I'm scared: Relapse

I am a 32 year old woman and I've found myself back into the cycle o bulimia again. I've relapse and I find myself not wanting to quit and I feel such guilt, shame and as a fraud because I don't want to quite. Its been a week since I relapse and before that I probable relapse about 2 years ago and I quickly stopped after 1 or 3 episodes of B &P. I find myself doing that maybe every few years but every time I did relapse I always wanted to quit right afterwards because I'm consumed with fear of the dark days of becoming addicted to the B&P.

The ED started when I was in high school and I lived that life for 3 years until I was put into therapy and it worked for me. So I'm somewhat aware of why I use B&P as my choice to cope with life's stressors. What triggered the ED again was my father's failing health and his alcoholism. I've taken on the role to care for his health. Another stressor is being in graduate school and the unbearable feeling of failure. Then finally being in a loving relationship with my boyfriend who I continue to push away and how I can't accept his love.

I'm on Wellbrutin XL for depression and anxiety due to graduate school. My doctors and therapist are not aware of my ED. I thought the ED would finally be put behind me. My boyfriend is aware of the B&P and he loves me regardless but I won't ever allow myself to feel good enough.

I'm at a road block and I know soon enough I'll fall into a sink hole that I can't get out of. I'm scared.

Hello, LoveHopeStrength14. Why not print a copy of your post for your treatment team and have them help you? Therapy worked before.

Give it some thought.

Hi LoveHopeStrength. Don't punish yourself! We all relapse. I can't tell you how many times I had to pick myself up, clean myself off and say "well, I can TRY to make that the last time". That's all you can do-try your hardest. The guilt and the shame are only going to keep you in the cycle. Be gentle with yourself. Try to use different banter in your head like "well THAT happened and it might not be the last time but I am not giving up". Slip ups happen to everyone. That's why I don't like to count how many days it's been since I purged. It's a recipe for guilt if you have to go back to day 1. And who needs more guilt! You slip up, you pick yourself up, you try again.

What I'm really concerned about here is you are on Wellbutrin and Wellbutrin lowers the seizure threshold for bulimics. Like, A LOT. That's why you have to tell your prescribing doctor. Bulimics are at risk for having seizures anyway but along with the Wellbutrin the risk is so high my p-doc took me off immediately when he found out I was back to purging (a while back, I've since stopped with the help of another med). So please, tell your doctors. I know it sounds like the hardest thing in the world to do but I don't think you should go cold turkey off Wellbutrin either. You should be taking something for the urges and anxiety.

Does your boyfriend know about the b/p? Men will NEVER understand why we do it and sometimes I regret telling my husband (he still makes me pee with the door open ) but he was a big help when I was in the thick of it. He followed me around for two hours after every meal to make sure I wasn't purging (I asked him to do this) and that helped my stomach readjust huge.

I hope some of all of this helps!!

Seizures? Never heard Bulimics are at risk for seizures. Can you direct me to the studies done on this? Been bulimic for 15 years actually never had one negative symptom they list under bulimia.

Hi Moxie Doxie. If you do a google search there are tons of articles on bulimia and seizures. Scared the crap out of me when I first started to try and get healthy. Here is just one:

Seizures

And here is one on how the use of Wellbutrin relates to bulimics and seizure threshold (for anyone interested in this):

Medication and the Treatment of Bulimia Nervosa

Oh........anyone who is dehydrated or has blood sugar issues are at risk for seizures. Not just because of Bulimia. If you rehydrate with gatorade or coconut water, like I always do, after purging your fine. I have never been dehydrated. You just have to do some extra self care so not to get caught from fainting or said seizure. Unless you want to get caught.

Thank you everyone who took their time to reply back to my concerns. Thank you everyone who sent me cyber hugs.

As an update I'm doing better. The thoughts are still there and I'm finding ways to not feed into the impulses. I met with my therapists today and she was so annoying when all I wanted was for her to listen to me. She was so quick to tell me what to do, warning me of all the health hazards of have an ED. I've lived with an ED for so long that I understand it intellectually of what this ED does to my body and why I use it as a coping method. What I'm struggling with is connecting with my emotions and my desires of not wanting to quit. It doesn't scare me that my teeth and gums can rot, my hair can fall off, I can scar my throat. At this moment in time nothing is worthwhile compared to the instant gratification of the having some sense of control in my life, the aftermath of the endorphins running through my body where every shuts down. In that moment of B&P, everything in my life is at a standstill, the numbing can outdo any other coping style in trying to handle my life's stress.