My lifelong battle with weight

[BlackBerryJuice 349]

This will probably be a multiple-post thread from me, I don't even think I'll do it in one night. Read it and feel free to comment if you identify with any of this. I just need to vent.

I'm currently at 195 and a BMI of 33. I've struggled with weight since I was 6 - I spent summer at grandma's that fateful year and she overfed me so much that my father claimed he didn't recognize me when he picked me up at the train station after. I lost MOST of that extra weight after going back to my parents', but I was never skinny again. So my mother started me on starvation diets (who puts a 7-yo who's overweight by 3 pounds on the cabbage Soup diet?) which would always end up in "celebrating" with an entire cake shared in between the 2 of us as a "reward." My father was extremely emotionally abusive towards me because of my weight - keep in mind, the heaviest I was while living with them was 165 lbs (I'm 5'5") as a teen. He'd say things like "You are a fat cow, I'm embarrassed to be seen out in public with you, I'm going to put a lock on that fridge," etc. Then he'd make remarks about other women, too - "Unless a woman is attractive, I don't care what she has to say." Not surprisingly, typical teenage self-esteem + emotional abuse + starvation diets led to eating disorder (bulimia).

I puked and overexercised myself into a size 8-10 at 145 lbs. Everybody was saying how healthy and radiant I looked! Thankfully, the one day I went to TWO very challenging 1-hour group exercise classes in a row without eating Breakfast and proceeded to almost lose consciousness because of the resulting dangerously low blood sugar, I was surrounded by strangers and just blamed it on feeling a little icky because of my period. Yet everybody kept saying "You look so good now! How did you do it?!"

Then I moved to the US from Europe and disaster struck. All of sudden, I'd go to the grocery store and see DOZENS of different types of Cookies, chocolates; fast food joints on every corner; and lots of stress to fuel up my emotional eating. 6 months later, I was over 200 lbs, and no amount of vomiting was able to compensate for my compulsive overeating. I was forced by my school under threat of expulsion (shortly after receiving over $50,000 in scholarships for college) to go into "counselling" with a psychologist. A psychologist THEY chose who had NO experience in eating disorders, whose sessions consisted of him trying to figure out who my friends were and ask them to spy on me to make sure I wasn't vomiting. Thankfully, I picked up magazines that focused on a healthier approach to weightloss ("Oxygen" instead of the starve-yourself "Shape") and connected with some supportive people on eating disorder message boards. I was slowly able to curb my purging to under 2 times a week (before, it could be up to 5 times a day) and just told the counselor I wasn't vomiting anymore, since I was tired of those excruciating sessions. His response? "I'm glad you are not doing that stupid stuff anymore!"

"STUPID STUFF!"

Edited June 27, 2010 by BlackBerryJuice

[BlackBerryJuice 349]

By only eating fruit for Breakfast, eliminating ALL sweets and junk food, replacing all breads and grains with salads AND 2 hours a day on the elliptical, I was able to get down to about 165 lbs - still a good 30 lbs overweight. Then I moved to college, where I continued to yo-yo between 165 and 185. The only times I was able to hit the low end of that weight range was when I had no stresses in my life and had hours to kill at the gym. As soon as finals rolled around, I'd pack on several pounds a week, steady. Thankfully, I really got into weights as a college student and learned more about nutrition for athletes - rather than starve myself on SlimFast shakes and the like, I at least began to watch my Protein intake and put on a lot of muscle. I could see an outline of a 6-pack at 165, but I just could NOT get below that weight and actually have visible muscles. No matter how hard I worked, eventually either physical hunger/exhaustion or emotional stress would catch up with me and lead to a binge and a feeling of being worthless. And each binge negated a week or two of being hungry all the time and working out for hours. I just couldn't keep it up.

My highest weight was 216, the summer after I graduated college and moved to Canada. I went through a series of very unfortunate events, to the point where I walked to the emergency room one day and asked to be sedated because I was having a nervous breakdown. To top it all off, I hurt my back in an accident and couldn't even sit for weeks; I couldn't walk more than 2 blocks without pain for 3 months.

Then I stepped it up at the gym and started eating less/healthier and lost a lot of weight.

Then stuff happened and I gained weight again, up to about 195.

Then I lost it again.

Then I gained back, to 208.

Then I lost it....

Then gained, lost, gained, lost, gained, lost.

Most recently, I've put on 20 lbs in 3 months. One day I was sitting across from my 155-lbs boyfriend at McDonald's, sipping my diet Coke, as he was ripping into his meal of TWO quarter-pounders with cheese, fries, mcnuggets, regular pop, AND apple pie. The night before, we went out and while I just had a main course salad, he had a fried appetizer, main course, AND a dessert that probably ran 1500 calories. And I just said to myself "Screw this, I just don't care anymore." So I ate, and ate, and ate. I stopped the stupid running because I was sick of wasting hours a day on something that was so hard and so unrewarding. I actually CRAVE fruits and lean meats now, after letting myself eat whatever I want - healthy food is no longer a punishment. I'll go for a swim once or twice a week - nothing intense, just half a mile or so. I'll play badminton with my boyfriend once a week, because it's FUN. But I'm never going to be on the elliptical for 1.5 hours a day, 6 days a week to compensate for some cup of chocolate pudding that will otherwise make me pack on a pound a day.

I recently read Crystal Renn's "Hungry." While she had a different eating disorder and did not have the weight-related emotional abuse coming from her family, I could relate to her on many levels - especially when she talked about how SICK she was of starving herself and exercising constantly, and how in the end, she just started putting on weight no matter how hard she tried to keep it off. I wish I could be as comfortable at my size as she is; she says she eventually just "settled" into her size. I have NO idea what it's like to MAINTAIN weight without feeling starved, so that's the one thing I CANNOT relate to in her story.

[Maddie 9]

Just so you know, I'm looking forward to the reading more.

[sbingram12 1]

me too I subscribed to this thread

[Shadowwolf549 0]

Ditto! I'm very interested and could so relate to a lot of it. :thumbup1:

[BlackBerryJuice 349]

Thanks! I'm away on vacation this week, so too busy sight-seeing/going to the beach to write another long post, but I'll definitely continue after a little while.

[Brendasgonnalose 4]

Have a great time on your vacation. Looking forward to hearing more.

Brenda