Hmm Wow.

This really makes me think.

But at the same time I just wish I could be in a place where I felt like this was ok to do... because so much of me is rebelling against the fact that I have to think about this and focus on this every day for the rest of my life.

I'm hoping once I just get over that, this could work. I just wish I had the time and could afford to go to weight watchers - because I think that being back there would help me.

But right now we're in such a financial crisis and have only one car, so there's just no way that would be possible.

Oh but I do have tools

I have the entire Weight Watchers program
A Zone Diet Book
A Palm Pilot with the WW counting softwear loaded on it (Shh don't tell)
I have head knowledge
I have Paxil
I know how much better I feel 40 lbs lighter...

It sounds like addiction and overall I find that to be true in my life. I wonder what was the moment when food crossed the barrier from being something that nourished me to a crutch. I am sure some of those mixed messages as a teen certainly helped, along with my family criticism. I have always felt weird and I guess some of that emotional outlet was taken out on food. Why then if I realize this does my relationship wax and wane so much?Am I alone in this?

I know at certain points I have gained because of depression, but when I got to my highest ever 265. Depression wasn't as much of a factor as being totally clueless. I really did not see that 265. Of course I wasn't weighing myself. I had no idea till I got on a scale for a pre-work physical. Talk about shock

So is there a moment when food goes from a nutritional source to a crutch? Can you remember when?

Miss Chris

Hmmm....Chris....good question! Thinking back, I guess was about 11 when family members first started making my weight an issue. I wanted to be a sixth grade cheerleader, and my mom said, "You don't really have the body to be a cheerleader." I don't remember that comment particularly bothering me, though, as I went on and did it anyway. Then in seventh grade, I joined the gymnastics team. Almost all of us were rank beginners...I remember one practice where we were doing handstands into somersaults and we all kept hitting the mat with a tremendous FLOMP! It started to get funny, and soon we were all seeing who could make the loudest flomp. Still, I wasn't ashamed to get out in front of lots of people in nothing but a leotard.

I think maybe the turning point was eighth grade. That's when boys really started to be a big deal for me, and I couldn't seem to get a boyfriend. I would look at the girls with boyfriends and they were all so much smaller than me. Not that I was big...probably 5'4" and a size 11...but they were all size 2 and 4. Also, I had a girl who sat next to me in band who was a child model and just absolutely obsessed over her weight. I think she thought she was trying to be helpful, but it wasn't when she would sit there and tell me all these "diets" to lose weight.

But eighth grade was my first serious diet. A peanut butter sandwich (no jelly) a day - that's it. If I was painfully hungry, I might eat an apple. Otherwise, I just drank Tab (EEEEEEWWWW!) all day. By the end of eighth grade, I was about 5'4" and weighed 106 lbs. (Of course, I gained all the weight back and then some over the summer.) At that weight, people just fawned over me, family members included. I think back though and, Jeez, I must have looked anorexic!

Long story for a short question...

I don't remember totally when, but I'm pretty sure it really started when people started pointing out I was a little heavy. I really wasn't heavy, but they said I was. I honestly was just big boned, and looking back on those pictures now, and the clothes I could wear makes me want to scream and yell at the people in my past who made me think I was fat. I was no where near fat.

I think a lot of it turned into a coping mechanism for me when I was about 12. I was diagnosed with an auto-immune disorder and pretty much had my life taken away from me. No physical contact sports, had to be immensely careful of everything, and I couldn't do much of anything, so I turned to food for comfort. I was also shunned and put down by people constantly, so again, food was my friend.

I hid my eating from everyone, because my mother nit picked over every bite of food. Even eating couldn't be fun because I ate to fast, I wasn't chewing, "You eat like a snake, you just swallow everything whole"... But they also criticized what and how much I was eating, so it was almost like I ate fast so I could get eating over with and not have anyone criticize me. I think I saved the enjoyment of food for times when I was by myself. I remember sneaking containers of frosting into my room and slowly licking the spoon savoring every bite, and stashing the container under my bed, for late night rendezvous.

It's almost like eating food was made forbidden, so I wanted it more, and snuck around eating food when no one was looking.

I was "forbidden" to participate in a lot of things, and made to think things were bad - like movies rated higher than PG, smoking, drinking, etc. The normal things.. but since my parents were really strict, I rebelled against all of it and just wanted to do it all the more.

