TW: eating disorders. I’m 22F, 5’3, 170 pounds. It seems like my entire life has been consumed, in some way or another, by an obsession with food.
When I was a kid, everything revolved around what I’d have for my next meal. I was never an overweight kid but I had an interest in cooking and eating for as long as I can remember. I was never picky, I loved eating, I always cleaned my plate, I usually went back for seconds.
When I was 10 or so, I was allowed to grab a snack without asking my mom for the first time. One day I was eating cheez it’s (still my favorite) from a paper towel when my mom remarked that I had way too much. “Read the side of the box,” she said. “Look at the serving size and count how many you should eat.”
When I was 11, I started becoming very conscious of my weight and eating habits. I didn’t want to be fat, even though I never had been. I felt uncomfortable in my changing body. I’d grab a little cup of cream cheese from the cafeteria, one that was meant for the bagels they sold, and that would be my breakfast. 80 calories. By lunch, I’d be starving so I’d use my lunch money to buy a slice of pizza and then be unforgivingly angry at myself.
By the time I was 13, I had a full blown eating disorder. I looked longingly at “thinspo” photos online of women who were literal walking skeletons. I carefully tracked everything I ate. A days’ worth of calories was never, ever more than 1000, usually around 600 or so. I would binge on food I didn’t even enjoy, like peanut butter, jelly and dry Cheerios stirred into oatmeal, because my body was starving. Then I would feel such immense guilt that I would vomit it all back up. I was obsessed with food, obsessed with the numbers on the scale and in my diet tracker. I weighed 97 pounds at my lightest, and I was at my adult height of 5’3. My periods stopped completely.
When I was 14, my parents heard me throwing up. I had made (because I still loved to cook) a grilled cheese with sun dried tomato, grilled in the oil from the jar. It was delicious, I savored it. Then I threw it back up. They told me they heard me, told me I had to stop. They’d listen intently when I went to the bathroom or shower.
I guess at that point I just slowly stopped. I put on weight gradually. I distracted myself with friends, and later, boyfriends. I graduated high school at a healthy 125 pounds.
When I was 17, I started college and lived on my own for the first time. Finally I had the opportunity to cook whatever I wanted in my tiny dorm kitchen, eat whatever I wanted in the cafeteria. My passion for cooking grew and I really started to develop my talents in the kitchen. With that came some more weight gain. I struggled with it.
When I was 19, my long term boyfriend and I broke up. I started going out with my friends. I started being told how great my figure was, how I had big boobs and a bubble butt, and I started to feel really confident in myself and my body. I weighed about 145 pounds, technically “overweight” which would have terrified my old anorexic self. But I looked in the mirror and loved what I saw. I was also very active since I had no car, so I was walking at least 2 miles a day. I put on a little more weight in the next two years but still was fairly happy with myself, and was continuing to spend most of my free time cooking.
When I was 21, this January, and weighed 155 pounds, I met my boyfriend. He started picking me up from school so about a mile of my normal walking route was gone, plus in an attempt to impress him (which worked), I’d cook us even more elaborate meals. The additional food plus the cut in exercise meant I put on more weight.
I graduated college this May and weighed 165 pounds. I had stretch marks on my thighs that were rapidly spreading and growing, a face that was (and still is) completely unrecognizable to me, a softer body that I was no longer happy with.
This June I started a full time desk job and put on another 5 pounds, since I had gone from very active a few months before to completely sedentary. Stretch marks still spreading, feeling my stomach touch my thighs in a way completely alien to me.
I guess I wanted to write this all down to hold myself accountable. I’ve always had an obsession with food. Part of it is my love for cooking - there’s truly nothing that I would rather spend an entire day doing. I think all day about what is in my fridge and what I’ll make for dinner, not because I want to eat it but because I love to cook.
But my relationship with food has been complex for over half my life. I’ve always been obsessed with it in one way or another, I’m either binging or not eating at all. There has never been a happy medium of “eat when you’re hungry and your body will balance itself” for me.
I want to get to a place where I’m naturally maintaining a healthy weight because, since that low day of 97 pounds a decade ago, I have never maintained. My weight has steadily gone up, and for a long time this was a good thing. I looked great, I carry weight well (I’m still only a size 10 at my current weight) so it was excusable to be “overweight” because I truly looked my best then.
I’ve gone from underweight, to normal weight, to overweight, to obese by BMI standards. Slowly but surely I’ve put the weight on and not mended my broken relationship with food, I’ve ignored it because until now my body has looked fine.
The scale has literally and figuratively tipped and I need to do something for my own health and happiness, but it seems like such a massive task because I have to heal half a lifetime of bad eating habits and associations with food. I need to get to a point where I am both healthy and happy, where I’m maintaining my weight without constantly thinking about calories or hunger or binging.
I want to lose about 30 pounds, and I don’t care how long it takes as long as I come out of it with a better attitude toward food and my body. I started 16:8 intermittent fasting a few days ago and I’m at 168.8. I think it’s helping. I’m trying to train myself to listen to what my body wants. I feel myself enjoying food instead of thinking about having more of it. I’m trying to pay attention to how I feel when I eat healthy foods vs junk.
Anyway, it’s cathartic for me to get all these thoughts out on paper. Thank you to anyone who is still reading this dramatic ass post. I hope it helps someone who’s dealing with the same issues with food as me to realize you aren’t alone. If anyone has successfully made a change, let me know what helped you. I’m taking it one day at a time right now.
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/comments/e9zvll/a_long_and_rambling_history_of_my_complicated/
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