For the longest time I’ve been miserable. Unwilling to believe that anything good will ever come into my life again. It felt like my life had manifested itself into The Series of Unfortunate Events. The future was coming for me and everything about it was bad.

Recently though, that’s changed. I’ve found myself with things to look forward to again. And that’s not to say that there aren’t big scary things in the future that make me want to run in the opposite direction as fast as I can. But they feel more manageable now – as long as I don’t think about them too hard.

I’m still in a bad place with my eating disorder. With the threat of hospitalization looming over me if I can’t get it together. But I’m really trying to get it together now. Harder than I ever had before. And in all honesty that’s probably because my parents are currently trying to take over my recovery, and I will do anything that I can to keep them away. Which means that I need to recover by myself. Soon. I’m not waiting for anyone to do it for me anymore. I’m not waiting for some magical cure. And that’s a pretty big change in my mindset.

Aside from that though, a lot of good things have come into my life recently. The guy that I’ve been casually seeing took me on a Valentine’s Day date. To see the sunset on the top of a mountain. How perfect and romantic is that? And even though it was an hour drive there and back, we talked the whole way with no awkward silences. It was the first date that I’ve been on in a while where I felt completely safe, comfortable, and myself.

I’m also almost excited to have my first appointment with my new nutritionist tomorrow. Which are words that I never thought that I’d be saying. But I’m really looking forward to have a set meal plan that I can follow. To eliminating most of the uncertainty surrounding food. I think that it’ll be a lot harder for my eating disorder to talk me out of things if it’s arguing with a nutritionist approved meal plan. The nutritionist knows what she’s doing. I don’t.

And after my nutritionist appointment tomorrow, I finally am getting my tattoo. That I’ve been thinking about for three months. And even though I’m definitely anxious about how much it’s going to hurt, I’m really excited to have something on my body which is entirely my choice.

Talking about my tattoo has also recently led me into conversations with a handful of people that I had let fall out of my life. And I’m not feeling so isolated and alone anymore.

My big and I have actually planned to take a spring break trip together to see some members of our sorority family who have graduated. And I’m genuinely really looking forward to it. I love traveling. I especially love road trips. And I can’t wait to catch up with them.

I know my future isn’t full of sunshine and rainbows (my anxiety likes to keep those in check), but it doesn’t feel quite so gloomy anymore either. There is good coming along with the bad.

-X