Absent, But by No Means Gone

The title of today’s entry refers to two different people: ED and me. Let me be egocentric and start with me, because doesn’t it all start, and end with me, right? I haven’t blogged in quite a while. Sorry, readers. Things have been crazy–yeah, like always.

Even though I am on summer vacation.
Even though Margaret is at overnight summer camp.
Even though Beth is at day camp.
Even though Ann is at preschool camp.

So what the hell can be crazy?

Um, me? OK, stop laughing.

So what my mind is still getting pulled into 150 different directions and my thoughts are bumping into each other. So what I can’t get out of my own way. So what I can’t sleep even though I am really sleepy all the time. So what I am bitchy as hell. So what I am sore and still and cranky and I can’t even get out of my own way. So what I am pissed off at myself for doing nothing constructive with my time and I keep telling myself to channel that frustration and anger into a mass session of productivity and then I sit on my *ss in extreme laziness and become more and more pissed.

I feel more and more absent from everything. I am barely going through the motions. Laundry is piling up. The mess is more than piling up. Meals have been reduced to pathetic affairs; cooking is a thing of a past, but just whatever foodstuff can be gathered quickly and tossed on the table. The only thing I manage to do that is remotely responsible is taking Beth and Ann to and from camp.

As I said absent–just like my daily blog entries–entries.

And ED.
The other person referred to in the title of this blog entry. He has been absent, but not gone. Absent from my thoughts? Hardly. He is never absent from my thoughts. ED is ALWAYS with me, whispering sweet nothings in my ear, “You’re fat. You’re disgusting. You’ll never be skinny because you are always stuffing your face with food. Stop lying to yourself.”

But ED has not really been with me to help me become skinny and happy. He has kept skinniness absent from my life. He’s been absent with his help.

But not gone. Over the past week or so, ED has peeked through the curtains. He guided me to my knees (you can guess why) I think twice. That’s it. Just twice. Just enough to say, “I’m not gone for good, just absent.”

ED, prove to me that you are really, really back. Stop being absent. Be present. Be present. Every day.

And I will try to be present. Not sure if, not sure how, but I will try. Both in my life and in my blog.

Insert Your Own Damned Witty Title Here

I had hoped to make this post last week or the week before but since I am just writing it now, I clearly didn’t. And I had hoped to make this entry light-hearted and funny and spunky, but I am not feeling light-hearted and funny and spunky. I am feeling annoyed and overwhelmed and frustrated and pissed and fat.

Yeah. I said it. Fat.

I always feel fat.

For a large part of the weekend I did my best to ignore my hard-to-miss fat (and the irony is NOT lost on me there). Mind you, I knew it was there (please, I don’t even NEED to comment on that one), but I was able to push it aside with a tremendous amount of straining effort.

I bought a couple of dresses–certainly not in the human sizes I would have liked. I spent a lot of time sitting outside reading and imagining me sitting outside reading but I wasn’t the me that was actually sitting outside reading.

The “me” I imagine is small. She is skinny. She is thin. She is fit. She is not fleshy. Her clothing size is a single digit. The number on the scale is small. Her clothes fit tight; not because her fleshiness cannot be contained in the material, but because the fabric craves to be snug against her skin (holy sh*t, I’ve been reading too much “Grey”).

The “me” I imagine exudes control and together-ness, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Again, “Grey,” and again, IMAGINE!

I was actually doing ok. The scale was going down. Food was going in my mouth during the weekend, but not a ton. Maybe a meal–quasi meal–a day…a tad of snacking, not much more. The scale was a wee bit lower. Not a ton, but down.

And then hell breaks loose yesterday.

Seth, Ann, and Beth return from a weekend away. Old Mags and I were spending a very rocky weekend together, and I was taking a lot of extended “breaks” away, but things were manageable. Like I said, I wasn’t bingeing. They get back, and I eat. Not crazy frenzy, but more.

And two meals that day. One big but I was ok with it because it was actually not that bad for me and I “planned” for it. It was the dinner one that screwed me.

What the f*ck, ED? Dinner? Really? It wasn’t a binge. Really, it wasn’t. And the scale was bad.

After dinner I DID NOT BINGE. I DID NOT EVEN SNACK! And trust me the night f*cking sucked.

F*CKING SUCKED!!!!!!

AND THE SCALE IS HIGHER.

F*CK YOU, ED!