The Sweet Witch

Whenever we go over to my inlaws, my mother-in-law makes enough food to feed an army. No, that's not a metaphor.

She's already cooked enough and packaged it up in Ziploc and Glad containers to feed an army for a week and put it into the fridge. That's for us to take home. That doesn't include the food she sets out on the table. It's always some sort of meat, usually red - prime rib, steak, ribs - plus at least one meat side dish, usually sausage. And there's always shrimp as an appetizer. Harley's a big meat eater, and it's clear she's cooking for him.

But there's plenty of carbs, too, don't get me wrong. Baked beans, cheesy potatoes, macaroni and cheese. Occasionally there's a vegetable - green bean casserole (the kind with fried onions on the top) or buttered carrots. Once in a while, a salad.


We went to my in-laws for my birthday yesterday. My mother-in-law likes to find reasons for us to come over at least once a month. My birthday is a good reason in January. We came home loaded down with food. Going there, for a food addict, is like asking an alcoholic to go to a New Year's Eve party at Cheers.


Of course, if you're going to meetings and doing what you need to do, it wouldn't matter if someone set a drink in front of you, right? You'd say no.

Me, I'm not so good at the "saying no" part. I clearly haven't gotten there yet. So my lunch today consisted of cheesy potatoes and baked beans. No protein in sight. And then there was leftover birthday cake. And she sent home two boxes of cookies. And a bag full of candy. And a gallon of ice cream, packed in ice. Of course she did.

Harley often likens her to the witch in the candy house in Hansel and Gretel. Sometimes I think he's right. And sometimes, when I'm lying in a stupid migraine-inducing sugar/carb coma after a trip to the in-laws, I wish we wouldn't keep leaving a trail of breadcrumbs that lead right back there again.

Happy Birthday To Me

I feel incredibly old. I'm sure my body is much older than my years, actually. Which is rather depressing.

This day always meant a good excuse to eat cake. I miss cake. And frosting. God, I love frosting. Why would something exist in the world that's so incredibly bad for you?

I saw an Intervention the other night - the first one I'd seen with a food addict. A young man, over 500 lbs. The therapist said, "Being addicted to food is like being addicted to heroin. You take it to numb out. That's the goal."

Yep. That's about right. Food is my heroin.

Whenever I complain about having another birthday, Harley says, "Well, it's better than the alternative." Ha. But some days I wonder.

5 Sticky Notes On My Computer That I Want To Have Made Into Refrigerator Magnets

1. Life is hard.

2. I am not that important.

3. My life is not about me.

4. I am not in control.

5. You are going to die.

These strike me as true in my heart. They come from a man named Richard Rohr. He didn't invent them. They are timeless truths.

They sound harsh to many people when I tell them they are a code by which I strive to live. I don't know if they're harsh. If anyone would like to know how I understand them, how they apply to my challenges with food, eating, body, and addiction, please comment and ask. I would be glad to offer my 2 cents.

King Harley

Stuck

Watched Fried Green Tomatoes this morning while the kids went out to play in the snow that will disappear in a great flood this afternoon and tomorrow.

Great movie.

Kathy Bates character's sobbing into a handkerchief after some young kid called her a fat cow, and Jessica Tandy is patting her on the back and comforting her.

"I just wish I could get it over with and get really fat! I'm too young to be old and I'm too old to be young."

I hear ya, sister. I hear ya. (Has it really been fifteen years since this movie was released? God, I am getting old!) It takes courage to really eat your way toward death. Or to stop. I feel so caught in the middle, afraid to go forward, afraid to go back.

"One candy bar won't hurt ya," Tandy says.

"One, no. But ten or eleven?"

Yep, I hear ya.

I could eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Tastes wayyyyy better than Lean Cuisine. (I'm watching the latest commercial - one woman eating a rice cake, the other drinking some frothy, scary-looking diet drink... and I'm supposed to believe the mouse-sized portion of chicken parts and freeze dried veggies tastes better? Feh!)

What is wrong with me?

I wish I knew. *sigh*

Lazy Is As Lazy Does?

Lot's of talk and thinking and feeling and heartfelt intention, but no action.

Hell, you'd think I was lazy and undisciplined, like a good fat man is supposed to be.

Yet, while it's true that I got away with murder in just about every facet of my life because everything has been easy for me to either excel at, or to simply get by with a "C" average when I'm uninterested, I do have a couple of post grad degrees, I get up and go to work everyday, etc... I know I'm not actually lazy and undisciplined...well, maybe a little undisciplined, but only because I rely on my ability to intuitively understand and respond to whatever comes up without much effort.

