More than conquerors...

Romans 8:37  " In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us."

     So my blogs have been about a lot of things but not really me. It seems that I am really good at talking about things but not really about what is going on with me. The whole reason I wanted to blog was so that people who may be struggling could see that they are not alone. That you can overcome the things that seem so much bigger than you.

     Sadly I don't believe I have been doing that. I really want this to be about my journey. So here it goes. I have been out of partial hospitalization treatment for almost a month now. I am going to out patient treatment at this point. The PHP portion of treatment was awful. I was so far away from my family. And it wasn't just me, there were people who were there from way back east. It is so hard to be ripped from all that you know and thrown together with complete strangers.

     You are there and expected to talk about yourself, what your feeling, what lead you to this place, what happened in your past, etc.  They dig at you every day for 11 hours a day. And they make you eat 6 times a day. I mean, it was nice not having to cook or clean up a kitchen, but it was a struggle. Oh and the food. Lets just say that if it was a restaurant, they would have been out of business within a week. Some of it wasn't bad, that is a very little some.

     Its like being a child. You go from group to group all day. Most of the people there don't really want to be so you spend some groups alone with the MC. That is so sad. You are there to be helped and you ignore it. I hated that. Going to groups and being the only one to show. Sometimes others would show up, that is when it was the best. You could really get something then.

     When others showed up, I got to hear their struggles. It made me sad, but it also helped me not to feel like there was something wrong with me. I mean there was, but I wasn't alone. These people were feeling the same thing I was, they had experienced similar things, they got me. I could let down and really talk about what was going on with me. For the first time, I could talk about my E.D. and not have people think I was weird.

     I met some really nice people in treatment. People that encouraged me to stay the course, to keep fighting, and that I was worth it. They were struggling with there own E.D. but they took time to care about others. Just like me, we could see what others needed, but we couldn't see what we needed. It wasn't easy to put the focus on myself. To think about me and what I needed.

     I really started to learn who I am, to like me and to be able to use my voice. Using my voice was probably the hardest thing to do. To learn to speak my needs in a way that conveys what I truly need, and not what would please others. Being the peace maker my whole life had made me susceptible to seeing to others needs above my own. I think that may be true of  a lot of people who struggle with E.D. 

     Fighting for me and getting through PHP was a big accomplishment. I wanted to quit so many times. I would call Ed and beg him to come and get me or to just let me come home. I felt like I was there for years, and nighttime was my biggest struggle. I felt so all alone at night. I have been with my husband for 26 years and not since he joined the Army had we been apart this long.  It was so hard.

     But I did stay. I stayed until I finished my treatment there. Than I came home and started out patient. I am really hoping that we can get to the bottom of why I did what I did. I don't want to ever go back to being that person but I can feel her hanging around in the edges. She is just waiting for a chance to sneak back in. I won't let her though. I did not work this hard and spend all that time away from my family, oh and not to mention. lose my job, just so I could go back to that. It isn't who I am anymore.

     Recovery is what I truly want. To be completely free from the desire to do that again. To never even wonder about it. That is what I continue to work towards. I get frustrated at times. I feel lonely on this journey, but I know I am not. My husband is by my side, and my family is in my corner, and my friends are all praying for me.

     My grandpa Harper used to say that if I a person was going to do something, they should give 110%. Well that's what I am going to do. I will keep fighting this until I win. Until I conquer it.