want us to,
or look at trouble we're having,
and want to blame it all on you...


When life calls for new beginnings,
and we fear they re doomed to end,
remember...


Wounded trust is like a wounded knee--
It is very hard to bend.

Please remember this
when we are out of sorts.
Tell us the truth, and be our friend.

For children who were broken...
it is very hard to mend.

Monsters Under the Bed...

Monster spray and flashlights, the weapons we are given by our parents for fighting the monster who lives under our bed. But what are the weapons when our parents were the monster under the bed?

Safe seems to be the big word in my life lately. How often I don't feel safe and how much I long for that safety. It is something as children we should be entitled to and not have to question, but somehow I never got there. And have no clue how to get there...

How does one feel safe in being able to trust others to protect them, when the people who were supposed to protect us as a child never did....

How does one feel safe in who we are, when the people who made us who we are never saw a single good in anythng we did or said....

How does one feel safe in reaching out to others for help, love or support, when those who claimed to love us used and withdrew love as a weapon to control and to punish.....

How does one feel safe in their own body, when that body has turned against you and failed you on such a catastrophic level, when your legs have not held you and your feet have tripped you to the point of broken bones and painful bruises....

How does one feel safe in eating, when food has been dictated as the enemy and the cause of so much bad in your life...

How does one feel safe in their own judgement, when you have been proven a fool and used so many times....

How does one feel safe to show who we truly are, when the world has done little but laugh, criticize and condemn...

How does one feel safe in the words of others, when those words have lied, schemed and hurt more times than they have healed or comforted...

My mother used to tell me over and over again, the past is the past, what she did has no impact on me, that I was now responsible for my own future, to stop living in the past, it's done and it's over, move on...! And I believed her, just like I believed there weren't monsters under the bed!

Stuck in reverse....

I had a really interesting shopping experience yesterday, I was looking for business clothes appropriate for giving presentations in front of large groups, so dress or skirt or suit type clothes. With where I am at these days with my views on my body shopping is not something I really enjoy, but it had to be done. As usual that meant a trip to the outlet mall. It was probably the least enjoyable shopping I have done in the last 16 months (well of course except for the shoe shopping part *smile* nothing messes up shoe shopping).

I just am not happy with where I am at physically, how I look and that mindset makes clothes look a lot worse to me, no matter how good they look to other people.

In the end I found a dress, a pair of pink capris, a few pairs of pants (all the same style but different colors) and a shirt. They work, others think they look ok. But I am really struggling with them, because of the size. The pants/capris were a 16. A year ago getting into a 16 was a dream I never thought I would reach, the day I got there I felt I had won the lottery. I blogged on here about it http://totallypredictableunpredictability.blogspot.com/2010/07/forwardregardlessrelentlessthat-is.html . Pictures went up on Facebook. It fle like a miracle. But 8 months later, it doesnt feel so great. I have made no real progress in that time, and while my body is somewhat in the same place (I have lost about 30 lbs since then, but not around my waist which is why I am the same size) my brain feels like I have gone backwards!

As I looked today at the clothes today that I bought I was really struggling trying to be happy about them, I logically know I should be so thrilled to be able to buy that size. But I just couldn't get there. So I decided to drag out my "before clothes" thinking maybe if I laid the new clothes on top of them I could see it. It has worked before. Today, not so much. I found myself slipping into "there isnt that much difference" or "there isnt enough difference" instead of that "wow" I used to get at comparisons.

Its so frustrating. I know on one level how hard I have worked, how far I have come, but on the emotional level I am not connecting to it any more. Its funny, I always thought if I found the theoretical genie in a bottle my wishes would be to move my life forward, but I think instead right now, I would wish to go back 16 months...just for one day....to remember how hard life was, how miserable I was then, to reconnect to where I came from, in hopes it would help me refind the value in where I am today, because I have lost hold of it. And my greatest fear, if I dont find a way to value where I am at now, I will start slipping back physically to where I was then!!!!!

The Magic Wand of a Fat Child....