I want my intuitive understanding to be enough when it comes to food, eating and being healthy. This seems to be the only thing in life that I'm continually thwarted by in such a big way.

I suppose it points to the thing that is deisgned to wake me up and show me I'm not really in control, the particular cosmic 2x4 that keeps hitting me over the head until I get it...until I get that the universe doesn't revolve around me. I dunno.

It seems so simple. Eat less - exercise more. It's impossible to deny the basic truth of that.

Why can't I simply do that? Maybe it's why "won't" I simply do that. Maybe I need to ask for help. But I have and I didn't really do what was suggested. So, what am I afraid of facing? Or, do I even need to figure out what I'm afraid of facing before I face it?

I tell others to stop the problem behavior and then face the emotional and psychological pain that comes up. I don't take my own advice in the area of food and eating.

Here's what it comes down to...at least what I'm feeling in this moment: no one cares.

Which means I really want someone to care. And I'm not even sure what that means.

Here's where this goes for me: I deeply care about others, but I feel I'm invisible (ironic, considering the size of my body), particularly, emotionally invisible. I'm not even certain what the pain is that I'm eating and staying fat in order to avoid (feeling invisible?), but I feel that my feeling and my heart matters less than everyone else's feelings and heart.

Is that it, the fear of being ignored, abandoned, rejected, that keeps me from taking action?

Queenie's parent's visited today and we talked about wieght, eating, food, etc... as her father has had serious health problems due to obesity, and he also had a very controlling mother when he was a boy, just as I did. Talk then turned to my 5-yr-old son and his wilfullness, stubborness and determination. I'm grateful for those qualities in my son, and while I will certainly wrestle with him and engage in a power struggle with him now and again, I'm very aware of the power I and Queenie have to crush and smother his sense of self-direction, volition and inner authority. It enrages me and nearly brings me to tears when I allow the memories to come up of how my own inner authority and sense of self-direction was crushed and smothered by the food that was very nearly literally shoved down my throat in vast quantities as a boy.

I'm getting a sense that I'm not lazy, but that I'm simply defiant out of fear of being crushed and smothered and fed into oblivion. I would rather keep up the illusion of control and keep doing what is comfortable, safe and predictable, even if it's literally killing me, than risk changing my behavior and taking action.

It's not laziness. It takes me a helluva lot of time, energy, focus and attention to to try and control reality so that I can keep the fear of being crushed and smothered inside, in the form of fat and unlived life.

I guess I'm the one who is crushing and smothering me. I'm keeping myself cut off and alone out fear of being cut off and alone.

That's fucked up.

I feel like I could really use a friend who could help me with this, but I probably wouldn't allow a friend in for fear of being given the message, yet again, that it's either them or me.

The King has left the building.

Codependents R Us

Harley and I met on the Internet, back when AOL was charging by the hour and people ran up $1200 Internet bills. Me included. When I met Harley, I was in a disintegrating marriage, and he was a psychologist with a lot of knowledge about relationships. He tried to help me fix my marriage. Can you imagine? I think he's glad he failed. :)

After my marriage fell apart and Harley and I started noticing each other in a more-than-friendship sort of way, we did what any self-respecting fat person on the Internet does in this culture. We lied. I was a 5'5" redhead... and that's where the truth stopped. I was a svelte 120 pounds, long of leg and rather busty. Well, the latter is true, but I can thank overly developed adipose tissue for it rather than a propensity toward a D-cup. Harley claimed he was a 180 lb backpacker, hiker and camper. Welcome to the Internet World of Wishful Thinking.

We never thought it would go any further than a little Internet fling. We felt safe pretending to be who we weren't. Neither of us could have fathomed that we, in fact, lived only half an hour away from one another. Neither of us could have imagined that the other was dealing with the same issue, the same pain, the same fear of discovery and rejection. When Harley wrote me a long letter telling me why he couldn't ever meet me face to face -- because he was a 400 pound obese man who had lied to me -- I felt nothing but relief... and a great deal of love.

Long story short, we met, we married, we had two children together. We also fed each other's addiction and created a safe cocoon of codependence. My ex was one of those naturally skinny guys. The one time he wanted to lose a little weight, he cut out drinking regular Coke and switched to Diet. He lost ten pounds like he was just breathing room air. Easy peasy. He never understood the concept or idea of food as anything other than fuel.

But it isn't any easier living with a fellow addict. It may even be harder - because, while he understands and sees much more about me than a non-addict would - he also has the same or similar issues and problems he doesn't want to face any more than I do. We've both been very good at dissolving our boundaries, so much so that it becomes dangerous for both of us. I sabotage him, he sabotages me, and we slide back into the comfortable place we've always rested together.

