I’m at a loss with my body. I want this new installment here will be a way for me to chronicle these challenges and to find some kind of accountability to make changes. This is the first time I’ve publicly documented the scale’s reports, the embarrassment and self-hatred of feeling out of control. This is my unapologetic truth. Be kind, readers.
I spend a large portion of my life focused on my body: hating it, condemning it, shaming it. This has been a constant in my life since childhood.
I am not a waif, I am not petite, and I am not delicate. I’ve wanted to be those bodies since I was 7 years old, the first time that I remember starting to compare my body type to my friends and family. My family’s obsession with health, my continued struggles with asthma, and my general sense of being other deeply impacted me then and continues to be a part of my internal narrative.
When I look back at my teenage years and think about that ugly voice inside my head, I realize I wasn’t as fat as I thought I was. Yes, I was bigger than my classmates, but I balanced out at a size 14 and had the boobs to carry it. I dressed well because my mom knew how to help me camouflage my problem areas and because we had the money to buy clothes that were stylish but fit well. I remained at a solid 162 pounds for most of my high school years, and at 5’7″ I was still well-proportioned.
College is when I started to pack on the pounds. After a bad breakup, I gained about 15 pounds, suddenly losing that high-end-of-average weight. And, did you know that bulimia really doesn’t help you lose weight? It’s an eating disorder for a reason. When you’re stuffing an entire large Papa John’s pizza down your throat and then vomiting it all back up on a nightly basis, your body recognizes that it’s not healthy and grabs every spare calorie it can.
Then next two decades were filled with yo-yo diets, extensive measures to limit my size, and failures. At 28 and pregnant, I gained nearly 100 pounds and then lost 60 after giving birth to my daughter. At 29 I packed on another 20 during and after my divorce, and then the scale went even further to the right. For the first time in years I could sneak eat without the fear of someone finding me in the kitchen late at night, stuffing peanut butter into my mouth. Spoon to jar, spoon to jar, spoon to jar. A repetitive motion of comfort eating while I faced loneliness, stress, and despair. I climbed closer to 270 pounds and compensated with plus-size clothing I purchased on credit cards. My climbing weight was one more example of failure.
Getting married again inspired me to lose weight the healthy way, but then that motivation disappeared after I wore my wedding dress. I finally lost weight at 38, but I didn’t do it in a healthy manner. Now, almost 4 years later, my weight continues to increase month-over-month. I’m working from home, so I no longer have a commute that keeps me walking. I binge eat regularly at night, searching for any high-fat, high-calorie morsel that will bring on the glazed eyes, distended belly, and blank mind that only food seems to create for me.
I’m desperate for the real motivation to make changes. As I’m now firmly set in my mid-life years, I know that taking care of myself is paramount if I want to have a healthy remainder of time left on this planet. But, the motivation is fleeting, and that continues the cycle of failure in my mind and body.
Does anyone else feel this way? Why am I like this? How do I get help?
Bookish Brain 