Crazy Christmas (TW: ED)

 

Whilst Christmas brings enjoyment, excitement, indulgence and treats for many, Christmas to me has always brought an element of anxiety and significant self-criticism. This post is to help myself, and hopefully others, understand the complex experience myself and others with mental health problems and/or eating disorders can go through at Christmas

My combined issues of Bipolar and Bulimia means that I have a rollercoaster of an experience every festive season. Christmas is one particular time of year that has a tendency to trigger a manic episode - or at least hypo-mania - due to the excitement that Christmas brings. I would probably explain the mania at Christmas as an enhanced version of how I felt as a child on Christmas day but prolonged for weeks on end and often detrimental to my mental and physical health. This year feels a little bit different with Covid and the tier restrictions we are facing.

My feelings towards Christmas 2020 are less hypomania in the sense of happiness, giddiness, and childish excitement that I would normally feel, but instead a heart-racing, stomach clenching, skittish kind of hypo that is fuelled by underlying anxiety, irritability and self-criticism. Sitting here today at the start of December I feel my heart in my throat and my hands typing away as a way of trying to comprehend my current combination of emotions. The 6th of December for me is currently bringing a chaotic mush of these thoughts:

1. Christmas brings a lot of fear foods to my table
2. Christmas involves a lot of discussions around weightloss, weight-gain, and plans for body-orientated New Years Resolutions
3. Covid means that Christmas won't be 'normal' - as my family and close friends know well, my life orientates around routine, a sense of normality, and daily predictability 

Whilst these thoughts feel very personal and individual, I know there are thousands of people in society who will be battling these same thoughts this festive season. I've decided to try and address these thoughts in this post not for other people's benefit, but so try and understand my own complex relationship with food, Christmas, and generalised anxiety.

Let's start with thought number one: Christmas bringing fear foods to my table. As someone who thrives in a position of control and orientates my day around when I will eat, what I will eat, and who I will eat in the company of, fear foods are something which I am very poor at tackling. Working with myself and my family, my list of 'fear foods' should slowly start to decrease - but this is proving difficult for me at the moment. Roast potatoes, mince pies, advent chocolate, and a good old cheese board - this is just the start of a long list of foods that cause a lot of anxiety at Christmas. Please remember when you are with family on Christmas day that comments on food choice and food quantities can ruin someone's entire day - Christmas day is about indulgence and enjoying food and the company of family, so please hold back on your judgemental thoughts and comments.

Thought number two - discussions around resolutions, weightloss and weight-gain. As someone who takes several medications which have significantly contributed to a three-stone weightgain in 2-years, the thought of people discussing fitness goals, weightloss plans, and talking about having 'earnt' their Christmas treats is a significant trigger. I am not asking family and friends to not discuss these things - these are completely normal conversations that familes and friends can have - but rather I am trying to understand how I can better perceive these conversations and engage in people's individual goals. I want to enjoy people's ambitions of losing two-stone to aid their health, or get excited about someone's goal to run a marathon in 2021, but there is a huge part of me that envies people's ability to just do these things without a voice in their head telling them otherwise. 

Lastly, and the most personal issue with Christmas 2020: Christmas won't be 'normal'. Battling an ED and Bipolar means that I feel most in control of my life when I am in charge - when I am the one calling the shots, planning the weekly meals, booking my blood tests and deciding exactly when I am going to walk the dog and go on a run. Christmas and Covid has meant that booking my routine ECG's and blood tests have become difficult, causing me to get anxious about the effect my medications are having on my body. Lack of control in my life causes significant anxiety, inability to sleep, and eventually making myself ill just through stress and anxiety. Luckily Jordan is very understanding and allows me to take control of our schedule on a daily basis, but Covid is something completely out of my control.

At first, I flourished in Covid. Many anxieties actually relieved at first, such as not having to engage in social activities, having my face covered in a shop making me less self-conscious of my appearance, Jordan working from home meaning I am never alone in the house. I had a very elongated manic spell throughout lockdown one, finding myself over-joyed with the prospect of being surrounded by family every single day and not having to be alone. This two-month long manic spell has been one of the longest I have suffered and coming out the other side was not easy, triggering issues with food and complex self-critical thoughts when I dipped back down from the manic spell. 

In contrast to lockdown 1, lockdown 2 has brought a lot of anxiety, complex issues with my body, and unhealthy eating habits. Having had my medications increased and there being yet more weight-gain, my MH team and I have had a bit of a field day trying to get me to understand that weight-gain is a small price to pay in order to not be sectioned or in a dangerous cycle of self-harm and negative self-thoughts. The combination of my food struggle and Bipolar has brought a whole new complexity to my mental health journey, as these illnesses seem to 'compliment' each other in the sense that depressive spells are hugely triggered by bad patches with my ED and manic spells can be brought on by success in combatting my ED and negative relationship with my body.

Christmas will not be 'normal' this year and the sooner people understand this, the better. As someone who thrives in a state of normalcy as this helps avoid both Bipolar and ED triggers, I have got to understand that whilst Christmas is not 'normal' by any stretch of the imagination, this is entirely out of my control. That there, is the small sentence which haunts me: things being out of my control. The thought of not being able to control every single element of my life and surroundings is the biggest issue I have. Christmas will not be spent with grandparents, cousins, close friends and work colleagues at parties and gatherings, which in many ways you would expect to ease my anxiety! I normally worry about social situations and gatherings weeks before the event actually takes place, but for some reason I am finding myself longing for social interaction and cheesy Christmas parties? Again, this is just another complex relationship I have with myself and my mental illnesses. Sometimes I think it is pointless trying to analyse why I feel certain things and not others, but I have to again remind myself that Bipolar is a complex illness, and as such, I am a very complex individual who's relationship with myself and my surroundings will continue to change on a daily basis, medication by medication, therapy session by therapy session.

So if you are going to take one thing from this endless rambling of thoughts, take this: bring more kindness than you have every brought before this Christmas. People have lost loved ones this year, people have lost jobs, friends, relatives and any sense of 'normality'. Suicide rates, substance abuse, and mental health problems are only getting worse as people feel isolated and in a state of anomy. Let's bring kindess this Christmas and remember: you never know what issues people are internally fighting at the Christmas day dinner table.