Dear ladies at Church of the Springs,
It was an amazing opportunity to have the opportunity to tell my story last night. Thank you to all who gave me encouragement last night!
This blog is meant to encourage you. Feel free to make comments and ask questions. It is a long story and to get it from the beginning you need to go to the right hand part of this page and click on the January Post. That will lead you from one post to the next. God has taught me so much about food and eating that has set me free. My prayer is that you would be set free too!
One thing that I did not mention last night is there is a book that has helped me so much. It is called Thin Within by Judi Halliday. This book has been such a blessing to me. If you are suffering in anyway with food and your body, it is a must read. If there is anyone who would like to meet and discuss the book, I would love to do that! This helps me grow even more in this area.
With much love,
JOY
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Friday, March 27, 2009
I EAT WHATEVER I WANT!
If you are new to this blog, be sure to read it from the oldest post first. Click on the Jan. posts on the side bar to start the story from the beginning. You can also be a follower of this blog or make comments.
The story continues:
If you have read my whole blog, it might surprise you that I eat whatever I want! The key word here is want. Before I ever went on a diet, I ate whatever I wanted and didn't think about it much. As soon as I became aware of the supposed need to lose weight, I began to want the foods that I thought I shouldn't have. Then I wanted those foods so much more. My mind was focused on those foods. When I severely limited my intake of food and exercised excessively, I wanted any and all foods, as much as I could get. It was all I could focus on, I was literally starving.
Now that I am focused on my health instead of making my body thin, I want completely different things. It has taken time and a gradual revolution of my eating. Now I really love to eat a big bowl of fresh fruit in the morning. I love to drink lots of water. I look forward to a large vegetable salad at least 1 or 2 times per day. I love raw nuts. I look forward to a hot meal with fresh cooked vegetables. I eat meat, rice, pasta, potatoes, but I focus most of my eating on vegetables. I am not trying to be "good", I really love this food. More than that, I love how my bodies feels. It has been easy to maintain a healthy body weight while eating these foods.
Do I eat desserts? You bet I do! The interesting thing is that I don't want them as much. Or if I do, I just want a little bit of them. I could eat a lot if I wanted, but the feeling of being free of excess body weight feels better. I also notice if I eat things with processed white flour and sugar, I just want more of this type of food. It is addictive. I am aware that I do not feel that great after eating them. Now what really does the trick for me if I want something sweet, is a really good orange, or raisins. One of our family's favorite treats is raw almonds and raisins. It really satisfies a sweet tooth plus give protein which boosts your metabolism!
Bottom line is this: I am free to eat what ever I want to eat. It just so happens that I want to eat really great food. So, I do!
The story continues:
If you have read my whole blog, it might surprise you that I eat whatever I want! The key word here is want. Before I ever went on a diet, I ate whatever I wanted and didn't think about it much. As soon as I became aware of the supposed need to lose weight, I began to want the foods that I thought I shouldn't have. Then I wanted those foods so much more. My mind was focused on those foods. When I severely limited my intake of food and exercised excessively, I wanted any and all foods, as much as I could get. It was all I could focus on, I was literally starving.
Now that I am focused on my health instead of making my body thin, I want completely different things. It has taken time and a gradual revolution of my eating. Now I really love to eat a big bowl of fresh fruit in the morning. I love to drink lots of water. I look forward to a large vegetable salad at least 1 or 2 times per day. I love raw nuts. I look forward to a hot meal with fresh cooked vegetables. I eat meat, rice, pasta, potatoes, but I focus most of my eating on vegetables. I am not trying to be "good", I really love this food. More than that, I love how my bodies feels. It has been easy to maintain a healthy body weight while eating these foods.
Do I eat desserts? You bet I do! The interesting thing is that I don't want them as much. Or if I do, I just want a little bit of them. I could eat a lot if I wanted, but the feeling of being free of excess body weight feels better. I also notice if I eat things with processed white flour and sugar, I just want more of this type of food. It is addictive. I am aware that I do not feel that great after eating them. Now what really does the trick for me if I want something sweet, is a really good orange, or raisins. One of our family's favorite treats is raw almonds and raisins. It really satisfies a sweet tooth plus give protein which boosts your metabolism!
Bottom line is this: I am free to eat what ever I want to eat. It just so happens that I want to eat really great food. So, I do!
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Why Diet's do not work!
Your normal Diet= what you eat on an everyday basis.
Dieting=a change in the way you eat so as to lose weight
Gaining weight= is what happens when you stop dieting and go back to your normal diet!
I have seen this over and over. I have been particularly watching this phenomenon for the last 32 years because if you read my whole blog you see that I went the route of dieting until I worked myself into an eating disorder or actually what I call disordered eating. (this means out of whack, crazy, out of control eating!)
This is what I believe is true and I believe that truth can set us free.
1. Our bodies are created to eat lots of food. Not just any food, but live food. (live food is food that can sprout or food that can rot) Have you ever noticed that McDonald's French fries do not rot?
When you eat a large amount of live food you feel satisfied. Your teeth get to crunch as much as they want to. You can actually get tired of eating.
2. Processed food leaves us wanting more. It has more calories, yet it does not satisfy. So when we go on a "diet" and restrict our calories and we are eating processed foods, then our bodies start to really scream out for more.
3. In order to arrive and stay at our God given body size, we need to eat smart, not less.
4. Whether we have been overweight all of our lives, or are just starting to gain weight for the first time, the only way to get back to our God given body size and stay there is through a life style change. What change can you live with for the rest of your life? One small change can make huge impact on the rest of your life and make a big difference.
5. We need to pay attention to our metabolism, not restricting calories. When you restrict calories you slow down your metabolism. When your metabolism slows down you gain weight easier- this is why people gain weight back after dieting and often a little bit more. The way to increase your metabolism is by exercising, building muscle and eating more (of the right foods)
6. When we deny ourselves food to the point of real hunger and then tell ourselves that we can't have food, then we set ourselves for fixating on food. When we fixate on food while denying ourselves, then we can't wait to have the food that we are denying ourselves of. So when people go off diets they often eat a lot of the food that they have been missing and probably more of it than they would have before dieting. This can be a vicious cycle of defeat.
What I often see is that people say that they do not have self control. They feel really bad about themselves inside because they can not control what they eat. What I believe is that if we are eating large amounts of raw unprocessed foods, our weight will normalize and our cravings will subside. We won't need that much self control.
This all begins in our minds. The first healthy thing that I did that turned the tide for me was focusing my thoughts on what was healthy for me. I thought about how good I felt when I exercised and moved my body. Then I thought about how crummy I felt when eating donuts, or other processed goodies that have little nutrition. I thought about how good I feel when I eat raw fruits and veggies. These thoughts became my actions. With God's help, these thoughts also replaced the ones that said," I have no self control, I am so bad!" (these thoughts just let to more out of control eating! Self condemnation does not work!) The negative thoughts brought me to a downward spiral. I now tell myself the truth- God has not given us a spirit of fear. He gave us a spirit of power and love and self-control. 1 Timothy 1:7. I know this seems simplistic, but God has created our minds to be really powerful and we can change our actions with correct thinking.
Dieting=a change in the way you eat so as to lose weight
Gaining weight= is what happens when you stop dieting and go back to your normal diet!
I have seen this over and over. I have been particularly watching this phenomenon for the last 32 years because if you read my whole blog you see that I went the route of dieting until I worked myself into an eating disorder or actually what I call disordered eating. (this means out of whack, crazy, out of control eating!)
This is what I believe is true and I believe that truth can set us free.
1. Our bodies are created to eat lots of food. Not just any food, but live food. (live food is food that can sprout or food that can rot) Have you ever noticed that McDonald's French fries do not rot?
When you eat a large amount of live food you feel satisfied. Your teeth get to crunch as much as they want to. You can actually get tired of eating.
2. Processed food leaves us wanting more. It has more calories, yet it does not satisfy. So when we go on a "diet" and restrict our calories and we are eating processed foods, then our bodies start to really scream out for more.
3. In order to arrive and stay at our God given body size, we need to eat smart, not less.
4. Whether we have been overweight all of our lives, or are just starting to gain weight for the first time, the only way to get back to our God given body size and stay there is through a life style change. What change can you live with for the rest of your life? One small change can make huge impact on the rest of your life and make a big difference.
5. We need to pay attention to our metabolism, not restricting calories. When you restrict calories you slow down your metabolism. When your metabolism slows down you gain weight easier- this is why people gain weight back after dieting and often a little bit more. The way to increase your metabolism is by exercising, building muscle and eating more (of the right foods)
6. When we deny ourselves food to the point of real hunger and then tell ourselves that we can't have food, then we set ourselves for fixating on food. When we fixate on food while denying ourselves, then we can't wait to have the food that we are denying ourselves of. So when people go off diets they often eat a lot of the food that they have been missing and probably more of it than they would have before dieting. This can be a vicious cycle of defeat.
What I often see is that people say that they do not have self control. They feel really bad about themselves inside because they can not control what they eat. What I believe is that if we are eating large amounts of raw unprocessed foods, our weight will normalize and our cravings will subside. We won't need that much self control.
This all begins in our minds. The first healthy thing that I did that turned the tide for me was focusing my thoughts on what was healthy for me. I thought about how good I felt when I exercised and moved my body. Then I thought about how crummy I felt when eating donuts, or other processed goodies that have little nutrition. I thought about how good I feel when I eat raw fruits and veggies. These thoughts became my actions. With God's help, these thoughts also replaced the ones that said," I have no self control, I am so bad!" (these thoughts just let to more out of control eating! Self condemnation does not work!) The negative thoughts brought me to a downward spiral. I now tell myself the truth- God has not given us a spirit of fear. He gave us a spirit of power and love and self-control. 1 Timothy 1:7. I know this seems simplistic, but God has created our minds to be really powerful and we can change our actions with correct thinking.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
You Are What You Eat
You Are What You Eat!
continued from the post- My Freedom Inside Shows up on the Outside!
