
Relapse
May 16th, 2017
I relapsed for the first time since being in recovery last summer. During the 4 months that I was “sober”, binging, purging and restricting never crossed my mind. I was astonished at how ED seemed to have been completely banished after 10 years of living with it daily. Recovery looked like it would be the easiest and surest thing in the world. So I was completely surprised when I found myself in the middle of a binge for no apparent reason and knowing very clearly that it would end in a purge. I wasn’t stressed and I was unapologetic about what was going down after the longest stint of sobriety I had experienced in a decade. Fortunately, during this time, I was still seeing Dr. W. every other week. I was very open when I confessed to the episode and relayed how shocked I was both that it occurred and that I was so indifferent to it. We combed through the seemingly minor events that preceded it and there were 2 things that she got stuck on. Both involved me not speaking my truth. One included me offering forgiveness, reassurance, and wishing happiness upon #3’s mistress when she reached out to me two years after being caught to offer an attempted explanation and apology. Being motivated to a fault by peace and the avoidance of conflict, it is not unusual for me to attempt to comfort someone who has wronged me. And I wasn’t fake. I did feel at peace when I offered this woman compassion and wished her well. But what she’ll never know, is what I had to pass through to offer her that compassion. Or the many times going forward that I will have to talk myself down from one of the memories involving her.
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