Moving On

When Katie and I met, there was instant excitement. We immediately went into planning swims, meeting up for rides and workouts and planning trips together. We even considered moving out to San Diego together! We were def in the honeymoon phase. We were able to devote our undivided attention to each other and we tried to see each other as much as possible. 

2008 Tour de Skyline!
 The Katias train kept rolling and all of a sudden I found myself proposing to Katie. Before proposing I thought long and hard since I knew what I was getting myself into. Katie would occasionally have moments of sadness and run away, which is something we worked on to the point where the running away stopped. Another thing was the eating… Katie calorie restricts. 1,200 calories a day and no more. On days when she overeats, she takes laxatives. The laxatives put her in a funk… sadness, crankiness, irritability, no patience… and I would become the punching bag. If she stepped on the scale and didn’t like what she saw, it affected her mood for the rest of the day. It’s crazy to think but when you’re deep in it, the calorie restricting, the binging, the laxatives… it all becomes normal even when you know it’s not good! And what she considered a binge eating event was 500-600 calories over her daily limit…  that’s nothing! But we worked on it. We referred to it as the “monster”. The eating issue was the monster near a giant hole holding a rope. On the other end was Katie. All she had to do was drop the rope and the monster would fall in the hole! Easier said than done. I would tell her it was ok and be with her. It was hard work but it was worth it.

Then the kids came along and the relationship changed. I went from 100% attention on Katie to dividing up my attention between the kids and Katie. About a year after Chloe was born, Katie had more and more episodes of anxiety/depression so she started taking anti-depressants. Eventually she settled on Cymbalta, and after some time I started noticing side effects. She lost feelings in a way. Before she would have crying episodes which would help move past the depression, but with the drugs… she didn’t cry any more. Things that used to upset her didn’t bother her as much any more. We started doing things separately. She would do stuff with the kids then I would do stuff with the kids. I knew it wasn’t right and we would try and do stuff as a family, but then we’d fall right back into our solo parent routine. We went to counseling, but the sessions turned into less about our relationship and more about how Katie could cope with her anxiety/depression/eating issues, so we stopped going. The one thing I’ll never forget is when the psychologist told Katie to try and focus on all the good in her life instead of the tiny little weed in the corner. I thought yes that’s it! But it’s not that easy. Around this time, Katie wrote this. This is pretty intimate stuff but sharing because I hope one day Katie can overcome the eating monster:

I can’t do this anymore

Today I got rid of the scale. Watch out world!

For the past 20 years I have weighed myself at least once a day and have let that number dictate my mood for the day.

I loved being pregnant. Most people think this is crazy. I even think it is crazy. Me, who has always been fit and overly concerned with being thin, never thought I would enjoy being pregnant. But for that time it went away. It being my eating issues.

Throughout high school I had a friend who made comments about my weight and occasionally told me I was chubby. I did not think too much of it until the summer after my senior year in high school, when girls started to be more concerned about their figures. Just as with other things… when I put my mind to something it is pretty much a done deal. I started being more cautious about what I ate… cutting out most fats and sweets from my diet. By the end of the summer I had gone from about 135 pounds to 120 pounds. My mom told me how fabulous I looked. I felt great. I went to college feeling good about myself and how easy it was to just drop the weight. Well being on the swim team and with my perfectionist attitude of more is better it was easy to drop another 20 pounds. I ended up stopping swim team after my freshman year… it was just too much. I continued to control my weight with exercise and a restricted diet. I continued to be uncomfortable and avoid social situations involving eating. I had a lot of anxiety about going into a situation where I might have to eat something I did not want to. Throughout college I stayed around 100 pounds and looking back that is when I started dealing with a bit of depression and anxiety.

My last year of college I lived by myself. After years of restrictive eating I had my first binge eating session. I felt sick and awful so decided to take a laxative. These behaviors, along with the binging and purging continued for years. Then a miracle happened and I got pregnant and the behaviors stopped for a few years… this was a wonderful time.

