With the one who makes me happy

Its 5:20am and im laying in my new bed in my new room unable to sleep. After an incredibly long and tiring day yesterday filled with packing, cleaning, moving and driving, I slept really well for the first half of the night. However now I am feeling wide awake and sleep feels like an very far off thing. So I thought I may as well use this time to write a quick post and update you all on how things are going.

 I If I have learnt anything through being sick, its that life is way too short to spend time unhappy of you dont need to be. To me, being happy is more important then having any particular type of career or heaps of money. That is why, after leaving my job and home behind in Swansea, and even my family and friends, I dont feel any regrets. Because now I can spend more time with the guy that I love and who makes me happier then anyone else makes me.

I have decided to apply to university in a Bachelor if Health science at university as that is available with mid year entry and I can already see that the course is well suited to me. I like the sound of all the units and am looking forward to once again studying these subjects that I am so passionate about and interested in. Last time I was at university, I wasnt in a good headspace at all. My anxiety was at an all time high (although I refused to take medication for it) and I was very underweight. This time I feel ready to get back into uni and im sure with the support of my wonderful boyfriend, I will be fine.

How things have changed

It really amazing for me to look back now and see just how far I have come in the past 12 months. To really demonstrate this i thought I would do a comparison of my weekend this weekend to a typical weekend for me a year ago.

For starters, back then I was underweight with an extremely unhealthy bmi of only 14. Now however, my bmi is 19 which puts me within the healthy bmi range. I know that I am still thin but am just happy that I am a healthy weight for my height. I have quite a petite frame and my siblings and parents are all thin so as long as my mind stays healthy I am happy with my current weight and have no desire to change my weight.

A year ago, if someone had asked me if I liked my body or the way I looked, I would have said definetely not. But now, I can honestly say that i dont mind my body and how I look. I know that I am healthy and that is the most important thing!

This past weekend I have been out to a restaurant for two different meals as well as eating lunch at a bakery. Eating out like this was aomething that I would have found terrifying 12 months ago and would have avoided at all costs. Now however I love going out for meals, especially with my boyfriend.

I also went for tea at my parents house and ate tea which was prepared for me by my mum which is something I refused to do 12 months ago. The reason this terrified me so much back then was because I hated eating an unknown number of calories.

Now, although I do still keep a rough track of how much i eat most days (mainly because I seem to undereat if i dont), knowing exactly how many calories I eat really doesn't matter to me anymore. I have finally come to the realisation that its ok to eat more sometimes and that a little extra food wont hurt me or make me instantly gain heaps of weight.

I am also comfortable drinking alcohol when i got out with my boyfriend and friends which is something I never would have done. I no longer have a fear of consumimg liquid calories and find a lot of enjoyment in being sociable anddrinking with friends. I also drink things like hot chocolate or juice, which i would have considered to be a waste of calories, 12 months ago,  sinply because I feel like them and enjoy them.

I also have a much healthier relationship with exercise now. Unlike 12 months ago when I would have been incredibely anxious about walking any less then my usual amount, now it doesnt bother me. For example both yesterday and the day before I only took my dog for one walk instead of two as I usually would as I wanted to spend more time with my boyfriend. And today I barely went for a walk at all as it started to rain just as I left my house.

I really enjoy being active and being fit and healthy but at the same time exercising less then usual doesnt cause me any worry or concern as it ince would have. 12 months ago, walking a certain distance each day was a priority for me. Now however, I have other priorities that are more important to me like my boyfriend, my health and my hapiness.

12 months ago I was on medication for my anxiety and also medication for my skin. Now I dont feel as though i need any of these medications so don't take them. Since reaching a gealthy weight and nourishing my body and mind I feel as though I think so much more rationally and clearly. My skin is also so much clearer due to me stressing less and eating so much better.

12 months ago I suffered from insomnia and was therefore exhausted all the time and trying to function daily on almost no sleep. Now I honestly believe that the insomnia was simply die to me refusing to give my body the amount of food it truly needed and deserved. Now I have no trouble sleeping and can actually sleep in some days which is something I could never do.

I wanted to share how things have changed for me over the last year so that you can all see that it is possible to recover. Its not easy... in fact its probably the hardest thing you will ever do in your life. It was for me anyway. But please trust me when I say it is so worth it. Recovering may be the hardest thing you ever do but it is also the most wonderful. Because the life you have at the end of it is worth every bit of pain and anxiety. So please, keep fighting with all you've got. Believe in yourselves like I did and you could be where I am today in 12 months time!

Me and my boyfriend, who is without a doubt the most wonderful thing that has come out of my recovery

Making big changes

In the last few months, I have been thinking a lot about my life at the moment and the future. While doing this I came to the realisation that if I want to stay with my boyfriend, then one of us were going to have to make a move as we live 3 hours apart. So since I definetely want to stay with my boyfriend and miss him A LOT when we are apart, I have decided to move to Launceston with him, which is a city an hour and a half away.

My plan is to work for the year and save some money before possibly going back to university next year. My boyfriends parents own a house in Launceston that we will be living in and my boyfriend plans to continue working in his current job but travel about an hour to get there each day and then another hour to get back. I feel bad that he will have to do so much travelling but also quite honoured that he loves and cares about me enough so that he is willing to travel.

