Recovering from my eating disorder and cleaning out my closet with project 333

The last couple weeks have been filled with breakthroughs in eating and hoarding habits. I pretty much had a nervous breakdown early last week and ended up taking a full two days off work to recover and visit my psychiatrist to figure out what was going on.

I’d been struggling terribly with my eating disorder since completing intensive outpatient treatment, badly enough that I’ve come to see it as a mini-relapse.  It’s okay, I’m back on my feet and actually better than ever. But something I did on those two days off really helped.  I FINALLY did project 333!

I’d gained a lot of weight since starting treatment three years ago. I used to wear a size 4; now I’m a 12. It didn’t happen overnight and because of that I own a LOT of clothes that don’t fit, don’t feel good, and don’t look good. Forcing myself into those too-small clothes was making me miserable and actually triggering my binge/restrict cycle, which was just making me heavier. When I finally figured that out I realized that I absolutely had to put away everything that didn’t fit and everything that I didn’t love.

I got everything out of the closet, out of every drawer. Here it all is on the couch. This doesn’t include outerwear, suits, or workout clothes.

I was surprised, it didn’t look like much. But it totaled:

43 T-shirts

6 Shorts and capris

14 Pairs of dress pants

4 Pairs of jeans

11 Sweaters

28 Work blouses

3 Skirts

That’s a lot of clothes! 109 items, to be exact. I went through everything and left only what I loved and what fit. I didn’t even make it to 33 items. I was shocked! I actually have to buy clothes to complete my 33 items and so that I don’t have to walk around half-naked, since I don’t fit in any of my shorts and many of my shirts anymore.

This is the huge pile of boxes of clothes that I don’t fit into. And one very exhausted me. 

I’m letting myself go out shopping next week to get three pairs of shorts and two shirts. Normally I would make myself wait or get the cheapest thing. But I realize that I’m probably going to be a size 12 for a long time and that I deserve decent clothes, and wearing clothes that make me look or feel bad can send me right back into the middle of my disorder. At least it’s only 5 items.

Next week I’ll update on my final selections and my completed closet!

You're probably wondering, what am I doing with the huge pile of boxes? It’s gone back into the closet. My dietician feels that I’ve probably topped out at my weight and she expects a bit to come off in the next year as I shake the last of my eating disorder and settle into my natural weight. The clothes that don’t fit will go out next May 1^st. Whatever size I am by next May is the size I’m going to be, and no smaller. I know it's an excuse, but it's been an emotionally rough couple weeks and I'm not quite ready to let go of my thin self (and thus, the clothes) completely, just yet. 

Friday's Fashion Fallout: The best things in life aren't free

Because when they are free, you tend to acquire them even if you don't really like them. 

We had these things called "free boxes" in college. They were on every hall and were a place you could drop off stuff you didn't want and grab anything you did. Me being me, I was always grabbing things from the free box. Come on, free stuff!  

Except that when it takes time and energy to hang on to the free stuff and keep it organized, and dig through it when you need to get to other things, it suddenly really isn't free anymore. This skirt was costing me space in my closet, and my sanity every time I put it on because it was too small and a funny length. Not to mention, it was terribly itchy because it was made of wool. Item 80: A free skirt that doesn't fit, looks funny, and itches like mad!

Have the "free boxes" in your life been a problem for you? 

Friday's Fashion Fallout: Men may love it...

This shirt just proves how completely distorted women's body image is, compared with the way that men see us. I wore this to, er, work one day. While it looks demure and all that, I'm all chest when I wear it. I wear it to work and suddenly guys are telling me how good I look. 

Only problem is, this shirt is so, so tight that it makes me body conscious. Body conscious to the point that I binge because of how body conscious I feel. Why? Because I bought the shirt 15 pounds ago and I remember how it felt then. Every time I wear it, all I can think is, "OMG I've gained so much weight." 

The complements don't make up for the way the shirt makes me feel. Strange. So it has to go.  $15 wasted. Item 179, an ED-inducing shirt.

Does anyone else have pieces of clothing that you hate but that other people seem to love?

Friday's Fashion Fallout: a handbag, a trip, and a marriage

I looked on Facebook this morning and read a friend's comment:

"Ten years ago today some of my new friends in London invited me to see Star Trek: Nemesis. Best decision I ever made. I sat next to the most wonderful man I've ever met." 

(aka, the guy she married!)

Is there a British spelling
 for the word "ugly?"

I visited my friend and stayed with her in London a couple months after she met this guy, and we had a fantastic time romping around the UK. One of my favorite memories of that trip was going to Harrod's and having high tea. We had too many scones with clotted cream, the strongest tea I'd ever had with too much cream and too many brown sugar cubes....it was just wonderful. We were shaking at the end from the caffeine and the sugar! I can't believe it was ten years ago.

