My official diagnosis…

It’s been an interesting and emotional couple of weeks in my head. When I walked into my first appointment, I was nervous, excited and ready to take ownership. Ownership of the mistakes I’ve made, the choices I’ve made and the actions that are a part of my everyday life. Instead, I walked out with a completely different type of ownership that has been hard to accept and that is to own that this is not my fault and that things have changed.

That’s the thing about getting help from someone who can see your life in a different way than you can. Someone who has done the study and practice on dealing with people with challenges. I’ve been pretty honest with myself in recent months/years about where I am at. In my session, we started talking about additional life factors that could be in play. I shared that I take meds for my thyroid condition. She suggested that could be a reason I’m gaining weight and I replied: “no, it’s me, overeating my calories”. I spoke about the fertility meds I had been on and the same question and answer came. Again, this happened when talking about my PCOS and breastfeeding. I said to her that perhaps some of these things are influencing my body and I’m sure they probably are, however, I wanted to take full responsibility for the reason I’m here and that is because of my choices.

Choices however that from additional sessions and research run so much deeper than anticipated. Speaking with Victoria over a couple of sessions it’s been completely eye-opening having her challenge me on topics and behaviours and also give me new perspectives to think about. I have always been aware that I have personality flaws (news flash, as do we all) and over the years have tried to improve what I can, but to have someone explain how trauma, brain development, mindset and thinking have resulted in myself possessing certain traits and behaviours is overwhelming.

So, over the past couple of weeks as I dissect this information and process what that means for me, I have had 3 main thoughts bouncing around my head.

1. What I thought I knew about myself; my core self and my resulting personality is not accurate and therefore leads me to question “Who am I?”.

An example of this, I’ve have always been an excitable person, I talk wayyyyy to much, and most of the time I am just TOO much for people, I am constantly having to ‘tone it down’ and in recent years I am finding that in some situations I struggle to control my excitement and almost feel like I am having anxiety over that situation because I cannot handle the excitement myself. This even happens in board games where I get so worked up on what is going to happen that it becomes uncomfortable for me to play.

Discussing this with Victoria she explained in detail how for some children who experience trauma the way that it ‘negatively’ presents itself or develops is in overly excitable behaviour due to two parts of the brain not being developed properly and therefore not communicating effectively to regulate this emotion.

MIND BLOWN. I had always just thought this was a part of my personality and ‘self’ but gaining more awareness that this is a result of trauma makes so much more sense and, in some ways, makes me feel a little like the rug has been pulled out from beneath me to question who am I? (emotionally/mentally/personality not spiritually) The same thing goes with my memory. My memory also hasn’t seemed to develop correctly which is normal for those in my situation and therefore I recall the emotions/feelings rather than the complete picture. It makes me question what else is just a result of trauma/flaws in my brain development and what is really ‘me’?

2. Over the past 6 months, I have been feeling as though my eating challenges have been beyond me. As though I am just not capable of handling it. Nathanael would encourage me to ‘do’ better but it was just such a struggle. When I mentioned that I think it might be more than just a lack of willpower we decided for me to take steps to assess this so I could know what I need to do to get help. I naturally came to the conclusion that perhaps I had an eating disorder but to actually go to a therapist, explain my life in detail and come back for another session where she tells me that I ticked almost every single box and that I have a diagnosable Binge Eating Disorder is again overwhelming.

In some ways, it’s incredibly freeing. Knowing that all this time that something I viewed as a personal and individual weakness has actually been an illness is game-changing. For so long I have thought that I am an embarrassment in my eating, a failure, a disappointment to my husband and my children. I have thought that I am just not good enough and that if I truly loved them, I would try harder and would be successful. I have thought many times that Nathanael must be disgusted to go places with me and would be embarrassed that I am so weak in my willpower. So, to know that it’s not that and that it’s an actual medical condition is relieving. I hated feeling like that about myself and pushing myself constantly to do better only to fall short. Now I know that like any other medical condition it requires the right treatment to be successful and doing that on my own isn’t the answer.

While it is liberating to know, the other side of that is very daunting. I’m no longer fighting ‘willpower’ I am fighting an illness. One that WHEN I conquer will only ever be in recovery, never to be fully healed. A constant battle to choose recovery. An illness that will stay with me for the rest of my life. I’m scared because I don’t know much about Eating Disorders and I’m scared I won’t be able to beat it. I’m scared of what type of future that will mean for me and my family. I’m scared that my treatment won’t work. Just like anything you have to know the beast you are trying to fight so that’s where I will start.

3. The last thing that I wanted to share that has been going on is the constant wave of emotions that I have been riding. There has been a huge sense of loss and a huge sense of being lost in recent days/weeks.

Grief for the years I haven’t known about any of this. Grief for the person and life I could have been. Acceptance for what has been and who I am. Acceptance for what I can and have been able to control and what hasn’t been my choice.

Anger for some of the things I have gone through that has assisted in my development. Sadness for the pain I have gone through that perhaps wasn’t completely necessary. Sadness for all the loneliness I’ve felt due to failed or broken relationships.

Feeling lost in who I am and who I could be. Victoria asked me in at the beginning of my recent session if I had a sense of who I was and I genuinely thought I did. I answered “Yes, I really think so” and now I’m just not sure. Clearly there is so much that I am not aware of and that I lack information on. With that though, brings a level of excitement for the possibility to discover who I am and to see who I will be when I have healed some of my wounds.

Sooooooooo right now I am processing. Slowly trying to take little bits of information and process how I feel about them and how they are going to change/affect my life from here on out. I think all of these emotions are normal and a part of the process and I want to give myself the time to feel through each of them. Give them the space that they need and deserve and then for those that aren’t going to serve me in my journey to move forward to make an effort to let them go.

I am SO happy with Victoria and I just so ready for my next session with her. I want to unpack all my baggage, give it a good decluttering, clean and reorganisation and then pack it up for the journey ahead. I am feeling extremely overwhelmed by the task ahead knowing that I am going to have to hike up some pretty big mountains, that it’s not just about the talking (which we all know I love to do) but that it’s about facing head on my daily actions and challenging my mindset and brain to become better.

I’m going to need your support on this journey and I am so grateful for the love that I’ve already received. We all have challenges in our lives and if you are feeling like you need help in any area don’t be afraid to seek professional help. It does not make you weak and it does not lessen your worth which is equal to all.

Love, Sarah Kay xx