For many of us who grew up "broken" and overweight, we have believed for a very long time (and in many cases have been told flat out) that if we would just lose weight, get thin, things would be better. That people would love us, would respect us, support us, care about us and want us in their lives, something we haven't felt or believed in most of our lives, if ever. These message may have come from parents who themselves were broken and didn't know how to love, but instead of facing that put the blame on us; from schoolmates who found security from their own insecurities by putting others down; from the media who blares hour after hour how the good people are thin and the bad people are fat. No matter where the messages came from, for many of us they shaped who we are, what we do and how we think, even if we don't realize it that is what drives us.

This post is much more personal than I would normally share. This is something I would limit to my private blog which only my eating disorder treatment team (therapist, dietician and physician) and my personal trainer would see. But in the last two days I have conversations with two of my friends, that made me realize, I need to say this 'out loud'. That I need to be the one brave enough to go public with my feelings on this. Jen and Angie, I am sharing whats in my heart and my head because I love you enough to not want you not to end up where I am!

In my last post I shared I was seeking treatment for my eating issues, I am about a month in now and have gone from just the therapist to working with a team of people. It's one of the hardest things I have ever done, it means exposing my inner thoughts and feelings in a way that, quite honestly, I find terrifying. Every session means admitting secrets I have hidden for years, feelings I am ashamed of and trying to change behaviors that while dangerous are also comforting. It is intense, emotional and at times overwhelming, but despite that, I am glad I was pushed to do it. I feel surrounded by the right people (safe people) who truly want to help and are willing to take me for who I am and that makes this the right time to deal with this. I have also come to see that this is not going to be a fast or easy road for me. That 41 years of thoughts and feelings are not going to be solved in a week or a month, that there is so much more to this than just learning to put food in my mouth and swallow.

The successful end to this journey, if it has an end, is not going to be a number on a scale or loving food and eating, but learning not to wait for the number on the scale to make me whole inside, realizing that you dont find Oz by following a diet or on a treadmill. And I can say that logically, I know that is where I need to get to, but that doesnt mean by any stretch that I am still not trying that solution. I am still battling on a daily, hourly, minute by  minute basis somedays to not see being thin as my nirvana, the key that will reverse all the pain I have faced in life, that will make everything that feels so wrong inside myself better. And more days than not right now I still lose that battle and the disordered thoughts win and I dont eat, or I over exercise. Knowing what I need to do and trusting that doing it is safe are still two very different things for me.

Here is my reality, I have struggled my entire life with feeling like I mattered, like I was wanted, like I had value in the world. I have spent most of my life doing everything I could to hear people who matter to me tell me they are proud of me, to love me and to care. I have spent most of my life feeling very alone and out of place. Sadly I dont think many of those feelings are unique to those who grew up in abusive situation, who were overweight as children or both. I have grown up as a child and now into my adult life believing if I disappeared off the planet tomorrow my absence would leave very little impact on people, that even most of my own family wouldn't notice for years, if ever.


But when I started losing weight, for the first time in my life I felt like people were proud of me, I heard that word more in the first few months than I had my whole life. For the first time ever people used words like pretty and beautiful to describe me. I finally had a group of friends and a social life, and simply put, for the first time I felt I had value. And honestly, I became addicted to feeling that way and in turn addicted to wanting to lose weight. While my whole life I had felt I was worthless because of my weight, ironically as I started lose weight my feeling of worth became directly proportional to the number on the scale dropping.

I want to be VERY clear I do not blame anyone around me for how they reacted, what they said or how it impacted me. The problem wasnt what was being said or done, the problem is was and is in my translation of those comments. There is a great irony to being "broken". Even when you do have value to people, even when you are loved and cared about you can't feel it. I know logically that people didn't love me or care about me more at 250 lbs than than did at 338 lbs, but I was more ready to believe it. I had spent so much of my life believing that if I was thinner I would be more lovable, more valuable, that when it happened and people started to notice me and express things they hadn't before, i was willing to believe it.

And the more I believed this, the more the world seemed to validate that. The greatest moment of my life, last August, was standing at Twins stadium, having 40,000 people celebrating my weight loss, but I look back at that now and realize how much that moment symbolizes how warped my thinking (and a lot of the world's) is. That losing a lot of weight would be given that much value was just a reinforcement of my backwards thinking that I mattered now that I was thinner and didnt matter before.

