Updated 101 in 1001

Over the last few months I have been truly living my life and have managed to tick of quite a few more of my 101 goals in 1001 days goals that I wrote last year. I am proud of myself for all of the accomplishments I have made and am going to make a conscious effort to complete some more of these goals in the near future.

1. Travel outside the country for the first time
2. Make a full recovery from anorexia
3. Meet Anna, a girl I started talking to through my blog who also lives in Tasmania
4. Do a fun run for a charity
5. Eat pannacotta
6. Make some new friends
7. Find myself a boyfriend
8. Reach 100 000 page views on my blog
9. Publish 1000  blog posts
10. Help someone  make a full recover from anorexia
11. Stop counting calories all together
12. Learn how to listen to my body and eat intuitively
13. Reach my bodies natural set point weight
14. Eat food from 5 different fast food Places
15. Go to the Taylor Swift concert in Melbourne with My dad and Amy
17. Drive in the city of Hobart
18. Learn to love my body the way it is supposed to naturally be
19. Raise money/awareness for eating disorders
20. Explore some more of Tasmania
21. Go on a week long camping trip
22. Eat a chicken Parmiagana meal at a pub
23. Fully complete a crossword without usng the internet to cheat
24. Develop a good relationship with my mum
25. Try to find way to show Dad and Amy how much they mean to me
26. Get a horse
28. Help my mum to get better
29. To get my hair back to being naturally curly, like it was before I got sick
30. Read 10 books
31. Get healthy and clear skin
32. Eat a delicious dessert at a restaurant without feeling guilty or anxious
33. Go to a gold class cinema
34. Go surfing
35. Sleep under the stars
36. Sleep in until after 12
37. Paint Tess's dog kennel pink
38. Climb a mountain
39. Have a ski lesson in the snow
40. Get contact lenses
41. Meet a famous person
42. Overcome my anxiety so that I do not need to take anxiety medication
43. Try Ben and Jerrys icecream
44. Eat a krispy Kreme donut
45. Find a brand new hobby
46. Eat a big slice of my nans home made christmas pudding
47. Feel comfortable in a bikini
48. Go snorkeling on a reef
49. Eat popcorn at the movies
50. Make a snowman
51. Do a huge jigsaw and frame it for my wall
52. Cook and eat every recipe that I wrote down in my 'favourite recipes' book
53. Spend some more time on our farm with my dad
54. Keep improving my blog, as I learn more and more about effective blogging
55. Send a parcel of Australian goodies to a reader in another country
56. Get more involved in my local community
57. Buy some presents and place them under the giving tree this christmas
58. Always be there for Amy throughout her teenage years for support
59. Develop a closer relationship with my brothers
60. Make more of an effort to visit the nan who I do not see very often
61. Watch 5 north Melbourne football games live with my dad
62. To actually go swimming when I take my sister to the beach/river in summer
63. Eat a cooked breakfast in a cafe
64. Eat real pizza from a Pizza restaurant
65. To comfortably have drinks with calories in them, just because I am thirsty
66. To make a christmas Gingerbread house
67. To stay out with friends so late that we watch the sun rise
68. Get fit
69. compete my traineeship at the bank (but keep working there)
70. Take Amy on a special weekend away
71. Grow my own Strawberries
72. Make homemade jam
73. Not weigh myself for 2 months
74. Go ice skating
75. Eat only unprocessed foods for 1 week straight
76. See fireworks on New Years
77. Do the mud run
78. Become an organ donor
79. Go for 1 week without watching tv
80. Stop picking at imperfections on my skin so that I stop scarring
81. Watch the news everynight for two weeks
82. To not feel any guilt, after being unable to exercise all day
83. To be able to accept a compliment from another person
84. Try every type of magnum icecream available
85. Eat two courses at a resaurant without feeling anxious
86. To eat less tinned/ packaged foods and to start making them myself from scratch
87. See dolphins/whales in the wild
88. Find a brand new form of exercise that I enjoy
89. Spend less time inside and more time outside (especially in summer)
90. Make it through a whole summer without getting sunburnt
91. See something that makes me believe in magic
92. Run 10 kilometers along a beach
93. Make 10 new friends in one day
94. Get a tattoo that symbolises my recovery
95. Eat pancakes with icecream for breakfast
96. Eat icecream from the tub with a good friend
97. Laugh so hard that I cry (I did this all the time once, but I havent for a long time)
98. Maintain my weight/not lose weight for 1 year
99. Do a colour run
100. Donate blood

101. To be proud of what I manage to achieve and who I am 

Please keep fighting, I promise it will be worth it one day

An overdue update

For so long I kept telling myself that I had to keep fighting my anorexia if I ever wanted to be happy and healthy. I hoped with all my heart that one day all the pain and hard work would pay off but I didnt really know for sure that it actually would be. I can now say, completely honestly and whole heartedly that recovery definetely is worth it!

At this time, for the first time in as long as I can remember, my life is simply amazing. Every day I wake up and cant help but think about just how lucky I am to be where I now am. I have the most amazing boyfriend I could have ever dreamt of having. Not only does he make me feel special and loved every single day, but he is also helping me to respect and appreciate myself, for who I truly am.

I know that if I had not recovered from my eating disorder, I never would have found Nathan and been able to make our relationship work. Although Nathan would be the most wonderful thing that has come out of my recovery, there are many other things that are great about being recovered too.

This year was the best christmas I have had for a very long time and I know that this was only the case because I have recovered. I didnt spend the day worrying about what I could or couldnt eat. I just enjoyed myself and made the most of spending time with my boyfriend and with my family. And I enjoyed eating yummy christmas foods too. For the first time in years I ate as much chocolate, ham, pavlova and sweets as I wanted and my anxiety was basically non existent.

