[stefi11]

I've never in my life used a message board on the internet. Maybe this is weird seeing as I'm 24 year's old and it's a normal thing for people my age. Anyway, I'm currently a Peace Corps volunteer in an amazing country in Eastern Europe, a place where people are OBSESSED with being skinny. On a regular basis EVERYONE in town comments about weight... from the mailman to coworkers to neighbors and friends. These comments range from attempts to be flattering, like "Your figure is looking much better these days" to downright rude, "That skirt would look much better if you lost 10 kilos." I've pretty much heard it all and at one point even started keeping a journal of the comments because I thought it was humorous, but it was depressing to realize the numbers of comments about my weight everyday.

So I love running but there's no place to run indoors here, and I can only run when the weathers decent (or I get sick and get lectures from the entire town). When I'm regularly exercising, my eating tends to be more controlled, but well, today it's not. Today I just ate 2 dozen cookies. Yesterday I had one dozen and an entire bag of chips. I disgust myself. It's so gross, and after I do it, the rest of the day I'm just weighed down and depressed about it (I think the chemicals in the food also typically affect my mood.) I've tried to make myself throw up several times, but I actually haven't been able to throw up since I was 7 years old. Unfortunately or fortunately (depending on your take), I think I have no gag reflex.

I;ve had disordered eating probably since I was 10. I've gone through periods of obsessive calorie counting and had extreme weight lose. I've had periods of extreme binge eating and excessive weight gain. I'm at a point where I just want this all to stop.

I need help and I don't know who to talk to about it. I don't really have any overwight friends and no one would really get it I don't think. I don't know... any advice? from anyone? I'm anngry at food for having so much power in my life.

[sumu1]

First off, congratulations on the 20 lbs you have lost. That is a positive thing, so please smile about that .

I'll be honest I can't imagine these town people saying all these rude things to you. You must be dying to say something back to them, to put them in their place but of course you can't do that. The only thing you can do is control the way you react and feel about their comments. Maybe something to remember is that you are in a different culture. Things that are considered rude here are just matter- of- fact comments there. Maybe remembering that they are not intentionally being rude, it's just their tendency to be blunt. Political correctness is an American thing. Take back the control in the situation. Their blunt comments say something about them NOT you.

The frustrating thing about food addiction is you can't just quit it, like smoking. You can't quit food, you have to quit the negative behaviors around food. I've been an emotional eater for most of my life too. And I've struggled with disordered eating myself. It's taken me most of a year to get this far in my journey to relearn how to eat. The things that seemed to work for me were, number one, if I know I'm heading toward a binge, try to stay in the moment (for lack of a better word), once you go into autopilot it's all over. Distract yourself, something, anything. Take a bath...that's a big one for me. And you got it, exercise. When I exercise my food seems to fall in place also. It's weird. And run in the rain...who cares what they say!!!! Dress for it and if you get sick a bit, stop and then keep going again... tell yourself, when they make their comments, that they are just expressing their deepest concern for your well being . I know, I know, it's easier said than done. But the more you do it, the easier it gets.

I think you hit on something too. I have a HUGE problem with sugar myself. It throws me into a depression also. I was on anti depressants but wondered if I modified my diet would it help and it did. I limit the sugar in my diet and take my vitamins and I feel SO much better. And it's helped my lose the weight because ( TA DA) it reduces my urges to binge. It's a lot less frequent now. Here's a thought...what I did was refocus on my issues with food. Almost by de-personalizing it. Putting the "blame" on my physical reaction to sugar, not the emotional. I told myself if I decrease the sugar, take my multi vitamin, B complex and Omega ( all good for nerves and mood control) I would feel better. It put more control in what I could do to make myself feel better. Now when I go for the sugary stuff, I think twice knowing how it'll make me feel because I know how GREAT I feel when I'm not eating a ton of it. It just seems to make it more of a medical problem, more tangible. More doable in my mind. Hope that kind of made sense.

Come here for support. This is a pretty active board, or a chat room. It sounds like you feel you are out there all alone, even though you are surrounded by people. Know that you aren't alone...consider this first post your first step into a phase of your life. Take care out there. Hope this cheered you up a bit.

[Serena C]

That's good you haven't been able to throw up - you don't want to go down that road, so please don't even think about that. I understand your feelings of disgust with yourself; I've felt the same way when I let food control me. But you've found a great place here for support since you don't feel there's anyone in your life who would understand. Well, we do!!!! Don't give up.

[3Beans]

I'm an RPCV myself, so I totally understand the culture shock. I was at almost 190 for most of my Peace Corps service. And I ate a lot too, out of loneliness and boredom. I was also in a country where it's inappropriate for women to be physically active in public.

Very few of the locals were overweight where I served and I really stood out, and like where you are, there weren't taboos about mentioning people's body shape. But they were just observing, not judging. Like, "your eyes are pretty," "you're fat," "I like your shirt," etc. I second what Sumu said. I'm sure you're getting used to many cultural differences, and this is simply another. Insulting yourself and purging your food certainly won't help in any way. If you have problems with portion control, perhaps you should keep unhealthy food out of your home.

If you can't run indoors, how about lunges, squats, crunches, push-ups, and so forth?

[djs06]

Stick around, you're definitely not alone. There are lots of wonderful people in this lovely little message board community of ours! Let out your frustration here as much as you want.

That's really cool that you're in the Peace Corps. Focus on the positive things in your life- you are clearly brave, as a lot of people (myself included!) would love to have those kinds of experiences and are too darn chicken