14st0lbs
I knew I shouldn’t have stepped on the scales this evening. I knew it was a bad idea before I even did it. Fourteen stone!!! This is ridiculous. This must be the lowest point of my weight-loss journey so far. I’ve put on one and a half stone from my slimmest, and I’m nearly back to square one. I was 14st7lbs at my heaviest. Not so far to go before I’m back to that size!!!
Why am I doing this to myself? Last night I had a binge. A proper binge. 8 biscuits, 4 packets of snack-a-jacks popcorn, two flapjacks, two packs of crisps and a cereal bar. That was after my dinner. I didn’t need any of it, but I still ate it. Why? What on earth is wrong with me? And yesterday morning I’d got up and decided that I would follow a diet for one day. One day only, and I still blew it!
I KNOW it’s self-destructive to binge, I KNOW crisps and cakes are bad for me, I KNOW healthy food makes me feel better and more energised, I KNOW I’m happier when I’m losing weight and getting compliments, I KNOW I’m eating food my body doesn’t need, I KNOW I’m not hungry even when I’m eating that thing I have a compulsion to eat.
It’s all crap. I’m crap, dieting is crap, weight is crap, low self-esteem from being overweight is crap. And yet, I’m responsible for my size. I, I am the one that feeds myself, I am the one that pushes food I don’t need down my throat. I am the one that acknowledges that I’m not enjoying eating the third or fourth biscuit or packet of crisps.
Am I really that rubbish? Am I really that weak-willed and shallow that I give in to every craving I have and lull myself to sleep with mouthfull after mouthfull until I feel sick? Why do I do that? do I really hate myself that much, that I want to punish myself week after week at the scales with a gain? Do I really hate myself enough to overfill my body with junk food? Do I really hate myself that much that I want to carry on looking fat and feeling uncomfortable in too-small clothes, and getting indigestion from eating the wrong things?
Am I really that crap that I can’t respecct my body enough to look after it? I know exactly what I could and should be doing for my health. Believe me, I’ve probably read more dieting magazines and books than 50 people together. I know what foods support my health, and what foods don’t. I know every trick in the book, but I don’t USE the tricks. When it comes to it, I don’t care, I want food and I want unhealthy food.
When did my relationship with food get so warped? When did food become a comfort, a way to switch off, a way to let go and forget? When did food stop being fuel and start being an obsession? Why do I think like a fat person? Why do I prefer the fatty foods and see them as treats, treats to be had numerous times a day? Why can’t I eat only when I’m physically hungry instead of when I’m having cravings? Why can’t I stop when I’ve had enough rather than eat and eat and eat and eat? Why can’t I make the right food decisions and why on earth can’t I choose foods that are supportive to my heath rather than detrimental to it?
I AM RUBBISH. I AM TOTALLY UTTERLY STUPIDLY RUBBISH. I need to get a grip, but I’ve been trying to get a grip for a year. And I’m failing to get a grip. I’m under a dietician, I go to Weightwatchers when I can. And I still can’t get a grip.
I’m USELESS. Totally USELESS. Utterly USELESS. I hate myself. I can’t even maintain a diet for a single day. What sort of crap is that. I can’t even eat healthily for a single day. I’ve tried dieting, I’ve tried ‘not dieting’, I’ve tried eating healthily, I’ve tried eating diet foods full of chemicals. But my head’s not in the right place.
But I’m panicking. I do NOT want to get back to my heaviest weight. I want to be slim, I want to be the old me, the me with a healthy relationship with food, the me that’s independant, the me that’s healthy, the me I was before I got ME and before I got depression from the frustration of having ME.
I want the motivation I used to have- I want the energy I used to have- I want to be able to get up an hour early each day and go jogging like I used to do before the ME, I want to cut my calories and diet properly without nearly fainting with fatigue like I do now, I want to be full of vitality instead of being constantly trembly and weak (a weakness that makes me want to eat). I want to be able to go to the gym, use the rower, the treadmill, feel the burn, get the endorphin high from being able to exercise and push myself. I want to go out and do things on my days off instead of lying on my bed exhausted and incapacitated. I want so much, and my illness has taken so much away from me.
No wonder I’m unhappy, no wonder I turn to food. Eating is one of the few things I can do. Eating is my way to feel good. My way of ‘treating’ myself. Eating is easy, it gives me energy. Everything else in my life takes my energy away.
Life with ME is hard. Right now, it feels very hard. It’s hard because my health stands in the way of my dreams. It’s hard because I feel ill most of the time, and when I feel ill nothing else matters. Not even losing weight. When I feel nauseous and shaky and my heart is racing and the room is spinning, carbs and sugar seem a very good idea indeed. Carrots and apples just don’t do it.
My heart is bleeding, It’s bleeding for the me I once was, the me that jogged every day, the motivated, energised, can-do me. In fact I guess what I need right now is a good cry. Perhaps I need to sit down and acknowledge that my life is hard. Maybe I need to allow myself to be struggling, maybe it’s ok to be weak and rubbish and a dieting failure, because I have good excuses. Maybe I should realise that I have good excuses. Maybe I should stop trying and maybe I should let myself balloon up into a size 24, and just not care, because I have excuses.
Maybe I should give in to my situation, and acknowledge that losing weight is a rubbish thing to do when you are ill, maybe I need to realise that I am too weak, to ill, too messed-up to be a successful dieter. But the tears running down my face make me think that that would be soul-destroying to give up. I don’t want to give up. It seems like an impossible mountain to climb, it seems like I have a wall of thick concrete to pull down, it seems like my whole life opposes me losing weight. That’s how I feel right now.
But I won’t give up.