After all of that we went down to the shopping halls in Harrods and I must've bought about $100 worth of teas, mugs, and of course, a handbag.

Have you ever felt pressure to get the stererotypical souvenir from somewhere you've visited? I felt like I needed to bring something home that had the Harrod's logo on it but hated the typical green oilcloth bags. So I got this handbag. It had the logo, and matched my preferred handbag style--black and boring.

Label as souvenir. Why do
I keep doing this to myself?

Which I've ended up hating. It's too narrow, too deep, and the straps are too long. I still have much of the tea from that trip, in fact I made some this morning before I read her post. Now I'm staring at the tea I'm finishing now and being shocked that 1.) it's ten years old, and 2.) the ten-year-old tea still tastes this good! I can and will reuse the tea tins, so I don't need to keep the handbag as a souvenir because I have other things to remind me of that trip. But, oh, the nostalgia! The wonderful memories of that vacation! The smells, the tastes....

None of which are actually captured in the handbag. I can let it go. Breathe....Wow. You'd think after decluttering this much stuff this would be easier. It doesn't seem to be. I logically know that there's no good reason to keep this bag, yet my heart really wants me to.

On to...

~The Reckoning~

Item 175: A souvenir handbag.

Cost: About $20. But it was ten years ago so I can't remember.

Fate: The thrift shop.

Total money wasted on crap I never should've bought: $1943.00

Friday's Fashion Fallout: yes, an entire post about bras

If you lived through the 80s like I did, who can forget Madonna and this outfit? If you can call it that.

courtesy of stylesbyclaudia.com

We all decided this was ridiculous, of course. I mean, I thought we had left the bullet-bra in the 1930s, when we didn't seem to know how to sew anything other than triangles?

from lingerieweapon.com. No kidding. I thought lingerie was supposed to attract a mate, not threaten to kill it?

No, in the 21st century we have learned. We have evolved. We have figured out how to make bras that have curves, and feminine form....and an incredible likeness to external silicone implants.

Behold, the Victoria's Secret Miraculous Bra. Guaranteed to add 2 cup sizes, for $59.99. Unlike the rest of my body, I'm quite happy with the size of my, er, tatas, but I never had cleavage. Oh, the downsides of having a huge ribcage. I thought I'd try it. The result? Sure, it added two cup sizes. But I think it did it in the wrong spot. Did I just glue a red, satiny breast implant to the outside of my chest and put a shirt over it? Why yes, I think I must've.

Me in my normal bra. See? NORMAL.

And now, me modeling the "miraculous" bra. It's an appropriate name, because only a saint could produce something this unnatural. And the most ironic part? Still no cleavage.

But apparently someone else wants to either look like a porn star or a plastic surgery case gone wrong. I sold it on ebay for $10. So I only lost $49.99 on the bra. Shudder.

The Reckoning

Item 143: The miraculous bra.
Cost: $50 in the end. And a large chunk of my feminism.
Fate: Ebay
Total money wasted on junk I never should've bought: $1554.00

 It's Friday....what have you cleaned out of your lingerie drawer today?

(last) Friday's Fashion Fallout: oh, but they feel so good!

Okay, just the fabric feels good.

Sorry for the delay folks, work has gone crazy this week *and* the hubs is out of town so I'm stuck doing my own dishes <whine>. Free time is not as abundant as it was.

Last Friday morning I realized that a piece of clothing can feel good...while feeling absolutely awful at the same time. Here's the little conversation I had with my jeans at 6:30 AM last Friday:

Jeans: ooh, it's Friday. Wear me, wear me!
Me: Okay, I think you're too short...
ED: You're too fat for them...
Me: Oh hell, let me just try them on.
(puts jeans on and successfully buttons them with minimal agony)
Me: See? The fabric feels great.
ED: They make you look fat.
Me: ED, fat is not a feeling.
Jeans: Keep us! Keep us! Feed me, Seymour!
Me: I have to go to work...no time to talk to inanimate objects!
Jeans: Before you go...did you realize we display your beautiful ankles when you walk so everyone can see them? And your belly button too? And make you look like you took up a side job in plumbing when you bend down?
Me: uh.....okay, these don't feel so good after all. I think I've found my weekly item to discard.

Lesson learned: there are lots of things that we judge a piece of clothing on when we play the keep/toss game. If it doesn't pass every test (fabric, fit, length, height, tightness, whether it talks to you....) then it probably needs to go. The space in the closet is worth it.

I'm now down to my goal number of jeans: just three! One junky pair for painting/camping/etc, one really good pair for work and a spare for when the others are in the wash. 

