GET REAL 11:38 pm on Monday, September 18 2006

When oh when are we going to get it?  What will it take for people to really realise the true meaning of eating disorders?  The implications on individuals and on society as a whole.  The super skinny set are not accidentally thin, they are not well.  To put yourself through the gruelling regime that maintaining an emaciated frame requires is not something done by any self-respecting person.  If you are prepared to deprive yourself and deny your bodies needs to the extent that is required to achieve size zero, or anything close to that, you can't think much of yourself.  To override the hunger switch, to exercise until your body is eating into muscle in a bid to find an ounce of energy, to live on a diet where five portions a day means five diet cokes and five hundred sit ups, is hardly the action of a well mind.  And unquestionably does not result in a well body.

Osteoporosis, infertility, eroded teeth, self-obsession, exhaustion, circulatory disease, shortened life span.  Not a good prognosis.  It is clear why the ultimate outcome of chronic anorexic behaviour is death.

Compulsive eating is as painful.  As damaging, and as deadly.  Starving bodies and stuffed bodies are one and the same they are sick bodies.  I know that because I have seen it in myself and I have seen it in many others.  In the grip of food obsession too little, too much, whatever it may be, rationale doesn't count for anything, logic becomes illogical, black becomes white, and vice versa.

Day after day, week after week, I meet and spend time with more and more young people who may have a toe in the pool of deep dark waters.  They have a desire to conform to the messages they are surrounded by, the images of beautiful bony frames that they understand to represent success and wealth and happiness.  They are perhaps feeling lost in the world and seeking a means of expression, and almost always feeling so down on themselves, that just as I once felt, they don't believe they deserve to eat.   And there are those who do eat, and are consumed with shame and guilt.  They more often see their reflection in the water in the lavatory bowl, than they ever happen to see it in the mirror.  And the binge eaters.  They are some of the least greedy people I know.  They do not demand love or attention or affirmation, or anything else that we all need to feel.  Instead, they hide away, starved of these things, and they stuff their needs and feelings down, pushing food down their throats until it hurts.  And hurt it does.  But the physical pain of fullness is a good distraction no pain is as appalling and unbearable as emotional emptiness.  If you focus on the food or lack of it takes the edge off all of those feelings.

Please, lets get real about this.  Too many people are suffering, too many families are falling a part, too many are in needless pain, and too many die, every year.  I am one of the lucky ones.  In many ways, it could be fair to say I shouldnt be here, because without question I am here only because I got a second, and a third chance.  I have a life and I know there is hope, there is never a hopeless case.  But if nothing changes, nothing changes, and therein as a society, we have a problem. 

'dem aching bones 9:15 pm on Sunday, September 17 2006

I feel some what creaky and stiff as I have been thoroughly inactive.  Working on figures and surrounded by receipts all weekend, to submit numbers to the tax man. (Someone polish my halo, please)

However, the grand news is that there are no more aches from being unwell and the bruises from crashing down the stairs are no more than a vague reminder of the horrible event.  I feel a million times better - I feel normal! 

Go back a few years, the norm was to ache, to be oh so ridiculously tired, to be bruised, and to be constantly cold.  Not so today.  Aches and pains are indications that something needs to be done, and today I endeavour to respond.  And the result is WOW!  It is so good, so incredibly good, to feel ok.  To have energy.  To have colour, an immune system, strength, an imagination, a real sense of reality, a future. 

I did a talk on friday.  I was a bit worried (Nerves still kick in from time to time - probably just to keep me in check).   But as ever, within the first few minutes I was away, and totally fine.  And the audience were fab. 130 or so VI form boys, 50 girls, and I think they surprised themselves more than anyone, by the fact that they listened so hard.  They were great.  As I drove home, having chatted to a few individually, I once again reflected on the amount I have to be thankful for and the appreciation I feel when these talks go well.  Theres nothing quite like feeling that you have done a good job, been honest and true, and shared something that someone else might appreciate hearing. 