How sad is it that I can see how my parents just trying to help by telling me I was eating too much actually made me eat MORE??

I can still see how this affects me today, because the only thing I've really been able to say "You cannot eat this ever again" and succeed at not eating is Ben and Jerry's ice cream. Make anything else "forbidden food" and I want it all the more.

I was just doing a search for women's magazine that might be interested in a story I have to sell and I stumbled across a pro-ana site. It was so sad. One girl asking about how long you can go on a water fast without dying...people were responding, telling her to make sure she ate something small like a hard boiled egg every four or five days so that her metabolism wouldn't slow down and she'd still lose....one response saying that she should be able to go at least 30 to 40 DAYS as long as she took a multivitamin every day.

What's scary is that I have purposefully gone four days without eating before. I have also tried the multivitamin and diet Coke diet. What keeps us from falling into that abyss? How close have we been? Is it a matter of "There but for the grace of God go I"?

Wow. That really messed with my head.

I don't think there were any traumatic issues in my life that caused me to eat. I have always been 'big boned'. Of course I think some of it was baby fat and it would have disappeared if I had not started dieting at such a young age. That is what is sad. I have dieted my entire life to get this fat! I also think I am one of those people who enjoys eating. I really think some people eat to live and make choices for nutrition and not for taste. I eat for taste. I love sweets and chocolate. I probably always will.

I also truely believe that at least some of it is genetic. My mothers side of the family had no weight problems. My fathers side did. I am not saying that I have to be fat. I can change it but it does make it a little more difficult.

No food - just water. That is just unbeleivable. What is pro-ana?

I don't think I can identify a moment or event. I was always bigger than the other girls - but I mean like a 12 in high school. After high school my weight started creeping up. So I always had the botfriends and no one made fun of me. No one still makes fun of me.

I was at a strss-seminar today and we were talking about changing habits and rewards and she said that when you bottom out - you will build a bridge and start to change what needs to be changed. I said what if I don't want to wait until I bottom out. She said the pain of the consequences have to be greater than the pain of the solution. Very interesting.

Pro-Ana is pro-anorexia, Pro-Mia is pro-bullemic, Pro-ED, is pro-eating diorders. Believe it or not they have web sites just like 3FC where they discuss starving tips and offer support. It is a thin line sometimes we walk. Thats what I found most disturbing.

But getting at the quote above, The pain of the consequence have to be greater than the pain of the solution. HMMM!The consequences of being fat?

1. Your clothing options are limited
2. Winded walking stairs
3. Society (no matter how fat it gets) sees you as lazy.
4. How sexy you feel is compromised
5. You can have health problems/lowered mortality

But alot of these consequence except for stairs are pretty in direct, in the interim you get to eat crap. Crap usually tastes good, just doesn't feel as good. That is part of the pain of the solution. Now my brain is frying as I wrap my mind around this. I like excercise but I always have to plan it, and if I miss the guilt is terrible. Broken self promises and all that. That sometimes makes me very mad The pain of the solution. HMMM.

Diet, lifestyle change, crossing the abyss to no longer deal with the 5 things above. Living healthy forever. Its alot on a persons plate. This isn't that complicated and yet it is!!!!!Your view??

Miss Chris

Very interesting thread! Thank you Chris for starting this and getting us all thinking about this issue.

For me, the biggest 'pain of the consequence' was my own self image. I hate the feeling that people think different of me and judge my self worth based on how much body fat I have. It has dramtic consequences for self esteem, dating, and interacting with others. I would give anything to not feel like my weight is the first impression that I make. Independent of all the health consequences that arise.

I keep trying to remind myself of the new world that will open up to me when I am seen just as every one else is seen. To have the impression that I make be a consquence of my action and not my bulk.

I know exactly when I started using food as a crutch. My grandmother, who was my caregiver, died, and I was alone after school. I started eating to fill that empty void in the lonely house. After that, I think it became more of a habit then anything, and food is the first thing I turn to when I feel lonely and bored. I notice that I don't turn to food when I'm happy or upset. Breaking what is now an ingrained habit is the hardest thing I've had to do, and I often fail miserably at it.

Intellectually I know that the health issues are important. However, like people who only quit smoking after a cancer diagnosis, I think it's harder to think about losing weight in response to a potential health problem rather than having an actual health crisis occur. Maybe that's the "bottoming out" in the health-related consequences? I hope not.