I love Harley, and I'm blessed to have such an amazing man in my life. But sometimes I wish we weren't so much alike. I don't know how it's all going to work out - I wish a had a crystal ball. Are we meant to do this together? Is one of us meant to lead the other? Are we supposed to be buoyed up by community, by the universe, like two beached whales waiting for rescue, not sure how to find open water again? Ugh, how's that for a self-deprecating metaphor? I should quit while I'm ahead.

Some days I'd say being with Harley is what makes my life worth living. Some days, I wish for someone who wouldn't tolerate my addiction, who would call me out, force me to quit killing myself and hurting everyone around me with my pain. I know there's a middle ground between those two extremes. Story of my life. Getting there. It's painfully slow.

Joy to the World

I'm tired, but I can't sleep. Insomnia is a very strange phenomenon. And a recent one, for me. I could always sleep. Like a rock. Through a nuclear explosion. No problem. But not anymore, apparently.

Now I'm up in the wee hours, pecking away at my laptop while Harley snores beside me. I always fell asleep before Harley even started to snore. At least I know he doesn't have sleep apnea. There's looking at the glass half full, right?

The wind is blowing hard outside, whistling past the windows, and I'm thinking all of those wee-hour thoughts. Like George Bailey in It's A Wonderful Life, wondering if everyone's life would have been better if I'd never been born? I don't have any icy rivers around here to jump into... which is a good thing, because I'm pretty sure I don't have a Clarence waiting to jump in after me, either.

I got a Christmas card - first one of the season - opened it up today to the message: "May the new year bring you great joy." Joy. Wow. What in the hell is that? I think I understand the concept... I vaguely remember having that euphoric feeling a few times, maybe. The births of my children. My wedding day.

No pressure or anything, but the new year should bring me JOY? Can we aim a little lower? How about just the feeling of actually wanting to get out of bed every morning? I'd settle for that. But JOY? That feels quite foreign to me. Very out of reach. Looming in the realm of the impossible.

How often do we humans really experience joy? I mean, aside from maybe Buddha or the Dali Lama or Amma or something... those few people who seem to have been lit from the inside out... how many of us get to experience that particular emotion? Is every day a joy? One thing a week? One a month? One a year? Realistically, how often should I expect JOY to show up on my plate? (Ah there's a metaphor... slipped right in there, didn't it?)

I'd like to say I'd settle for happy. But what I really want is... joy. Euphoria. Pleasure, with a capital P. And I want it every single day. Every single moment of every single day. What? Unrealistic expectations? No one promised me a rose garden? Yeah. Right. I got it.

So the food keeps going in, the highs keep coming, and I keep longing for... more. It's never enough. Even at one in the morning, when I can't sleep and the night winds howl, and I could be outside instead of in, I could be nonexistent like George Bailey, life could always be worse, always... still, it's never enough.

This hole is bottomless. Nothing could fill it.

Intuitive Eating

I read Geneen Roth years ago. Had a wonderful therapist for a while who was all about "Making Peace with Food." And now Tribole and Resch have brought the idea of intuitive eating into more mainstream thinking. It certainly makes sense to me - although I have a problem trusting that it will work. Go figure.

I know I'm passing a lot of the "food rules" on to my kids that I was taught as a child. We were never allowed to open anything. Especially the peanut butter. But that rule went for anything - bags of chips, pop, whatever. We were never allowed to take the first or last of anything. We weren't allowed to eat anything without asking first. We weren't allowed to eat anything too close to dinner. You had to eat your dinner in order to get "dessert." You had to take at least one bite of everything on your plate, even if you knew you didn't like it. You had to sit at the table with everyone else to eat dinner. There was no food allowed in our rooms. My god, the rules about food were endless...

And they're still endless, here in my own house. I'm doing the exact same thing, I know it, to my kids, as my parents did to me. It's all the same rules, because it's all I've ever known. Granted, my kids are skinny - now. But I was skinny, too, until I hit puberty, got more freedom, and started doing what I wanted (and was told I couldn't) when it came to food.

When I read about intuitive eating, I break out into a cold sweat. I'm supposed to trust MYSELF when it comes to food? I'm supposed to trust my children to know what they want, to know when they're hungry and when they're full, and let them eat what they want, when they want? Even if they want to eat a bag of M&M's an hour before dinner? Really?

That works? That creates people who have a healthy relationship to their bodies and food? I have such a hard time trusting that's the truth.

Although logically, I know the opposite is true. Growing up with a compulsive eater (my father) who had a million rules and regulations when it came to food certainly created a person (me) who has a very UNhealthy relationship to my body and to food. So if that's true... does logic dictate the inverse is true? Is there some scientific law out there that proves that somehow?

