[carcar05]

So I was going through a bunch of old photos tonight. I had a realization- All my life I have either been too heavy or too thin, and there was only a short time when I was just-right and healthy, and that was my senior year of highschool and my freshman year of college.

Everything else, I was either so skinny it was sick (those periods lasted for moments it seems like, weeks at most! haha!) and the rest I was either slightly chubby or truly overweight.

Here I sit, at my one of my heaviest weights (not counting pregnancy and all that) and on the one hand I have never had so much self-confidence. I have never felt as happy or comfortable with ME. I'm married to a wonderful man, we have a happy family- he loves me the way I am and I feel comfortable.

But on the OTHER hand, I have never felt this disgusted with myself. Or this hopeless about becoming thin and healthy.

I feel like I'm flip-flopping between self-contentment and self-loathing.

True, I hide from the camera- proof of what I've become is just too much for me to take. True, I hide myself from my husband- I don't want him to see too much of what I've become. True, I hesitate to get pregnant again because I am just too heavy and unhealthy to feel comfortable making that commitment yet. Even when I am feeling "comfortable" with myself, I feel these things.

I think at the root of this whole thing is that I have always had an unhealthy relationship with food. And for the last few months, being on this site, I've begun to recognize that... even when I say I'm being healthy, even when I am doing my best to eat right and work out, I am not truly being healthy. I fall into episodes of eating too little, and others of eating too much. I just feel a little psychotic with this whole retrospective realization. It makes me hungry! (hahaha! Truly, I tell ya I eat my emotions, dang!)

I want to be healthy and thin, and I want to provide my children with opportunities to learn those healthy habits as well. I don't want them to grow up learning any other way of living. Anyway I probably should have made this a blog post but at the same time I'd really appreciate any input you girls have. How can I develop that healthy relationship with food?

EDIT: I have to say that I know I am not morbidly obese or anything, I realize that I am overweight with a BMI 1 point away from obesity, and I want to take charge of that NOW. I just don't want anyone rolling their eyes at the "featherweight" or whatever, this is a real issue I want to take charge of but I don't know how. :-/

[jahjah1223]

Carcar i was 1 point away from obesity too when i snapped out of it .. and the thin part .. well i was sickly thin throughout all of my childhood i remember my mom always taking me to doctors so i can gain weight!! lol
Good luck :-)

[HeatherMcG]

carcar- I totally understand what you mean. I thought I ate like everybody else. I never realized that food was my friend.... until it was gone. I had to figure out that even though I can enjoy food and should, it is ultimately FUEL for my body and is not a comfort tool. Maybe if I had learned this earlier, I may not be where I am now.