Eating Disorders / Mental Health

LOOKING FORWARD

Today was a non-linear recovery day. You know – the old cha cha cha – a few steps forward, a few steps back. Recovery is a non-linear process. But that’s okay – I keep telling myself…

I made some really excellent decisions today and made some really excellent progress. Then I made some really crap decisions and slipped back again. Cha cha cha.

But what I have done is focus on two little things – writing and looking to the future. I didn’t do a lot of writing today – I actually did paid work during my paid work hours today. But after work when the normal temptations descended upon me, I quickly sent out a message – while endeavouring to avoid running into a light pole at the same time – and once again, I didn’t need to eat. I actually stopped thinking about food. Briefly! But every brief success is a big improvement on last week.

Then I got caught in a highly emotional and slightly distressing situation and got stuck back into the chocolates and biscuits. C’est la vie… This eating disorder is going to go down kicking and screaming. But it’s going to go down.
Which brings me to the second point – while writing is awesome as a go-to tool in the moment, long term, I need to look forward and get a picture of where I’m heading and why I want to go there.

I don’t have major dreams for the future – I only ever had two major dreams in life, become a mother and making a living as a flautist. I’ve been a mother – three times over for my biological children, and more times than I count for my niece, nephews and students over the years. Mothering has been my purpose in life for as long as I can remember – love, love, loved it. But it too has passed.

My career as a flautist is over.

I’m okay with that – I’m sad and relieved. I’m really melancholy. I loved it but I don’t want to go back. It wasn’t everything I wanted it to be but was so much more than it could have been. There were a lot of really awesome times. I never felt so alive and whole as I did when performing in a show, but it’s history now. I need a new future. I need to look forward and think of something else.

In the past few weeks I have been told from numerous sources I should write. Well – I am writing! Not for money or profit or purpose. Just for fun and just for me. I absolutely love writing though, and find it is a safe place for me to express and explore. Somewhere I can get lost and be creative and feel engaged. Not sure what I would DO with writing in the future… But it is my focus for now. Keep writing here and see what happens.

I have had lots of blog posts published on The Mighty, and BayArt, and there are other sites are publishing one or two of my stories here and there. Not exactly big time – but for now I’ve been very introspective with my writing. Perhaps I’ll venture out and do something more interesting one day.

I have signed up for a seven-day writing challenge which I’m looking forward to. No idea what’s involved. Not entirely sure why I want to do it, but when it comes to writing, the world is my oyster. I don’t feel a need to make a career out of it – which is a blessed relief, as making a career as a writer is even more problematic than making a career as a musician! And I am perfectly happy with the lovely job I do now anyway. But stringing a few words together and emphatically sharing my opinion with people, sounds like a nice fun way to spend some of my future.

So – looking forward, into the land of my future self, I hope to find myself writing regularly about not just mental health issues (I’m getting bored writing about the same old crap all the time…) but about everything interesting in my world. I’m sure there will be other lovely things in my future – like travelling, finishing our house, and meeting my grand-babies – but a purely selfish and cathartic pursuit, will be writing.

My first genuine future goal. I’m looking forward to it.