I've been a member of 3FC since 2008 I think. I'm on my phone so I can't see my profile info and I don't even know if my ticketed weight is accurate to now. I haven't been on in nearly a year. I wanted to post my story with the hope that it might help someone else.
I have had a life long struggle with food. Sometime around early elementary school I went from a healthy weight to very obese (not just chubby or heavy, but significantly overweight). I stayed that way until early high school when the eating disorder started, starving, binging, and constant obsession with how fat I was. On and off diets, excessive exercise and yo yo weight gain and loss...this continued through my 20s. I always thought I just lacked will power.
In my early 30s I got into running and still kept counting calories. I still went through periods of binging and when I'd fall of the wagon I'd regain. (I also had several pregnancies). I thought I was struggling with bouts of depression (I didn't realize it was a direct result of being continuously abused), and when I did, I'd eat more and gain. I knew I was an emotional eater, but I didn't really give that enough focus.
A little over a year ago, I got into lifting and significantly cut back on cardio. I also switched to looking at food by macros (carbs, fat, and protein) and watched the carbs, increased protein and fat. This helped a lot when I would fall off the wagon food wise, I noticed that lifting versus tons of cardio, allowed me to over eat more and not have that huge gain, like when I was doing all cardio (running). Also increasing my daily calories, meaning no more restricting, stopped part of the binging, especially night binging. In the old days I'd eat 1300-1500 cals a day. Now I eat maybe 1800-2000, I don't track as closely though. It's more about macros, rather than calories now.
But even with all that I still had this underlying "depression" that seemed to ebb and flow and I'd use food to soothe myself. I'd read so much how people that have an addiction are medicating some kind of negative feeling, but I just assumed I was just a person that was broken, for no reason, I would just have to deal with episodes of depression and food addiction for the rest of my life.
But during this time, the past few years I had also been working through and coming to terms with the abuse I endured as a child. Some was physical but a lot was psychological. This past year I was able to realize and accept that both my parents had Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and were severely emotionally abusive and neglectful. I had to come to terms with the fact that neither would ever change nor were they capable of parental love. (They continued to emotional abuse me right up until I went no contact.) And I had to grieve the loss of normal loving parents, and the childhood I never experienced.
And suddenly my relationship with food changed.
I looked back over my mental health, and recognized that times when I was at my worst (and binging the most), were times when their abuse had escalated because of various events/occasions etc.
A weight lifted when I learned this and went no contact. All my anger left. And when I reached the acceptance stage of my grieving, the depression left too. And I no longer get the same feeling with food. I'm embarrassed to admit that I used to look forward to eating, to binging. I looked forward to it, because it was my drug. But I just feel differently now. I eat when I'm hungry. My portions are much smaller (normal sized). I just stop when I'm satisfied. I only eat later in the evening when I'm hungry, rather than to feel better. I do still enjoy a sweet treat, but I don't look forward to it in the same way. I do still crave sweets a bit more right before that time of the month, but nothing out of control.
I hadn't even recognized I was being abused, as if you know anything about narcissists, the abuse is subtle. I was gaslit constantly and I am still recovering from that, and likely will be for many years. If you aren't familiar with gaslighting, google it. There is much to be found on how damaging it is just for an adult that enters into a relationship with a narcissist, so one can imagine just how destructive if is for a child raised by narcissistic parents.
When I finally got to the bottom of my struggles, my addiction resolved. I still enjoy food, but it's not the same. I have commented to my husband that food doesn't give me the same thrill it used to. Sometimes I miss it, since now when I have negative feelings for other reasons, I don't have an escape.
I do still lift weights, though I've slacked a bit over the holidays. I try to count macros, but I've been laxed with that too. Honestly since healing I am just generally more relaxed all around, and it's wonderful. I was able to recognize that much of my shame about my weight came from my dad's critisism of "fat women", and how they were "slobs", etc. So the drive for me to get thin to be worthy of love has begun to dissolve.
I'm currently a size 8 (ok, tight 8😜 and I would like to lose a little before summer, but I no longer feel like a worthless loser of I don't. I am not a slave to food or my body anymore. I still don't like "depriving" myself, meaning if I want a cookie, I'm going to have a cookie lol...but it's not like I want the cookie because it's going to make me happy, nor do I think about it all day, and one is enough, I don't need a whole bunch. And if I don't get to eat a cookie, I'm ok with that too. And probably the biggest change, I don't feel the same when eating it. I no longer get that "high" from eating/or while eating. It's not a fix for me anymore, because I resolved the issues when I realized the real cause (abuse, neglect, gaslighting).
I'm finally happy. ❤️
I don't know your story, but maybe mine will help someone. It was emotional wounds all along. Getting away from my abusers and reading A LOT about their disorder and connecting with other adult children of narcissists helped me heal. And I no longer need to medicated those wounds with food. If you haven't considered the emotional aspect of binging, it's worth looking into, or if you have, maybe you need to keep digging.
Hope this helps ❤️