Bulimia and substance abuse

I have always said bulimia and an eating disorder came into my life when I gave up drugs.  That was when I was 19-20 years old.  That is actually not true at all!  Disordered eating has been with me since at least 12 years of age. Seventh grade I was restricting my food to iceberg lettuce all day.  I played with vomiting at that time.

I then used caffeine pills trying to drown  my appetite.  THEN, I found loretabs.  The cure all!  I got access to them from my kitchen cupboard. My dad had recently had knee surgery. Loretabs turned to anything I could get my hands on, NyQuil, ambien(again from home cupboards), dramamine.  That was all because I could get my hands on it.  

Then I found adderall! Oh my love for adderall!  I could use some adderall right now!!  Adderall at the time took me from 120 lbs down to 114 lbs! In like a matter of a week! It was amazing!  I remember my brother Todd visiting St. George when I was 114 lbs and he commented how good I looked.  It felt so good!

Eventually, that over the counter use led to Alcohol.  Alcohol was amazing!  It took away all those bad thoughts about myself.  It allowed me to be social and free.  Alcohol led me to Marijuana.  Never enjoyed marijuana too much.  Marijuana was probably my enemy.  Not sure why I used it so much.  It did the opposite of what I was looking for.  It made the thoughts in my mind I was trying to escape from SO MUCH LOUDER!  Oh the thoughts it created and the insecurities it gave me.

Unfortunately, alcohol was just another demon.  It made me too loose.  Every major regret in my life came from drinking alcohol.  I learned I couldn't drink if I didn't want to end up in some strangers bed not sure how or what happened.

SO, where did that lead me?  Cocaine and heroin.  Oh, there couldn't be anything better in this life could there?  If only it didn't destroy a person.  Those were magic drugs!  HEROIN!  I love you heroin.  Yes, I love the way heroin makes me feel.  You know why?  Because heroin makes you NOT FEEL!  It was everything I had been searching for!  I finally found the answer.  Oh and cocaine, can't even get started on how amazing that feels, but of course without heroin to go with it you will get anxiety from hell.

Unfortunately, we are talking about drugs.  Drugs ruin lives and they ruined mine.   Nothing mattered except getting high.  Drowning the pain and running from myself.  Eventually, you have to wake up and you are you again.  Except, you are you with a lot more problems and damage.  Losing jobs, hurting family, losing a home, losing love.  Gosh, why do drugs have to ruin you?  If only they could really be the answer.



SO................ I got clean one day.  Yeah all that is history.   Lets fast forward.  I got off drugs, but what do you know?  I was still Kim.  I was still that dang freaking person I had been running from for years and years.  I was still Kim with body image issues and disordered eating.  I started working at Hogi Yogi.  At night time we could eat all the cookies we wanted.  They had awesome cookies.  I loved those cookies, but I didn't want the consequence of eating them.  So Bulimia arrived(hi bulimia, I remember you).  Bulimia made me more depressed than doing drugs.  Oh I was SO SO SO depressed.  So, I went to the doctor for depression and bulimia and he gave me prozac and xanax.  YEA!  Thank YOU DOCTOR FOR GIVING ME A DRUG THAT I CAN TAKE WITHOUT GUILT!  It was like the bells in heaven went off!  Bulimia was gone!  Depression was gone!  Xanax ran out and I remembered how lovely it felt to not be Kim with bulimia.  So I was back at it.  Sorry mom and dad, I know how much it hurt.  But maybe you can see why I did it?  Maybe not.

My lifestyle landed me pregnant though.  It often does right?  Heavenly Father had to have had a hand in this somewhere I'm certain.  My drug addict mind went from looking for a fix to "I'm pregnant?  Okay bye bye lifestyle".  My pregnancy took my appetite away.  I was cured!  No appetite, no desire for drugs.  Then I discovered counting calories and exercise.  I was cured!  It was the happiest time of my life!  I had no desire for bad foods, I could count calories like it aint no thing.  That's the beginning of the rest of my story...

Continue with the post The Ugly truth if you want my current day situation.