You are what you eat! I have heard that statement many times and thought that I believed and understood it. Then I experienced an example that helped me to remember it forever.
My husband has always experienced digestive problems and had gotten to the point where he took Tums or other antacids on a regular basis. I kept suggesting that something needed to change in his diet.
Whenever I read about digestive health and nutrition, pork was one of the first items that was suggested to be eliminated. My husband had been eating more and more pork over the last few years because he ate in a cafeteria setting for meals because of his job. He often had bacon, ham, pork chops, ribs and roasts. Unrelated to that (or so we thought), his body began to have a distinct odor that even the kids noticed. We teased him and told him he must be getting old!
His stomach was bothering him more and more and so he came to a point of being ready to try something new. He eliminated pork first. Within a week his weird body odor completely disappeared. It was amazing. His stomach felt much better too!
Somehow this experience encouraged him to look even further into what he was eating to see if he could totally eliminate his digestive and headache problems. My daughter had recently figured out that she was intolerant to wheat products. As soon as she eliminated wheat she went from daily throwing up to healthy. So, my husband tried this too. Within on week he was a new person. No more need for antacid tablets, and headaches are rare. Both my husband and daughter released about 10 pounds without trying.
These experiences have peaked our interest in reading more about food and nutrition. One thing that kept coming up was the MSG and High Fructose Corn Syrup that is in so many of our processed foods. I had heard about this for a long time and believed that these were not good. What I didn't realize is how many foods had these products in them and that they help make your body fat! We were eating them all the time without realizing it!
MSG is called an excito- toxin. It stimulates your taste buds so that the taste is extra good, but it also makes you want to eat more of the food, and later on more food again. So here is an ingredient that works against your attempts at eating nutritionally and maintaining your God Given body size. It also excites the brain cells until they die. Read about it in the book 'Excito Toxins, The Taste That Kills' by Russel Blaylock, MD. My favorite food that has MSG is Ranch Dressing. Our family loves this dressing and felt like we were eating something good for us when we ate it with raw vegetables. Now we know! Other favorites for us used to be flavored Doritos. MSG is in so many foods- read all labels.
High Fructose Corn Syrup is an artificial additive that is cheaper and easier for manufacturing. There is research that shows that because of its chemical makeup it goes directly to the liver, releasing enzymes that instruct the body to store fat! We eat enough calories as it is, we do not need the kind that doubles its efforts in our body to make us gain weight! This makes me mad. It is in pizzas, baked beans, candies, yeast breads, flavored yogurt, baby food, ketchup, cookies, beer, sodas,mayonnaise, juices and most manufactured foods.
We have read some books that have alerted us to what is in our food. We do not buy into everything that is in the books, nevertheless we have learned so much from them. They are:
1. Natural Cures That They Don't Want You to Know About by Kevin Trudeau
2. The Liver and Gallbladder Miracle Cleanse by Andreas Moritz
3. The Apple Cider Vinegar Book, by Bragg
4. The Makers Diet by Jordan S. Rubin
The most recent awareness that we have is about the antibiotics and hormones in our meat and dairy. Again, this is something that was added so the manufacturer could make more money.
Two major condiments that we (especially our son) use in our house are Ranch Dressing and Ketchup. I make my own ranch dressing w/o MSG and I buy organic Ketchup- without the high fructose corn syrup. There are ways around everything. We are finding we can make changes. I go to the internet continually for ideas.
So, what are we doing about it? We shop around the perimeter of the store and rarely go up and down the aisles where there are processed foods. We try to eat whole unprocessed food. We eat raw whenever possible. We eat very little meat. When possible we buy organic. If we want dessert, we make it ourselves. We haven't completely switched everything over, but are on a journey of improving how we eat.
continued from the post- My Freedom Inside Shows up on the Outside!
You are what you eat! I have heard that statement many times and thought that I believed and understood it. Then I experienced an example that helped me to remember it forever.
My husband has always experienced digestive problems and had gotten to the point where he took Tums or other antacids on a regular basis. I kept suggesting that something needed to change in his diet.
Whenever I read about digestive health and nutrition, pork was one of the first items that was suggested to be eliminated. My husband had been eating more and more pork over the last few years because he ate in a cafeteria setting for meals because of his job. He often had bacon, ham, pork chops, ribs and roasts. Unrelated to that (or so we thought), his body began to have a distinct odor that even the kids noticed. We teased him and told him he must be getting old!
His stomach was bothering him more and more and so he came to a point of being ready to try something new. He eliminated pork first. Within a week his weird body odor completely disappeared. It was amazing. His stomach felt much better too!
Somehow this experience encouraged him to look even further into what he was eating to see if he could totally eliminate his digestive and headache problems. My daughter had recently figured out that she was intolerant to wheat products. As soon as she eliminated wheat she went from daily throwing up to healthy. So, my husband tried this too. Within on week he was a new person. No more need for antacid tablets, and headaches are rare. Both my husband and daughter released about 10 pounds without trying.
These experiences have peaked our interest in reading more about food and nutrition. One thing that kept coming up was the MSG and High Fructose Corn Syrup that is in so many of our processed foods. I had heard about this for a long time and believed that these were not good. What I didn't realize is how many foods had these products in them and that they help make your body fat! We were eating them all the time without realizing it!
MSG is called an excito- toxin. It stimulates your taste buds so that the taste is extra good, but it also makes you want to eat more of the food, and later on more food again. So here is an ingredient that works against your attempts at eating nutritionally and maintaining your God Given body size. It also excites the brain cells until they die. Read about it in the book 'Excito Toxins, The Taste That Kills' by Russel Blaylock, MD. My favorite food that has MSG is Ranch Dressing. Our family loves this dressing and felt like we were eating something good for us when we ate it with raw vegetables. Now we know! Other favorites for us used to be flavored Doritos. MSG is in so many foods- read all labels.
High Fructose Corn Syrup is an artificial additive that is cheaper and easier for manufacturing. There is research that shows that because of its chemical makeup it goes directly to the liver, releasing enzymes that instruct the body to store fat! We eat enough calories as it is, we do not need the kind that doubles its efforts in our body to make us gain weight! This makes me mad. It is in pizzas, baked beans, candies, yeast breads, flavored yogurt, baby food, ketchup, cookies, beer, sodas,mayonnaise, juices and most manufactured foods.
We have read some books that have alerted us to what is in our food. We do not buy into everything that is in the books, nevertheless we have learned so much from them. They are:
1. Natural Cures That They Don't Want You to Know About by Kevin Trudeau
2. The Liver and Gallbladder Miracle Cleanse by Andreas Moritz
3. The Apple Cider Vinegar Book, by Bragg
4. The Makers Diet by Jordan S. Rubin
The most recent awareness that we have is about the antibiotics and hormones in our meat and dairy. Again, this is something that was added so the manufacturer could make more money.
Two major condiments that we (especially our son) use in our house are Ranch Dressing and Ketchup. I make my own ranch dressing w/o MSG and I buy organic Ketchup- without the high fructose corn syrup. There are ways around everything. We are finding we can make changes. I go to the internet continually for ideas.
So, what are we doing about it? We shop around the perimeter of the store and rarely go up and down the aisles where there are processed foods. We try to eat whole unprocessed food. We eat raw whenever possible. We eat very little meat. When possible we buy organic. If we want dessert, we make it ourselves. We haven't completely switched everything over, but are on a journey of improving how we eat.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
My Freedom Inside Shows up on the Outside!
My Freedom Inside, Shows up on the Outside!
continued from the Post called "Perspective and Anatomy of an Eating Disorder"
My story continues after God freed me from disordered eating. I met my husband after I had figured all these things out. God had totally changed me from the inside out. I became very content with life and where it was headed. I was happy and excited about my relationship with God. I came to know and believe that where ever he led me, it was good. When my relationship with my future husband became serious, I wanted to make sure he knew everything about me. I shared every detail with him. He loved & accepted me with my flaws. His acceptance of me was a mirror of God's acceptance. After we were married I went through 5 pregnancy's with the weight gain that comes with the territory. No matter how much I gained, I seemed to grow more beautiful in my husbands eyes. When I lost the weight, I grew more beautiful. If I got frustrated with my body, he did not. He never one time said to me, "do you really think that you should be eating that since you are frustrated with your weight?" Given my history, I think that if he monitored me in any way, or criticized me, I would have gone back to underground eating. God knew who I needed close to me in order to continue my journey to wholeness.
Throughout the next 25 years I continued with my conviction of NO DIETS! (If I even thought diet, then I wanted to eat everything, plus the kitchen sink!) However I was not completely satisfied with how I looked. I was still influenced somewhat by the skinny gymnast body in my mind. That was hard to compete with, & it left me unsatisfied with myself. My one regret of those years is that I spent any time being unsatisfied with myself. Even though God, my husband, my kids, and my friends accepted me, I still did not accept myself. I remember thinking that I did not want to look back at my life living in regrets, or wasting time being frustrated about my body.
If I knew then what I know now about food, my journey would have been shortened. I did not know that the actual type of food that I was eating was influencing my body so much more than I thought. My answer was not about how much I ate. I will write about this information that I learned in my next post labeled "You are what you eat!"
I continued with my conviction of no diets, eat healthy, & enjoy exercise. This kept me from becoming obese but I did gain weight with each pregnancy and kept some of it on.
I don't remember how or why, but about 7 years ago, I finally made peace with my body. I was then about 30 pounds over what I wanted to be, yet I finally accepted myself. The weird thing about this is that when I finally accepted myself totally I was finally free to release the weight that I had gained. I did not pursue losing weight, but God has led me on a journey that I did not expect.
