Turmoil with Food

Habit is habit and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed downstairs a step at a time. --Mark Twain

Its time to get to the core of why I'm overweight. Food has been my crack, my heroin, my meth, my cocaine, my alcohol, my family.

Having issues with weight is always about more than the food. My beliefs show up in my relationship with food. So if I'm eating when I'm not hungry or bored, I'm basically saying I can't feel these feelings. Life is too much for me (or not enough in my case). There's no goodness in my life except for food right here, right now. I'm basically eating because I've given up on something, some part of myself. You think that, 'I am so small that the pain is going to overwhelm me,' but in reality the truth is you've already experienced that pain.

And what food does at that point is it doubles your pain, rather than make it go away. You're still in pain about what you were in pain about before you ate, but now you've added a whole level of more discomfort which is: 'Oh, I can't believe I ate this. What's wrong with me? Am I ever going to get my life together?' Then you're feeling like a failure on top of the discomfort you were feeling before.

Most people who are not over weight do not understand that food, to us, is an addiction. I am addicted to food. We use food to 'Numb out'. We use it to cover our feelings, our boredom.

I have never been a religious individual, more spiritual. When I refer to 'God' I refer to something that is bigger. We each have this longing—we've had moments of awe and wonder in our lives. A lot of us don't call that God, but we know that something is possible for every one of us besides our daily lives. The way we get caught with errands and taking care of other people. We feel that this possibility exists, wonder and mystery and possibility ... or the feeling you have in nature. The feeling that everything is possible. I have learned that my relationship with food is directly related to how close I am to the source. The issue isn't really the food. It is about my disconnection from that which is real which we call 'God'. Real = God Life = God

We turn to food as an obsession, addiction. Obsession gives you something to do besides have your heart shattered by heart-shattering events or emotions. The emotional struggle that accompanies overeating is familiar, whereas the "heart-shattering events" are often new and raw. We are afraid that the pain will destroy us. Or the heartbreak, or the discomfort even. We don't actually know that we can feel those feelings without being destroyed by them. Getting up and living day-to-day and going through the stuff of day-to-day, that's difficult. But somehow we believe that food is cushioning it.

Conquering issues with weight starts with learning to love yourself. How do I start looking at myself and loving myself? Kindness.

You might ask, 'What made you come to this conclusion?'. What really clicked was recognizing that going to the food hasn't been working and that what I've been looking for isn't in the food. So what I am trying to get rid of and what I am trying to not feel, it didn't help to be eating over it. The other thing that clicked was that there is a whole lot of pain there to look at. I need to look at some of the layers, recognizing some of the beliefs that are keeping me at the weight where I am. Those beliefs, are that I'm not good enough, that nobody likes me and that nobody would accept me the way I am. Being overweight feels like a disability. I am still a person, a human, just like you. I wish people could see that.

Growing up as a child was so hard, what I'm really feeling is every time I have ever been beaten by my father. Every time my step mom told me that I was ugly. That I would never find someone to love me if I was over weight. That over weight individuals do not deserve love. She looks at me with disgust, hatred almost. What I recognize as I'm stuffing myself with the burgers, sandwiches, is I still have that feeling of if I don't do what pleased the other person, then somehow that person has the power to annihilate me. I've been so intimidated by someone who isn't even in my life anymore.

We somehow believe that if we hate ourselves enough, if we shame ourselves enough, we'll end up thin, happy, peaceful people. Somehow if I torture myself enough, I'll end up feeling great about myself and about my life, as if hatred leads to love and torture leads to contentment.

Does that make sense at all?! Hell to the No!

It's time to start loving myself, treating myself.