A message to my boyfriend about my weight issues

Thought this would be worth putting here.

Tue, Feb 26, 2019 5:47 PM

Hey babe,

I have a lot to talk about and I wanted to send an email where I could carefully consider my words. You have some experience with my on/off dieting but you don't know the extent of my problems with my weight and food relationship.  I just wanted to make these issues known and communicate to you the importance of me doing something about them.

I've been overweight all my life. I struggle with it in a way that I wouldn't expect you to understand.  I won't go into every little detail but I'll just say I think I have an undiagnosed binge eating disorder. I don't know how to fix it without therapy. Maybe if I have health insurance someday that would make it affordable, I will take advantage.  But so far I've just read self-help books and for a long time leaned on Weight Watchers. I've seriously considered surgical solutions (which I think would just be a band-aid).  I even tried Over-eaters Anonymous for a while. I know how to lose weight and how I should eat.  I just struggle with making myself do it. I truly feel addicted. My weight has gone up and down since I was about 12 years old. If I'm not actively trying to lose weight or eat healthy with a plan, I gain and gain.

Anyway, lately I've just been consumed with negative thoughts about my body and my weight and my out-of-control feelings around food.  I'm mad about how I'm gaining back all the weight I fought so hard to lose in 2015-ish.  It makes me feel really scared because I don't want to end up a different looking person than who you met. That just feels wrong to me. It's not fair to you.  I know everyone has their own standards of attractiveness. I don't think it's shallow.  I used to think it was - that a significant other should love you no matter how you look, but I've changed my attitude on that. And besides, my weight affects our relationship (or will affect it eventually) in other ways.  My snoring, for example.  For those reasons and for many, many others, it's just become really important to me to get serious about getting healthy.

I read a book that gave me some strategies to deal with the binge eating and I'm going to combine it with calorie tracking.  I'm going to treat it with the seriousness of having very serious food allergies. There will just be some foods I can't let myself eat anymore.  And there will be situations where I can't enjoy it like the binge-eating me would like. We're going to have to eat out a lot less and go out drinking a lot less.  We can still cook together but it will have to be healthy stuff. I'll still go out for important occasions and just try to inconspicuously not partake of food/drink or do it in very small amounts.

I know this will suck for you.  Eating out is fun.  Drinking is fun.  I'm sorry to have to do this. But it won't be fun for me to have gained 40 pounds by this time next year.  It won't be fun to feel depressed and start having physical/health issues.

The stuff we have planned this weekend - I still want to go.  I will just eat healthy beforehand and when there maybe eat/drink a few carefully thought-out things that will still fit into my calorie allowance.

Ugh.  I hope all of this make at least some sense.  I wanted to be honest.  I want to ask for your help. I love you and I hope all this isn't too much for you.

-Your (now low-fat) cupcake

A slip-up and a victory

So things have been swimming along. I completed 4 weeks of staying on-plan! I weighed myself and over the course of the 4 weeks, lost 3.6 pounds. I'm very happy with that number.

I had a small slip-up that I handled really well. There was a surprise Blue Bell ice cream attack at work. Blue Bell is my FAVORITE!! A coworker was leaving and that was our goodbye to her - standing around in my boss' office awkwardly making small talk and eating ice cream. I panicked when I saw the ice cream and thought, "Ok, I shouldn't deprive myself and make it weird by not eating any - I'll just eat a very small amount".  Well, after I finished (scarfed down) that small amount, I was then scared about what would happen next - just stand there and feel awkward? No, I need to be eating to lessen the social anxiety! So I served myself another bowl, this time a pretty large amount. And with caramel sauce. Scarfed that down, too.

Afterward, as I walked back to my desk, I felt disappointed in myself. I never get horribly mean to myself after I "mess up" while dieting. Just this faint feeling of disappointment.  More like I'm annoyed with myself.  But still, I reminded myself to not beat myself up and get right back on track. I had been planning to eat at a restaurant with the BF and a friend that night. I had already pre-tracked what I was going to eat. A quick thought flashed through my mind - you already screwed up with the ice cream - you might as well go hog-wild at the restaurant. I dismissed the thought pretty quickly though. Phew. I re-configured my plan at the restaurant. I decided to skip my 2nd lunch (more on that in a bit) and I ended the day with calories to spare!  I was SO proud of myself!

Yesterday was my 2nd session with James and I told him about my small victory. He was so proud of me! Yeah!! I told him my plan for the next time something like this happens is just to hide out in the bathroom. He thinks it'll work. I do, too (BF doesn't.)  I'm going to let him know how it goes.

