So I guess I started "dieting" around age 11-12ish. I remember my usual meal: chicken breast, white rice with spray "butter" and salad (with full fat ranch dressing of all things.) I'm not sure where I got my ideas of what constitutes healthy eating.
Sad memory: when I was junior high age, during a dieting phase, I finally succumbed to the call of a bag of peanut m&m's. I ate about half it and felt so remorseful that I threw the rest of it away in the trash. I guess it kept calling me because I decided to spray it with roach spray (yeah, food addicts aren't above digging food out of the trash). I remember crying a lot and really hating myself that day.
I think I was about 15ish when I was finally successful. I read Oprah's story and followed the plan in her book "Make the Connection". I had decided I'd had enough of my shitty life, of hating myself and feeling out of control. I counted fat grams, I ate lots of turkey-sandwich-and-pretzel lunches. Every morning, I used my mom's stepper and invented my own step workout routines set to music on mix tapes I made myself (one of the songs I remember is "Come Out and Play" by the Offspring - heh) I lost somewhere around 70 pounds. I was so proud of myself. The 2.5 pounds came off every week like clockwork. I had a tremendous amount of motivation. It was almost like I was on autopilot. I eventually even took up jogging 5 miles a day. I remember waking up at like, 4:30 in the morning to get my exercise in.
Eventually though, it became tough to maintain eating less than 20 grams of fat a day, and then I went and broke my foot (in a mosh pit, see a few paragraphs below). I stopped exercising and slowly went back to my old habits. Of course, the weight crept back up.
Since then my life's been a series of on and off dieting, though to my credit, I have usually done it "the healthy way". I've never starved myself. The worst was probably Suzanne Somer's low-carb plan. I've gone vegetarian for a while. Vegan for a while. I joined a boot-camp program. I did the "Abs Diet" (which I still like and refer to). Between these attempts, my biggest food problem is bingeing. Something emotional will trigger me and I eat with the desperation of a wild beast - any food that is "bad" is stuffed down my throat to the point of wanting to vomit. Sometimes I did vomit, not because I wanted to, but because physically my body couldn't handle the massive amounts of food I ingested.
I also did a lot of eating in secret. Once I was able to drive I often got drive-thru fast food and ate it mindlessly in my car. I remember having daily habits of stopping at Jack-in-the-Box after school.
Those were days that I felt utterly out of control and disgusted with myself. I read self-help books. I tried to get to the root of my problems. I went to therapy. And I'd keep having my ups and downs.
I've tried praying away my demons many times, which brings me to becoming a very religious person as a teenager. At the same time, I enjoyed being "alternative" - I had body piercings, colored hair, I participated in mosh pits.... I was a punk for Jesus. It was all pretty ridiculous, but I guess it gave me some semblance of "cool", enough to not hate 100% of myself.
This continued into college, 5 hours from home, where I was so lonely that I dropped out my first semester and went to community college. Bouts of depression followed me. Eventually I came to a point where I tried to accept my fatness. In art school (I went back to my university after a couple of years), I painted a whole series of pin-up girls that were not just curvy, but FAT. I even painted myself naked as a pin-up (the important bits were covered.) I was trying to do my part to change the system that made me hate myself so much. I think it was a necessary part of my journey because after that, I was able to be nicer to myself. I stopped calling myself mean names, usually involving large animals like whales and cows.
I guess as I've gotten older, the health aspect looms larger and larger though. H and I went through a time in our marriage where he was very angry that I didn't care whether I lived for very long. I was basically killing myself slowly and expected him to be okay with it. He didn't think it was fair to him. And he's right. It wasn't.
I estimate that I've had by now, maybe 50 times in my life where I've told myself, "Okay, this time it's for real. I'm going to lose weight for good. Enough is enough." Sometimes it lasts a day, sometimes a few months. I am scared to make any more declarations like that. I feel strong right now, like I really can make it all the way to my goal weight. But I have a nagging feeling - what if some big life change happens and I turn to food again? That's what I'm struggling with right now - what if. This is my current background on my phone. It makes me feel a little better. A little more in control.
I still do a lot of readings on food addiction. I haven't binged in a while. I know I will never be "cured", though. It's kind of depressing, but I have to keep reminding myself that there is no finish line. That I will probably - no, I WILL - keep falling but as long as I keep getting back up, I'll be good.
