I want to stop making myself sick. I want to stop using food to quench my more essential desires. I want to stop pumping chemicals, additives, CRAP into my body. I want to stop betraying my body. I want to start trusting myself. I want to start respecting my body's wisdom. I want what I eat, what I DO, to line up with what I know, how I feel. I want to have a normal, healthy relationship with food. I want to be able to pass food by when I'm not hungry... I want to free my body from these layers of unnecessary padding.
I have struggled with my body (though not necessarily my weight) my whole life. In adolescence I was medicated for ADHD with Adderol or similar drugs, so I was very thin without having to try much at all, it completely wiped out my appetite. But I continued taking it because of this, developing some weird drug-reliant form of anorexia, sometimes becoming bulemic. When I starting smoking pot, I began bingeing at night on junk foods. It set off the appetite suppressants and I began to gain weight. Even after I stopped smoking pot, the weight stuck. I really wasn't excersizing enough, I was eating too much meat and carby foods, and not doing enough to use them up. But I was still obsessing about my weight/body image. Before I got pregnant with DD, I was at my heaviest (which isn't overweight, but in my mind, unacceptable) at 140 pounds (I'm 5'6). I was mid-diet. I gained 40 pounds during my pregnancy, and soon after having her, a combination of exclusive breastfeeding and suddenly adhering to a veggies-and-lean meat, portion controlled diet, I dropped all the weight and more and got down to probably 125/130, which I hadn't weighed since my anorexic pre teen days. I felt amazing. But it didn't last long- as DD started solids at 6m and my strict diet wavered, I started gaining weight (but not much). And so the head games begun again.
Over the winter I developed an issue with binge eating/compulsive eating- eating thousands of calories, eating all day, eating foods I KNEW were unhealthy, eating when I wanted to stop, eating eating eating. I've been entrenched in a battle with my mind since the fall. It's not my body- it's my brain. Every week a new diet, a new plain, a new fix to the issue- the compulsion. But nothing worked. Then I started reading Geneen Roth- which did and didn't help- I loved reading someone who had the same issue as I did, it made me feel less insane, but the idea of letting myself "stop dieting" was odd. I have done this. I have gone weeks with no diet in sight. MY issue is eating when I'm actually, truly hungry. I also have (I believe) a sugar and possibly a wheat intolerance issue/addiction. So those foods are triggering and bad for me.
When it has worked, what has worked for me is basically eating healthy foods- not stressing too much about portions- and not being too hard on myself. I have a pantry stocked with great foods. I am vegetarian and increasingly vegan (cold turkey was impossible for me.) I eat TONS of fruit (probably too much) and lots of veggies. Bread with organic smart balance is my current high ... trying not to overdo it. But even with these great foods, I can reeeally over do it. So what I want to do is for 21 days- the habit changing period- eat ONLY when I am hungry. Probably 3-4 small meals of fruit, veggies, nuts, and limited amounts of bread/possibly organic yogurt/etc. The biggest thing being- eating ONLY when I feel really, truly hungry.
And I need some support. If ya couldn't tell. People in my life are sick of hearing about my "food issues" and wish I would just shut up already and be normal. I don't think they get that this is an addiction for me, as strong and potent as my parent's alcoholism or my uncle's drug addiction or my fiancé's cigarette habit. Maybe worse, since food is everywhere and the big food companies are relentless in their advertisement.
I have struggled with my body (though not necessarily my weight) my whole life. In adolescence I was medicated for ADHD with Adderol or similar drugs, so I was very thin without having to try much at all, it completely wiped out my appetite. But I continued taking it because of this, developing some weird drug-reliant form of anorexia, sometimes becoming bulemic. When I starting smoking pot, I began bingeing at night on junk foods. It set off the appetite suppressants and I began to gain weight. Even after I stopped smoking pot, the weight stuck. I really wasn't excersizing enough, I was eating too much meat and carby foods, and not doing enough to use them up. But I was still obsessing about my weight/body image. Before I got pregnant with DD, I was at my heaviest (which isn't overweight, but in my mind, unacceptable) at 140 pounds (I'm 5'6). I was mid-diet. I gained 40 pounds during my pregnancy, and soon after having her, a combination of exclusive breastfeeding and suddenly adhering to a veggies-and-lean meat, portion controlled diet, I dropped all the weight and more and got down to probably 125/130, which I hadn't weighed since my anorexic pre teen days. I felt amazing. But it didn't last long- as DD started solids at 6m and my strict diet wavered, I started gaining weight (but not much). And so the head games begun again.
Over the winter I developed an issue with binge eating/compulsive eating- eating thousands of calories, eating all day, eating foods I KNEW were unhealthy, eating when I wanted to stop, eating eating eating. I've been entrenched in a battle with my mind since the fall. It's not my body- it's my brain. Every week a new diet, a new plain, a new fix to the issue- the compulsion. But nothing worked. Then I started reading Geneen Roth- which did and didn't help- I loved reading someone who had the same issue as I did, it made me feel less insane, but the idea of letting myself "stop dieting" was odd. I have done this. I have gone weeks with no diet in sight. MY issue is eating when I'm actually, truly hungry. I also have (I believe) a sugar and possibly a wheat intolerance issue/addiction. So those foods are triggering and bad for me.
When it has worked, what has worked for me is basically eating healthy foods- not stressing too much about portions- and not being too hard on myself. I have a pantry stocked with great foods. I am vegetarian and increasingly vegan (cold turkey was impossible for me.) I eat TONS of fruit (probably too much) and lots of veggies. Bread with organic smart balance is my current high ... trying not to overdo it. But even with these great foods, I can reeeally over do it. So what I want to do is for 21 days- the habit changing period- eat ONLY when I am hungry. Probably 3-4 small meals of fruit, veggies, nuts, and limited amounts of bread/possibly organic yogurt/etc. The biggest thing being- eating ONLY when I feel really, truly hungry.
And I need some support. If ya couldn't tell. People in my life are sick of hearing about my "food issues" and wish I would just shut up already and be normal. I don't think they get that this is an addiction for me, as strong and potent as my parent's alcoholism or my uncle's drug addiction or my fiancé's cigarette habit. Maybe worse, since food is everywhere and the big food companies are relentless in their advertisement.
I'm right there with you. I hate it so much, but often wonder why I can't stop even though I want to so badly. The best I've figured out is that bingeing serves a purpose for me ~ it distracts me from whatever is bothering me, it is a "friend" to me, it "fills" me when nothing else can. There have been times when I've gone a month or so without bingeing and I find myself missing it. But then I go and binge and HATE it so much, and wonder why I actually missed that awful, bloated, out of control feeling. I have been struggling with it on and off for more than 20 years (started when I was about 18, and I'll be 42 next month). I'm not overweight, oddly enough (5'2", 120), but I think that's more metabolism than anything else. In fact, I've often said to myself that I'd be happy to stay where I am weight-wise, forever, if only I could stop bingeing.