We talked about what drives me to binge. He wants to try something called EMDR with me - it's a technique that accesses the subconscious part of the brain that has experienced trauma. I told him it sounds hokey but I'm still willing to try it. I know there is something that drives me to eat that I can't put my finger on. Sometimes it's obvious, like stress or boredom. Sometimes it's not. I just know eating brings me this immediate gratification, this fake ...joy. A high, really. But it's not obvious to me why I'm always chasing this high. On the surface, I think I'm pretty happy and stress-free. So anyway... since EMDR deals with the subconscious, that might be just what I need.  We're starting it next week.  I also have homework - to come up with a concrete plan for how to eat while on vacation in couple of weeks.

Here's to another month of staying on track!

the story of my life on a diet - part 1

The Early Years

I've been overweight my entire life.  When I was a baby, my mom called me her lechuga (lettuce) because I was "fresh and round" like a head of lettuce.  I weighed 10 pounds as a baby; I'm told the nurses were in disbelief upon learning that I was not, in fact, a 6-month-old. Obesity runs in my family from my mom's side; my mom, my sister and all of my aunts are overweight or have been at some point.  I grew up being constantly tormented by my then-thin sister.  I don't remember being made fun of that much at school but maybe I've just blocked those memories out.

Random weight and food related memories of my childhood:

-Being about 7 and my parents sitting me down and having a serious talk about my weight.  They went out and bought me a scale that night.  I don't remember what came of it but I do remember not having any kind of plan and feeling very scared.  They probably told me I was gonna die or something.  They're dramatic like that.

-Going to Mexico all the time as a kid during school breaks was so fun.  My aunt owned a little convenience store and of course I loved hanging out with my cousins, but that store was a big reason I loved visiting her.  My favorites were Pizzerolas (pizza flavored tortilla chips), Poffets (cheese-flavored popcorn), cajeta (a caramel-type spread) on bolillos (a chewy white bread roll), the sodas, the candy... all for free.  I was in fat-kid heaven.  Elsewhere in Mexico - street tacos, tamales, Mexican hot chocolate (way better than American) and of course, like typical grandmothers, mine were always insisting that I eat, eat, eat.  Who was I to argue?

-I used to love to come home from school and eat a couple of frozen mini cheeseburgers, pizza rolls or mini pizzas (like, the Totino's Party Pizza kind, which, to this day, I still eat when I feel like trashing my "diet".)

-I started cooking from a young age (maybe 10?) and I remember often making cupcakes and other treats for parties at school.  Of course, my mom cooked too, and I would happily eat everything she cooked.

-When I was 9, we moved into a house that was next door to an Exxon station.  I was constantly waddling over to buy Blue Bell ice cream (another present-day problem food), Cheetos and Snickers bars.  I bet if you checked their records, you'd see a huge jump in business once we came around.

Looking back, I don't understand why mom let me eat the way I did.  Recently, H (the husband) wanted to ask her but I couldn't.  I figured her feelings would be hurt.  I can only assume she was trying to make me happy.  Maybe she felt it was too mean to deprive me of the foods I loved.  Maybe in my tween years she felt she needed to make up for the stress her marital problems put on my sister and me.  I dunno.  I do know my mom loves me and tried her best.

I should mention here that I went through a few instances of sexual abuse as a kid.  I'm assuming that it was from this point that I went from enjoying food to abusing it.  It was strange though how I sort of blocked out those memories until I was an adult.  I believe on a subconscious level I was fattening myself as a method of protecting myself.  I often felt unloved.  But food loved me back, at least temporarily.  It numbed the bad feelings.  It brought me instant gratification.  To this day I have a huge problem identifying and talking about my feelings.  So many times H will ask me what I'm feeling and I truthfully cannot put a label on it.  I feel kind of broken in that respect.

I was a very introverted, quiet, kinda weird but generally well-behaved kid.  I didn't have very many friends.  I did, however, get good grades in school.  I loved to read (probably to escape) and to draw.  In some ways my childhood was typical.  In some ways it wasn't - being a 1st-generation American to Mexican-born parents was something that shaped who I am.  Though I grew up speaking Spanish, there was still a language barrier sometimes.  I love my mom very much, but I wish I had grown up closer to her.  A lot of my familial relationships were like this.  I think this is why I felt so lonely as a kid.  I would have been closer to my sister, but we apparently hated each other back then.

Yeah, loneliness.  I think this was one of the main contributors to my food problem.  In some ways I'm still lonely, but I am so thankful for my husband.

Well, next time I'll talk about where the dieting starts.