This started with my niece and her husband deciding that they would fast from desserts until they got married. My kids asked them one day if this was hard. I expected them to say, "Yes, it is hard but it was a good thing." Instead they looked at each other with a puzzled look on their face and both admitted that except for the first few days, it was not hard at all and they did not miss it. Something happened inside of me at that moment. I had been aware of the fact that I had been eating things that I did not really need or even want. I ate everything in front of me and never said no. Remember that part of my strategy for not going back into disordered eating was to never say DIET! So consequently I said yes to everything. I decided then and there that I was going to experiment by going without desserts totally for a month. I did not say anything to anyone about this. It was between myself and God. Each time an opportunity came up (which was daily!), I just told myself that it wasn't that big of a deal to skip the dessert and that the next day I would be glad that I didn't have it. I told myself that I could have it if I really wanted it, but that I could also say no. I did this for about 3 months before I said anything about it. I ate everything that I wanted without the desserts and my body automatically lost weight. I actually had given up weighing myself but I knew I lost weight because my clothes were loose.
The cool thing about this experience for me was that I had come to the place that I could say no to myself and not feel deprived. I didn't pull up my bootstraps and make myself do it. I didn't do it because I felt bad about myself. I did it out of the fullness of my life. I guess you could say I felt full inside. This was God's work in me. The change that had happened on the inside for so long, was finally coming out to the outside.
The next thing that happened in my journey was that a friend of mine complimented me on how I looked, so I decided to tell her about giving up desserts and what that had done for me. She listened to my story and then suggested that I would like a book called 'Thin Within' by Judy Halliday. I bought it and read it with excitement. The book is a grace -oriented approach to lasting weight loss. The book practically told my whole story. God had already slowly but surely taught me what was in that book. Thin Within also challenged me in some new ways that totally changed the way I ate. If you are reading this and are frustrated with your ability to release excess weight and get back to your God given size, you have to buy the book. I have read it 4 times now. It challenges me every time. As I read 'Thin Within' and applied the principles my body began to let go of some more weight. I wasn't reading the book because I wanted to lose weight. I was reading it because I knew that I still ate out of emotion instead of taking my problems to God. I really wanted to deal with that issue. In this process of learning I lost another size.
At the same time I also started working out at Curves. I had taken aerobic classes, ran, walked, played sports, and worked out in a gym off and on most of my life. The only thing that I had not done was any weight bearing exercises. I started at Curves because I was ready for something new and the concept of a 30 minute workout seemed appealing. I really became motivated when my mom at 65 went through a bout with cancer. She almost died as she went through radiation and chemo. Before her treatments she was robust, healthy and active. We water skied and snow skied together each year. As soon as she started treatments, she could not eat anything for months. She was fed through a tube. Several months after she stopped the treatments she started at Curves. 3 months later we water skied and she popped out of the water faster than she had ever done before in her life. It was because of the workouts at Curves. That same ski trip, I couldn't get out of the water for the very first time because of added weight, and soreness in my knee and shoulder. I decided that when I could I would start Curves too. I had the chance several months later. Within 2 months of starting Curves I had lost another size.
So between making some lifestyle changes in my eating and working out just 3 times a week for a half an hour, I lost 2 sizes. I had already come to the place where I had accepted myself at the larger size, but was excited to let go of the extra weight so easily.
After one year at Curves I was talking to my mom about whether I should continue or not. Her comment was," you need to take care of your health." Somehow her comment helped shape my commitment from that point on to concentrate on my health and not worry about the weight. It made it easier to continue working out. I have worked out at Curves for 5 years now and it has continued to help me. My knee and shoulder problems are greatly improved, & I eventually lost yet another size to my total shock. When I do the things I love like water/snow skiing, I can do it with energy and strength. (I know that Curves is not the answer for everyone, but for me it is a perfect combination of a short work out, I can talk to other women while working out, it is in every town that I live in or visit, and it also gives a whole body workout every time.)
My story is about experiencing the joy of becoming free from the inside out. I am writing about physical changes in this post, but what really changed in my life is a growing relationship with the Almighty, Everlasting, Loving God. It is He who patiently taught me, and led me and continues to lead me on this journey. He had been working in my heart already when I heard from my niece and her husband that going without desserts was not hard at all. (A year before this, I could not have done it and would not recommend it if you love desserts.) It was God had showed me my need to make a change in my inside attitudes about food when he provided the book 'Thin Within". He also showed me what Curves could do for me before I ever committed to it. The point is that as I journey with God and take the next step, He meets me there to teach me, heal me and show me the way. He is very, very patient!
It is very significant how much joy I experienced as I let go of this excess weight. If you have read my posts from the beginning of my story you will remember that there was a time in college when I lost the 10 pounds from my high school weight that I thought would make me perfect. Yet when I did, I was not happy at all. Something was missing in that victory. It actually led to more turmoil inside. Now as I released the excess weight the cool thing was that I was so very content and full inside. Only God could do that, I could not do it in my own effort. Believe it or not I was happy at a weight that was 15 pounds above my high school weight. The victory is not in what my body weighted. Rather it was in the joy & freedom I felt inside. In the Bible in the book of John chapter 8 verse 32 it says, "So if the Son sets you free you shall be free indeed."
My journey continues to this day. I have learned even more about why our bodies react the way they do to the food we eat. I have learned some things that I feel can possibly shorten your journey to achieving your God given body size. My next post is labeled "You are what you eat!"
continued from the Post called "Perspective and Anatomy of an Eating Disorder"
My story continues after God freed me from disordered eating. I met my husband after I had figured all these things out. God had totally changed me from the inside out. I became very content with life and where it was headed. I was happy and excited about my relationship with God. I came to know and believe that where ever he led me, it was good. When my relationship with my future husband became serious, I wanted to make sure he knew everything about me. I shared every detail with him. He loved & accepted me with my flaws. His acceptance of me was a mirror of God's acceptance. After we were married I went through 5 pregnancy's with the weight gain that comes with the territory. No matter how much I gained, I seemed to grow more beautiful in my husbands eyes. When I lost the weight, I grew more beautiful. If I got frustrated with my body, he did not. He never one time said to me, "do you really think that you should be eating that since you are frustrated with your weight?" Given my history, I think that if he monitored me in any way, or criticized me, I would have gone back to underground eating. God knew who I needed close to me in order to continue my journey to wholeness.
Throughout the next 25 years I continued with my conviction of NO DIETS! (If I even thought diet, then I wanted to eat everything, plus the kitchen sink!) However I was not completely satisfied with how I looked. I was still influenced somewhat by the skinny gymnast body in my mind. That was hard to compete with, & it left me unsatisfied with myself. My one regret of those years is that I spent any time being unsatisfied with myself. Even though God, my husband, my kids, and my friends accepted me, I still did not accept myself. I remember thinking that I did not want to look back at my life living in regrets, or wasting time being frustrated about my body.
If I knew then what I know now about food, my journey would have been shortened. I did not know that the actual type of food that I was eating was influencing my body so much more than I thought. My answer was not about how much I ate. I will write about this information that I learned in my next post labeled "You are what you eat!"
I continued with my conviction of no diets, eat healthy, & enjoy exercise. This kept me from becoming obese but I did gain weight with each pregnancy and kept some of it on.
I don't remember how or why, but about 7 years ago, I finally made peace with my body. I was then about 30 pounds over what I wanted to be, yet I finally accepted myself. The weird thing about this is that when I finally accepted myself totally I was finally free to release the weight that I had gained. I did not pursue losing weight, but God has led me on a journey that I did not expect.
This started with my niece and her husband deciding that they would fast from desserts until they got married. My kids asked them one day if this was hard. I expected them to say, "Yes, it is hard but it was a good thing." Instead they looked at each other with a puzzled look on their face and both admitted that except for the first few days, it was not hard at all and they did not miss it. Something happened inside of me at that moment. I had been aware of the fact that I had been eating things that I did not really need or even want. I ate everything in front of me and never said no. Remember that part of my strategy for not going back into disordered eating was to never say DIET! So consequently I said yes to everything. I decided then and there that I was going to experiment by going without desserts totally for a month. I did not say anything to anyone about this. It was between myself and God. Each time an opportunity came up (which was daily!), I just told myself that it wasn't that big of a deal to skip the dessert and that the next day I would be glad that I didn't have it. I told myself that I could have it if I really wanted it, but that I could also say no. I did this for about 3 months before I said anything about it. I ate everything that I wanted without the desserts and my body automatically lost weight. I actually had given up weighing myself but I knew I lost weight because my clothes were loose.
The cool thing about this experience for me was that I had come to the place that I could say no to myself and not feel deprived. I didn't pull up my bootstraps and make myself do it. I didn't do it because I felt bad about myself. I did it out of the fullness of my life. I guess you could say I felt full inside. This was God's work in me. The change that had happened on the inside for so long, was finally coming out to the outside.
The next thing that happened in my journey was that a friend of mine complimented me on how I looked, so I decided to tell her about giving up desserts and what that had done for me. She listened to my story and then suggested that I would like a book called 'Thin Within' by Judy Halliday. I bought it and read it with excitement. The book is a grace -oriented approach to lasting weight loss. The book practically told my whole story. God had already slowly but surely taught me what was in that book. Thin Within also challenged me in some new ways that totally changed the way I ate. If you are reading this and are frustrated with your ability to release excess weight and get back to your God given size, you have to buy the book. I have read it 4 times now. It challenges me every time. As I read 'Thin Within' and applied the principles my body began to let go of some more weight. I wasn't reading the book because I wanted to lose weight. I was reading it because I knew that I still ate out of emotion instead of taking my problems to God. I really wanted to deal with that issue. In this process of learning I lost another size.
