weird day but in a good way

Tuesday 29th June 2010 7:50pm

After being able to stay off college while the rest of the year when to look round liverpool uni - again one of the college's local uni's which is why they go, I had to make sure i kept myself busy and my mind occupied away from what i knew could creep up on me, the ability not to eat get away with knowing i could lie my way though the day, perhaps a few months ago i would have done that but today i was determined to make today a practice day for the summer holidays, 6 long weeks off and the holiday i dreaded more than any.

I managed to drag myself out of bed despite the miserable weather outside and took the books back which were way over due to the library, 78p fine on each book is not alot but i was still like robbery! Walked back to the bus stop and there stood an old lady, she looked scared at first some "teenager" deciding to come and stand near her at what she deemed as her bus stop and did remind me of this at several occassions! Eventually she realised i wasn't going to rob her bag and run off and i think she was only reasurred of this by my bus pass, eventually she started to talk to me, it was one of those where i was wondering if i was the only person she would talk to all day, she told me her life story, literally! she told me about how everyday she gets out the house gets on the bus and goes places, yesterday she was in New Brighton and told me how she was horrified that once again another tesco was takig over such a lovely town. She noticed my arms as by this point the weather had picked up and obviously i wasn't going to trouble her with my life so i came up with the "i fell out of a tree" i don't think she bought it but she looks satisfied with the answer! she got on to the love of my life david cameron, witted on to herself for a bit and how upset she is that her bus pass might be taken off her in 2012, with the added comment of "if i'm still alive" i reasurred her she would be as she was such a positive person and the bus turned up, as we got on the bus she told me i'd made her day and let everyone else on the bus know as well, i was like bless you!

yeah so i manage to get to work and pick up the leaflets for the disability awareness day and also the most exciting part of my day i think my letter to offer me the job offically with all the documentation, i was so excited i think jayne thought i'd taken something although before i'd had my id badge picture taken which i wasn't expecting! so got the leaflets and was like a mad woman giving some into the chemists, college, sports centre etc around sankey although it was so sad to hear that shops can't take them, how mad is that! raising awareness on such a major part of society it was sad, although it was not the staff memebers fault i just thought how can a shop which makes a massive income not be able to take in leaflets for a proper charity who are being supported by major companies like the NHS!

come home so tired my energy levels had dropped completly and i just went straight to the diet coke in the fridge while the poor dog was crying outside to come in! later on about tea time of course the usual conversation starts with what you having for tea blah blah, and i go blind there is nothing i can have, nothing i can dare touch or bring myself to make, dad is coming up with different ideas and i'm there like no no no, eventually a decision is made and make it and sit down and first staring blanky at the plate as though i was back at the unit with no choice other than to eat, i'm nearly out a year and refuse to go back in hospital and have to go through the entire process over and over again i'm not wasting anymore of my life or changing my dreams to fit in with me now! i was so desperate to go into nursing but after all the stays and experiences i don't think i could hack it, making someone so determined not to eat actually eat knowing what they would be thinking and how much they were hating me for sitting there and watching them, chopping up food which they don't want and would refuse to talk to me again until they were ready, as i would be to worried that i could be back in the situation and be the hypocrit which so many staff members can be! bringing up conversations about going on a diet while you're sat there eating an 800 calories meal something which once ago was your limit for the day and now they are buzzing off each other as they go to slimming world and weight watchers with their steamed vegetables and slim fast shakes, you get to the point though were you pitty people like that, diets are a fad where as an eating disorder isn't however that fad diet can quickly turn into an eating disorder if that person's feelings start to change and bang they are sitting at a long glass table having to listen to staff talk about their next crazy diet and how they have lost a stone while they have gained that and having to fight against their anorexic thoughts and get out of the hospital!!

