So I have been pondering food lately…okay not really pondering maybe obsessing, certainly eating! To start with you probably need to know my history. I was ten when I first started to gain weight. My mom was overweight (yes you could and should say obese, but this is my mom, so be nice.) I actually have a weird recollection of recognizing that she was overweight and wanting to be like her. I have the same weird recollection about wearing glasses. My mom and sister both wore glasses and I didn’t. I’d sit and squint, until I think I squished my eyes into near-sightedness. Maybe I would have gotten there anyway but hours of squinting probably didn’t help. Anyway, the fat didn’t affect my eyes…so I’ll go back to talking about weight. By my teens I was definitely overweight which continued into my twenties. Then the dieting – up, down, up, down, up, down. I should have just done push ups (up down up down up down) and it might have been more effective. I don’t even remember all the random diets.
Twice I’ve lost a substantial amount of weight, once on a liquid fast….hmmmm…now that I think about it, I think both times were on a liquid fast. Lost 100 lbs or so…then happily or unhappily ate my way back to the beginning. If you read diet or self-help books, you learn that food addiction is about control…or lack of control…or self-image…or lack of self-image….or rebellion….or deprivation. Dr, Phil says it is all about internal dialog telling yourself that you are not a good person. I think Dr. Phil might be tuned to the wrong channel. My dialogue goes nothing like that. I’ve read all the diet/self help books and I’ve never had that AH HA, the part that explains what goes on in my head. I think there is a definite battle that goes on between the ears. One little voice says "I will not eat that cookie," then the other voice answers, "Oh, but it will be so good and you deserve it.” Back and forth and back and forth….
So in 2006, as I crested 300 pounds, I took a giant leap and had gastric bypass…to be exact a Roux-en-Y where the stomach is separated and a small pouch is created and connected directly to the intestine. From there I lost 150 pounds. I won’t go into all the details, hands down the single hardest thing I have ever done – it certainly is not the easy way out.
So now I am analyzing and brain debating addiction. They say it take 20 days to change a habit – wrong! Two years and I can slip into the same old eating patterns without a thought. Put a jar of jelly beans in my vicinity and all thought of restraint is gone. It is amazing to think that with just a small pouch and no stomach access that we can still gain weight, but check any magazine or ask around and everyone knows someone who gained it all back. You actually have to beat the odds, bypass the bypass so to speak. So what makes it worth it? Are jelly beans that good? Are you kidding me?
According to wikipedia: “Addiction is characterized by the compulsive use of substances or engagement of behaviors despite clear evidence to the user of consequent morbidity and/or other harmful effects.” Yup, makes total sense.
So what has to happen is to make a life-long change in my relationship with food. You’d think after gastric bypass and all the life changes it created, that this would come naturally, but no. I keep thinking it is going to take some shift in consciousness – like a switch. I hear the right thing, read the right thing and walla – switch shuts off (or turns on) and I have new perspective in controlling my food intake. In the meantime, every day is a battle of will with myself.
We create powerful obsessions with food by trying not to eat certain foods. The more we try, the worse it gets. Eventually, the only thing filling our minds will be the thought of that thing we are trying not to eat. The jelly beans are calling to me. I hear voices and they sound just like jelly beans….or oatmeal cookies…..or wheat thins…….or
As kids, we ate when hungry and stopped when satisfied. But as adults, we morphed into pleasure-centered food addicts. Why is it so hard? Why is it so difficult to eat a little less? After all, we desperately want to eat right. It is our heart's desire. We want to be thin, healthy, full of life, looking great and living life to its fullest. But instead we throw it away for 20 seconds of taste-bud pleasure. Sick.
So I have no answers and continue to seek while each day fighting to not go back to where I have been. Can you relate?
Twice I’ve lost a substantial amount of weight, once on a liquid fast….hmmmm…now that I think about it, I think both times were on a liquid fast. Lost 100 lbs or so…then happily or unhappily ate my way back to the beginning. If you read diet or self-help books, you learn that food addiction is about control…or lack of control…or self-image…or lack of self-image….or rebellion….or deprivation. Dr, Phil says it is all about internal dialog telling yourself that you are not a good person. I think Dr. Phil might be tuned to the wrong channel. My dialogue goes nothing like that. I’ve read all the diet/self help books and I’ve never had that AH HA, the part that explains what goes on in my head. I think there is a definite battle that goes on between the ears. One little voice says "I will not eat that cookie," then the other voice answers, "Oh, but it will be so good and you deserve it.” Back and forth and back and forth….
So in 2006, as I crested 300 pounds, I took a giant leap and had gastric bypass…to be exact a Roux-en-Y where the stomach is separated and a small pouch is created and connected directly to the intestine. From there I lost 150 pounds. I won’t go into all the details, hands down the single hardest thing I have ever done – it certainly is not the easy way out.So now I am analyzing and brain debating addiction. They say it take 20 days to change a habit – wrong! Two years and I can slip into the same old eating patterns without a thought. Put a jar of jelly beans in my vicinity and all thought of restraint is gone. It is amazing to think that with just a small pouch and no stomach access that we can still gain weight, but check any magazine or ask around and everyone knows someone who gained it all back. You actually have to beat the odds, bypass the bypass so to speak. So what makes it worth it? Are jelly beans that good? Are you kidding me?
According to wikipedia: “Addiction is characterized by the compulsive use of substances or engagement of behaviors despite clear evidence to the user of consequent morbidity and/or other harmful effects.” Yup, makes total sense.
So what has to happen is to make a life-long change in my relationship with food. You’d think after gastric bypass and all the life changes it created, that this would come naturally, but no. I keep thinking it is going to take some shift in consciousness – like a switch. I hear the right thing, read the right thing and walla – switch shuts off (or turns on) and I have new perspective in controlling my food intake. In the meantime, every day is a battle of will with myself.
We create powerful obsessions with food by trying not to eat certain foods. The more we try, the worse it gets. Eventually, the only thing filling our minds will be the thought of that thing we are trying not to eat. The jelly beans are calling to me. I hear voices and they sound just like jelly beans….or oatmeal cookies…..or wheat thins…….orAs kids, we ate when hungry and stopped when satisfied. But as adults, we morphed into pleasure-centered food addicts. Why is it so hard? Why is it so difficult to eat a little less? After all, we desperately want to eat right. It is our heart's desire. We want to be thin, healthy, full of life, looking great and living life to its fullest. But instead we throw it away for 20 seconds of taste-bud pleasure. Sick.
So I have no answers and continue to seek while each day fighting to not go back to where I have been. Can you relate?
I can so relate. I have been trying for the last 6 months to lose about 30 lbs and I haven't lost a single one. I started working out, trying to eat better. Only to get frustrated that it isn't working and break down and eat terrible. It is such a vicious cycle. I want to do better, I know I can, but when I get now where, I figure I might as well just eat whatever I want, instead of trying to be good.
ReplyDeleteYep...it's a very vicious cycle.
ReplyDelete