At the same time I also started working out at Curves. I had taken aerobic classes, ran, walked, played sports, and worked out in a gym off and on most of my life. The only thing that I had not done was any weight bearing exercises. I started at Curves because I was ready for something new and the concept of a 30 minute workout seemed appealing. I really became motivated when my mom at 65 went through a bout with cancer. She almost died as she went through radiation and chemo. Before her treatments she was robust, healthy and active. We water skied and snow skied together each year. As soon as she started treatments, she could not eat anything for months. She was fed through a tube. Several months after she stopped the treatments she started at Curves. 3 months later we water skied and she popped out of the water faster than she had ever done before in her life. It was because of the workouts at Curves. That same ski trip, I couldn't get out of the water for the very first time because of added weight, and soreness in my knee and shoulder. I decided that when I could I would start Curves too. I had the chance several months later. Within 2 months of starting Curves I had lost another size.
So between making some lifestyle changes in my eating and working out just 3 times a week for a half an hour, I lost 2 sizes. I had already come to the place where I had accepted myself at the larger size, but was excited to let go of the extra weight so easily.
After one year at Curves I was talking to my mom about whether I should continue or not. Her comment was," you need to take care of your health." Somehow her comment helped shape my commitment from that point on to concentrate on my health and not worry about the weight. It made it easier to continue working out. I have worked out at Curves for 5 years now and it has continued to help me. My knee and shoulder problems are greatly improved, & I eventually lost yet another size to my total shock. When I do the things I love like water/snow skiing, I can do it with energy and strength. (I know that Curves is not the answer for everyone, but for me it is a perfect combination of a short work out, I can talk to other women while working out, it is in every town that I live in or visit, and it also gives a whole body workout every time.)
My story is about experiencing the joy of becoming free from the inside out. I am writing about physical changes in this post, but what really changed in my life is a growing relationship with the Almighty, Everlasting, Loving God. It is He who patiently taught me, and led me and continues to lead me on this journey. He had been working in my heart already when I heard from my niece and her husband that going without desserts was not hard at all. (A year before this, I could not have done it and would not recommend it if you love desserts.) It was God had showed me my need to make a change in my inside attitudes about food when he provided the book 'Thin Within". He also showed me what Curves could do for me before I ever committed to it. The point is that as I journey with God and take the next step, He meets me there to teach me, heal me and show me the way. He is very, very patient!
It is very significant how much joy I experienced as I let go of this excess weight. If you have read my posts from the beginning of my story you will remember that there was a time in college when I lost the 10 pounds from my high school weight that I thought would make me perfect. Yet when I did, I was not happy at all. Something was missing in that victory. It actually led to more turmoil inside. Now as I released the excess weight the cool thing was that I was so very content and full inside. Only God could do that, I could not do it in my own effort. Believe it or not I was happy at a weight that was 15 pounds above my high school weight. The victory is not in what my body weighted. Rather it was in the joy & freedom I felt inside. In the Bible in the book of John chapter 8 verse 32 it says, "So if the Son sets you free you shall be free indeed."
My journey continues to this day. I have learned even more about why our bodies react the way they do to the food we eat. I have learned some things that I feel can possibly shorten your journey to achieving your God given body size. My next post is labeled "You are what you eat!"
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Perspective & anatomy of the eating disorder
Perspective & Anatomy of an Eating Disorder
continued from post- Never Say Diet!
Looking back, I am not surprised that I had an eating disorder. I helped create it by my actions, my lack of knowledge and the lies I believed. I also know now that we have an enemy of our souls- Satan. If he can't keep us from becoming a Christian, then the next thing he will attempt to do is to keep us from living a victorious Christian life. The path I had been headed was not only NOT victorious, I actually wanted to take my life at one point. Total praise goes to God for how he uses the hard things in our life to bring us to himself and deepen our relationship with him.
So let's look back:
On the outside I looked great and really had a fun childhood full of good things. I was healthy, happy, had 2 parents together, got good grades, & had several close friends. I had a relationship with God even though all I knew about it was that He saved me and I was going to heaven. When I graduated from high school I was voted Best All Around for my senior class. I was successful in school, sports, cheerleading, & friends. I had a happy life and it surprised me when I worked myself into an eating disorder but underneath the surface the dam broke.
The first ingredient was that I was a super-sensitive child. Therefore when my Dad made statements like "you shouldn't eat that or you will get fat," or "if you just lose 10 pounds you would be perfect," I chose to begin to sneak eat and chose to believe that I wasn't really loved by my Dad. Another less sensitive child might have heard those same statements and not even remembered them let alone respond to them. Based on those statements and others like them I chose to believe that my Dad did not accept me or really love me. It took me years to realize that he really did love me, just not perfectly like I wanted him to. I realized much later that even though we love our children dearly we can not meet all of their needs perfectly, only God can.
Being sensitive I was also self-conscious and hard on myself. I didn't feel particularly great about myself. I tried to make up for this by excelling in sports, especially gymnastics. I had decided in my freshman year that by the time I graduated that I would be the best high school gymnast at my level in our 7 high school area. I wasn't thinking that I would be the best I could be, but that I would be above everyone else- best all around. I did achieve this. I believe that this was a way that I was trying to feel okay about myself. It was something that I could control. I began to define myself by my physical abilities and my love for gymnastics. (Gymnastics is a tiny girls sport- I was 5'9")
Add to this that I did not feel that I was attractive. I felt that there was something wrong with me. I surely did not have many guys breaking down my door trying to date me. I thank God for that now! I saw it as rejection then, but now I see it as God's protection.
I also had a lack of knowledge of food and nutrition. I ate the typical American Diet which was full of fats and comfort foods. I did not gain weight in high school because I was so busy and extremely active. This all caught up to me in college. My life style slowed down somewhat. Our fun revolved around food. I gained weight. Then I set out to diet without knowledge of proper nutrition.
When I went on that the 1000 calorie diet, worked out 3 hours a day in gymnastics, and ran 3 miles a day, I put my body into starvation mode. My metabolism slowed way down to protect itself. My thoughts began to revolve completely around food as if I were a starving person in a prison camp. I started to obsess about food. I faulted myself about this. I believed I was obsessed because I wasn't disciplined enough. I started to beat myself up with this fact, so not only was I starving but I was telling myself how bad I was for feeling that way. Here is where things came together in a destructive way. I was self-conscious, sensitive, had a lack of knowledge of my body and nutrition, believed lies about myself, and then finally I starved myself to the point where my body was shutting down.
I know now that Satan can not read your thoughts as God can but he can see who you are, your personality, your background, how you respond to things, and your circumstances. He uses these things in our lives to tempt us to believe lies. If he is successful, then we are defeated. I became progressively more defeated to the point of feeling lost and without hope.
The lies that Satan wanted me to believe were:
1. I was not truly loved.
2.The only way I could get attention and be someone is through my physical abilities.
3. If I could just lose the 10 p0unds then I would be perfect.
4. Something was wrong with me.
5. I was unattractive.
6. If I was successful in limiting my food, that meant that I was okay.
7. If people knew what was really going on (the binge eating) then they would think I was crazy and would not want anything to do with me.
This last lie was the greatest of all. This kept me from sharing what was going on with me to anyone. I became more and more lonely. I know now that if Satan can get you alone he has more power over you. There is no one to dispel the lies! It is just like animals in nature. The predator tries to isolate an animal out of the herd so that he can overcome it. I was completely overcome until I finally shared my obsession with someone. Bringing this to the light was such a hard thing to do but it was truly the beginning of my healing. I am thankful for Terri and Jan (the people I first chose to share it with) who were so accepting of me.
I have come to learn that God answers all of our prayers. We do not need to pray in a hopeless way. He just may answer our prayers differently than we expect. I thought He would make me perfect, instead He set me free from my self-imposed perfection. God also always answers prayers in a way that is the very best for us. God answered my prayer when I cried out to Him in my desperation. He led me to other believers that could fill in the gaps of my knowledge of Him. He led me to hear truths that have set me free. As I continue to learn even now 30 years later, God is showing me more truths especially in the area of how certain foods affect our body. This will be continued in the next blog- My inside freedom shows up on the outside!
continued from post- Never Say Diet!
Looking back, I am not surprised that I had an eating disorder. I helped create it by my actions, my lack of knowledge and the lies I believed. I also know now that we have an enemy of our souls- Satan. If he can't keep us from becoming a Christian, then the next thing he will attempt to do is to keep us from living a victorious Christian life. The path I had been headed was not only NOT victorious, I actually wanted to take my life at one point. Total praise goes to God for how he uses the hard things in our life to bring us to himself and deepen our relationship with him.
So let's look back:
On the outside I looked great and really had a fun childhood full of good things. I was healthy, happy, had 2 parents together, got good grades, & had several close friends. I had a relationship with God even though all I knew about it was that He saved me and I was going to heaven. When I graduated from high school I was voted Best All Around for my senior class. I was successful in school, sports, cheerleading, & friends. I had a happy life and it surprised me when I worked myself into an eating disorder but underneath the surface the dam broke.
The first ingredient was that I was a super-sensitive child. Therefore when my Dad made statements like "you shouldn't eat that or you will get fat," or "if you just lose 10 pounds you would be perfect," I chose to begin to sneak eat and chose to believe that I wasn't really loved by my Dad. Another less sensitive child might have heard those same statements and not even remembered them let alone respond to them. Based on those statements and others like them I chose to believe that my Dad did not accept me or really love me. It took me years to realize that he really did love me, just not perfectly like I wanted him to. I realized much later that even though we love our children dearly we can not meet all of their needs perfectly, only God can.
Being sensitive I was also self-conscious and hard on myself. I didn't feel particularly great about myself. I tried to make up for this by excelling in sports, especially gymnastics. I had decided in my freshman year that by the time I graduated that I would be the best high school gymnast at my level in our 7 high school area. I wasn't thinking that I would be the best I could be, but that I would be above everyone else- best all around. I did achieve this. I believe that this was a way that I was trying to feel okay about myself. It was something that I could control. I began to define myself by my physical abilities and my love for gymnastics. (Gymnastics is a tiny girls sport- I was 5'9")
Add to this that I did not feel that I was attractive. I felt that there was something wrong with me. I surely did not have many guys breaking down my door trying to date me. I thank God for that now! I saw it as rejection then, but now I see it as God's protection.