It makes me sad as well when the people in college are talking about diets and needing to loose weight when they are lovely anyway a lot of them know i don't like diets i've told staff off as i think they are just stupid, they are a fad you loose the weight feel good then eat again and go back also known as a yo yo diet! all people need to do is make sure they have what they need, it's the extra food which is why you gain weight, you can eat chocolate, crisps, sweet etc it's not bad for you but yet people say oh i being naughty today i'm having crisps, no you're not being naughty it is normal to want to eat junk food providing your diet is varied!!!, this was another conversation i had to listen to from 2 young girls who looked about 14 on the way back i was like omg you're in school, i got diagnosed with anorexia then, and today i saw one of my triggers, but yet reacted so differently maybe as it's where i am at the moment!

The year 7 photo which we had taken a couple of months into our first year of high school was a major trigger of mine, i look huge compared to the other girls in the class and still think that, and even when i get people to pick me out if they come across it they are shocked, they don't have to tell me you can see it in their eyes and facial expressions. It was this photo and my individual photo which set me off, as soon as i saw this photo in the yr 7 i was horrified at how big i was but yet at the time i was 11 so thought i would just ignore it and hopefully i would just be lucky and it would just go within the next few years, but as time went on i saw no difference i was sick of my theighs rubbing together and them being red raw when i got home and crying because of the pain, so gradually this picture became an obsession if i felt i looked that i wouldn't eat the next day (this started to happen about january of 05, i set my new years resolution with the result to loose weight get fit and fit in with everyone else) so today when i got my notification on facebook i had been tagged into a photo i knew it would be an old one but wasn't expecting it to be this photo, at first i did as i did while i was getting ill and just looked at it compared myself to everyone else around me then stopped, i'm nearly 19 I was 11 on that photo so why the hell should i still be bothered everyone on there has changed and people have moved on, it was scary though knocking myself back into reality, although i'm so glad i was tagged into this picture and Lauren I thank you so much for doing it, you have helped me a lot just by that one photo =] although i did go through all the comments made under it expecting one to be there about my size there wasn't just of how shocked everyone was to see this 8 year old picture! that form the mighty 'K' saw me through so much they helped me when i needed it and kept me going when i was at my worst, the cards i recieved from them were so lovely although i never did show it at the time! when i came to prom it was like i'd never been away although the amount of people who asked me if i wanted to sit down does still make me laugh, even people that didn't know me properly still showed concern due to it flying round the year that i had been finally hospitalised and was warned of this my stillings herself, the 2002 yr 7s are my originaly year group and i still see you as that even when i talk i'm like my real year group as though the yr 12s are like some image of my imagination but they're not they are lovely =]

so that was my weird moment seeing my triggering photo and not let it actually trigger me off to the dark world which i hope is starting to pass =]

xxxxxxx

Strange moment!

The day this morning had been decided, me and mum had to get ready for our stall tomorrow at St George's Hall in Liverpool - she is advertising the advocay service she now works for and little old me was manning the talking eating disorders stand (for our support group, which mum is the co worker for)

We had to go the the Casbar Coffee Club first, which is where the Beatles started out and where we are lucky enough to have our group, full of memories of the beatles, as leigh who runs it is married to one of pete best (the original drummer) brothers! So mum and me walk into the house which is on top of the basement which we have the group after been barked at by the dogs who are actually really cute, despite their size, and sat there drinking coffee is Pete Best, my mouth dropped, i couldn't bring my self to say hello despite the cool hello he greated us with, i just stood there looking like a prize idiot! I have met him before as they run events there but never got so close for him to say hello, i think my heart stopped beating for a second! He could be my grandad and yet i was so in ore of him it was true! He is an original beatle and that won't change, it's thanks to him them formed and to meet the person involved with such an historic group was amazing (although this was not my stange moment!) We went to pick up leaflets about b-eat and other company leaflets plus a massive folder which decided to fall on my foot later on it the day, explaining eating disorders and everything which is associated with the evil and vile illness!

