hey everyone.
I am new to this board but have been on this site before.

I feel as though this past semester my whole life has gotten completely out of my contol. Last semester I lost over 30 pounds. It started off naturally, but I soon became obsessed with "dieting" and began to over analyze every peice of lettace I put into my mouth and quickly began eating near nothing every day for fear of gaining weight. Over break I was determined to stick to my 300 calorie day diet (at most) but I realized what I was doing to myself and began to try to eat healthier. This resulted in me gaining a few lbs because we went out a few times and it was the holidays, but I was pretty much at my same weight. My first day back at school my boyfriend and I broke up. I didn't handle it well at all. I looked in the mirror and convinced myself that it was because I was now this fat cow and he couldnt bare to be with me, even though during break it was pretty obvious to me we were on the rocks and wouldnt be together much longer, (especially since we didnt see each other at all that month.) It also didn't make sense that that would be the reason he broke up with me because he told me when we first started dating that he didn't care about my weight, and he thought I looked fine and didnt need to worry about what I ate. He didn't know what I was doing to myself to achieve the "perfect" body.
After the break up I began eating. I dont even know how much but I ended up going up to 132 for spring break. which is about a 5 lb gain. When I got back from spring break I thought I was fat and completely ugly and went for a week without eating. Then I binged for a few days. Then I looked in the mirror and saw how fat I was and I stopped eating completely again. After 5 days I was back down to 127 and felt so proud of myself. The only downfall was that I was dancing and do so much physical stuff I was wearing myself out. I had no energy except for the minor fix that diet coke would give me for a few hours. I confessed to my friends what I had been doing but I wouldnt listen when they tried to help me. The next day I called my mother and cried for a few hours just about what I had been doing and how I had been struggling and she helped me realize that I didnt have to starve myself. She told me to go to the store and get food to put in my room so that I could have stuff to eat if I was hungry and no one was going to the cafe. Now I have the problem of over eating, because I have all this food. And I am at the point where if I eat ANYTHING I feel like I have already failed and that I am gaining weight so I may as well just keep eating and be the fat lard I am doomed to be. I dont know why I became like this but seriously it is the only thing that consumes my thoughts. And the only way I don't eat out my feelings is to write them down or call my mother and hope she can talk me out of binging.
It has only been 2 days of me having food in here and I feel like I have gained all the weight I lost of not eating back again. i dont know if its right because I dont have a scale in here.. but I dont even want to know. Also I am on my period right now so that is making me have even more cravings then usual.

I just wish that I could have more confidence and control of myself. The only time I am really happy with myself is when I am not eating anything and I feel hunger, because then I know I al losing weight. If I ever feel full I feel like I have lost and just keep eating because I am so upset. I dont know what in the world to do with myself. today I am actually on a pretty good track of just eating normally, and trying to lose weight healthily. I had a weight watchers english muffin for breakfast with jelly and a turkey sandwhich for lunch.. but since I felt full after the turkey sandwhich I felt like a failure and almost binged on celery and peanut butter. I stopped myself because I realized the endless amounts of calories I would be putting in me and just stopped. However I didn spread peanut butter on a rice cake. Eh, oh well i can live with that one mishap. And tonight I am going to try to eat a small salad. If I can just keep myself busy it keeps my mind off my body.

If anyone has any words of encouragement or goes through anything like what I am going through please send me a message or something.

Thanks,
Joanna

It wasn't too long ago that my mom told me she was afraid I had an eating disorder (a few years back) I was constantly watching everything I ate, and even after eating an apple I would go to the gym to work it off. So I know how you feel.. and I'm starting to notice similar patterns happening now. Yesterday I didn't really eat much through out the day, and by night when I would normally have dinner, I decided not to eat. Not because I wasn't hungry, but because I was feeling good, felt "light", and didn't want to eat and ruin that feeling. My boyfriend encouraged me for like, 2 straight hours to eat, so I finally gave in. But today I had the same feeling - I didn't want to eat because that means weight!
Just be thankful you're acknowledging these things, and you know what to watch out for. Thats what I keep thinking to myself. If you ever need to chat, feel free to PM me

There is lots of support here! This place is full of great people....keep coming back........looking forward to getting to know you!

L

You have a lot of good insight and that's very helful. Like you, I had a substantial weight loss that percipitated my plunge into my eating disorder. I had al that was needed--depression, anxiety, very low self esteem, feeling that I had no control over my life (except whether I ate or not). Find a good counsellor, someone you like and trust with whom you can discuss these issues--how you feel about eating, your body, life in general. You're at a point now where you can get a god grip on this and turn it around and not harm yourself. A nutritionist will help you make a meal plan for healthy eating that you'll enjoy and feel comfortable with and will NOT make you fat. Get some help now. Ypu'll be fine. Lots of luck. Hugs, Marion

Joanna, When I was reading your post I nodded most of the way through. Definitely understand, and have those same feelings of failure when I eat ANYthing. But now I think about how if you dont eat after 3 hours, your metabolism slows down, and keeping your metabolism up helps you lose weight. I think I have a slow metabolism in general, so I try to do everything I can to speed it up, like build muscle, have bursts of exercise periodically in the day and eat every 3 hours. It doesnt have to be a lot, 100 calories or 300... but starving yourself will actually sabotage your efforts to lose fat.

So I try to think these logical thoughts when I get the guilt feelings, and it works for me. As long as I dont binge at any of those 3 hour increments, which I do not, then I am boosting my weight loss when I eat. Try to remember that, and dont starve yourself! You can totally be in control of yourself. You can definitely do it. Take care

good luck hun and good posting....