I also had a lack of knowledge of food and nutrition. I ate the typical American Diet which was full of fats and comfort foods. I did not gain weight in high school because I was so busy and extremely active. This all caught up to me in college. My life style slowed down somewhat. Our fun revolved around food. I gained weight. Then I set out to diet without knowledge of proper nutrition.
When I went on that the 1000 calorie diet, worked out 3 hours a day in gymnastics, and ran 3 miles a day, I put my body into starvation mode. My metabolism slowed way down to protect itself. My thoughts began to revolve completely around food as if I were a starving person in a prison camp. I started to obsess about food. I faulted myself about this. I believed I was obsessed because I wasn't disciplined enough. I started to beat myself up with this fact, so not only was I starving but I was telling myself how bad I was for feeling that way. Here is where things came together in a destructive way. I was self-conscious, sensitive, had a lack of knowledge of my body and nutrition, believed lies about myself, and then finally I starved myself to the point where my body was shutting down.
I know now that Satan can not read your thoughts as God can but he can see who you are, your personality, your background, how you respond to things, and your circumstances. He uses these things in our lives to tempt us to believe lies. If he is successful, then we are defeated. I became progressively more defeated to the point of feeling lost and without hope.
The lies that Satan wanted me to believe were:
1. I was not truly loved.
2.The only way I could get attention and be someone is through my physical abilities.
3. If I could just lose the 10 p0unds then I would be perfect.
4. Something was wrong with me.
5. I was unattractive.
6. If I was successful in limiting my food, that meant that I was okay.
7. If people knew what was really going on (the binge eating) then they would think I was crazy and would not want anything to do with me.
This last lie was the greatest of all. This kept me from sharing what was going on with me to anyone. I became more and more lonely. I know now that if Satan can get you alone he has more power over you. There is no one to dispel the lies! It is just like animals in nature. The predator tries to isolate an animal out of the herd so that he can overcome it. I was completely overcome until I finally shared my obsession with someone. Bringing this to the light was such a hard thing to do but it was truly the beginning of my healing. I am thankful for Terri and Jan (the people I first chose to share it with) who were so accepting of me.
I have come to learn that God answers all of our prayers. We do not need to pray in a hopeless way. He just may answer our prayers differently than we expect. I thought He would make me perfect, instead He set me free from my self-imposed perfection. God also always answers prayers in a way that is the very best for us. God answered my prayer when I cried out to Him in my desperation. He led me to other believers that could fill in the gaps of my knowledge of Him. He led me to hear truths that have set me free. As I continue to learn even now 30 years later, God is showing me more truths especially in the area of how certain foods affect our body. This will be continued in the next blog- My inside freedom shows up on the outside!
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Never Say Diet!
NEVER SAY DIET
continued from Post- A Defining Moment
I now had an inside realization that God loved me and accepted me no matter what. But I still had a very long journey to go on about accepting myself. I had made the decision to force myself to eat what ever I ate in front of other people. The next thing that happened is that I became sick of living my life thinking about food at all. I became more upset about the compulsion than I did about the extra weight that I still had on my body. So I prayed a prayer from my heart. I asked God to take away the compulsion. I wanted to wake up in the morning more excited about living than food. I wanted to wake up with a zest for life. I think it was around this time that I started letting go of any hope of getting back to my high school weight. I decided that I cared more about living a full life free from food addiction than I cared about looking perfect.
I prayed that prayer because every time I focused on losing the weight by dieting, all i could think about was food. If I started a diet, I was focused on food, so I thought about it more and wanted to eat everything in sight plus the kitchen sink. So a new idea came to my head. I would not try to lose weight or limit what I ate. Instead I began to focus on the positive. By this time I had taken classes in nutrition in college. Being very interested for obvious reasons, I read anything that came in my path. I wanted to understand my body better. So I knew that fruits and vegetables were a priority for my body. I started thinking about how great my body felt when I ate these things. I tried to include them every day. I also thought a lot about how physically bad I felt when I ate processed foods with white flour and sugar. I also focused on how great I felt when I exercised. (Exercise was fun and easy at this point because I was a Physical Education Major, so I had to take PE classes. It did become more of a challenge later when I was out of school.)
I didn't know it at the time, but I was starting to live a biblical principle. Philippians 4:8,9 says "Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-THINK about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me- put it into practice, and the God of peace will be with you." Proverbs 23;7 says "For as he thinks within himself, so he is.
As I focused on what I should do or eat instead of on what I should not do or eat, the compulsion lost more of it's hold on me. In fact, more than focusing on what I should do, I thought about how much I liked these things. I knew that I could NEVER SAY DIET again.
My body began to release some of the weight that I had gained. I settled in about 5 pounds above my high school weight. I was physically active. My life was very full with friends, learning, and best of all my relationship with God.
A victory for me during this time would be to make homemade cookies and not eat them all. I felt accomplished to eat just a few and leave the rest.
God answered the cry of my heart when I was so desperate and out of control. I had thought at first that if I was really a Christian, that He would answer my prayer by making me perfect. I thought that I would instantly eat perfectly and lose my weight. Instead God had a much bigger plan. He wanted my heart and a relationship with me. He allowed me to get to the end of myself so I would finally really look up. This has been a continuous journey that I am still traveling on.
As I have been on this journey for the last 30 years I have learned so much. I am still continuing to learn. In my next blog I will begin to share my perspective looking back on the eating disorder.I will also share what I have learned so far that has helped free me for the bondage of food, dieting and extra weight! The next blog is called Perspective!
continued from Post- A Defining Moment
I now had an inside realization that God loved me and accepted me no matter what. But I still had a very long journey to go on about accepting myself. I had made the decision to force myself to eat what ever I ate in front of other people. The next thing that happened is that I became sick of living my life thinking about food at all. I became more upset about the compulsion than I did about the extra weight that I still had on my body. So I prayed a prayer from my heart. I asked God to take away the compulsion. I wanted to wake up in the morning more excited about living than food. I wanted to wake up with a zest for life. I think it was around this time that I started letting go of any hope of getting back to my high school weight. I decided that I cared more about living a full life free from food addiction than I cared about looking perfect.
I prayed that prayer because every time I focused on losing the weight by dieting, all i could think about was food. If I started a diet, I was focused on food, so I thought about it more and wanted to eat everything in sight plus the kitchen sink. So a new idea came to my head. I would not try to lose weight or limit what I ate. Instead I began to focus on the positive. By this time I had taken classes in nutrition in college. Being very interested for obvious reasons, I read anything that came in my path. I wanted to understand my body better. So I knew that fruits and vegetables were a priority for my body. I started thinking about how great my body felt when I ate these things. I tried to include them every day. I also thought a lot about how physically bad I felt when I ate processed foods with white flour and sugar. I also focused on how great I felt when I exercised. (Exercise was fun and easy at this point because I was a Physical Education Major, so I had to take PE classes. It did become more of a challenge later when I was out of school.)
I didn't know it at the time, but I was starting to live a biblical principle. Philippians 4:8,9 says "Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-THINK about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me- put it into practice, and the God of peace will be with you." Proverbs 23;7 says "For as he thinks within himself, so he is.
As I focused on what I should do or eat instead of on what I should not do or eat, the compulsion lost more of it's hold on me. In fact, more than focusing on what I should do, I thought about how much I liked these things. I knew that I could NEVER SAY DIET again.
My body began to release some of the weight that I had gained. I settled in about 5 pounds above my high school weight. I was physically active. My life was very full with friends, learning, and best of all my relationship with God.
A victory for me during this time would be to make homemade cookies and not eat them all. I felt accomplished to eat just a few and leave the rest.
God answered the cry of my heart when I was so desperate and out of control. I had thought at first that if I was really a Christian, that He would answer my prayer by making me perfect. I thought that I would instantly eat perfectly and lose my weight. Instead God had a much bigger plan. He wanted my heart and a relationship with me. He allowed me to get to the end of myself so I would finally really look up. This has been a continuous journey that I am still traveling on.
As I have been on this journey for the last 30 years I have learned so much. I am still continuing to learn. In my next blog I will begin to share my perspective looking back on the eating disorder.I will also share what I have learned so far that has helped free me for the bondage of food, dieting and extra weight! The next blog is called Perspective!
Friday, January 30, 2009
A Defining Moment!
A DEFINING MOMENT!
continued from post- Changed from the Inside Out
My life was now characterized by fresh hope and joy in my relationship with God. I was constantly learning something new. It was a time of wonder. However, I still had my compulsion to overeat and bad habits that I had developed over a lifetime.
One of these was sneak eating. I ate undercover because I was so self-conscious. I thought that people were looking at me and saying, "Why is she eating?" "She doesn't need that." "She is so fat." I was enslaved by what I thought people were thinking about me.
As I began to process the truth of the Bible I will never forget the day that the truth of God's love for me went from my head to my heart. I had been hearing about it. I repeated it to other people. I thought I believed it, but I had never really applied it to me.
I can remember exactly where I stood all by myself in my apartment when I realized that God loved me no matter what. That meant that he loved me if I was 300 pounds over weight. He loved me if I ate compulsively. NO MATTER WHAT I DID OR DID NOT DO, HE LOVED ME WITH AN EVERLASTING LOVE. I can still feel what this felt like. I gloried in that moment.
This epiphany was the first step to begin to free me from my self-consciousness.
I made a decision from then on to eat whatever I ate in front of people. I chose to care more about what God thought of me than what people thought of me. (I have since learned that people are pretty busy thinking about themselves and are not always thinking about me!)
My self-consciousness was not gone, but it began to be replaced with God-consciousness. My habit of sneak eating was so strong that I had to make a conscious decision each meal to relax and stop worrying what people were thinking about me. I reminded myself of God's love for me.