My strange moment - me and mum had to go to Hollins Park to pick up some display board for tomorrow, we pull up and this wave of fear fell over me, i felt as though i was drowning in it, the dark mood came back and I had the weight in my stomach - despite knowing that i was no longer there as an inpatient looking through the down stairs window leading to the reception, was an elderly lady, well i say elderly she might not have been - she sat there staring, looking at nothing just the outside world, probably just wishing that she could get out. I'm guessing that the medication she is on completly zomified her and i realised (my strange moment) that I was once that lady, staring out of the window desperate to know what i was missing, wondering if the world had changed as although i had only been there for a matter of weeks when i felt so washed out it felt as though it was years and my body had aged so much - my friends where growing up and i was there looking through a window counting down the hours in which i would be allowed out for my few hours - that lady was me, sitting there with tears rolling down her face seeing someone being able to walk in that hospital and be freely able to walk out, her hopes where the same as mine, to be free, be in the mist of her family and friends

I realised how different my life could be now if i hadn't have got ill - but i did and in a weird way i'm glad, i'm glad i've been through what i have as i'm willing to stand up and fight, fight for people like the lady at the window and improve services and stamp out the stigma in which will most probably surround her when she leaves, hopefully thanks to stamp out stigma campaign www.stampoutstigma.co.uk will help improve this and be able to see that those who are mentally ill may have triggers and sometimes these horrid words are one of those triggers!

...

On Friday, those of you from around warrington, would have heard about the poor man who decided that he wanted to jump of the runcorn bridge - this man was obviously at the end of everything and thought he could no longer cope with life, if there was interventions earlier this may have been prevented and the people from around warrington would not have been complaining about having to be stuck in traffic, me included, however i didn't complain as i wanted the man to jump and be done with it but because the entire situation could have been prevented. So i sat on the bus listening to two ladies talking about this poor man, i think they managed to say every word on the leaflet which the 5BP have given out, how i didn't turn round and wollop them i have no idea but i suppose it wouldn't be the best way to deal with it, i then routed in my bag for a leaflet, why i have no idea i would have been like one of those annoying sales people on the street promoting something for the person to accept it and later bin it, i didn't have a leaflet but it got me thinking we should have the posters in the bus, i was an unlucky person having to listen to that and managed to cope with it, knowning that a year a go that man could have been me, i didn't want go that why, but the fact he got to the point in which life was so unbearable was just horrific, i just think if someone had heard that converstaion who had no one to talk to or rant off to after how would they have coped knowing that all the words in which these ladies chose to descripe someone with a mental illness applied to them too those cruel words could trigger someone off back into the darkness to make them think they to did not deserve to be here and should be an out cast from their family.

TIME HAS MOVED ON!!!!!! we want to make the difference so that people can see everyone as equal as everyone is!! that lady at the window may have been in the system for a long time the looking out of the window could be her life but this needs to change, inpatient treatment is not also suitable for everyone, sectioned or not - i don't want to be the lady in the window i want to stay being the person on the otherside getting on in life!

xxxx

outline of things =]

Like many, you're probably wondering why call a blog the jourey back to life? Well that is what I'm doing, the start of my recovery from my years of hell from the grips of anorexia, depression and self harm is starting, the place I never believed I would reach, but yet i'm here, eager to do well and help others realise themselves and realise that the anorexia is in control of them and not the other way round.

My anorexia started off when I was about 13, a vunerable year 9, self consious and wishing i was someone different. I believed I was fat and out of control with my life, i needed structure, to which i took from my food. No one really noticed at first until i started year 10 and came back from the summer holidays, i was told i looked lovely i'd lost weight and it was noticable! i got this strange buzz and it just spiraled from there, even though people could be cruel saying i was attention seeking i didn't see it that way i was in control, no one could force me to eat it was up to me, the need to be in control grew, grew way out of control the one thing i seeked the most, what i wanted the most. My GCSE year was horrible i was doing work all the time and as i perfectionist a piece of work that should have taken 20 minutes could take up to 2 hours! My great gran who i loved more than anything sadly died, although she noticed that i was loosing weight and warned family of her concern, rachael was fading away and i was becoming isolated finding reasons why i couldn't sit down why i had to be moving about, when she passed i hated the fact things where changing, having a great gran who had lived through war and had so many amazing stories made me stand out, but now i had nothing but my anorexia kept me going!

