Thursday, July 23, 2009

Same old with a new lesson

so nothing too exciting has happened over the past couple of days. been feeling fuller after meals and during the day. had a couple of good--i guess?--visits. however, i did forget to mention in my last blog that i got the "you go girl box" one night and it was awarded to me from my roommate who i'm quite intimidated of but admire so much at the same time. so to get that from her was quite a special thing for me. oh, and the allusive "you go girl" box is a box of random things that one girl gets to choose from every night after our post-meal meeting after the girl who got the box the night before picks a deserving girl for that night. it's basically awarded to someone who is working really hard or just dealing with some hard stuff and is still being positive or something of that nature.

BUT today good things happened to me. i was informed that i am finally able to be out of the wheelchair!!! I CAN WALK! i seriously never thought i would ever be this excited to be able to walk! going from being an exercised obsessed person--still am obviously just cant do it here--to being ecstatic about being able to walk??? is that possible? also, i got off staff supervised tables which is quite nice. i can finally sit with my peers and not have staff staring at me while i eat. granted they still watch but there isn't one staff member directly looking at me. sadly, i am still on supervised bathrooms. its stinky but i can understand why. i am still at a pretty low weight, although i did reach the weight required to be out of the wheelchair, and my vitals are still on the lower side, so it is a danger to not be able to know if i'm on when they can't see me behind the door of the bathroom--even though in the morning i take a shower unsupervised where im standing for like a half hour? haha oh well.

there has been a bit of drama in the community relating to a certain new member who has been discussing numbers, sizes, food, and ED things extremely openly. she has made comments to girls about looking "fuller" and to me about looking "healthier." this girl also happens to be my roommate which is where a lot of the issues come in. not only are her comments at therapy extremely triggering, but she decided to go through my things without asking me. last night she said "i don't mean to pry but i was looking at your pants and you have some really good ones and i was wondering if i could try them on to see if i could wear some some time." me being who i am, though i felt EXTREMELY uncomfortable with this said, oh yea sure i guess if you want. so she proceeded to try two pairs on--my favorite ones mind you. they fit, but somewhat tightly. so:
#1, i was NOT ok with her wearing my clothes. i don't like to share clothes with anyone, whether it be me wearing theirs or someone wearing mine.
#2, SHE WAS STRETCHING OUT MY PANTS. pants that are already too big for me right now and that i wanted to wear again when they fit.
#3, ILLEGAL to do in this place and not cool for ED stuff.
THEN she proceeds to ask if i want to see how she measures if shes "ok" as far as weight goes when she doesn't have a scale to go by--i.e. when shes here because they do blind weights. so she takes out this pair of black shorts, puts them on, and examines herself. when she fits without any "muffin top" shes "ok." if not, she needs to loose weight. so i kinda told her how those are probably not good to have here at all and how that is not helping her ED at all.
THEN today. i walk in the room and shes is putting MY pants back into my closet. i just kind of ignored this and went on my bed and read. she then went on her bed too to read and finally said something like:
"so i feel really bad that you walked in on me today going through your pants again. ive just been feeling really horrible about myself and i knew your pants were a size 0 so i wanted to try them on to feel better. i fit in them, so i felt better about myself. but i guess it's good that you came in cuz i probably really shouldn't be doing that."
UM NO YOU SHOULDNT BE! but me, once again being who i am just nicely said something like "yea, you really shouldn't be comparing yourself to me. its not going to help you get comfortable with you and it doesn't help your treatment or your ED."

i was quite bothered by all this and discussed it in therapy today and i checked-in with a staff member tonight. long story short. i confronted her about the incident and about the things she says to girls and how open she is. she took it well and was very receptive. it felt good to say this to her and finally say something to someone when they do something to make me uncomfortable since in NEVER speak up, but just deal with my discomfort instead. hopefully now she will be more conscious of how what she says really does affect and trigger others in the community.

so some good things and some bad things and obviously there are ED struggles along the way that don't really need to be discussed but are for me to sit with and challenge. i am glad that i finally took the initiative to say something about my discomfort with the happenings of late. im always so afraid that when confronting someone i will make the situation between me and that person awkward and that rather than having just me feel uncomfortable, both of us will after the confrontation, so i just figure one person uncomfortable is better than one. as a result, i continue to feel uncomfortable and the situation only escalates as well as my discomfort. and then a whole other barrel of fun begins with anger and resentment. however, this experience showed me that some people are extremely receptive to being confronted. though it didn't go as perfectly and poetically as i would have liked, i took the step to try and assert myself and do what i needed to to explain my discomfort. maybe ill try this out more often and will find that i don't have to live in a world of discomfort and fear of how other people will react. after all i cant control how people will react to what i have to say but at least i can try. and maybe, a lot of people will be like my roommate and appreciate and learn from what i have to say.

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