So let me tell you about the chubby anorexic and other tales of the woes of poverty in America with mental illness. This is a frank discussion of my current mental state and details of anorexia and its related control issues - it is truthful but gross in some aspects - consider yourself warned.
Yep, I'm anorexic and going through a serious stage of it right now. I've lost about 65lbs last time I bothered to check - scales are usless on a boat and really, something I don't care for having been called fat.
So anorexia is about control - this is absolutely the case for me. There is a tonne of food packed away in this boat. Lentils, meat, cheese, bread, peanut butter, vegtables, seaweeds, rices, beans of all kinds - there is plenty of food here and food I usually enjoy. But I don't have anything else to control right now, so I control my body. It's more than just eating or not eating - it's a whole package of related control issues.
I am not functioning well enough to find work. I basically can't leave the boat unless it is with someone else for a specific purpose - picking up meds, food, soda, using the toilet. I am taking my meds - at least the important ones I can afford. But if I don't eat, I can control using the toilet too. I'm not kidding either. I can piss in a bucket and dump that overboard at night. For a crap I have to go up to the real toilets which are pretty gross right now since it's fishing and tourist season.
Don't eat solid foods, don't shit. It's as simple as that and yet another way I can control my body. Then there is the general issue of hygene itself. I have none.
This is odd because as a kid I was actually at one point showering six times a day and developed a full body rash as a result. Now I'm pretty much the complete opposite - if I shower twice a month I'm doing "good." And this is while I was working too - just put on more deodorant and change clothes periodically - and no one ever said a word to me. And I have long hair - and we know what long greasy hair in a pony tail looks like - nasty.
I do floss fairly regularly - getting my teeth fixed is expensive and I was told flossing is better than brushing. I have one tiny mirror in my home I can't find most of the time, so what I look like is of no issue to me. Ever. I will go out in weird combinations as long as it's cleanish and I'm covered up in the right places. And again, I don't go out unless I have a reason to and try to get home as quickly as I can.
Back to food - it's not that I don't eat at all - I do eat. But I eat very small amounts unless I'm stoned - even then I will limit what I eat sometimes - just to shut my stomach up. The feeling of "hunger" no longer registers with me anymore so I start getting a double cough from the acid buildup. Eventually I will get annoyed with it enough to eat something to shut it up. Today it was a couple of bites of matzah and hummus and some yogurt pretzels. Yesterday is was two chicken strips. I do eat, but sparingly and only when I feel forced to.
When I have to eat or shower or shit I feel like my body is betraying me - that I still don't have control. I realise that these things need to be done and I have no desire to die at all, but I want to be able to turn them on and off like my feelings.
I haven't spoken to my wife in over a month - not because I don't want to - but because she doesn't. I know she is depressed and hates her job but without being able to talk to her and listen to her - I can't help. I'm married but it's as if I've never met her. The void is starting to eat at me. So I just turn everything off and call it being patient - really it's just trying not to feel burnt. I still do anyway.
If I can't get functional I will lose my boat. I don't have a lot of time to do that in - and without medical insurance it's not likely to happen. Once I'm homeless again I don't know what I will do - I can't exactly crawl home to my parents or anything. My abilities to see a way out are fading but I haven't given up hope. I just need to figure out how to get my shit back together and have no idea where to start.