The chaos theory

Goreygirl

Gold Member
Hey all

well this week has been a tough week with 2 severe falls off the wagon and a migraine (triggered by stress me thinks). I had been really focussed before that and have been trying to figure out why I have found this week so hard and why I found it so hard to tell the gremlin to feck off (gremlin = my addiction behaviours).

Anyway I've been doing some thinking and something my therapist said to me weeks ago suddenly began to reasonate... . he said that addicts live in chaos and become quite comfortable in that chaos. Now theoretically at the time I nodded at him and agreed I could see parallels in my life (my finances, my failure to deal with paperwork/bills, my sloppy housekeeping, my recent 2 year dysfunctional relationship with a toxic OH) but in all honesty I didn't really "feel" it if you know what I mean?

And today I have realised I am no longer in chaos:
  • my paperwork is all sorted and filed and up to date
  • my bills are all paid and up to date and all arrears are sorted
  • my remortgage has come through and I actually have a financial plan in place and have paid off all my debts (thus also reducing all my monthly outgoings)
  • I finally broke all contact with my ex and haven't spoken to him in 2 months (thank you Natalie of baggagereclaim.com for the help with this!)
  • I open mail as it comes in the door and deal with it/file it.
  • While I'll never be as OCD about housework as my sister I am doing chores etc. on a regular basis.
  • I finally started taking control of my eating by starting CD.
I've realised life suddenly in a way became more uncomfortable for it's order; suddenly I wasn't standing in my own way... life was mine for the taking ... a brighter future was opening up for me..... and that suddenly felt very very scary .... and the easiest and quickest way for me to "sabotage" and create some chaos was to "binge"... which allowed me to feel out of control again... now this is an emotion/feeling I am comfortable with! Or was... cos it didn't really work ....it wasn't as comfortable as I remember... in fact it felt a bit prickly.... and I realised the only person I was fooling was myself.

My therapist has said that I am going to have to find that "thrill" feeling from somewhere else....from outside myself in a healthy way... via a hobby of some sort. Human beings are not designed for day to day hundrum routine and we eventually start looking for excitement - I guess it's our choice whether that is via dysfunctional methods (affairs, complusive/secret eating, financial disarray) or functional ways (challenging hobbies etc).

I know thedietguy.com (aka icemoose) talks about this aswell on his blog and how he now does parachute jumps, has climbed Kilimanjaro etc.... and now I can see why.

Gg
 
CG, if there is one thing that always gets me in your posts its the complete honesty that you share. Your effort to not use denial as a form of excuse is refreshing. I wish you a better week and am sending additional vibes for your gremlin to make a quick stage exit left!!

It must be something in the water as i too fell off the wagon with more than a thump and hoovered up food (all the wrong kind) in a nanosecond....
Dolly x
 
Thanks Dolly.

My CDC takes the same approach. I met her today for a late weigh-in and she didn't take the "there there, it's just a blip.. no harm" point of view; rather she was straight in there with challenging me so as to help me fight the binge urges in the future. She was very clear of her opinion that if I am going to continue on the binge path CD is just not going to work for me and there would be no point in paying lipservice to the plan (taking into account the goals we discussed my first meeting).

Hope you are feeling better? Are you back on plan? I've been advised to bring it back to the "choice" principle and keep focusing on day by day. And when I think of food think of an alcoholic and booze....

Take care Dolly; don't critisize yourself (if you are).. it's just wasted energy and drags you backwards

xx
 
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