Adjusting Focus

In honor of National Eating Disorder Week, I wanted to share with you my recent experience with my eating disorder. I've struggled with an eating disorder since I was about 13 years old. With various mental health struggles hitting me hard with the start of quarantine and COVID-19, I decided to see a psychiatrist. I was given a new diagnosis (something I am not quite ready to delve into on here as I try to figure it out for myself), and new medication. This medication had a side effect of weight gain. I was hesitant to try it at first, knowing that I was still in recovery from my eating disorder and worried potential weight gain could trigger me. Still, I was desperate to sleep and stop oversleeping, to feel like my life had purpose again. Within a few weeks, I'd noticed weight gain as my jeans started to get tighter. I shed a lot of tears and hated getting ready to go to work. At the same time, I was feeling emotionally lighter, ready to face the world in front of me. After ca...

 As 2020 comes to a close, like many, I’ve had the opportunity to reflect on everything that made up my year. There were a lot of changes, a lot of trials, and a lot of good things that made 2020 the Year of Courage. I had to grow up a lot, which honestly, was kind of scary. But, I made it, and am thankful for all that happened.  I started out by moving to Utah for my internship working with immigrants and refugees, and started my final semester at BYU-Idaho. I came out as bisexual, moved into my own apartment, graduated college, worked 2 jobs, got a cat, and battled depression. I started therapy again, began new medication, restarted my gym membership, and towards the end of the year, felt hopeful about what the future held again. Despite the challenges we still face with COVID-19, I feel a sense of peace I haven’t felt in so long. For a while I struggled to find any joy and an sense of hope that life would get better, that I should keep going. I’m thankful for my parents, my...

 *TRIGGER WARNING REGARDING SEXUAL ASSAULT. 18+ LANGUAGE. It's taken me so long to finally type this. It's hard to get the words to say what this all means to me. The truth is, it's taken over a year to even realize that I was affected by such an event. Not to mention I didn't even realize what had happened until I was sitting in my room, at the beginning of being in lockdown from COVID, utterly alone. Scrolling on through an Instagram feed I stumbled upon, looking at images of individuals sharing why they never reported, wondering how such terrible things could happen to innocent people who never asked for it, when I realized how it could happen. Because it happened to me; I was sexually assaulted. The words are more or less still terrifying to write (I can't say them out loud), and the fear of my ex-boyfriend finding this and calling me a liar is very real. Maybe because I once agreed with him that I was a liar, and called myself one in poems written about and for...

For a long time, I believed my religion was enough; it was all I needed in life. If all else failed, I had God. I had this organization I so devoutly believed in and followed. What I didn't realize was that the day would come I would feel this wasn't enough for me, that I was feeling isolated, resentful, and overall unhappy with where I was, and religion played a rather large part in that. And though I am much happier with where I am now, happy to be leading my life as an openly bisexual woman, leaving wasn't necessarily an easy choice. My therapist pointed out that I spent my entire life within this organization, and have only spent less than a year out of it. That meant my thinking wouldn't change over night, and it would take time. I expressed to her the guilt I often felt when I did the things I was always taught not to do-date women, for one, get tattoos, pierce my ears more than once, drink coffee, and a lot of other things, a lot of which are relatively small in ...

It's been a while since I've posted here. Quite frankly I've been in some very dark spots over the last little bit and my motivation to write has been almost non-existent. I've spent more days crying on the floor and more hours sleeping than I would like to admit. But, for the first time in a very long time, I felt a burst of inspiration. I'm reading " The Gifts of Imperfection " by Brené Brown. I'm currently on a "vulnerability/courage journey" so that I learn to stop hiding and running from my emotions, share those emotions with others, and also learn how to be more present when I am feeling good (I often find myself on edge, waiting for the next "bad" thing to happen to ruin the happiness I have). It's been very eye opening, terrifying, and uplifting. Once again, for the first time in a while, I'm getting new ideas and writing more. I take notes constantly. I also cry a lot still, and throw my own pity parties because I w...

Since leaving my home in Massachusetts to go to my first semester at BYU-Idaho in 2016, I've managed to move/have new roommates every few months (and on a mission a new area and a new companion every so often). Though I like to plan out my life, I've grown accustomed to knowing no place is ever permanent for me. My move to Utah, though, would be different. I planned on being here for a while to get state residency, and hopefully apply to grad schools close by. That meant Salt Lake would (most likely) be the longest I've ever stayed in one place since high school.  I've come to realize that the inconsistencies of where I live and who I'm living with has been harder than I've led myself to believe. I used to tell people I loved the change of never being "still" for too long. In some ways, the change is nice. Moving and living with new people every so often has allowed me to meet my closest friends, and have some incredible memories/experiences. On the ot...