I believe that when the truth of God's love came through to me, I made the biggest change in relationship to food. The compulsiveness began to lose its hold on me. It was during this time that I made one of my most important realizations about food and diet that has affected the rest of my life. Read about it in my next post- Never Say Diet!
Thank you Lord God for what you have done and continue to do in my life!
continued from post- Changed from the Inside Out
My life was now characterized by fresh hope and joy in my relationship with God. I was constantly learning something new. It was a time of wonder. However, I still had my compulsion to overeat and bad habits that I had developed over a lifetime.
One of these was sneak eating. I ate undercover because I was so self-conscious. I thought that people were looking at me and saying, "Why is she eating?" "She doesn't need that." "She is so fat." I was enslaved by what I thought people were thinking about me.
As I began to process the truth of the Bible I will never forget the day that the truth of God's love for me went from my head to my heart. I had been hearing about it. I repeated it to other people. I thought I believed it, but I had never really applied it to me.
I can remember exactly where I stood all by myself in my apartment when I realized that God loved me no matter what. That meant that he loved me if I was 300 pounds over weight. He loved me if I ate compulsively. NO MATTER WHAT I DID OR DID NOT DO, HE LOVED ME WITH AN EVERLASTING LOVE. I can still feel what this felt like. I gloried in that moment.
This epiphany was the first step to begin to free me from my self-consciousness.
I made a decision from then on to eat whatever I ate in front of people. I chose to care more about what God thought of me than what people thought of me. (I have since learned that people are pretty busy thinking about themselves and are not always thinking about me!)
My self-consciousness was not gone, but it began to be replaced with God-consciousness. My habit of sneak eating was so strong that I had to make a conscious decision each meal to relax and stop worrying what people were thinking about me. I reminded myself of God's love for me.
I believe that when the truth of God's love came through to me, I made the biggest change in relationship to food. The compulsiveness began to lose its hold on me. It was during this time that I made one of my most important realizations about food and diet that has affected the rest of my life. Read about it in my next post- Never Say Diet!
Thank you Lord God for what you have done and continue to do in my life!
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Changed From the Inside Out
Continued from post- A New Beginning (To get the whole story you must start from the first post labeled Goodbye to Diet's forever!)
As I poured out my heart to my mentor that evening, she just listened. At the end of my outpouring, she said one small quiet sentence. "You need God." At that moment something burst in my heart and I knew that what she said was completely true. I was so sure of it, that I remember saying, "I will do anything, go anywhere and read whatever I need to to understand more about God and his place in my life."
Previous to this moment I had some understanding about God. I had been brought up going to Sunday School. (I couldn't play outside on Sundays unless I went. My parents dropped us off but did not go themselves at that time.) As a 7 year old I remember very clearly hearing that I was a sinner and needed to be saved from my sins in order to go to heaven. I had no problem believing that I was a sinner. I was clearly aware of my imperfections and sins. My Sunday school teacher said that Jesus died on the cross for me, taking the punishment that I deserved so that I could have a relationship with Him and go to heaven. She said that all I needed to do was to receive that gift of salvation by asking Jesus to come into my heart. I clearly understood this and made the decision to ask Jesus to come into my heart.
I continued to go to church as a child all the way through High School. I went to summer church camps. I loved hearing about God. All this gave me a lot of peace except one little thing. Somehow I got the idea that if I were a Christ Follower (Christian) I would be perfect. Well, I certainly knew that I was not perfect!. So every time I heard a message about the need to receive Christ as my Savior, I felt this need to ask Him to come into my heart again. I guess I felt that since I was not perfect, I wasn't sincere enough when I asked Jesus to come into my heart the first time. I also struggled with hearing that I should read my Bible and pray. Well I tried to do that but I didn't understand the Bible and I fell asleep during my prayers!
Looking back I realized that I felt alone in my faith. Neither my family or friends hardly ever wanted to talk about these things. I did not have someone to encourage me. Though I went to church, I went alone and did not know anyone. I walked in and out all by myself.
By the time I got to college I still believed and held onto the fact that God was in my life. As I struggled through the eating disorder I prayed and cried out to God for help. The help that I thought he would give me was to make me perfect. I thought that I would wake up and have complete control over my eating. This did not happen so I got a little confused.
It just so happened that the OA group that I was attending was headed up by some Christian girls. I knew that I was a Christian too, but I sensed something different about these girls. One of the girls named Danna was my OA mentor. I knew that she struggled with an eating disorder too, but still I knew that she had something that I didn't have.
This brings me to the moment when my mentor Danna said to me, "You Need God." When I told her that I would do anything, go anywhere and read anything to understand more about God, she told me about a christian retreat that she was going to that weekend. It was held at a place called Mt. Hermon. I knew that I had to go.
The speaker that weekend was a man named Josh McDowell. He was not only a very compelling speaker but he talked about the very things that I needed to hear.
Here are a few of the basic things I came to understand that weekend:
1.God's Word the Bible is truer than our feelings. If God said that we are saved when we ask him to come into our lives, then it is true on the basis of His Word because He never lies. I did not need to keep asking Him over and over again. (1 John 5:11 say, "This is the testimony, God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life and he who does not have the Son does not have life.)
2. Most importantly, when we ask Jesus to come into our lives, this starts a relationship with Him. He does not demand perfection from me, in fact He accepts me just the way I am. (The Bible says in Romans 5:8 that "God demonstrates His love towards us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.") He didn't wait until I got my life all together before He reached out in love toward me. But, He does love me too much to leave me the way I am. As I give Him permission, He changes me.
3. I learned we should read the Bible, not because it will make us better in God's sight, but because it is His Love Letter to us. He wants to have a relationship with us. He speaks to us through His Word. (Psalm 119:105 says, "Your Word is a lamp to my feet a light to my path.")
4. We should go to church, not because it is the right thing to do, but because God has created us to need fellowship with one another. We need to walk with other people. God has given gifts to each of us that will encourage each other to grow in our relationship with Him.
5. God has given us rules and guidelines to live by. These are for our good. Like a loving parent God wants only good for our lives. When He gives a commandment it is not to make our life miserable but to set us free to be all that we can be.
Thinking back to this time now 34 years ago, I can still feel how exuberant I felt upon learning all this information. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had a God-shaped vacuum in my heart that I had been trying to fill up with food. No matter how much I ate I could not fill the empty places. Even when I thought I was in control and eating perfectly, my life was empty. Only God could fill that hole. I had asked Jesus to come into my life as a little girl, but now I was asking Him to take the steering wheel of my life. I gave Him control to do as He liked with me. I embarked on a lifelong journey with God.
I could not wait to go to church. I threw myself into hearing God's Word whenever I could. I read my Bible with new eyes. I joined other college kids at Campus Crusade for Christ. I met with a discussion group. I listened to tapes. I talked about what I was learning all the time to whomever would let me talk about it. I am sure that I was a little bit obnoxious!
I came to a very important defining moment during these months regarding my relationship to God and relationship to food. It is so important that I will give it a blog all to itself.
The next post is labeled A DEFINING MOMENT.
As I poured out my heart to my mentor that evening, she just listened. At the end of my outpouring, she said one small quiet sentence. "You need God." At that moment something burst in my heart and I knew that what she said was completely true. I was so sure of it, that I remember saying, "I will do anything, go anywhere and read whatever I need to to understand more about God and his place in my life."
Previous to this moment I had some understanding about God. I had been brought up going to Sunday School. (I couldn't play outside on Sundays unless I went. My parents dropped us off but did not go themselves at that time.) As a 7 year old I remember very clearly hearing that I was a sinner and needed to be saved from my sins in order to go to heaven. I had no problem believing that I was a sinner. I was clearly aware of my imperfections and sins. My Sunday school teacher said that Jesus died on the cross for me, taking the punishment that I deserved so that I could have a relationship with Him and go to heaven. She said that all I needed to do was to receive that gift of salvation by asking Jesus to come into my heart. I clearly understood this and made the decision to ask Jesus to come into my heart.
I continued to go to church as a child all the way through High School. I went to summer church camps. I loved hearing about God. All this gave me a lot of peace except one little thing. Somehow I got the idea that if I were a Christ Follower (Christian) I would be perfect. Well, I certainly knew that I was not perfect!. So every time I heard a message about the need to receive Christ as my Savior, I felt this need to ask Him to come into my heart again. I guess I felt that since I was not perfect, I wasn't sincere enough when I asked Jesus to come into my heart the first time. I also struggled with hearing that I should read my Bible and pray. Well I tried to do that but I didn't understand the Bible and I fell asleep during my prayers!
Looking back I realized that I felt alone in my faith. Neither my family or friends hardly ever wanted to talk about these things. I did not have someone to encourage me. Though I went to church, I went alone and did not know anyone. I walked in and out all by myself.
By the time I got to college I still believed and held onto the fact that God was in my life. As I struggled through the eating disorder I prayed and cried out to God for help. The help that I thought he would give me was to make me perfect. I thought that I would wake up and have complete control over my eating. This did not happen so I got a little confused.
It just so happened that the OA group that I was attending was headed up by some Christian girls. I knew that I was a Christian too, but I sensed something different about these girls. One of the girls named Danna was my OA mentor. I knew that she struggled with an eating disorder too, but still I knew that she had something that I didn't have.
This brings me to the moment when my mentor Danna said to me, "You Need God." When I told her that I would do anything, go anywhere and read anything to understand more about God, she told me about a christian retreat that she was going to that weekend. It was held at a place called Mt. Hermon. I knew that I had to go.
The speaker that weekend was a man named Josh McDowell. He was not only a very compelling speaker but he talked about the very things that I needed to hear.