I've been reading a lot of fat acceptance blogs lately. My favorite so far is Shapely Prose, but I've also been enjoying Unapologetically Fat, Fear & Loathing in the Kitchen and First, Do No Harm. The truth is, the idea of fat acceptance has always been anathema to me. Accept my weight? Accept my body as it is? Are you kidding me? I'd rather dream about being thin and sexy and beat myself up because I'm not those things...

and how twisted is that?

Where has it gotten me so far? Hating myself because I'm fat hasn't made me thin, that's for sure. It hasn't solved any problems, it certainly hasn't made me change my wicked, bingeing ways. Hating myself because I'm fat has just made me... hate myself. That's all. No solutions there. Just more pain, perpetuated.

I don't have an answer. Do I want to be thin? Hell yes. Will I ever be? I don't know. Can I accept that? Ugh. I don't want to. But it is what it is. Whether I can change it or not, I'm a fat woman. I can certainly say that. But can I say, I'm a fat woman, and I love myself as I am?

Damn, that's tough. How do you turn around nearly four decades of self-loathing?

Pink Elephants

I like to pretend pink elephants don't exist. I'm quite good at it, actually. I seem to have a knack for conveniently "forgetting" things, behavior, patterns. Ask Harley about my movie watching. I will "forget" a plot of a movie, so I can watch it over and over with nearly the same amount of enjoyment. If it's something I've only seen once and haven't seen for years, I will only vaguely remember the details.

When I was married to my ex, he had affair after affair. He was one of those guys who could convince you (or at least, me) that he was invisible even though he was standing right in front of you. I spent a lot of time second guessing myself in that marriage, thinking I was insane. Finally, I wised up. It took me years, of course, but eventually, the evidence piled up so high that I couldn't ignore it anymore.

But a pink elephant has to be pretty big, bright neon, and make quite a mess before I'll notice. I'm pretty sure I know why. It's easier for me to live in denial and ignore something than it is to confront someone about it and deal with it. I'd rather not know. Ignorance might be bliss, but denial keeps the peace.

I still haven't learned my lesson since divorcing my ex. Harley has faults, of course, but at least he's a grown up and is willing to look at them. That's all I ask, really. My ex insisted on staying a child, lying to avoid confrontation. Sadly, he keeps reminding me, year after year, that I made the right choice when I left. Harley, on the other hand, while he moves in what I call "glacier time" actually does make changes. Sloooooooooooooooooooooowly.

I know that the eating and food stuff isn't the "problem." It's actually been my solution. And it's been very effective, if I do say so myself. It's the thing I've been using to keep myself from seeing all my pink elephants. And it's turned me into some strange, twisted version of said elephant, so that when I look into a mirror, I don't even see myself. Who I really am. I don't know who that woman is in the mirror. I don't know if I ever did.

I'm afraid of all the things I've denied over the years. I'm afraid to open that box and look at them. That's the truth. I know stopping the food means the pain is going to come up. You can't ignore 100 pink elephants for thirty-seven years and expect them not to stomp you when you finally decide to pay attention to them again. I know I'm gonna get crushed.

I'm so not looking forward to that part.

Emotional Bypass

I am a walking couch-potato cliche, I know - a fat woman sitting in my living room watching Oprah and eating chocolate. The show? "Suddenly Skinny." How could I not tune in, right?

Gastric bypass - the thing I've been fantasizing about as a magic bullet - apparently bypasses the stomach, but it doesn't bypass the reason you were eating to the point of morbid obesity in the first place. If you can't eat your feelings anymore, what do you do? I've often thought weight loss surgery must act as some sort of catalyst, speeding up the process of dealing with the pain and fear and anxiety the compulsive eating tries to cover. Makes sense, right?

It had occurred to me, too, that perhaps you might find something else to be addicted to, if you couldn't use food to cope. But that's not the fantasy in my head. The fantasy is that being thin makes people happy - that it would make me happy. It's supposed to make everything okay again. Thinness is the "answer." Isn't it?

I didn't know, though, that it's really happening to real people out there. The reality of gastric bypass can mean the transfer of one addiction to another. From compulsive overeating to alcholism. From compulsive overeating to gambling or sex addiction. Just something else to fill the hole.

Carnie Wilson, the poster girl for gastric bypass, became an alcholic. It's seven years since her surgery, and she's been sober for two years, now. Yay her.

She said, "I can find addiction anywhere in my life. I was a born addict."