Over the past year or more the binging and purging has been happening more and more frequently… one to maybe two times a week. I feel out of control. I keep trying new things to try and stop these behaviors… diet groups for accountability, making lists of things to tell myself when I feel an episode coming on. But when these episodes happen I don’t even have time to think. I am tired, my patience is almost shot, and my life right now just elevates these behaviors. After an episode, I am left feeling completely depressed. My depressed state is hard to hide and at the end of the day just not fair to my family.

I have everything I want in life… so why do I feel depressed so frequently. Well pretty sure my eating behaviors play a huge role. This is not something that is ever going to completely go away. But I need to learn to minimize it, especially in situations where it may thrive. I have an eating disorder and I need help.

Looking back I wish I would have done more. I wish I would have gotten professional help. I thought love and family would overcome it all. I found this which helps me (partially) understand what happened.

Around this time, she started working with a triathlon coach. The relationship grew into more than just a coaching relationship. She would tell me how much he paid attention to her…. how I didn’t pay enough attention to her. I saw texts between them and knew she was having an emotional affair, and hoped that it didn’t turn physical. Fast forward three years later and days after emailing me wanting a divorce, she was sleeping with this dude. A few days later they were in love. A few more days and she was asking him to move in with her.

I was appalled. I was embarrassed. How did she think this was a good idea? He would cut the grass and coach her for free she said... wtf? Everything you read says to use caution when introducing a significant other to your kids post separation/divorce. I had to fight to get language added to our divorce doc to keep this dude from moving in. But it's always been about what Katie needs. Soon after finding out Katie and split, a friend of mine msged me and said "you know, I always wanted to say this to you but didn't since you were married, but omg Katie is so self-centered! I had to stop following her on social media b/c her posts were all "look at me" posts. And it always seemed like she was trying so hard to paint this image of "happy on the outside" but you could see she was sad on the inside".

Back to a year from now… we grew farther and farther apart. Nothing I did was ever good enough. It didn’t matter that I would stay home and watch the kids so she could go out with the girls, or get her flowers, or go to wineries, or go out on dates… it didn’t matter than I handled all nighttime responsibilities because she was too tired or had a bad eating day. It was always about me not cleaning up after myself, or not showering after work, or cutting it too close on time (which by the way if you check Leo’s attendance record not once was he late to school… which is one of the things Katie would constantly worry and get anxious about in the mornings). It was as if nothing was ever good enough. Every husband likes to feel appreciated for what he does for his wife and kids. But the focus was on Katie making sure she was comfortable, reducing anxious situations, minimizing situations that led to bad eating days. After I while you ask “what about me?” Over time I stopped caring and trying so hard with Katie. I wasn’t getting anything in return. And I focused more and more on the kids.

I thought by showing Katie the joys of having and raising a family, I could make all the anxiety, depression, and eating disorders go away. But it didn’t. I have a tendency to gravitate towards girls that need someone to “save” them. Someone that comes in a fixes everything. Guess you could say I have a helping disorder 😂 But it doesn’t work like that. This is something I promise to be more aware of moving forward. It’s important that the person you’re with is happy from within. You can try and try and try, but over time you realize it’s never going to be good enough and you grow apart. That’s the hardest part for me. The feeling like I gave up. But anxiety/depression/eating disorders take their toll. At the end it was too much to shoulder. Naively I thought showing her the joys of raising kids and a family would cure all that, but it doesn’t. I thought the crying episodes would stop (well they did but the Cymbalta had other side effects). I thought the eating would get better. I thought the binging and taking laxatives would stop.

The last few weeks have been a roller coaster, but there’s also a feeling that I can be myself again. And I can focus time on ME! Feels like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. It’s hard when you’re busting your ass to make things right and you're constantly being reminded of all your faults. Now I can go outside after dinner and let the kids run around without being pestered about bath time. I can leave crumbs on the countertop. I can be spontaneous. It’s going to be ok. I feel free 😀. Looking forward to the next chapter.