July 13th- Trying to stay strong

Today was perhaps the most difficult day I have ever had to deal with migraines and my binge eating.  To start the morning I woke up immediately with a full blown migraine which thankfully I was able to get under control with an Imitrex tab and a couple more hours of sleep.  However, maybe a couple hours after my headache went away, I had yet another one start up and took my second and final Imitrex for the day.  The thing I really hate about taking my Imitrex tabs is that when I get maxed out earlier in the day, I wind up having this dazed almost foggy feeling all over.  Sometimes it causes me to be a little slow in processing what I am trying to think or work through a problem or question.  Any way, this second migraine lasted about 2-3 hours which took me into about 2pm.  To try and get the "foggy" feeling to go away, I decided to lay down and rest for a little bit.  Unfortunately, I got to wake up to my third migraine for the day.  Hoping for a miracle, I decided to take a couple extra strength Tylenol which thankfully caught the headache early enough and I was able to end the day without a headache.

As far as my binge eating for the day, I started out going out to breakfast with Catie and her mom and decided try what my nutritionist suggested and have a breakfast with more protein than just having several bowls of cereal which is what I usually have in the mornings.  That being said, I had country fried steak with the gravy along with some of Catie's french toast and some hash browns.  While it tasted good, I still felt myself wanting even more food.  I decided to try and let the feeling to binge come and think about other things to distract me from the intense thoughts of eating food.  Thankfully, because I was not around any other food I could get my hands on I was able to ride out the urge to binge.  Trying to ride out this urge I swear felt like one of the hardest things I have tried to do in a long time and felt pretty close to a form of torture.  After breakfast, Catie, her mom, and I went out to go in to Brainerd/Baxter and get a few things at Target.  While at Target we stopped in the Starbucks and all I could focus on while my drink was being made was ordering just about any pastry/treat that was in the food display.  I kept feeling the urge to build more and more and more until finally my drink was done and I literally stopped at the pick-up station with my hand on my drink quarreling in my mind over whether or not to order some kind of pastry.  Thankfully I was able to fight through this and walk away.  I didn't have any other urges for the remainder of being out and about.  Once we got back to the cabin however in the middle of my second migraine, all I wanted to do was to have a break and find any way to take the edge off of being depressed and frustrated from my headaches.  Before laying down, I went into my "snack pack" and began to eat what wound up being 3 snack size Pringle packs, 4 packs of fruit snacks, 4 packs of cheese crackers, 1 sandwich bag size of Cheese-Its and 6 small brownie bites from Sam's Club.  Of course I didn't feel any better, if not worse, because my stomach was now overly full and began to give me the all to familiar nauseated feeling.  Plus, this only made my migraines worse.  I couldn't help but feel ashamed and depressed that I was not able to stay strong and not cave into the urge to binge.  After sleeping for awhile, I was able to focus on cooking dinner and read my book for awhile.  This actually went well even tough I had nothing but food in front of me while grilling.  Once I sat down to eat dinner though, it was a different story.  I was able to maintain my goal of eating just a hamburger and a brat. But, once I started eating the cut-up watermelon, I felt the feeling of it tasting good and only making me feel the urge to want to binge begin to kick in once again.  I wound up eating about 5 servings of watermelon and then once inside the cabin about 3/4 of a bag of chips.  Once I began to feel even a remote feeling of Kieran needing to get changed, I was able to immediately stop binging and focus on other things.  For the remainder of the evening I was able to focus solely on playing a game with the family.

Like I said earlier, today was probably the most difficult day (migraine wise) I have ever had to experiencing with my migraines or even my bingeing.  Due to my initial post, many people have commented on trying some other techniques such as relaxing breathing, music, and medications.  In order to not let the migraines and binging get the best of me, I was able to use my next coping skill to suggest for you all.  That technique is called guided imagery.  By thinking about an environment that I can rely on to bring happiness and joy if I were able to be there.  Guided imagery has oddly enough only worked on certain days and to a limited effect with the migraines.  Whether it be for binge eating or other issues, guided imagery is my suggestion for you all to try as a coping mechanism for your fishing lisence.

Thanks for taking the time to read my post and I look forward to hearing/reading any comments that you may have to help me improve the blog.  Thanks again everyone and I appreciate all the positive energy and encouragement you have always provided me and continue to provide me to this day.  Thanks again.