But sadly as quickly as I lost weight and found that feeling of worth, just as quickly it has left. A as the weight loss has stalled, I have fallen right back to how I felt about myself before, except this time into a place of desperation to get back that feeling of having value, of mattering in the world. It was something I had never had before in my life and something that I have become willing to do almost anything to get back to. Whether that whatever is not eating, working out until I drop, considering the use of diet pills, diuretics or other things. All dangerous, all stupid, but truly the sign of how addicted to the feeling of worth that losing weight gave me.

I started treatment a month ago to learn to feed my body, but what I am slowly coming to see, if that treating my eating disorder is going to be much more about feeding my heart, my soul and those pieces of me that never became what they should have. So many times through my life I have felt broken, but something Aleica has helped me see, I never got broken, because the way I grew up I never got the chance to be whole in the first place. Hopefully this is my chance to do that, and the first lesson I need to figure out is how to separate that from whatever the number on the scale or the image in the mirror is saying!!!!

Never Say You Love Me....

"Never say I love you...if you don't really care
Never talk about feelings...if they aren't really there
Never hold my hand...if you're going to break my heart
Never say you're going to...if you don't plan to start
Never look me in the eye...if all you do is lie
Never say hello....if you really mean goodbye
If you really mean forever...then say you'll try
Never say forever...'cuz forever makes me cry "

Total Disclosure.....

I started this post over two weeks ago, I have fought with it since, trying to find the right way to say all this. It might be the hardest one I have ever posted, because it means sharing some really deep dark secrets, but I am realizing I need to do that, I can't keep living with my secrets... so here it is, it isnt the perfect post, but it's honest.....those that will read it and judge me I can't worry about any more, if people can't accept that have some major flaws they just have to walk away I guess, I am who I am, I am where I am and pretending for the world isn't helping, so here it is, total disclosure.....

"Hold yourself together like a pair of bookends
But I've not tasted all your cooking
Who are you when I'm not looking?" Blake Shelton
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xXD9-1mLBY
 I am a logical, rational, highly intelligent person. I can easily sit across the table from the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and tell him how his firm is falling apart and why, I can stand in front of a room of 10,000 and speak with absolute passion and clarity about middle east peace or philanthropic needs without breaking a sweat. 

Just as easily I can sit and spout the biological needs of the body with the best medical school graduates, I am tell you without a single emotion the down sides and dangers of not eating, I can logically share that I have lost 120+ pounds because I started eating and that the scale goes up when I don't.

But not one bit of that matters as soon as I have to face a plate of food, or even the thought of one. For as far as I have come in the last 15 months in some ways I am moving backwards, and when it comes to eating, body image and coping with all that goes with that, I have moved back 15 years in the span of a few months.
 
I made a promise when I started this blog, to be honest and straight forward, and as I look back at the last couple months I am not sure I did a great job keeping that promise. I have never lied, my sin tends to be one of omission. This blog has become a tug of war for me, like so many other things. I started it to share and to vent my feelings, but people started reading it, and started coming here for motivation, so I felt less and less safe showing my flaws and my falters, to the point I started a personal blog just where I could be fully honest again. And, it wasn't just about the blog, I hid what was going on from many of the people around me (who I hope will forgive me when they read this). I realized this morning (after swearing my trainer to secrecy on something last night) that isn't fair, it's not what I promised and it does nothing for those of the rest of you also battling in silence - and I know there are many of you. So it is time for some honesty.
 
Simply put food is not going well, my self image is not going well, I am fixated on losing weight vs being healthy and getting fit and I am doing a lot of damage to myself, both physically and mentally over it. That part is probably no secret to anyone who knows me well. In the last 6 months I have retreated from doing any kind of group physical stuff (sat and watched this weekend, quite frankly in tears, as my friends did an indoor tri), I have pretty much cut out a social life because it usually involves food.

In short my eating disorder is back in full force. I am under eating, over working out and obsessing over my weight, my body and the scale. It is back to controling much of my life and it is taking its toll physically. To the point that getting help became a necessity not an option. Yet I have kept that help a secret

I started down the path to help softly a couple months ago. In January I started seeing a Health Coach, Christy. Looking back I know I needed more even back then, but I wasn't ready, heck I'm still not ready but now don't have a choice. I knew from the get go this wasnt the right fit for how bad things were, but I was hiding how bad they were, so it worked, it kept the concerned people around me happy, I was doing something. And that worked til my body told on me.

