I’ve been under a fair amount of strain lately. A dear friend of mine is dying from a metastasized cancer. I have an energetic and challenging sixteen year old. My older son is struggling at college. My husband injured himself and has been having a rough time dealing with the injury. Work has been very busy. In other words, life is happening, despite my being in a right-sized body. All of the above are hard enough, but combine them with the cold and rainy Sunday of last weekend, and I had a potential recipe for disaster. On that gray, wet, dreary day, all I wanted to do was to curl up on my sofa under a blanket and eat and watch television. But I didn’t. Instead, I worked my program. I called people and told them what I was feeling. Aloud, I said to them, “I want to eat.” Somehow,... Continue Reading
I felt different when I was growing up and was somewhat of a loner. My gay feelings inside reinforced this isolation. I could never tell anyone about this part of me. I heard very little about God growing up. I only heard, “God sees everything,” meaning “watch out.” Or if I stubbed my toe or dropped something, it was “God works in mysterious ways.” I prayed up to the stars to please help me figure out/understand the feelings I had inside. It seemed to me that I was a little girl trapped in a boy’s body! Food was always there at birthdays, holidays, vacations, and all the days in between. We celebrated life with food. I comforted and rewarded myself with food treats. In some ways food helped get me through a very difficult part of my life by numbing me out. Using food this way became a ritual and... Continue Reading
I was finding myself thinking about food every time I drove home from work or from a meeting. I would pass a fast-food place or a sugar and flour shop and start to think about what I would eat if I weren’t in Program. I wasn’t hungry and I wasn’t having a craving. I was just thinking about it. One night coming home from a meeting, I passed three fast-food places in a row, and I spent the entire time mentally making out my possible menu for each place. I realized what I was doing and began to talk to myself in a very negative way. I scolded myself, using verbal abuse and negative talk. I was angry at myself for thinking about food. I should have known better with 155 pounds off my body. My sponsor suggested that I stop the negative talk in situations like this and ask... Continue Reading
I knew I had a sugar problem, because when I ate sugar, things went badly. What I did not want to give up was alcohol. Yet whenever I drank, I ended up face down in the sugar. Lots of sugar. It took life smacking me in the face, with the unexpected death of a dear family friend, to wake me up. Her 25 years were over – she didn’t get any more chances. After that, I was no longer willing to squander the rest of my time on this planet waffling between trying to control my eating by drinking, not drinking, doing drugs, isolating, or exercising. It was two days before Thanksgiving when I got a sponsor in FA. On Thanksgiving I stuck to my food plan, but I ate some protein around 3 p.m. I hadn’t known what to do with myself, so I had been standing in front of the food... Continue Reading
I remember wanting food, lots of it, no matter what it was. Day after day, I filled myself with whatever was available, usually flour and sugar if I could find it, but sometimes I would even eat fruit or protein, or anything I could get my hands on. I don’t know when the shame and guilt started, but when it did, I started to hide, sneak, and steal. Then my weight went up, and the comments started to come. It never occurred to me to stop eating, but I actually don’t think I could have. I just kept eating, hiding, stealing food, and feeling more and more shame and guilt. It seemed like I became 200 pounds overnight. My siblings didn’t have serious problems with weight, but my mother had always been overweight, so it seemed like my fate was sealed. I was the youngest in a family of seven,... Continue Reading
