A busy day

Wednesdays are by far my busiest and most hectic day. It is 6:30 am right now and I know I should be trying to get organised for my day, but I just wanted to write a quick post first. I start work at 8:30 today and still need to get completely ready and take Tess for a walk so I really do need to get a hurry on.  I wont be able to take Tess for our usual long morning walk so perhaps I will just take her to the beach and let her have a run instead.

My day doesnt even end when I finish work tonight at 5:45 as then I have yoga for 2 hours. I am quite looking forward to yoga after missing it last week but it does mean I wont get home until really late which us a bit annoying. I will have to take an extra snack to work to have before yoga as otherwise I would be starving by the time I got home and had tea. I am planning on having soup and fresh bread for tea though so atleast it will be quick and easy to make when I do finally get home. 

I have received lots of emails over the last day or two that I really want to reply to but I dont think I will be abke to today as I am just so busy. But I have the day off work tomorrow so I will be able to reply to them all then :) please, if it ever does take me a while to reply to you dont think that I just cant be bothered or dont want to, it really is only because I haven't had time. i care about you all ALOT and it kills me to not be able to reply straight away when I can see that you need support or advice.

I slept until 6:00 am this morning and was woken by my alarm which is pretty good for me. My sleeping routine is starting to normalize and I suppose that this is all just a part of recovery. I find now that I can fall asleep at a 'normal' time, I can wake up at a 'normal' time and I am not awake for hours throughout the night. It means that I dont seem to have as much time to reply to emails and write posts though as I used to do that when I couldnt sleep however being able to sleep is definitely better!

I am not going to let myself get stressed out about being busy though. I know that there is only so much I can do each day and getting stressed and panicking wont change that. Being busy isnt a reason to be unhappy, it just means that I have a life and that is something to be thankful for!

Yoga Mindfullness

Not only do I really enjoy yoga and find it physically beneficial, but I also find it mentally beneficial as well. Last night whilst at yoga our instructor said something quite amazing while we were 'looking into our hearts' She said;

The greatest challenge in life is discovering who you are,

The second greatest is being happy with what you find.

I thought that this was an amazing message as well as message that is very true. Finding out who you are is important and difficult in life, but so is accepting who you are. To me, being 'happy with what you find' means to trully accept yourself, as the person you are supposed to be. I believe that this means accepting who I trully am, both on the inside and he outside too. 

While I have been trying hard to accept the person I am supposed to be in regards to the way I look and my body, I have not really been working on accepting myself, in the ways that matter most. I now realise that I also must learn to accept myself for my personality and for the type of person I am. Afterall, it was not only my body that I have grown up to hate, it was the rest of me as well. 

So for me, my journey for recovery, health and happiness will not only involve learning to accept myself for what is on the ouside, but also for what is on the inside too.

Work, Doctors appointment and yoga

Unfortunately I woke up this morning with another skin infection on my face. After taking Tess for an early walk between rain showers, I went to work at the supermarket. I hate working when I have a skin infection as I get so self concious however I know that I cant expect myself to look perfect all the time. Blemishes are just a part of everyday life so i guess in a way these infections are good as they teach me to accept myself for who I truly am no matter what.

I left work this morning to go to the doctor so that I could get some more antibiotics and my doctor also gave me a refferal to go and see a dermatologist, since nothing else seems to work for me. I am excited to be going to a dermatologist as I was starting to feel as though there was no hope that my skin would ever clear up as no matter what I did, I would still get infections. I just prey that the dermatologist has some real answers for me and can help me to get better.

For the first time in as long as I can remember, my doctor didnt weigh me when I got to her doctors office. I suppose she felt as though I was looking so much healthier that she really didnt want to know my exact weight. I went straight from work to Yoga which as always I really enjoyed. The only problem was that my back was especially sore, even before we started and my shoulders were too. The pain wasn't unbarable however so I just pushed through it and still managed to have a good time.

Overall, besides a few hiccups I have had a good day. I hope your day was wonderful :) x

Another day closer to being recovered

After another positive and enjyable day today, I really do feel as though I am getting closer and closer to being recovered. I weighed myself this morning, just to make sure that I have not lost weight and I havent. It really is exciting for me to have a non-underweight bmi and once more to actually be relatively happy with my body at this new weight. I never thought I would say this and I do have occasional moments hen I feel self conscious about my new body but I actually think I like my body more now then I did when I was thinner.

Since I am now a healthy weight, I have decided to cut back my daily intake sliightly to 3000 calories as I calculated my current intake and it is actually over 3200 calories which does feel a litttle excessive to me now, considering I am now a healthy weight. I still think that 3000 calories is a good recovery intake for me unill I actually feel as though I am completely recovered. I am still not certain that I have reached my natral set point weight but I should still reach that while eating 3000 calories if I haven't already.

I worked at the supermarket today and had a reasonably good day, although t was quite long working fom 8:30 until 5:45 and then I had to go straight to yoga. I really enjoyed yoga again and Ithink I will try and get myself  a yoga mat so that I can do some yoga at home as well. I find yoga is a fantastic activity for me to do as it is helping me to build strength up again after losing a lot of my muscle during my anorexia and the mindfulness really helps me also.

I also got an invite to my cousins 21st birthday and as soon as I got it I was extremely excited. Although this does not seem like anything special, for me it is as I have not wanted to go to anything like this for years. In fact, any parties I have been invited to in the past I have not gone to or absolutely dreaded. Now that I am getting better I really do want to get out and socialise more so I really am looking forward to what will hopefully be a great night. I feel like I have already missed out on many years of just having fun so I really want to start enjoying myself now!