The day I was actually diagnosed with having 'anorexia' was horrible I sat in an office with professionals a set of scales and notes, my entire life was looked over and i later discovered at one point or another i would have been unlucky enough to develop my eating disorder - i got back into the car and cried my mum holding me so tight neither of us knowing what was in store for us, truthfully i think we expected for this illness to go away like a cough or a cold but it decided to stay and haunt us until this very day.

I had countless admissions to eating disorder units or similar missing out of crucial stages of my life, boy friends, parties, college and even finding myself . . . thankfully now though i was accepted back in college 2 years later, while my friends started university, i was back in college but i have met some lovely people who are getting to know me as rachael, well when i don't have my crazy out bursts!!

When I had my light bulb moment in 2009, it was the last day of college for my original year and i could see how far they had come i knew i couldn't stay like this stuck in the darkness of depression and having my life revolve around food and my routines. I went public with my story through the most amazing jouralist who made my story so unique and not just another person preaching about anorexia, mine was awarness - i lost all my teenage years, came close to dying, was force fed, nearly sectioned and was so negative was given the diagonis that i would alway be that way i refused to let my life be ruled by the dark thoughts of my anorexia and everything else which comes with it.

I sit here today proud to be who i am, i am not the person i was with anorexia and even before, if i was who i was before i would be walked all over but now i'm gobby (in a good way) and refuse to let people get away with things. I have had to let people in my life go which was hard but i can't afford to go backwards and i have to let my life move on, find out who i am today!

I am a b-eat ambassador, which was crazy - those who know me well will know when i was at my worst b-eat was the enemy telling my mum what typical tricks where etc etc, but now starting to recover i see them as my light and my hope! there are so many amazing people on this scheme, some recovered, some further on in recovery and some in the same position as me only just at the start of the jorney to recovery but we are in it together and will give each other the support in which we need. I also am the young ambassador for warrington disability partnership, i like to say i was head hunted! i was seen at a conference sharing my opinion on services and the team were like we need her!!!!!! apparently i'm a mini version of my mum, a good thing i have no idea, as she is one of the most loudest, gobbiest people about raising awarness on mental health it is untrue, i would not be alive today if she and my dad had not kept me going. I have put them through so much but yet they have in a way got me my work =] I also help with the PALS team based at hollins park, where i was unlucky enough to spend some of my life there, aged 17, under age to be on there - but i'm able to make a difference to that and loving it!! i refuse to let anyone have that experience it was horrible and one i never want to relive, and if i do it will not be on a voluntary basis and my parents would get even louder if it happened!!

So my life is starting to move, college is giving me something to do =] i have normally got on with staff well some yes i dont like =p but this year they have just accommodated my needs they know what triggers me and don't judge if i come in slightly moody or with new signs of SH, they may not like it i don't expect people too but in time i will stop and i will be able to find better ways of coping - my new friends are lovely, it's took me a while to get to know people as trust is a major part of my tick list to trust people, i still have routines which annoy a lot of people, but it helps me cope! Still today i'm a perfectionist with work, as people in my classes would have realised, i do not have a normal level pace well to me i do, to everyone else it's mad how quickly i will get through work. I'm hoping they have got used to it, it doesn't make me any different but once i'm in work mode in a lesson that's it, i'm in a world of my own!

Just because I have a mental illness doesn't mean i'm some uncontrolable person, i have my moments as people have seen, but that is just a small part of me =] i am a 'normal' person just with a few unique qualities! so my advice just take me how I am!!

x x x x x x