It has been a big decision, to leave my life, job and family behind in Swansea but I am excited for what the future holds. I have decided to make the move up to Launceston over the easter period and honestly cant wait. Although I am not looking forward to actually packing up all my house and cleaning it from top to bottom at all.

Some people have expressed their concern about me giving up my job and moving away to live with someone who I have been with for less then 6 months, but I honestly feel in my heart that it is the best thing to do. Ever since getting sick I have realised that all that truly matters in life is being happy and my boyfriend makes me incredibely happy. So I'm not going to pass up on the opportunity to be with the one person who makes me truly happy out of fear that something could go wrong.

Having a boyfriend has really helped me in the final stages of my recovery

While this may not be the case for everyone,  my boyfriend has helped me enormously to overcome the last few stages of recovery. I think that this has been the case for me because he is such a wonderful person who I have developed a very special bond with so quickly. While it has helped me a lot, it is very important to note that having a boyfriend is not necessarily always a positive thing in recovery. This depends not only on what stage of recovery you are at but also the type of person your boyfriend is.

Although I was already weight restored when I met my boyfriend,  my mental state has continued to improve in leaps and bounds. When we began going out for dinner all the time, drinking alcohol  and enjoying food together, I really was still scared of all of those things. But just being with such a wonderful person really did help me to get through all of those things and eventually enjoy them with no fear at all. Now I have completely overcome the fears of eating extra food on some occasions and also eating out and consuming liquid calories. In fact, I now enjoy doing all of these things!

The fact that my weight has remained constant since I have started going out and eating more sometimes, has really proven to me that its perfectly fine to eat more sometimes and that doing this won't hurt me. No matter how many times I read or was told this was the case, I never truly believed it. Nathan has helped me to really start living and in the process has helped prove to me that eating extra doesnt necessarily lead to weight gain and is not a bad thing. It has also shown me that missing meals sometimes wont hurt me either. I know now that our bodies are not calorie counting machines and our energy requirements are not an exact science.

Having someone who loves and accepts me completely for who I really am really has helped me to accept myself too. I really do think that my low self esteem and poor confidence is what caused my eating disorder in the first place and it was also preventing me from making a full  recovery. For a long time I knew that learning to accept myself was an essential part of my recovery and I was right, because it is only through learning to respect and appreciate myself for who I truly am have I been able to overcome the final few stages of recovery.

Occasionaly, I still have moments when I wish to be thinner or am not completely satisfied with how I look but I think that this is all just a normal part of being a girl and I never act on these thoughts. The main reason being that I know my boyfriend likes me just the way I am and there is therefore no reason to change. Also, I know that if I got sick again I would hurt my boyfriend and possibly lose him, which are two things I couldn't bare to do. So not only has my boyfriend helped me to make recovery progress, but it has also stopped me from slipping backwards in my recovery too.

Recovery makes you stronger

This is so true! After overcoming all of the obstacles of recovery, I know that I am much stronger then I have ever been before....

An amazing weekend

As you would have most likely realised from this post title, this weekend has been another amazing one for me! After not seeing my boyfriend for 10 days, I was so excited to see him on Friday night. As usual we went to the local pub for tea and drinks. I had my usual chicken caesar salad which is my all time favourite food. It is so good to be able to eat foods like caeser salad which contains many different foods that wouod have once really frightened me withno guilt at all. Even though it contains things like cheese, full fat dressing, bacon, croutons and chicken, I still always completethe entire thing and enjoyevery single bite of themassive portion!

I saw this on facebook last night and laughed so hard 😂

On Saturday we just enjoyed spending time together. Except when I got up and walked Tess by myself as Nathan is always too lazy to go with me. We watched some of the cricket which was being played in Swansea and visited my dad and sister. We went for lunch at the bakery and then back to the pub again for tea. This time I had spaghetti bolognaise with a side of vegetables which was tasty too! My brother and also lots of the local youth were at the pub so we had a really great night and didnt leave until midnight. Many games of 8 ball were played and many beers were also drunk!

When Nathan, my cousin Siarne and I got back to my place at about a quarter to 1 we stayed up a little later snacking on chocolate and chips and having many laughs before going to bed. We didnt get out of bed until 9:30 or so and after an hour or two of watching telly and alsotaking Tess for a walk, it was lunch time.  After lunch Nathan and I went and picked up my little sister and cousin and took them up the cranbrook river swimming. The water hole was really full after our recentfloods so the girls had a great time swimming.

Please remember that it is possible to like your body at a healthy weight. Although I am no longer super skinny, I do accept my body the way it is and have no desire to be thinner then I currently am.

The only bad part of the weekend was when Nathan had to leave so that he could start the 3 hour trip back to where he lives. I miss him so much during the week when we are a part but I know the next five days will fly by and I will be with him again before I know it! This weekend I am going up to Launceston to meet him so that we can go to festivale, whichnis a food and wine festival. It will also be valentines day and since this is my first valentines day with a boyfriend, I cant wait!

Keep working on loving your body, it is possible and it feels great!