Staying busy

Its Monday, y'all! I just finished my oatmeal and raisin concoction for breakfast and am waiting to lecture to a class of Master's degree seeking students. I find it ironic that I'm lecturing to these kids as a "professional", a dietitian with a master's degree, and a 4th year PhD candidate at a pretty dang good university. But these kids are really my age and older and likely have their lives together much better than the dietitian over here, wondering what she'll have for lunch and if she'll keep it down already.

Somehow, with a raging case of alcoholism and bulimia, restrictive, and over-exercising tendencies, I graduated with a bachelor of science in Nutrition and a minor in psychology in 3 years of undergrad. During my 4th year of school, I managed to finish a combined dietetic internship and master's in public health nutrition. I also managed a bar, working upwards of 25 hours each week. During this time, I was chronically tired, hungry, lonely, and angry at myself for turning into a super functional fuck up. It's fairly well known that the HALT acronym (hungry, angry, tired, loney) nails the triggers for eating disorder behavior, so it's no wonder I was so sick throughout college.

I have only recently understood how important several key ideas are to recovery from pretty much anything. The first idea is to accept help from others. We are often perfectionists, always doing and going and providing, and never cutting our eating disordered selves a break. It's unthinkable to ask for anything, let alone help for a problem. I have learned that recovery is not possible without accepting help from friends, family, support groups, and your team of professionals responsible for taking care of you. The second idea is to relax. You must schedule down time for yourself and you must learn how to do nothing. Whether your down time is spent taking a nap, lounging on the couch, or laying by a pool, it's so so important to make sure you're successful in recovery. Don't underestimate the power of doing nothing!

This brings me back to the reason I'm writing this post. I'm listening to the first lecturer right now and ready to give my portion of the lecture soon, and my mind is begging me for a break. With the conference last week, I worked long hours and only had Sunday to mysef. I need down time and I need it soon! I'm hungrier than usual, more tired on shorter runs, and more irritable than I prefer. These are all signs that I'm pushing too hard right now and even undoing some of the hard work I've put into recovery. So, during this week while P is out of town, I'm going to leave work at the end of my 8.5 hours, not bring anything home to finish, and focus on filling my evenings with rest, support groups like ANAD and AA (both of which I truly enjoy), and a big bunch of nothing.

I think I'm doing a good enough job in eating, exercise, and sobriety that I trust myself with unstructured down time, but I also know I'm prone to slip-ups. But! I have a ton of friends to catch up with this week and a whole dang memoir to write and publish. So I should be a-okay!

I'd love to hear from you readers through comments and/or messages. Who's out there reading my meaningless words? What are your favorite down time activities? I need some new hobbies and welcome your feedback!