So I didn’t know how to start this and I had an entire post written about my life story, specifically since starting college but it just didn’t feel right. I couldn’t finish writing it. The thing is, this place is for me and my thoughts, I don’t need to share my life story, I’ve lived it. Of course I’m going to talk about my life and different experiences that got me to this moment but I don’t want it to be a place for me to dwell on the past. I try my hardest every day to live in the moment and be grateful for everything that got me here today, but not to live in it. To me, there is no point in living in the past. In therapy last week I used the metaphor of thinking about my life in chapters. The chapters can be whatever you want them to be whether it’s different ages, school grades, years, weeks or experiences. For me, it’s a mix of them all but mostly chapters for different experiences and periods of my life. I don’t have them listed out or anything but specific experiences or times in my life to think about. When I think about it this way, it’s so much easier to get closure from things and then truly move on. Last week, I finally admitted I had binge eating disorder for 9 years of my life. It took me over 9.5 years to even admit I had disordered eating, then I admitted it was an eating disorder and finally last week I fully admitted to myself that it was BED. It was hard. I’ve always known deep down that’s what it was but I was too ashamed and embarrassed to admit it to myself, let alone anyone else. But almost 2 years ago I started to change my lifestyle and I’ve lost 65 pounds through tracking and exercise. I put myself into recovery without even realizing and I am so proud of that. I think eating and food will be difficult for me for a while. It’s not something that changes overnight, especially with an ED. There are still nights when I binge and I do my best to not beat myself up over it. However, those nights have become rarer and rarer. I live my life with balance, I don’t track my food, I fuel my body and listen to it. I exercise because I genuinely love to and moving my body, whether it’s lifting or walking makes me happy. Finally admitting to myself that my ED was BED gave me the power to accept it and get closure. To me, that was the last line of that chapter and now I can finally close it and truly move on. That doesn’t mean I won’t go back to that chapter to reflect and learn, but I’m done writing it. It was 9 years living with it, controlling my life and over 1.5 years slowly recovering myself. I am so fucking proud of myself and it’s so freeing to finally close that chapter of my life and move forward living my life with balance in every aspect of it.
When you think of your life and your experiences as chapters that you can start writing, revise and finish writing, it reminds you of your power in your life. You are the author of your own story, as silly as it sounds it is nothing but true. You can do whatever you want with your life and I find that fact so unbelievably freeing. When I finally close a chapter, and I realize I am truly done writing it, that internal closure within myself brings me immense peace in my mind, body and soul. Closure is something that is really important to me and it’s tough in situations where you can’t get it from another person or from yourself. But using that metaphor helps me achieve that within myself which is the only person that matters. That’s a really hard pill I have had to learn to swallow the past few months, which is ironic because I am 19 years old and still cannot swallow pills but that’s besides the point. This whole chapter thing is yours to do whatever you want with. There are chapters I have not started writing yet. I have chapters that could be finished but for now I’m content with them. I could keep writing or not, but for the moment they are good where they are at. There are some chapters that I finished and I can’t keep writing even if I wanted to. My childhood, middle school and high school are all times in my life I simply cannot go back and change and that is okay. Sometimes you don’t need to close those chapters yourself, they do it for you. That’s the thing about your past, you can’t change it. Every second of every day you are getting older and there are more and more things you just cannot change. Do your best to learn from your past, but not to live in it. People change, life changes and you change as you grow and evolve as a person. Take time to reflect on how you got to this point in your story and then be present in where you’re at, wherever it may be.
I try to live my life with no regrets. It’s hard sometimes and I’m not going to pretend I don’t regret anything but what’s helped me is realizing that while I may regret something, whatever it is led me to where I am at today. My favorite quote of all time is everything happens for a reason, all my friends know it, I say it probably everyday. It is just so true. Every decision, moment and experience in my life has led me to where I am at right now. I can’t change any of those now and the only thing I am left to do is be grateful for them. Even if I would’ve done things differently if I could go back, I can’t and you can’t either. If my school hadn’t gone online my first semester, I wouldn’t have started losing weight and changing my lifestyle. If I didn’t end up getting treated horribly by my roommate and former friend this year, I wouldn’t have depression and anxiety right now. And while I can dwell on the pain of that situation, and I did for a while, I also have so many good things that came out of it. I wouldn’t be unlearning my unhealthy coping mechanisms, rediscovering myself, seeing who my true friends are, falling in love with myself (at least trying to) and I sure as hell would not be writing this right now. That is just a glimpse into recent events in my life that led me to where I am right here right now and I wouldn’t trade any of it for anything. This year of college was one of the most difficult times of my life and it was filled with pain and tears and sadness. But it was also filled with happiness and laughter. It was filled with moments where I hated myself and felt alone in a room full of people. But it was also filled with moments of self love and discovery and learning to love time alone with myself. So once again I say, everything happens for a reason AND if you don’t know the reason you’re simply in the happening. Once you truly adopt that mindset, you look at everything in life with a new perspective to live in the moment and love that moment. To quote Ferris Bueller, “Life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around every once in a while, you’re gonna miss it”.
Every experience, every person and every single thing in your life affects you whether you realize it or not. Finding gratitude in that, whether it was negative or positive, gives you the power to enjoy your life that much more. You can learn something from all of them, even if it’s small. It sounds so cheesy but the little things add up and make you who you are. All of these experiences and people have affected you and shared you into who you are and gotten you to where you are.
I could write for hours about this but for now, I’ll end with this. Your life is yours. You have the power to make it whatever the fuck you want it to be, whether you truly realize that or not. Live a life you’d relive. Enjoy every 24 hours you get to be alive, even if sometimes it seems impossible to enjoy. At the end of the day, you are still breathing and if that is the only good thing, then enjoy that tiny sliver. Do your best to live in the moment and be grateful for where you are at, with no regrets. Learn from your past and then move on from the people, places or experiences that don’t have a place in your story anymore. Remember that you are the author of your own story and every single thing happens for a reason.
Enjoy your life. I love you and of course, if it is just me reading this, I love you and I am so proud of you.
3/31/22
Comments