But I also feel immensley frustrated - there are so many young people out there, and whilst I talk to a few thousand each year, I would love to get the chance to speak to more. Springback is my springboard, its time to jump higher, further, deeper.

 Al

wham bam thank you maam 5:42 pm on Monday, September 11 2006

Im back, feeling alot better after a rather miserable and poorly week.  Last day of medicine too :o)  Although to add insult to injury, I came down my staircase the fast way yesterday - I fell.  It is not to be recommended and I have the bruises to prove it.  May last week be well behind me now and whatever this week brings, I can't help hoping it will be better!

I know that falls down flights of stairs were not what he was referring to at the time, but all the same I wonder if I should try to extract something positive from the words of the inimitable Nelson Mandela

The greatest glory lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

Once my back straightens itself out I will rise, and walk tall.

Al

mayday 6:15 pm on Monday, September 4 2006

I felt perhaps the worst physical pain that I have ever known last night, and ended up in casualty this morning.  It wasn't my teeth, as I had assumed, they are in the clear. Allegedly the offender is my sinuses.  Tiny cavities. Huge hurt (fine example of Inverse Proportions).

I found myself feeling vulnerable and helpless - and desperate for help.  Which is why today A&E doctors are at the top of my list of super heros. 

And I am reminded of what a gift my health is, one that can never be taken for granted.  Cant wait to bounce back soon.

Al

bim 12:19 am on Monday, September 4 2006

Shes a wonderful person, and an expert at what she does; she's been playing a big part in the helping me smile widely (in the literal sense). Nonetheless she still terrifies me.  Because she is a dentist. 

Right now the pain in my jaw so huge that the terror is insignificant.  I will be at the surgery first thing tomorrow, pleading for my turn in that reclining chair. 

Al

painting rainbows 7:46 pm on Sunday, September 3 2006

I went up to the park behind the church this today.  This is the 3rd summer that I have lived here and today is the first time I have headed up there on a summer sunday to enjoy the music performed in the bandstand.  It was lovely.  Very English.

There were a few young families but it was predominantly an over-70s (or 80s?) audience.  Most were comfortably planted in their deckchairs, going nowhere in a hurry this afternoon. 

I sat, and then lay, on the (slightly damp) grass and with music ranging from Mozart and Rossini to Lennon and McCartney echoing all around me I had space and time to think, to be still, and to be.  Its not very often that I literally be.  Be still, be quiet, be in the moment, just be.  Even when I am doing nothing I am usually doing something(walking, talking, writing, reading, driving, the list goes on and on). I had uncluttered, undistracted space for thoughts, feelings, and dreams. 

I noticed how blue the sky was, how fast the clouds moved, how loud the breeze was in the boughs of the trees above me.  I thought about some of the people who mean so much to me, and are a part of my life; some friends, some family.  I wondered about the future - about aspects that I am excited about, and the oh-so-much that I do not yet know about.  I had time to go through in my mind, some of the fears (projections) that I feel and whilst I mended none of them (that was not the point), it allowed me the chance to keep in check (and sometimes amend) my perspective which has been known at times to go right off the wall when allowed a free rein!

I rested my chin on the ground and watched an ant scale the steep face of a blade of grass.  And I wondered what it must be to look on the world from the viewpoint of an ant (or beetle, or butterfly).  I tried to imagine it for myself, without my own preconceptions influencing the exercise. It was harder than I thought!  Perhaps we could all do that just a little more often (not necessarily with insects, but with one another) imagine looking through different eyes, seeing in a new light - reds blues and greens in shades that you never knew existed, and be reminded that we are not all the same - perceptions and perspectives can and do vary. This is a part of what makes us who we are, and makes every last one of us unique and individual. 

Colour is not only in those things that exist around us.  It lies within.  The human spirit holds a palette from which we can create exquisite rainbows - its simply up to us to pick up the brush and do it.

And when Barrys Born Free theme aptly rounded off my peace in the park, I gathered myself up and wandered back home.

Al.