This Is Me

This Is Me

(all true events) 

I dedicate this book to anyone who has had some of the hard times I have had. Things will get better for you! You are perfect in my eyes! I want you to know you ARE loved!

Chapter One

Hi, I’m Katie, and I would like to tell you about my true story about growing up and living as a plus sized girl.  My story starts like everyone’s does, where I was born. I was born in Kokomo, Indiana; it’s a tiny little town in the Northern part of Indiana. It was a little town with lots of side streets, stoplights, and my enemy, fast food restaurants. Since my dad worked nearly all the time, and my mom was busy with her job at the hospital in town, I was mostly with my grandma.

 My grandma, Memaw, as I called her, was a happy bubbly little old lady who always had a smile on her face. She was my world when I was little, she was my best friend. While my mom was at work, my and my younger brother, Alex, would always go over to her house and have the time of our lives. We would do many things such as, coloring, helping her with her garden, and my favorite, watching ice-skating on her little tiny outdated TV from the 90’s.      

I loved my Memaw so much, but sadly my world, my life, my joy, came crashing down hard on me. On July 10th 2008, my mom had gotten a call saying that she had passed away from a sudden heart attack. My heart was shattered into a billion pieces. I felt like someone stabbed me in the heart and I died, but sadly still alive. I felt like I didn’t have a reason for living any more. She was my best friend, I loved her with all my heart, and I had lost her. Every year on July 10th I just try to think positive and just remember her happy little grin and our time we spent together. But every time I think about her being gone it still hurts as much as it did the first time I heard that she passed away. My world was gone.

After my Memaw passed I really started to gain weight. I was 8 when she passed away, I had been a pretty heavy kid early on in life but my weight skyrocketed when she passed.  Every time I would think about her laugh, I would turn to food, every time I thought about her grin, I would turn to food, every time I thought about her, I turned to food. Food had become me new best friend.

Food was my whole world. I guess I thought it filled the hole in my heart, but all it did was fill my stomach and make me heavy, but I didn’t care. I would eat all the food I wanted, and no one stopped me. I felt better when I ate, when I would eat it felt like therapy for me. I was young; I didn’t know how to handle my feelings, and my broken heart. Food was my only way to escape from my problems.

My mom put my in therapy to try to work out my troubles and pain in my heart, but it only worked for a couple months. Then my trusty friend, food, came back. I would get comfortable with food, a little too comfortable.

I knew I had a problem with food, but I didn’t want to own up to it. I was more comfortable hiding my feelings and eating, then spilling out my thoughts and emotions.

Chapter Two

My feelings toward food started to become stronger around age 10, and it was harder for me to not think about food. I would sneak food in the middle of the night and not tell anyone about it. I would hide it from my parents, my friends, everyone. No one knew. I would decline any things my parents would say like, “where do it go? Did you eat it? I swear I had more of that in my lunch box.” I would pretend to not hear it.

 I would try to cover up my eating habits by eating only healthy food, or no food at all in front of my family. I would go through many fazes where I would get up in the middle of the night and eat food, sometimes too much food, and I would end up making my self sick. I would tell my mom that I got sick because of a stomach virus, or that I was allergic to something I ate. But I knew the truth. I hated lying to people. I hated having to hide my food addiction from everyone. I felt embarrassed, ashamed, and disgusted with my self and the way that I ate and they way I lied to people about it. I hated it, but most of all, I hated my self.