Here are a few of the basic things I came to understand that weekend:
1.God's Word the Bible is truer than our feelings. If God said that we are saved when we ask him to come into our lives, then it is true on the basis of His Word because He never lies. I did not need to keep asking Him over and over again. (1 John 5:11 say, "This is the testimony, God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life and he who does not have the Son does not have life.)
2. Most importantly, when we ask Jesus to come into our lives, this starts a relationship with Him. He does not demand perfection from me, in fact He accepts me just the way I am. (The Bible says in Romans 5:8 that "God demonstrates His love towards us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.") He didn't wait until I got my life all together before He reached out in love toward me. But, He does love me too much to leave me the way I am. As I give Him permission, He changes me.
3. I learned we should read the Bible, not because it will make us better in God's sight, but because it is His Love Letter to us. He wants to have a relationship with us. He speaks to us through His Word. (Psalm 119:105 says, "Your Word is a lamp to my feet a light to my path.")
4. We should go to church, not because it is the right thing to do, but because God has created us to need fellowship with one another. We need to walk with other people. God has given gifts to each of us that will encourage each other to grow in our relationship with Him.
5. God has given us rules and guidelines to live by. These are for our good. Like a loving parent God wants only good for our lives. When He gives a commandment it is not to make our life miserable but to set us free to be all that we can be.
Thinking back to this time now 34 years ago, I can still feel how exuberant I felt upon learning all this information. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had a God-shaped vacuum in my heart that I had been trying to fill up with food. No matter how much I ate I could not fill the empty places. Even when I thought I was in control and eating perfectly, my life was empty. Only God could fill that hole. I had asked Jesus to come into my life as a little girl, but now I was asking Him to take the steering wheel of my life. I gave Him control to do as He liked with me. I embarked on a lifelong journey with God.
I could not wait to go to church. I threw myself into hearing God's Word whenever I could. I read my Bible with new eyes. I joined other college kids at Campus Crusade for Christ. I met with a discussion group. I listened to tapes. I talked about what I was learning all the time to whomever would let me talk about it. I am sure that I was a little bit obnoxious!
I came to a very important defining moment during these months regarding my relationship to God and relationship to food. It is so important that I will give it a blog all to itself.
The next post is labeled A DEFINING MOMENT.
A New Beginning
Continued from post- My story- reaching the bottom.
To continue my story:
My loving, accepting, skinny roommate found an ad in the college newspaper the next day advertising a group called OA, Overeaters Anonymous. We went that very week. I was very nervous but excited to learn about anything that would help me. As I walked into that gathering I was shocked to find a group of about 15 people ranging from very skinny to very overweight. As the meeting progressed 3 people told their stories. I was very relieved to find that other people were suffering just like I was. I heard the words anorexia, bulimia and binge eating for the first time.
The start of my healing was to share with my roommate. The second was to hear these stories. I realized finally that I was not alone, and that I was not the only person thinking that I was going crazy!
The other things that I remember about that night were coming home with materials to read, a food plan, and new friends. I embarked on the program with boundless energy. I wanted to be healed. I attended weekly meetings and met with a mentor. I seemed to progress for awhile with my new found information and support group. I began to share more openly about what I now called my eating disorder.
I eventually shared all of this with my Mom who lived 3 hours away. She had me go to a medical doctor. This was 1975 and eating disorders were not as understood by the medical community. He listened to my story and then gave me blood tests that showed that I was slightly hypoglycemic. He had no other help for me other than telling me to eat protein between meals to keep my blood sugar stable. This visit began my journey that continues to today to understand how food relates to our health.
It was very significant that during this time period I was able to start verbalizing what had been going on inside of me. Up to this point the struggle had been going on inside of me with only me to interpret what it all meant. I had been beating myself up with what I call the "club of condemnation" for far too long. Every time I had even slightly blown my self imposed diet & exercise regiment I told myself that I was so horrible. Nobody could be as bad as I was. I could not even control what I put in my mouth. I was so sure that I was the worst person ever. It was healing to talk to others who understood what was going on and who were struggling with the same thing. It was during this time that I realized that someday when I was better I wanted to help other people with the same problem.
For several months I followed the OA program. I went to the meetings, shared the struggle with others and tried to diligently follow an eating plan. I did pretty well for a time. I would sometimes blow it a little, talk about it with someone and then recover and go on. I wanted so badly to just have the whole thing over with and have my old skinnier body back.In a way I was putting my perfectionist standards on myself again, by trying to follow the OA program perfectly.
Well I got better for a while and then I got progressively worse. One day I blew it so bad that I got on my bicycle and rode a few miles across town in the rain to talk to my OA mentor. I was so upset with myself and feeling so hopeless again. The conversation that we had after I poured my heart out changed my life forever! This story is in my next blog called "Changed from the Inside Out."
To continue my story:
My loving, accepting, skinny roommate found an ad in the college newspaper the next day advertising a group called OA, Overeaters Anonymous. We went that very week. I was very nervous but excited to learn about anything that would help me. As I walked into that gathering I was shocked to find a group of about 15 people ranging from very skinny to very overweight. As the meeting progressed 3 people told their stories. I was very relieved to find that other people were suffering just like I was. I heard the words anorexia, bulimia and binge eating for the first time.
The start of my healing was to share with my roommate. The second was to hear these stories. I realized finally that I was not alone, and that I was not the only person thinking that I was going crazy!
The other things that I remember about that night were coming home with materials to read, a food plan, and new friends. I embarked on the program with boundless energy. I wanted to be healed. I attended weekly meetings and met with a mentor. I seemed to progress for awhile with my new found information and support group. I began to share more openly about what I now called my eating disorder.
I eventually shared all of this with my Mom who lived 3 hours away. She had me go to a medical doctor. This was 1975 and eating disorders were not as understood by the medical community. He listened to my story and then gave me blood tests that showed that I was slightly hypoglycemic. He had no other help for me other than telling me to eat protein between meals to keep my blood sugar stable. This visit began my journey that continues to today to understand how food relates to our health.
It was very significant that during this time period I was able to start verbalizing what had been going on inside of me. Up to this point the struggle had been going on inside of me with only me to interpret what it all meant. I had been beating myself up with what I call the "club of condemnation" for far too long. Every time I had even slightly blown my self imposed diet & exercise regiment I told myself that I was so horrible. Nobody could be as bad as I was. I could not even control what I put in my mouth. I was so sure that I was the worst person ever. It was healing to talk to others who understood what was going on and who were struggling with the same thing. It was during this time that I realized that someday when I was better I wanted to help other people with the same problem.
For several months I followed the OA program. I went to the meetings, shared the struggle with others and tried to diligently follow an eating plan. I did pretty well for a time. I would sometimes blow it a little, talk about it with someone and then recover and go on. I wanted so badly to just have the whole thing over with and have my old skinnier body back.In a way I was putting my perfectionist standards on myself again, by trying to follow the OA program perfectly.
Well I got better for a while and then I got progressively worse. One day I blew it so bad that I got on my bicycle and rode a few miles across town in the rain to talk to my OA mentor. I was so upset with myself and feeling so hopeless again. The conversation that we had after I poured my heart out changed my life forever! This story is in my next blog called "Changed from the Inside Out."
Friday, January 16, 2009
My Story- Reaching the Bottom
continued from post- My Story, The beginning
It was a devastating feeling for me to achieve what I really felt was missing in my life and yet feel so empty. This came after I very excitedly had written in my diary that I felt like I had arrived at self-discipline. I finally felt in control of my life and body. I had lost the 10 pounds that would make me "perfect". I was much better at gymnastics. It was such a brief moment of seeming victory.
What happened next was the complete opposite. When I went off my strict diet even one little bit, I felt so bad. I would reach for the club of condemnation and hit myself with it. I felt so bad that I would eat more. As I ate more, I felt even worse and tried harder to fill my emptiness. All the while I would tell myself, it was okay, I would start tomorrow by being perfect in my eating again. The yo-yo went back and forth. Eat perfectly, be confronted with food that I wanted to eat, but felt like I shouldn't, eat a little bit of it, feel so bad, then eat more. Binge eating.
Somehow during these few month before summer break, I was able to keep up the weight loss.
Then came the most lonely time of my life. I had been so busy with people and activities in my senior year that I was burned out a little. So in my freshmen dorm life I did not make connections at the beginning of the year along with everyone else. I had a friend from home that was at school with me, her roommate and my own roommate (who was very busy with her boyfriend.) That was enough for me at the beginning, but when I hit this lonely time I did not share it with the few people who were real friends, and I was not connected with all the girls in my dorm. So it was lonely because I did not put the time in to make deep friendships, and I did not share what I was going through with anyone. I just felt bad inside.
I went back home for the summer to work and hopefully work out in gymnastics. Well my chances to work out were rare, my high school friends either were busy with boyfriends or had moved away. I took a job at a pie shop called Marie Callenders. Up till this point in my life, I did not even like pie. I hated it! Well on the last day of my freshman year as I passed through the food line at the dorm, all of a sudden pie looked good to me. So now here I was with a disordered eating problem, lonely, and working all day long by pies and other good looking food. Not a good combinaation. My binge eating was in full swing as I would have one taste of pie, which turned into one piece which turned into eating the whole pie! My poor body. I of course felt so bad about this I would try to make up for it by not eating or fasting. One time after eating an enormous amount of food, I ran 5 miles on a severely full stomach. That summer I regained the 10 pounds that I had lost and gained 10 more.
I still had some hope when I returned to college. I somehow felt that eating in the dorm cafeteria was the answer to my problems. I could eat my 1000 calorie diet and start working out again. Well to go back working out 20 pounds heavier brought me to my all time discouragement. I was so discouraged and felt that something was really wrong with me. I felt that I was the worst person in the world. I had no self-discipline. I could not control my eating. I was like an addicted person on drugs or alcohol. It was no different. After eating a huge amount of food, I would swear to myself that in the morning I would start again and eat perfectly. Of course I never ate "perfectly" again.
