Journey To Healing: Diary Of A Food Addict

Understanding The Past And The Pattern Of Failure! Chapter 6

By the end of my Freshman year in High school, I weighed 180 lbs. I know I had to do something, so over the summer vacation, I worked hard and managed to lose 30 lbs. in three months. I remember standing in front of the mirror in my Moms bathroom crying because I thought I looked fat. I was beautiful, but very ignorant to what was happening to me. I later realized I was developing an eating disorder. The last thing a 14 year old should be worried about is her body image. It was fused inside my mind because of the way I was treated at school. No one knew I was battling severe self-esteem issues, I hid the struggle very well. People who would have never given me the time of day started talking to me, but their interest in me was very shallow, almost transparent. They didn't care about the real person inside my heart. Since I had lost a lot of weight, the reality is that I was simply more appealing to the eyes. About three months ago, I was asked by an old classmate, if I remembered when a certain guy, not mentioning any names, had spit in my purse when we were in school. Here we are 21 years later and this is brought to my attention. I was just reminded of the stupidity of some people I had no pleasure of being around when I was growing up. Besides that, I didn't remember anyways. I guess it was one of the many things I have blocked from my memory so I could escape and cope with the past. Sadly, it took me a long time to come to terms with the way I was treated by some of my classmates, with the pain affecting me way into my adult life. When I say I have battled my weight and self esteem, I do not say it lightly, it became a part of me.

Fast forwarding almost 27 years later, no one ever plans their lives to be a complete mess. I have literally felt that way for many years now, as far back as I can remember. A lot of it seems to be a thick fog in my mind, letting me remember only the most devastating situations, all rolled together in one thing, FAILURE. Even though I have failed at loving myself and building a life that my family and I deserve, I do have my two greatest accomplishments, my two children. As I speak about my hope and dreams out loud, no one believes me anymore, because I have started and failed so many times. It makes me sad, but I understand where people come from when they hear me say that I'm getting my life back on track. Each time I truly would have the best intentions, only to fail over and over again. After a while, I started to not even believe my own words, almost defeating myself before I even started. But this doesn't have to be my reality any longer. There was a time where I actually lost 90 lbs in a year, only to gain back all of it plus more, reaching my highest at 307 lbs. The problem seems to be that I wasn't doing it for the right reasons. I believe that I lost those 90 lbs. out of anger, if that makes any sense. At the time I was going through hard times in my life and no matter how hard I tried to fix it, things just seemed to get worse. I remember the day I told myself, I'm going to lose weight and no one is going to stop me as I slammed my car trunk shut. I had enough, I just felt like running far away. During this time, I didn't have my children, it was just me and my husband. When I spoke those words out loud, it was like I was set on fire, it stayed on my mind 24/7. But you see, I had a secret weapon. I had started using a diet pill packed with ephedra. It made me feel like I was going 100 miles per hour. I exercised on my lunch breaks from work, and again after work, and could complete a whole hour of exercise easy. I ate decent I guess, but with all the exercise I still lost weight. I was totally out of control. I'm lucky I didn't give myself a heart attack. Not much after I lost the weight, the FDA decided to ban the sell of ephedra containing products, so I fell off the wagon. People were apparently dying from using any product containing the controversial ingredient. Yes, its okay to use health supplements, to help nourish your body, but this was something that was unnatural to use, and I was completely dependent on it. In my most desperate times, I even went to an even lower level, and started using Citrate of Magnesia. Laxatives is commonly used by people who are scared to gain weight after they would eat bad food, and a lot of it. The list goes on and on, I have never felt complete. It's like attempting to swim upward in a rapid river, getting knocked from one side to another, only to feel myself drowning towards the end but being able to pop my head out of the water one last time to take another breath. The struggle is real.