I hope that everyone else is getting closer to recovering also. Remember if you are not actively fighting your anorexia, you wont make progress. Nothing changes if nothing changes and as long as you believe you can, you will! <3

Sleeping in and feeling positive

I couldn't believe it when I got up this morning, turned on the light ad saw that it was 6:30am. Ok, I know that this isn't a real sleep in for a normal person, in fact many people would consider this as getting up early, but for me it is a sleep in. I cant remember the last time I slept past 5am and quite often it is much earlier then this (like 3:30am). I probably would have slept even later still if it wasn't for Tess coming and waking me up. She was probably wondering what was going on I am usually up hours before then. I would really love too be able to start sleeping later everyday so fingers crossed that this is just the first of many 'sleep ins'.

I am feeling really fantastic and positive today. My boss text me last night to tell me our training that was supposed to be on today was cancelled which means that I get the day off which I am really happy about! It means that I can have a relaxing morning and then I will be able to spend the afternoon with Amy as my mum is working and Amy is on school holidays. I am feeling full of energy so I will probably rug up (As it is icy out again today) and take Tess for a nice walk or perhaps even a short run, I will see how I am feeling when the time comes.

I did yoga last night for the first time and I loved it! I have paid for 4 more weeks in advance and really hope that I can get to all of those sessions. I am so glad I decided to give it a go as I really felt fantastic while I was doing the yoga and even now, afterwards. I think that I will be able to build up some more strength throughout all of my body and I also think the mindfullness side of yoga will really help me too. I can now see why some eating disorder ttreatment cenntres have yoga programs for their patients to participate in. After doing a proper yoga session I really can see how yoga can help to heal both the body and mind.

When I got home from yoga, I saw that my mum had left a little gift for me. It was a beautiful fridge magnet that her and my sister had boughtt me that day when they went and visited Bicheno, a nearby town to where we live.

I hope that everyone has a fantastic day today <3 Does anyone have anything interesting planned?

Yoga and Pilates with Amy

This morning I had some fun doing a yoga andd pilates dvd with Amy. I bought the dvd when I was at my sickest but never actually had the energy to do it. Amy stayed in her giraffe onesie while we did it but still managed to do lots of tricky moves. I really enjoyed doing these exercises however I found some of them really difficult which just shows that I have quite a lot off work to do, in terms of strengthening my body again in terms of muscle. I am now even more excited about doing yoga classes each Wednesday night in the school gym.

Starting Yoga

I have decided that I am going to start doing yoga which is held each Wednesday night in the school gym. It only started last week and I was talkinng to the lady that takes it and she said that she would be more than happy for me to come. I told her that I have ligamentous laxity (so I am super flexible) but she seems to think that it is ok for me to do yoga as long as I don't over stretch my body and as long as I focus on holding poses and controlling my movements carefully.

In fact it should help me alot as it will help me to build up the muscles around my joints so that they can support my joints in the ways that my ligaments fail to. I think that yoga is also a fantastic sport to start participating in as it can help me rebuild all of the muscle that I lost through my anorexia, without exerting myself too much. Afterall, I want to reach a healthy weight by gaining back some of my muscle as well as just fat. I know that I need to have some fat on my body too but I obviously don't want to just have all fat.

So I am going to ring the yoga instructor and let her know that I am going to be there Wednesday night. I work at the supermarket Wednesdays anyway and finish work at 5:45 so it will be perfect as Yoga starts at 6pm. I am excited to be doing this as I do not only think it will be good for my body but also for my mind too. And it will be a great way to get out in the community and meet new people and spend time with those I already know.

I found the following article online which talks about how yoga can help a person to
recover from anorexia.

Research shows yoga helps eating disorder recovery

Interestingly, despite the growing numbers in terms of eating disorders in our nation, very little is actually known in regards to how they form, and what causes relapses in sufferers. Researchers led by Lourdes P. Dale from the University of Hartford determined to discover alternate healing for eating disorder recovery as it was noted that many of the traditional healing techniques failed at focusing on the emotional and body awareness aspects of eating disorders. 

The study involved a 6-week yoga workshop incorporating women with a history of eating disorders. The results were reported that the women who attended the workshop were better at identifying their emotional states, being aware of their emotional states, and found themselves more capable of handling their mood fluctuations. There was also a significant drop in the level of eating concerns for this particular group of women, and these positive outcomes carried on even after the workshop was complete.

Yoga practice focuses on deep breathing, mindfulness, and attention to how the body is working. It literally allows you to take your attention off of the matters surrounding you, and forces you to only think of the matters at hand, the person struggling with an disorder is thus allowed to redirect all their pain, and energy into the mat itself. Peaceful meditation allows for the re-centering of the thought processes, and the poses provide the strength of the body and redirection in the flow of the bodies energy. All positive, and necessary benefits in terms of eating disorder healing. 

The biggest challenge in any form of recovery, is taking the first step. It is literally mind over matter and a clarity will suddenly strike the sufferer that says, “I will no longer let this control my life. I am in control.” And when that clarity finally hits them, they will be ready to begin the healing process. Yoga can be there to guide them through to full, and lasting recovery.

http://www.evolationyoga.com/yoga-eating-disorder-recovery/

Here is also a video which I found from someone who strongly believes that yoga can make a wonderful difference to a person recovering from anorexia.

https://youtu.be/khB79zfC0hU

So if you think yoga might help you to recover, give it a go. I will let you know how it goes for me on Wednesday night. :)