Wow, congratulations! I can't even do one, hahaha :blushing:

I think this thread is quite reasonable and a great idea.
I myself am recovering from an eating disorder, bulimia nervosa and dysthymia (a light depression where not all symptoms are fulfilled, but those symptoms have been around for at least 2 years (in my case much longer), while during a depression it's mostly just several weeks).

I was having huge up and downs for years now.

And I went through "I can do it (on my own), I'll get healthy and happy and everything will be perfect" to "I'm so extremely miserable and nothing will be good NEVER AGAIN why can't I simply die." sometimes, those moods changed within a day, without an emotional trigger or anything.

While I always expected a lot from previous years (on New Year's Eve, I always thought "the next year is going to be "my year"). And well.. this year was the first year where I didn't thought so. I did not expect much.
I knew I'd have lots of work in front of me, because my therapy just started and it will also continue for some more months. Or maybe even years, who knows. I'll be studying up from September, I'll have lots of stress, lots of work ahead of me.
I was quite depressed at first.

And.. it gets better. Around january, I finally had an insight that I actually have a mental illness. This might sounds strange, because if you binge and purge for years and you're hiding and crying and lying a lot, you know that something is not alright. But I always thought that it is a character weakness of mine, that I'm just not strong enough, too sensitive- not good enough.

And when I finally understood that I have an illness and that it is my responsibility and in my power to fight against it, but that it is NOT my fault that I have it, I was able to change things.

I still have a lot of work in front of my, from my mindset. I still tend to see everything in black and white, I struggle a lot with being proud of myself. Whatever I achieve is barely good enough, whenever I do mistakes, it just shows what a failure of a person I am etc.

But for the first time in my life, I actually feel how much power I hold in. I used this power to destroy me, but just this power will now be the thing that rescues me.
And it's quite ironic that now, while being in recovery, I am slimmer than anytime else in at least the last 5 years, if not even more (still a healthy weight, my therapist controlls this every week, no worries :flowerforyou: )

But I slowly stopped punishing myself and I slowly discover, how much easier things can be. How much potential I have. And that I can achieve the things I want- and that I deserve doing so!
This gives me lots of strength.

And now, I'm 5'5" and at 127/128lbs, which is around the borderline I may weight as long as I am in therapy (my therapist and I came both up with this number together, even though it would be healthy until at least 125lbs).
But for the first time in my life, I do not hate my body. Actually, I adore to feel what my body is capable of. And how my body saved itself- saved me, even though I tried to destroy it. My body is so strong!

And even though my mind is still struggling with this, I decided to eat my TDEE from now on, to maintain my weight and to try to gain some more muscles. The scale will go up. I eat at least 400 kcal more per day, if I do an active workout, I'll eat the calories back. But I want this and I deserve this.
Less restriction what depends on food, more fuel for my body, more treats for my mind.
And I want my body to get stronger. I want to be able to do push ups- or at least one. I want more muscles.
I want to actually feel that my body is capable of carrying me through my whole life, that I don't need to depend on myself.
My body is not my enemy anymore.
And accepting this, is one of the biggest accomplishments I ever gained, not only this year, but from my whole life.
I am quite proud of that.

And one day I'll be able to tell you from my first push-up :drinker: