I have not had a few good days. Have not logged my food choices. Have eaten what I want when I want it and feel awful. I know today is a brand new day and I want to feel good today. So hour by hour I will pray to be in control again. But at the same time I feel very alone in this battle.....logically I know that I am not....but I just want a piece of cake to just be a piece of cake instead of a loaded vessel of comfort. Will likely never happen and this will be my battle til' I die. Food is my drug and I have to daily fight it and realize I feel best when I eat healthy and don't fill my body with crap. My cranky side though says I just want to be normal and not have to fight this.....one hour at a time I will try to focus otherwise. Anyone relate?

Very much relate!!!! at this period I can't seem to get past feeling I'm denying myself when I don't give in to what I want to eat. We ask 'why does it have to be so hard?' we just haven't gotten to the point where we've accepted that is the way it has to be for us, and either embrace it as something better (positive thinking) or feel we're denying ourselves (negative thinking)

but I think 'normal' people struggle too, we just see their outer healthy-sized selves but I think everyone struggles with something. So I hope it helps you to know that you're not alone!

You're not alone -- so many of us are fighting this battle and struggling with it daily and we're here to support you.

If I'm reading you right, I think what may contributing to the overwhelming feeling is you're looking at this in the biggest picture possible, your whole life. It's sounding like you think you'll either get to be healthy and never eat cake, or eat cake and be heavy and unhealthy.

I think there is a happy medium. I don't think we're always able to find it right away. Shrink your picture. Look at whatever time frame feels least overwhelming to you - a day, a week, a month - and go with that.

You may not be able to have a piece of cake now (I also am steering clear of treats because I don't have a lot of control myself) but that doesn't mean you won't be able to your whole life (I think no treats forever would make any of us miserable!). I think the answers become clearer to us about our personal limits the further we go in this journey.

So keep going! Don't give up! It will feel better to battle this, even if you slip up, then to just give up.

chickiegirl said it best....look at it at whatever time frame feels best for you. For me, I have to take it just one day at a time especially since I am new at really battling this.

I know that it will take some time before food is just a need and not a want. In the beginning it will be difficult and everything will be black or white, but like pp said, you will eventually find that happy medium or gray area.

We are all here to support each other! Also, thanks for sharing it's really great to know that we aren't all alone out there.

I know how you feel, I've lost 22 lbs and I've got a million more left and I always think about food. When I'm hungry I can't JUST reach for something. I have to go okay is this good for me? How many calories are in? How many have I had so far today? And so on.

Today I was hungry and was like what's up with that, come to find normally by the end of my work day I'll have had 700-800 calories but I ate just over 500. I got myself a snack that was 95 calories and feel better, but I feel like I'm going to be calorie counting for the rest of my life

I agree totally!!I am always thinking about food.I hate it.At breakfast I am already thinking about lunch.Its crazy.I see people at work walk by food all of the time and do not even glance in the direction.I cant do that.I ency my kids.They eat until they are full and then move on to something else.I long for that!

I think a lot of that obsession and constant food thinking comes from the deprivation mentality. When I am in a place where I can tell myself "I can have some more tomorrow", or "I can have some next week" it eases that need to have it all now before it is somehow taken away from me. It is SO freeing to be able to enjoy things in the moment and not be completely consumed by when can I eat next, what will I eat, how will I hide it, etc. Keep posting here.