I have a horrible time with using or hearing the word malnourished about myself. I weight over 200 lbs I still can not wrap my brain around it even being possible for me to be malnourished, I keep hearing my mother say "you could live off the fat of the land for years". But that is one of the sad truths of an eating disorder, you can look fine and be destroying your body, and that is what I have been doing for months living on nearly nothing or the same couple foods (protein shakes and chicken).

And that denial finally crashed in on me sitting in my doctor's office. My body has had enough of it. I am deficient in some key areas and if I don't do something it is only going to be more problematic going forward. So I had to accept the step I have fought and fought again.

On February 21st I started seeing a therapist at an Eating Disorder Program and will be seeing her at least weekly for an unpredicatable length of time (not going away anytime soon I would guess).

I dont know why admitting that is so hard for me, but it is. It feels like the ultimate admittance of failure and weakness. I have hid it from as many people around me as I could (it is what I swore my trainer to secrecy on). It also scares me who in my life will run away screaming when they hear I am this broken. I keep thinking of all the comments that have been made to me about how I am such a motivation to people, and now I feel like I am just letting everyone down by showing my true colors.

But at the same time I also know there are a lot of people around me who are fighting the same battle and hiding it out of their own shame. I am sharing this as much for them as I am for me.

The one thing I am trying to come to terms with in working with Alecia (the therapist) is that being this screwed up isnt my fault. That it has roots in how I grew up, in how I have faced life and that it has gotten me through some really terrible situations. I can logically say that but still working on it being something I can make friends with. Either way it is who I am, it is where I am, and now its time to stop hiding it and face it.

I think in admitting this I am also taking the blog into a new phase of its life also, it is time to admit the dark side of facing issues with food and eating, maybe a lot more honestly than I have up to now. Time to share some of the dirty little secrets from the minds of those of us who battle ourselves and food, whether we weight 300, 200 or 90 lbs.

Normal isn't enough!

I apologize for there not being many posts lately. I have been at a somewhat tough place emotionally, and trying to sort it all out. I have just been really unhappy with where I am at with my weight loss (or lack there of), with not feeling like I am making all the progress in the gym I used to and a whole lot of self esteem issues because of it.

Things kind of hit the fan for me over it this past week and I turned to two wise men to help me out. The club manager (if I could vote for who in the world I would have had for a dad Tony would have been it, he is so good with wise, straight forward advice and even when I may not like what he is telling me, I always feel better about things after we talk) and my trainer, Nick. Both helped me see sides of this journey I have not seen before.

Tony particularly got me thinking about needing to change the rules I am measuring my weight loss by - that my expectations were right for when I was at 338 lbs to EXPECT a fast weight loss but now I needed to realize that to lose that same percent was going to come at a different percent but that that wasn't the same as failing, it was time for a new set of rules to measure myself against before I throw up the white flag. It was the first time someone has actually given me permission for this to happen at a slower pace (vs the expectations I was living under in the beginning) and just to have someone tell me it was ok helped a lot.


But it was something Nick said has really stuck with me though. We were talking about my feeling that the first part of this journey (Nov 09-April/May 10) I was in such a positive place and just feel like a switch was thrown and I haven't been happy with much since. Ironically I had made this comment to Tony a few months ago, but I was tying it to things with Gui. Nick got me thinking about this completely a different way, related to my body and my view of my body. As we talked it through at first I thought the switching point might have been the indoor tri I did last May (I came in last and was very disappointed in myself about that - to the point I am not doing the event this year) but after a day of thought, I think it was before that that I lost my footing. I think it was when I got back from Israel in April. That trip is the last time I can really say I felt good about myself and was happy for any period of time.


Israel has held an important role in this journey. It is where I reached my breaking points (in Feb 09 and Oct 09) and decided I was done with being so abnormal, where the true realization of how screwed up my body was making my life hit me and where I vowed to change. When I was in Israel on those trips everything physically was a struggle, from walking to getting around buildings to fitting on the bus. It's where because of my inability to do stairs and to keep I up I had to pass up the chance of a lifetime meeting a plane full of Olim because I physically couldn't do it. On the February '09 trip when we were just outside of Gaza during the height of the bombings I realized how truly life threatening my weight was when I realized if a Tzeva Adom warning (this is the warning that a bomb is about to hit) went off and we had to evacuate the bus I would probably not be able to do it fast enough and would put others at risk too. On this trip, and my subsequent one in October 09, I came to the acceptance of how abnormal I was, I came out of my denial about not just being fat but of it being a true liability and I vowed to change it.