Item 133: Jeans that never really felt good. Money wasted: $25.

Total money wasted on stuff this year: $1437.00.

Friday's Fashion Fallout

Just a quick post between the wonderful power outages we've been having in DC. This shirt was an old standby of mine, kept at home while I was doing my fellowship in DC and then Tennessee. When I actually ironed it (ha!) it was what I usually ended up wearing when I visited Gram when I went home each month. But I'm not a size four anymore and don't expect to be ever again so it's time for this shirt to go.

But because I wore it to visit Gram, this OF COURSE means I can't bear to completely get rid of it! Lessee....how can I repurpose this one? Well, I'm short on spare fabric for my quilting projects right now so this is getting chopped up into quilt fabric.

I repurposed last week's item into rags, this week's item into a quilt. What else have you repuprosed clothes into? I have a feeling I can't keep turning everything into rags or quilts, or I'll end up hoarding those :o)
 
Item 130: A well-loved shirt, worth the money.  A casualty of my eating disorder that hopefully will have a better second life.

Friday's Fashion Fallout: wearing my grief on my sleeve (literally)

This Friday's Fashion Fallout item is an Alzheimer's Association hoodie in their trademark forget-me-not purple. Ah, it's purple and it reminds me of Gram. I'm screwed already. 

If the whole point of wearing this was to be a walking advertisement for the Alzheimer's Association, why didn't they design it so that you could actually see their logo? 

Hey kids, here's a marketing lesson: your slogans need to make sense! Putting the word "move" on a sleeve with no context is just silly. Then again, maybe it's just a sign that they're using donation money for research instead of marketing. 

The only move I'm going to make is to take this thing to the thrift shop. 

The Reckoning

I'm going to leave this one out of the reckoning this week. It's financially confusing because some of the money from the jacket did go to a cause I support, but some of it didn't and I don't know how much. I also had to purchase a shirt for my new volunteer job, which will take the place of this in my closet. 

Friday's Fashion Fallout

I just had to jump on the alliteration band wagon there, didn't I? Hey, at least I'm not trying to be punny. Hehe.

Anywho, the challenge of cleaning out our closets is a really daunting one. It's a problem of two 'but's:

But I paid good money for this...but I used to like it...but I may want it someday...but it belonged to a relative...but I'll never find another one like it again...you get the picture.

The second 'but' is of course the one I mentioned in an earlier post, the butt. As in, I better keep this piece of clothing because I may be able to get my butt into it at some point. 

Put these two things together and what do you get? A girl who stands in front of her closet and can't bear to get rid of much. How do we fight this? I'm fighting it by taking it one single item at a time. For the next few weeks let's see if I can find one item from my closet each Friday to get rid of. You can try it too. Just one. No biggie, right? 

I hope so. Because I just got rid of the last of the "easy" discards, the pieces of clothing that were no challenge for me to toss.

 

How do you prefer to declutter your closet? All at once, or little by little? Do you schedule a cleanout at the end of every season? And because I love cheating on little challenges: what hasn't worked for you? I'm sure we'd all love to learn from your mistakes. I know I will!

Today's photos are the last 'easy' items to discard. I'm only counting prices on the items I never should've bought. Top photo: 1 scarf (free), one winter headband (free), one pair of heels ($15), three shirts (three free, one on permanent loan from a friend who lives in Spain), one pair of shorts ($10), one baseball cap ($10), one pair of dancing shoes (used these, so they were worth the money). Bottom photo: one sweater ($20), one pair of shorts ($10), one turtleneck (I wore it, it's just worn out), one pair of too-large pants (but I did wear these), one skirt (permanently on loan from a friend who lives in Japan.) 

Okay, and while I'm at it, I should stop stealing clothes from my girlfriends. Especially the ones who live abroad. 

The Reckoning

Items 115-128: A ton of clothes.

Cost: $60

Fate: One of those Planet Aid dumpsters.

Money wasted on junk I never should've bought: $1262.00

You too can buy achievement for the low, low price of $455!

How many times have you gone to great lengths to make a better impression at your job? How much has it cost you in time? In energy? In money? Was it worth it?

A few years ago I interviewed for a Big Deal internship in my field. I'd done the proverbial "sweating blood" for it and it would only last a year. I wanted to make a lasting impression. How did I do this?

While living on $1000 a month and paying $500 each month in rent, I went and bought an interview suit that I thought would give me confidence. I dipped into my savings and spent $500 on it.

It did give me confidence. I stood taller, carried myself more confidently, and smiled more because damn, I looked good. I landed the fellowship.Of course, I gave the suit some of the credit. I still do.

