Today is Thursday 1st May (sorry I’m a bit behind, recovery is EXHAUSTING). Day four of recovery. May Day. Accurate – because that’s the first thing I shouted trying to drag my body out of bed, feeling the entire weight of being in recovery pressing on every joint.

MAYDAY.

My body felt noticeably heavier. It was the first thing I noticed before I even opened my eyes. Pain.

Rolling over took effort. Putting my legs on the floor took MORE effort. Standing up my knees screamed their own version of mayday, clicking loudly and sending a sharp pain up my leg.
“UGH. I am definitely in the rapid weight gain phase of early anorexia recovery,” I thought.

I’d already gained over 2kg (4.4lbs) by Tuesday which was Day 2. Now it was Thursday, and I knew I’d gained more.
“Maybe I’m wrong? Imagining it? I’m not even eating that much over maintenance for that to be possible – I’ve already gained 2kg this week,” I told myself.
So I got tricked into weighing myself. For “maybe it’s not THAT bad” reasons.

The scale, of course, didn’t care about my feelings. It blunty confirmed what my knees already knew: I’m now up over 3kg (over 6.6lbs) from Monday. Today was going to suck.

The Morning After the Night Before

Last night, there was another Biscoff-related incident. Two big bowls of the best Biscoff concoction my recovery chaos goblin has ever come up with – Biscoff Weetabix, Biscoff Krave, and crumbled Biscoff biscuits – in my previous undereating safe bowl, the one I used to make half a tin of beans in for the last year and a half. That was the chaos. And this morning? The consequence.

An extra kilogram. Just from those two bowls of cereal – plus the rest of the day’s food, which had been far less dramatic. I know the whole “recovery symphony” professionals perform when you’re upset about rapid weight gain:
“It’s water weight!”
“You’re just refilling your glycogen stores!”
“It’s not real weight!”
“It’s not fat! That’s impossible!”

And I know, rationally and scientifically (I’ve read far too many research papers on it), they’re right – especially since my chaos goblin tends to demand the most glycogen-loading, fibrous, carb-heavy foods possible, almost like it’s deliberately trying to make my body hoard fluid like a drought’s coming, and asks for more even though I’m still doubled over in pain from last night’s fibre brick.

But it’s impossible to feel reassured when my knees are burning from the strain, making getting a coffee painful, and I feel like I’m wearing a heavy, weighted sumo suit I cannot take off that is getting heavier with EACH DAY that passes. Building and building.

I’ve put over 3kg on my still-underweight, disabled body in just four days. That’s a lot for any body – but mine is disabled and screaming. It’s effort just to exist today. It’s even more effort to stay in recovery.

Because it’s not just the weight of the kilos. It’s the emotional weight too. The kind that doesn’t show up on a scale but somehow feels heavier – with every step, every meal, every moment of trying to do the right thing when it feels all wrong, every kilo pulling you very quickly into a future you do not feel ready for. I just want this part of it to stop. I don’t care about glycogen or the other things you think I’m concerned with, thank you very much.

Shattered and Hollow

After spiralling and eating my breakfast – despite everything inside me screaming at me to skip it, because I wasn’t hungry, because I desperately wanted to go back and get rid of the 3kg – I decided to clean up the chaos in the kitchen. Chaos goblin – well, I don’t call my alter ego that for nothing – had left it in a right state. The evidence of assembling the Best Biscoff Bowl the night before was all over the counter: milk splashes, Biscoff crumbs, the bowl. The crumbly crime scene of recovery.

It was so difficult, because of my joint pain and general heaviness, but I put on loud music and just cleared away the evidence. I always find it helps – to reset my kitchen to its former state, as if it didn’t happen. Harder now, though. Because the real evidence of the Best Biscoff Bowl wasn’t on the counter – it was in my body. The pain that movement caused. The heaviness that didn’t go away when the crumbs did.

I decided to listen to First Aid Kit. I love them so much, and I was feeling the perfect kind of emotional for it, so I thought it would be helpful. I’ve listened to them many times over the past year during my relapse, and they’ve always put me in a chill mood.

But then the song “Shattered and Hollow” came on. And I felt something I haven’t felt in over a year.

Bubbling up from what felt like my heart, this warmth rose through my chest until it reached my eyes, and I felt the deepest ache inside myself. I started to cry. Not the usual scattered crying I’ve been doing every day after eating. This was an ugly cry. The kind that makes your ribs ache. The kind that makes you feel like you might never stop crying until you collapse. The song was too perfect for what I felt.

The weight gain isn’t about numbers, or glycogen, or water. It’s about being pushed forward too fast into the future. And not being able to slow it down.

Because every time I try to gain some control over that future – over my intake to slow it down – the chaos goblin shows up again and leaves a trail of Biscoff crumbs in its wake. I’m not ready to go forward. But I also know I’ll never be ready.
And the lyrics made me feel that so clearly.

But I’d rather be
Broken than empty
Oh, I’d rather be
Shattered than hollow

I know I’d rather be absolutely shattered by this song than feel hollow. I have felt so hollow through this entire relapse. I don’t want to feel that anymore. I’d rather be emotionally destroyed than feel nothing. I’d rather cry over my weight gain than stay underweight and disconnected. Because feeling the pain means I’m still here. It means I’m still me.

But then the song reminded me why I’m so scared to move forward. Why I keep wanting to go back.

Oh, I’d rather be
By your side

I still feel like moving forward is taking me to a place without my best friend.

Weight As A Unit of TIme.

Weight, for me, is a unit of time. When I relapsed, I took myself back to the time I met WeeGee. Both of us were fighting our EDs when we met 13 years ago, and we were fighting together. To borrow lines from the song again:

I’m grieving today in an entirely different way. I’m not just grieving for WeeGee – I’m grieving the weight gain because it made me realise I have to leave WeeGee behind. I have to leave her here in the past. I have to let her go.

I have to give up control to the rapid weight gain that’s forcing me into a future like a time machine travelling at faster-than-light speeds – a future she isn’t in.

I found her here, in this relapse, but it was the WeeGee I met when we were in recovery, not the WeeGee I lost when she died.

Relapsing didn’t bring me peace. It didn’t bring her back. It didn’t help me run. It only delayed it –
Grief sat there, quietly, waiting for me to gain weight so I could feel it fully.

And today was that day.

I Don’t Know How.

I don’t know how to let WeeGee go.
How to leave her here.
But I have to move forward, and keep moving forward and hopefully I’ll find a way.

Today I am 3kg up, in a lot of pain, emotionally devastated, ate food anyway – and part of me writing this now is weirdly glad.

Getting emotionally devastated by a song reminded me of who I am without my eating disorder. And the lyric was right:

“Oh I’d rather be, shattered than hollow.”