This culminated in depression. I became hopeless that I could ever change my life. I knew that it was not in my power. This led to thoughts of taking my life, because what I was experiencing was not a life worth living. I did not have ideas of how to take my life, but in my desperation I cried out to God for help. I remember exactly where I was when I prayed that prayer. I was up in the 10th floor stairwell at the top of Whitney Hall at Chico State University. I don't remember why I did this, but when I came down I found my roommate and another girl in the dorm together. For some reason, I decided to share with them what was going on with me. For the very first time I shared what I thought was my inner ugliness. They were both skinny by my standards, so somehow I did not expect them to understand. In fact, I think that I expected them to confirm what I felt. Instead they listened with compassion and my skinny roommate who could eat anything and not gain weight even if she wanted, said to me," We are going to find help." She didn't say, I will find you help, I understood her to say that together we were going to find help. I was no longer alone. This was the very first baby step in my eventual healing. My next post A NEW BEGINNING will describe how that healing took place.
It was a devastating feeling for me to achieve what I really felt was missing in my life and yet feel so empty. This came after I very excitedly had written in my diary that I felt like I had arrived at self-discipline. I finally felt in control of my life and body. I had lost the 10 pounds that would make me "perfect". I was much better at gymnastics. It was such a brief moment of seeming victory.
What happened next was the complete opposite. When I went off my strict diet even one little bit, I felt so bad. I would reach for the club of condemnation and hit myself with it. I felt so bad that I would eat more. As I ate more, I felt even worse and tried harder to fill my emptiness. All the while I would tell myself, it was okay, I would start tomorrow by being perfect in my eating again. The yo-yo went back and forth. Eat perfectly, be confronted with food that I wanted to eat, but felt like I shouldn't, eat a little bit of it, feel so bad, then eat more. Binge eating.
Somehow during these few month before summer break, I was able to keep up the weight loss.
Then came the most lonely time of my life. I had been so busy with people and activities in my senior year that I was burned out a little. So in my freshmen dorm life I did not make connections at the beginning of the year along with everyone else. I had a friend from home that was at school with me, her roommate and my own roommate (who was very busy with her boyfriend.) That was enough for me at the beginning, but when I hit this lonely time I did not share it with the few people who were real friends, and I was not connected with all the girls in my dorm. So it was lonely because I did not put the time in to make deep friendships, and I did not share what I was going through with anyone. I just felt bad inside.
I went back home for the summer to work and hopefully work out in gymnastics. Well my chances to work out were rare, my high school friends either were busy with boyfriends or had moved away. I took a job at a pie shop called Marie Callenders. Up till this point in my life, I did not even like pie. I hated it! Well on the last day of my freshman year as I passed through the food line at the dorm, all of a sudden pie looked good to me. So now here I was with a disordered eating problem, lonely, and working all day long by pies and other good looking food. Not a good combinaation. My binge eating was in full swing as I would have one taste of pie, which turned into one piece which turned into eating the whole pie! My poor body. I of course felt so bad about this I would try to make up for it by not eating or fasting. One time after eating an enormous amount of food, I ran 5 miles on a severely full stomach. That summer I regained the 10 pounds that I had lost and gained 10 more.
I still had some hope when I returned to college. I somehow felt that eating in the dorm cafeteria was the answer to my problems. I could eat my 1000 calorie diet and start working out again. Well to go back working out 20 pounds heavier brought me to my all time discouragement. I was so discouraged and felt that something was really wrong with me. I felt that I was the worst person in the world. I had no self-discipline. I could not control my eating. I was like an addicted person on drugs or alcohol. It was no different. After eating a huge amount of food, I would swear to myself that in the morning I would start again and eat perfectly. Of course I never ate "perfectly" again.
This culminated in depression. I became hopeless that I could ever change my life. I knew that it was not in my power. This led to thoughts of taking my life, because what I was experiencing was not a life worth living. I did not have ideas of how to take my life, but in my desperation I cried out to God for help. I remember exactly where I was when I prayed that prayer. I was up in the 10th floor stairwell at the top of Whitney Hall at Chico State University. I don't remember why I did this, but when I came down I found my roommate and another girl in the dorm together. For some reason, I decided to share with them what was going on with me. For the very first time I shared what I thought was my inner ugliness. They were both skinny by my standards, so somehow I did not expect them to understand. In fact, I think that I expected them to confirm what I felt. Instead they listened with compassion and my skinny roommate who could eat anything and not gain weight even if she wanted, said to me," We are going to find help." She didn't say, I will find you help, I understood her to say that together we were going to find help. I was no longer alone. This was the very first baby step in my eventual healing. My next post A NEW BEGINNING will describe how that healing took place.
Monday, January 12, 2009
My Story, The Beginning
MY STORY!
I was a healthy, active child. Up until about 11 years old I never thought about being fat. It never entered my mind. I just played and ate and was happily oblivious. Then one day, as I was grabbing a piece of bread for a snack, my Dad came by and said, "If you eat that you might get fat!" Being a sensitive, self-conscious child, 2 things happened to me with this comment. "Sneak eating" became established and I began to think that I was a possible fat person.
I was a healthy, active child. Up until about 11 years old I never thought about being fat. It never entered my mind. I just played and ate and was happily oblivious. Then one day, as I was grabbing a piece of bread for a snack, my Dad came by and said, "If you eat that you might get fat!" Being a sensitive, self-conscious child, 2 things happened to me with this comment. "Sneak eating" became established and I began to think that I was a possible fat person.
At this point my weight was not affected. I was still a very active healthy child.
At age 12 until age 18 one of the jobs that was assigned to me was the dinner dishes. Our family ate fast and then they left the table to go watch TV. I was left to do the dishes by myself. My companions were the dishes and the left overs. I think I stayed at the table a little longer than I needed because I was not anxious to get up and start the dishes. In my boredom I developed the habit to eat more than I needed.
I have one brother 2 years older than me with a dominant personality. We fought a lot and I felt that he hated me. It also just happened that the boys in the neighborhood were my age but his friends. So I just assumed that they hated me too. Therefore I developed a attitude about myself that said, "I am not attractive to men."
Then around age 16 my Dad said one day, "If you would just lose 10 pounds you would be perfect!" Now I was painfully aware of my imperfection and was confirmed that something was wrong with me.
Life still continued looking unaffected on the outside. Through high school I was involved in dance, gymnastics, water ballet, cheerleading, and various other activities. Looking back I realize that I was so active that I could eat what I wanted and not gain weight. My life was so busy, so I didn't have a lot of time to eat.
Underneath though I had a cancer that was beginning to eat away at me. I didn't feel great about myself. I felt unattractive, and I felt that if I could just lose those 10 pounds I would finally be perfect. I thought that the weight was why I didn't feel attractive.
In the summer before my senior year, I went to a gymnastics camp. Gymnastics was the love of my life. It was also a world of tiny girls. I was 5 foot 9 inches. I believe that through the size difference I became even more self-conscious. On the way home from camp a friend introduced me to the Atkins Diet. I had never been on a diet before. I was excited about this though because I felt I had my answer. I was excited because I didn't feel that I needed self discipline because I could eat as much protein as I wanted. It seemed so easy. I followed it for a few weeks and lost a few pounds. I got sick of it quickly and went back to my old way of eating and gained the weight back plus a little bit more. It was my first yo yo!
Life continued with an extremely busy senior year. The next year I decided to go to a college and pursue being a physical education major.
When I got to college I tried out for and made the gymnastics team. We worked out 3 hours a day 5 days a week. Despite this I gained the freshman 10 pounds by Christmas. When I got home I was discussing this with a friend who advised, " you are good at gymnastics and could be really good if you would just lose weight." With that comment there rose within me a determination to finally do just that.
This time I read an article about a 1000 calorie diet. I was not very well educated about diets and it looked good to me. So I set out on this perfectionist journey of eating. I also added to my 5 days a week gymnastic workout by running 3 miles per day. The weight started to drop, I was improving my gymnastics and started to believe that I had arrived at almost perfection. I actually lost the 10 pounds that I thought that I should lose to be perfect by about March.
I didn't understand at the time, but I realize now that I was starving my body and it was going into starvation mode. My mind was like someone deprived of food at a prison of war camp. All I could think of was food. I went to bed dreaming about the small meal I would have the next morning. I left breakfast thinking about lunch. I had a hard time concentrating on school. The most significant thing that happened to me during this time is I realized that I lost the weight but that I didn't feel any different about myself. Worse still, I didn't feel that people (more importantly men) perceived me any differently than before. I can remember where I was when I realized this. A sadness and hopelessness settled into me. Even though I had good friends during this time, I did not share any of this with anyone.
My story is continued in the next post labeled REACHING THE BOTTOM.
My story is continued in the next post labeled REACHING THE BOTTOM.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Goodbye to diets forever! Hello FREEDOM!
My reason for starting this blog is to encourage anyone who is sick of, frustrated by, and tired of dieting and diets. This is targeted at those who want to be truly free. Free to live without having having to think about diets. Free to wake up in the morning and plan their day without thinking of their eating plan. Free to eat all foods (real food, not diet food) and really enjoy them without guilt, shame, & condemnation. Free to be have the body that God designed without excess weight.
Jesus says in the Bible- "I have come that they might have life and have it to the full." John 10:10 It also says, "if the Son sets you free you shall be free indeed." John 8:32
I have experienced and am excited about these truths but it has not always been that way. There was a time when I was in complete slavery to food. If you would like to know how I became enslaved and how I got free then read the post called - MY STORY.
Jesus says in the Bible- "I have come that they might have life and have it to the full." John 10:10 It also says, "if the Son sets you free you shall be free indeed." John 8:32
I have experienced and am excited about these truths but it has not always been that way. There was a time when I was in complete slavery to food. If you would like to know how I became enslaved and how I got free then read the post called - MY STORY.
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