Processing it all Part 5 (Last 2 years v. Now)

The last two years have been the hardest of my life. I feel like I lost who I am as a person. The last two years were characterized by:
--overwhelming feeling of failure
--the most inconsistent food intake of my life
--horrible, horrible body image
--overwhelming feelings of guilt for eating
--significant weight gain
--lack of sleep
--lack of exercise
--a horrible living situation (for one of the years) (If I have doormat tendencies, my roommate had snow plower tendencies)
--an unrelenting, perfectionistic, self-critical, rigid way of thinking that just WOULD NOT LET UP! I counted calories. I counted failures. I vowed to work harder. I vowed to eat less. I vowed to be better. I vowed to be thinner.
--not wanting to go out in public b/c I was so ashamed of how I looked and who I am
--a lot of self hatred
-a lot of self anger
-feeling out of control
-non stop calorie counting
-non stop working. my first year of teaching, i worked every day from 5am to 11pm. EVERY DAY.
-a large sense of being powerless
-a big sense of not being good enough for the world and even being downright bad for the world - like I was so bad I was contagious of badness
---no excitement, no skip in my step
-hiding from fun; shunning advenure

Needless to say, I have not been myself.

This summer is a HUGE turnaround. This summer is characterized by:
-acknowledging some successes in teaching
-less body hate
-body image NOT getting in the way of life
-no food rules, rare calorie counting
-lots of exercise (in a good way)
-more reasonable, patient, encouraing, forgiving self-talk
-excitement to be alive
-WANTING to connect with people and be in public and be part of this world
-more self acceptance
--seeking out fun and adventure
--initiating social get togethers

why this change?
-gave up on wanting to cling to the ED
-more connected to place/people around me
-is it also b/c of no teaching?

I can't explain it but I feel more wonderful than I've felt in a while.

So I'm afraid to go back to teaching b/c I'm afraid that all these nice new changes will go away. I'm really afraid of that.

Everything in me is telling me not to do this.

(not done - to be continued. it's now 2:15am....)