BTW here is the blog from those two trips..... http://ylcisrael2008.blogspot.com/

When I went back to Israel in April 2010, I went back a different person, but didn't know it til I got there. I can see it when I read back to my blog posts from that trip (they are in this blog filed under April). It was the place where I realized I had left the land of the abnormal and was now part of the normal. There was nothing I wanted to do on that trip I couldn't. I walked to the marina, I climbed hills, I played on the playground in Sderot. I was like everyone else.

But what I didn't realize until the other night with Nick was I also made a mental leap on that trip, and unfortunately it wasn't a positive leap for me. My expectations changed of myself and where I saw myself in the world physically. I went from being proud of how much I had and could accomplish to feeling ashamed of myself and unhappy with where I was, because I had changed who/what I was measuring against.

When I saw myself as broken/abnormal/handicapped and I could do something new I (and quite frankly everyone around me who was used to how little I could do previously) saw it as an accomplishment but it was ok if it wasn't perfect or as good as everyone else, because it always had that asterisk after it of my limitations..."*she did great considering...!". Nick asked me when I was working out with my friends before that if I used to get upset that they were faster or better than me (like I do now) and I realized the answer was 100% no. I didn't measure myself against them because I saw myself as different. It was ok for me not to keep up with them, just that I was doing it was enough, it was more than I thought I would ever be able to do and it was a great victory. But it's not ok now.

Once I started to see myself as normal, I did start measureing myself against the people around me and quite truthfully I didn't measure up (in my eyes) and still don't feel I do. I am not as fast, I am not as coordinated, my balance is not as good. And for someone who is driven by being the best at everything this has become a real stumbling block for me.

It is a weird analogy, but the reality is I feel like I went from being the winner in all the special olympics races to the last place finisher in the olympics and I am not doing so well with that. Where I saw the first as complete success, I see where I am now as failure. And the result is frustration and fear. Frustration because I don't know how to stop myself from measuring against the people around me and frustration because I don't feel like I have the tools, mentally and physically, yet to get to the front of the pack of normal people (to use Nick's phrase, to become more than normal) and fear because what if the back of the pack is the best I can ever be? I have never in my life been ok with being the back of the pack and I worry that I might have to accept that when it comes to physical stuff, and I'm not good with that. Good enough is not good enough for me.

And that makes the fact that I have retreated the last few months make a lot more sense to me. If I cant be good at something I dont do it, so I have stopped trying in this arena. And I know that is the wrong answer. As Nick pointed out I need to figure out how to find the fire to push myself to move up in the pack, but in all honesty I dont know how to do that when it comes to physical things, and more than that worry if my body just isnt capable of it. When it is something intellectual, I can learn it no matter what it takes, I know I have the capability, but with my body I fear there are limits. Although I know Nick would tell me they are self imposed limits, and am starting to agree with him, I just dont know how to knock them down.

I dont want to make him a big focus of this (the past is the past) but there is part of me that has also been thinking aobut Gui since Nick and I talked about all this. I have thought over and over (and said to people after the last few months) that I felt we stopped being productive around April or May and wished I had opted then to make a change. I think this new realization puts that in a new light. I still think I should have changed trainers in April or May, but I see why now. It wasn't per se personalities as I was putting it on (although what it was did lead us to butt heads for sure). Gui was the right trainer to get me from abnormal to normal, he had that same goal for me. But his intent as I look back at things we talked about, was never to be the one who took me from normal to more than normal. And as I wanted/needed to get to that it became a more stressful interaction between us.

I could say I regret I wasted the months I did from April to July in that situaton, but I have been having a conversation with someone new in my life lately about things happening for a reason, once again I believe that. There is more than fate at work that put Nick at LTF when it did and me not changing trainers until the right trainer was there to help me get to that next level. Now I just have to figure out how to stop being my own limiting factor and make that happen!