Apparently so did my fellow interns. It turns out we all poured a ton of money into our clothes. At the end of the first day, we asked the program director, "So, what's the dress code for the rest of the year?" She looked us up and down and said, "Just keep dressing like you are."

Peach pinstripes on a grey suit? What was I thinking?

So we all ran out and spent huge amounts of money on clothes. Fortunately we were getting full-time, really, really good paychecks by this point. But I still spent $2000 on three suits, three pairs of pants, and five shirts. 


I still work in the same field in a very similar environment and I still feel like I need to dress as well (or better) than everyone else to be able to compete. Fashion seems very important in my office. Makeup too. To the point where I once heard someone express the opinion that she feels like a stellar wardrobe is important to get ahead in our office. It's purely opinion, of course. But clothes do seem to matter in my field.

But as I've gone through my closet I'm realizing that I can't afford to look like I've walked out of a magazine, either financially or emotionally. I would rather be blogging or playing with my gerbils than picking out my 50th blouse at Ann Taylor. Besides, my tastes and size are going to change and my clothes will end up being unwearable.

Oh yeah, that label says what you think it says.

I spent $500 on this suit. I wore it maybe four times before I realized I hated it. Then I gained 15 pounds and I'm determined not to risk having a relapse of my eating disorder by trying to lose weight to fit into it.

I couldn't bear to just donate the suit so I did what Minimalist Mommi suggested (thanks Megyn!) and I sold it for a measly $45. I don't think this suit got me ahead at work. But I was really, really confident while I was wearing it and that did get me ahead at work. Was it worth the $455 I lost? Can you put a price tag on confidence?

We're a fashion-conscious world. People in the workplace can and may judge you based on your clothes. Have you found the happy medium between being a slave to fashion and being able to use clothes to give you that extra bit of confidence?

Can I learn to get my confidence from things other than my clothes? Or can I learn to use nice clothes in moderation to boost my confidence without violating my wallet?

The Reckoning

Item 76: A suit that doesn't fit that I hate.

Fate:The consignment shop.

Cost: $500, made $45 on it.

Total money wasted on junk I never should've bought: $947.

How am I not naked after getting rid of all of these clothes?

I'd like to thank everyone who commented on the last post for your support. I know a lot of you are sharing the same struggles, and I understand how much strength it takes to be able to come out and admit that.

But let's move away from the serious and have a little fun rummaging through my closet. Here's what went to the clothes donation box in our building this week, and why. I put my best recollection of prices on the items that I didn't really wear much. If I left the price blank, then I'm not going to count the item because I got use out of it and it was a good purchase. Let's see if we can find some themes:

Too many memories of wearing
this on my first date w/ an ex 

Too tight ($10)

Too embarassing
(ew, armpit stains!)

Too short ($12)

Too scratchy ($25)

Too short

Too reminiscent of a job I hated ($15)

Too stained

Too short. Waaaay too short. (free)

Too poorly made ($10)
(One leg was bigger than the other.
I still bought them because they were cheap.

Too stupid (priceless).
Just kidding! $15.

That Titanic shirt has got to be the dumbest piece of clothing I've ever purchased. What's yours?

The Reckoning

Item 69-75: Clothes I hated that I never really wore.

Fate: The Planet Aid donation box in our building. 

Cost: $87 

Total money wasted on junk I never should've bought: $492.

Items 17 and 18: Victoria and Secret.

[caption id="attachment_172" align="aligncenter" width="222" caption="( www.victoriassecret.com)"][/caption]

Don't I wish I could throw Miranda Kerr out as well. Good grief does she look like a photoshopped, emaciated alien.

No, I just got rid of my two most uncomfortable bras. Now I'm down to 8 in total. I'm going for 7. Do I really need more than one a day each week? That seems like plenty of styles to give me some variety and meet my needs.

Really, how many bras and panties does a woman need? Before I get to today's reckoning, let's take a poll:

[polldaddy poll=5704601]

Now, let's try a reality check:

[polldaddy poll=5704603]

Was there a difference in your answers? For most of us there is. What's the solution?

Probably depends on how much you love Vickie's. Some people like to have no two alike. I prefer versatility. I like the idea of getting everything in black, replacing items as they wear out. No worry about mis-matching tops and bottoms in the morning (or at night..) And if there were a sexier color than black, why do women AND men love the little black dress so much?

~ The Reckoning ~

Original Cost: Likely around $40 each.

What convinced me to get rid of them: One word: Madonna.

That, and I realized that I only wear them when everything else is in the wash. Never should've bought them in the first place.

Fate: The Planet Aid clothes donation box in our basement.

Total $ wasted on junk so far this year: $153. Ouch.