Fat Girl in a Little Coat

After much meditation, I've decided to go very public about a very private issue: my weight. The entry below was written on June 4th, 2015 and summarizes my thoughts as I began the "maintenance" stage, just two weeks after the completion of losing ninety pounds. The time that has passed between this entry to date can be described by no less than a roller coaster, but more on that to come. I hope you will go with me on my journey to developing a healthy relationship with my body and with food, and ultimately, finding balance.

June 4^th marks a very important day in my personal history. It was one year ago today that I decided I didn’t want to feel trapped in the obese, out-of-breath, always-tired, can’t-keep-up body I was in. My exact thought was, “Being controlled by something completely within my control just isn’t my style.” And so began a journey to lose the weight, shape my body, and feel happy and confident in my appearance. Ninety pounds later, here we are.

However, the purpose here is not to share any weight loss secret, revolutionary diet, or magic regimen for losing weight. If we are all honest with ourselves, we know how to lose weight. The difficulty comes in actually doing it.  The intent is to share a dark side of weight loss that no one will share – that scary secret that is kept hidden in the back corner of the closet under all the junk no one wants to ever sort through. While consistent exercise and restricted eating will change your body on the outside, by no measure will it change who you are on the inside. Revolutionary! This thought never crossed my mind. When I decided to lose weight, I went head first, ninety-to-nothing changing my habits and lifestyle, but I never slowed down to diagnose why I was obese to begin with. Why not? Compared to changing your mind, changing your body is a piece of cake.

We’ve all heard that dealing with food addiction is so difficult because, unlike drugs like nicotine or alcohol, our body must eat food to survive. We can’t just stop eating like we can just stop smoking or stop drinking. We must eat, and in doing so we are bombarded with challenging our addiction multiple times a day, every day, every week, for the rest of our lives. Food abuse and addiction can present in many different forms, or in a combination of ways. Regardless of the abuse, eating disorders such as compulsive eating, binge eating, and emotional eating are very real, and the battle against them is very real. Some people can have a handful of M&Ms and be satisfied; some people cannot. Some people have a bad day and can talk through it with a friend or spouse; some people prefer to eat ice cream alone to decompress. We are all wired differently, and there is no shame in being different. The challenge here is to acknowledge your weakness(es), intimately know the signs, and create boundaries. Enlist someone for accountability and support. Most importantly, the power against food abuse is outside of yourself. This battle of nature against spirit is bigger than you. You may have a lot of willpower, but no one has an unlimited supply. You must rely on a higher power to empower, fill, and fulfill you like no food (or anything else) can do.

Is this “battle” I have waged worth it? Am I happy I began the journey to health, oblivious to the costs? In a word, yes, but by no means am I saying that it is easy. You will have to make sacrifices. You will be uncomfortable. You cannot ignore calories, nor can you quit working out. You must consider your food and activity choices every day. In exchange, you earn a physically changed body, a healthier body with increased energy, and better chances of a longer life to share with your family. Ultimately, you will be found obedient by glorifying God in your body.