Getting my feet wet
Well, this is my first post here. I suppose I should share a little about myself, though I don’t know if anyone will be reading this. Not that it should matter, I suppose. This is mainly a way for my to give words to my thoughts and feelings rather than keeping them inside. I love reading and I love to write so I am going to take advantage of this love and use it for therapeutic purposes.
I am 31 years old. I weigh around 420 pounds. It hurts me to type that. I have been overweight all my life but once I was out of graduate school the weight just exploded. I have Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis (hypothyroidism) and PCOS. Those have contributed to the weight problems as I was not diagnosed with the thyroid troubles until I was well over 280 pounds. I also am an emotional eater. I have been one as far back as my days in elementary school, although now it’s on a much larger scale, hence the huge weight gain. The reasons for my eating disorder will have to be another topic for another entry as I could write a book just on that!!
There has been only one other time when I was really serious about losing weight. It was the spring time of my 8th grade year and I decided I wanted to be skinny/skinnier when I went to high school. I was SO determined. I made so many changes and I had such incredible success (I lost about 40 pounds and could have stood to loose another 15 or so when I stopped losing). I could cry how close I was to being “normal” compared with where I am now. I did most of it on my own - I exercised, I worked hard to eat healthier. But then when high school started I found myself with more freedom - I could buy fries and these huge homemade cookies they served and sold for like .10 cents a piece. This was a huge change (my elementary school did not serve hot lunches).
I had broken away from most of my elementary school friends and was ready to make new friends, which I did right away. But then there were boys. I was not ready for that at all. I went to Catholic schools all my life so I had a really sheltered life (and my parents were super conservative and never talked to me about relationships, etc.) and the only boys I was around were the same ones I’d known since like 2nd grade. But here I was in high school with tons of new guys there.
I wasn’t emotionally ready for this attention or for the freedom. So I started making bad choices with food (I have to remind myself that I was only 14.. it’s hard to not want to eat junk food like your friends) and I grew lazy and stopped exercising. So the weight came back.. plus much much more.
Since then I’ve never “felt” as though I could be committed to doing it again. I can’t explain why I never tried to exercise or do anything seriously about my weight until now. I thought about it so much, though. Several times a week, every week since I’ve been out of high school I have thought about how much I’d love to lose weight, how much I’d love to really focus on it. But I never could get the motivation, the courage to do it.
I saw once on a drug addict intervention show that one of the counselors remarked that it’s really hard to get off of drugs because the drugs *are* working.. they *are* numbing the pain, even if they are also killing you at the same time. It’s hard to tell them to stop when it is working for them. I think this is how it is with me and food. All these years the thought of turning my back on eating for comfort has been a scary thought. I struggle with clinical depression and oftentimes the food just enables me to numb the pain, the worries, the stresses of my life and my own emotional turmoils.
Things are feeling different now, though. I don’t feel a desire any more to pig on out most foods. Things that I usually enjoyed eating don’t appeal to me. I feel as though I have a very good shot at accomplishing weight loss goals.
I came here and to the forums for support and encouragement. Also to find people like me whose successes can inspire me.
I don’t expect miracles or an easy fix. I know this is going to be a long, hard journey that will begin now but will continue the rest of my life as I know I will always need to eat and live healthier. My first steps begin here and now.