Sad memory: when I was junior high age, during a dieting phase, I finally succumbed to the call of a bag of peanut m&m's. I ate about half it and felt so remorseful that I threw the rest of it away in the trash. I guess it kept calling me because I decided to spray it with roach spray (yeah, food addicts aren't above digging food out of the trash). I remember crying a lot and really hating myself that day.
I think I was about 15ish when I was finally successful. I read Oprah's story and followed the plan in her book "Make the Connection". I had decided I'd had enough of my shitty life, of hating myself and feeling out of control. I counted fat grams, I ate lots of turkey-sandwich-and-pretzel lunches. Every morning, I used my mom's stepper and invented my own step workout routines set to music on mix tapes I made myself (one of the songs I remember is "Come Out and Play" by the Offspring - heh) I lost somewhere around 70 pounds. I was so proud of myself. The 2.5 pounds came off every week like clockwork. I had a tremendous amount of motivation. It was almost like I was on autopilot. I eventually even took up jogging 5 miles a day. I remember waking up at like, 4:30 in the morning to get my exercise in.
Eventually though, it became tough to maintain eating less than 20 grams of fat a day, and then I went and broke my foot (in a mosh pit, see a few paragraphs below). I stopped exercising and slowly went back to my old habits. Of course, the weight crept back up.
Since then my life's been a series of on and off dieting, though to my credit, I have usually done it "the healthy way". I've never starved myself. The worst was probably Suzanne Somer's low-carb plan. I've gone vegetarian for a while. Vegan for a while. I joined a boot-camp program. I did the "Abs Diet" (which I still like and refer to). Between these attempts, my biggest food problem is bingeing. Something emotional will trigger me and I eat with the desperation of a wild beast - any food that is "bad" is stuffed down my throat to the point of wanting to vomit. Sometimes I did vomit, not because I wanted to, but because physically my body couldn't handle the massive amounts of food I ingested.
I also did a lot of eating in secret. Once I was able to drive I often got drive-thru fast food and ate it mindlessly in my car. I remember having daily habits of stopping at Jack-in-the-Box after school.
Those were days that I felt utterly out of control and disgusted with myself. I read self-help books. I tried to get to the root of my problems. I went to therapy. And I'd keep having my ups and downs.
I've tried praying away my demons many times, which brings me to becoming a very religious person as a teenager. At the same time, I enjoyed being "alternative" - I had body piercings, colored hair, I participated in mosh pits.... I was a punk for Jesus. It was all pretty ridiculous, but I guess it gave me some semblance of "cool", enough to not hate 100% of myself.
This continued into college, 5 hours from home, where I was so lonely that I dropped out my first semester and went to community college. Bouts of depression followed me. Eventually I came to a point where I tried to accept my fatness. In art school (I went back to my university after a couple of years), I painted a whole series of pin-up girls that were not just curvy, but FAT. I even painted myself naked as a pin-up (the important bits were covered.) I was trying to do my part to change the system that made me hate myself so much. I think it was a necessary part of my journey because after that, I was able to be nicer to myself. I stopped calling myself mean names, usually involving large animals like whales and cows.
I guess as I've gotten older, the health aspect looms larger and larger though. H and I went through a time in our marriage where he was very angry that I didn't care whether I lived for very long. I was basically killing myself slowly and expected him to be okay with it. He didn't think it was fair to him. And he's right. It wasn't.
I estimate that I've had by now, maybe 50 times in my life where I've told myself, "Okay, this time it's for real. I'm going to lose weight for good. Enough is enough." Sometimes it lasts a day, sometimes a few months. I am scared to make any more declarations like that. I feel strong right now, like I really can make it all the way to my goal weight. But I have a nagging feeling - what if some big life change happens and I turn to food again? That's what I'm struggling with right now - what if. This is my current background on my phone. It makes me feel a little better. A little more in control.
I still do a lot of readings on food addiction. I haven't binged in a while. I know I will never be "cured", though. It's kind of depressing, but I have to keep reminding myself that there is no finish line. That I will probably - no, I WILL - keep falling but as long as I keep getting back up, I'll be good.
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