The other side of exercise

I have realized that I was little bit unfair in my post about exercise addiction. Not that the points weren't true, but I didn't mention plenty of points that makes exercise important for me in positive or at least less negative way. I don't mean the high I get from endorphines or the better body image couple of hours after exercise and its anxiolytic effect. It is part of the addiction and similar to every crack/food/alcohol/gambling addiction. It is definitely NOT good. But I thought about some more points about exercise in context of actually staying in recovery/moving forward.

• Exercise makes me feel connected with my body (for a while). It is not only the better body image. I have never experienced significant body dysmorphia and I (ironically) don't think about my body that much. My body is something numb down there under my head and I don't feel connected to it the most of the time. I have no boyfriend, thus no feeling of perceiving my body with someone else*. During exercising I am able to feel the body in some kind of positive way (see other points). Actually I don't think that feeling disconnected with your own body is something eating disorders related. I've discussed it with a (non-ED)-friend and she told me she feels the same way, somehow almost bothered by having to have her body and being jealous of that women who enjoys their bodies and live in harmony with them most of the time. The olfactory or pain perception is also very individual, so why not the feeling of being connected with our bodies?
• Exercise makes me be thankful to my body. I know I should be thankful all the time. And it makes me feel almost ashamed that my body seems to be much more persistent and resistent to stress than my mind. 
• Exercise motivates me to stay in healthy weight range. I know it is not the best argument, because you could object that it is only substituting one ED behavior with an another. It is complicated to say why exercise is so important to me, I think it is something for another post, but when I compare the benefits and damage, I honestly think that exercise (well running) is kind of saving my ass. I hate not being able to run at some pace and I know I need some minimal weight (not the edge minimum to be able to run couple of miles and be out of danger zone, but the minimum to feel strong, run fast and enjoy it at the same time). I think the idea of losing the ability to run (and the experience of going through this several times in the past) scares me enough to stay on track. Maybe not the healthiest motivation, but motivation that counts. 
• Exercise makes me thirsty. This is weird reason, I know. I am terrible drinker. Well non-drinker. Unless it is not 35°C or unless I exercise, I almost never feel thirsty. I usually drink only with meals or snacks, because I like feeling at least little bit hungry/not full before the meal and fluids make me feel full. In my second hospital I really struggled with my 2 liters a day and my poor roommate struggled even more looking at me, because she had the opposite problem and was on fluid restriction. We were so jealous of each other in the first days! During/after exercise I am able to drink about 1 liter of fluids, sometimes even more and sort of enjoy it which is nice. 
• Exercise gives me sub-identity. This is ambivalent. I don't want to base my self-worth on exercise (and sadly I do it quite often and hate it). But I think it is better to have the identity of someone who is active and exercises than of someone who is anorexic. It is like choosing minor hell in favor of greater hell, I know. But I live and I would probably not live if I stayed in greater hell. (Rationalizing too much?)
• Exercise makes me make time for myself. I've always lived in big city. But we have traveled a lot and we were often in our weekend house and spent weeks in summer camp or sport camps. I LOVED it. The most incredible memories I have are always located in the nature. I have had very old gray-violet sweatshirt with big front pocket that I call klokanka, something like Kangaroo-sweatshirt and I spent hours in the forest walking and filling its pocket with stones, pieces of moss and resin (yep, Mum and the washing machine weren't impressed), nice twigs and leaves and other things. In Sweden I was walking on the beach and collecting stones and shells and something what we called amber (old rounded pieces of glass). I could walk like this for hours, just thinking and talking to my imaginary friends and planing what to do with the treasures in my pocket. I still have some. I enjoy this kind of splendid isolation during exercising outside. It is just me and my thoughts. 

Ok, I think these are my major points. The not so good part of this all is that I know I will need to cut my exercise quite drastically in very near future and I have no idea how I will cope. On the one hand it will give me the opportunity to rearrange my schedule and make it less hyperactive. On the other hand I am scared that without this motivation exercise gives me I will feel miserable and slip into restricting (it happened in the past:/). Do you have some behaviors that are so ambivalent- part of them is disordered and other part is motivating? I hope everyone will have good week and I leave you with a song I have listened to last week very often. I think it is beautiful.

*Aaaargh. Trying not to write NO TOUCHING, NO SEXUAL LIFE and not feeling awkward turns out to be much more awkward than writing it directly.