Dont get me wrong. Occasionally I still get an old anorexic like thought or concern about my weight or something I have eaten. However I suppose the difference now is that I am strong enough and healthy enough to ignore these thoughts and to continie to truly love my life. I know I now have way too much to lose by moving back to where I used to be. Simply nothing good can come out of me listening to anorexic thoughts  however I know that  so much good can come out of me ignoring them.

I am sorry it has been so long since I last posted. I have been meaning to post for a while now, to let you all know that I am happy and healthy but life has just been so busy and it really has been hard to find the time. I hope that you too are continuing to gight on your recovery journeys and i promise you all that no matter how hard it may seem at times, it really is worth it!

My boyfriend and I at the Christmas parade

Amys primary school graduation dinner

Still love walking with Tess

I like this photo as I just look so happy 

I finally feel comfortable with my body

My cruise was a blast

Goodbye to Blogging

This is an extremely hard post for me to write, but I knew that oneday the time would come for me to say this. I just didn't think it would come just so soon. For the last 8 months my blog has helped me more then anything else ever has. I have grown so much stronger both physically and mentally since starting to blog and 99% of the time, I forget that I ever even had anorexia. Now, I just feel like a normal girl who is now starting to live the life she truly deserves, completely free of her eating disorder.

I love helping people who are suffering from eating disorders and always want to be here to help anyone I can however I no longer feel as though regular blogging has a place in my life anymore. In a way, I feel as though it is dragging me down and stopping me from making a full recovery as it is just a constant reminder of where I have been. At the moment, my future is looking incredibely exciting and bright. I have met an amazing boy who I think the world of and I have my wonderful family close by too.

Not only do I simply feel too busy to blog anymore, I also don't want to do it if it is going to prevent me from making a full recovery. The friendships I have made through my blog are so valuable to me and I hope to keep talking to these wonderful people into the future, even if I don't blog anymore. Also, I plan to leave my blog active on-line so that people who are battling with anorexia can still use it as a recovery tool and even contact me, if they want to ask any particular questions or even if they just want to chat.

I know that some of my readers are going to be dissappointed in my decision to stop blogging, but I really hope that you understand this decision and I promise I will still update you all occassionaly on whats going on in my life and how I am doing. I am so thankful for all of your support over the last year and I can honestly say that without you all, I would not be where I am today. Please, never forget that just like me, you are also capable of doing anything you set your mind to. No matter how hard it may seem, you can beat your eating disorder and go on to live a truly wonderful and happy life.

  

Another amazing weekend

The past weekend has been another amazing weekend spent with Nathan. I drove to Launceston on Friday night after work and met Nathan just out of the city before I followed him into where his parents house in Launceston is. Over the weekend I met his parents, 2 of his sisters and one of his brothers and they were all lovely. I think nathans mum was a little concerned when she first saw me that I wasnt old enough to be with Nathan as he is almost 23 but she was ok once she realised that although I look younger, I am actually 21.

Over the weekend, we didn't really do anything overly exciting, but it was just nice to spend time together. We watched some prison break which is the series we are watching together and went out for 3 meals all up. We went for a drive to a place called greens beach on saturday morning and stopped at the tamar valley resort for lunch on the way home. I had a huge chicken caesar salad which was delicious but I made muself terribly sick eating it as I ate too much. By the time I finished I could barely walk my stomach was so full. After that we headed to nathans sisters house where I got to meet nathans baby neice and nephew who were adorable.

We then went out for tea at the casino with nathans parents and some of their friends. Neither of us were still very hungry so we kust got chicken nuggets and chips for tea which was nice and simple. Then nathans parents went home and nathan and I stayed at the casino a little later. We went to a bar where we had some drinks and chatted for a few hours before heading back home. By the time we got up and showered the next morning it was 11 o'clock so we pretty much headed straight out to get some lunch. We went to Levi which is a really nice restaurant at the seaport where we both had steak and chips.with a side of vegetables. It Was seriously the best steak I have ever eaten and I really enjoyed it.

Even though I barely did any exercise and ate out a lot, I felt really good all weekend as I was with someone who makes me incredibely happy. Even though I have felt my life getting more and more normal over the last 7 or 8 months, I believe that seeing this boy really is helping me to keep moving forward and is allowing me to completely move on from my eating disorder. This past weekend I just felt like a completely normal girl all weekend and I didnt let my anorexia control me once, even for a moment. I think it has been really food for my self confidence too as the boy is always complimenting me on how I look and my figure. Whixh really  does help me to accept myself.

I havent mentioned to the boy about my anorexia yet as it just hasnt come up and although I am sure i will tell him one day, I dont have any intentions of telling him anytime soon. I like the fact that he doesnt know about my past and that he doesnt know me as the anirexic girl, which is what so many others know me as. I know he would be understanding but I dont want him to feel as though he cant keep treating me exactly the same way as he currently does. Occasionally he jokes about what I eat or something like that and I just laugh as I honestly do find it funny. I wouldnt want him to feelas though he couldnt do that anymore and he probably would as he is a very thoughtful and considerate guy.

So true

Some recent dinners

Battered fish, mashed pumpkin and potato, carrots, peas, broccoli and cauliflower

Tomato pasta served on a bed of baby butterleaf lettuce 

Chicken nuggets with BBQ sauce, mashed veggies and boiled carrot, peas, cauliflower and broccoli 

Beef caneolli in tomato sauce, 1 Slice of fresh buttered bread, lettuce, red beet, cherry tomatoes and cheese

Beef bolognaise with carrot, cauliflower and broccoli