I listened to her, and I heard myself. I know I'm addict - but food feels like a "safe" addiction. It's legal. No one is going to take my license or put me in jail if I eat and drive. I need food to live, so I can rationalize a food addiction much easier than I can any other. Plus, I have a fat family, and can point to "bad genes" when it comes to my appearance.

But if I lost the weight, if I did something drastic like gastric bypass - what would happen to my addiction? Would I transfer it to something else? I'm totally not a drinker, I hate the taste of alcohol. But if I didn't have food - what would I turn to? Because I know I'd turn to something. I'd have to. What would I end up addicted to? Vicodin? Booze? What?

I said jokingly the other day that I'd rather be addicted to heroin. But... would I really rather be a heroin addict? Would I REALLY?

Carnie said, after her surgery, she started drinking, and when it got really bad, she woke up every day not knowing how she was going to stop.

But that's how I feel about food. I wake up every day not knowing how to end this. I have all the information. I know all the hows. My favorite saying by Maya Angelou, "When you know better, you do better," just doesn't seem to apply in this situation. I know better. But I can't seem to do any better. Why not?

The belief, when you go in for weight loss surgery, is that if you decrease the weight, you'll decrease the emotional pain. The reality is that when you shrink your weight without dealing with all those feelings, your pain increases. That's a paraphrase of the psychologist on Oprah today.


That's the stark reality.

And that's what I'm afraid of. That's the honest truth. I'm afraid of the pain I've buried under the food. I'm terrified of collapsing into an emotional wreck. The food is keeping me emotionally functioning (if rather numb.) Without it? I feel as if I'll end up a quivering, sobbing mass of jelly that they're going to have to pour into a straight-jacket and lock in a padded room for the rest of my life.

And I don't even know what the pain is - its source or its origin. And the truth is, I don't want to know. Losing the weight means not using the food to cover it anymore. Losing the weight means leaving myself exposed and vulnerable. Losing the weight feels like death - even though the opposite is also true as well. If I keep eating this way, I'm going to die. It's quite a difficult place to be.

Playing Games

When I was in school, there were only a few "fat kids." I didn't get heavy until I hit puberty, but after that I was one of the fat girls. In our entire high school of 2,500, there were probably only 5 or 6 of us. That's a pretty small percentage. I stood out like a purple cow in a herd of black and whites.

Today? The statistics say 15% of adolescents ages 13-19 are overweight. So in the 80's it was about 2%. Twenty years later? 15%. And it seems to be increasing exponentially.

What's wrong with this picture?

I know there's been a lot of attention focused on this topic. Every other television or radio show talks about the obesity epidemic. Kids are getting diabetes and have high cholesterol and all sorts of ailments doctors didn't see starting until mid-life. There have been lots and lots of theories about why we're getting fatter, as an entire culture. Most of them, I think, hit the tree, but miss the target. And I think most of them miss the target intentionally - because they're afraid of what it might mean in terms of changing our world, if we really looked at the underlying cause.

Queen B's theory on why we're so fat, so young?

Obesity is the direct result and cost of consumerism.

As the gap keeps growing between the poorest and richest in the Western world... so does the gap between fattest and thinnest. Why? Because it's all about quantity rather than quality, from our houses to our consumer goods to our food. We're outsourcing labor to places like India and China - because they can produce large quantities of goods at cheaper prices. We're growing food on industrialized "farms" - big agri-business it's called - and turning most of it into processed foods full of artificial flavors, chemicals, fats and sugar. Those foods we don't process, we breed to produce bigger fruits and veggies that are full of harsh pesticides and chemicals, and the meat that's sold which isn't processed is full of antiobiotics and hormones.

And we wonder why we're fat?

According to the statistics, "The world’s underfed population has declined slightly since 1980 to 1.1 billion, the number of overweight people has surged to 1.1 billion."*

Just the other day, I was wondering about my tendency to go to extremes. But it clearly isn't just me. It's a whole culture. While I was one of the only fat kids in my class at one time, I'm actually not the only fat girl anymore. Lots of people are walking around like I am - wondering what the hell happened? There's no moderation anymore. We have a nation going to extremes - either ballooning up to morbid obesity or depriving themselves to starvation. Both of them are the direct result of consumerism.

Because some part of me believes that my consumption - in this case, of food - is going to make me happy. We've been sold - literally sold - on the idea that it is the consumption of goods, food, services - those are the things that make us happy. We only give lip service to the notion of "You can't buy happiness" - but we don't really believe it, and we especially don't live it.

I saw an interview with an actor this morning who spent time on the streets with the homeless as an exercise for a role he was playing. He said something that opened my eyes. "People seem to think that life ends when you lose all your stuff - but that isn't true. Life isn't stuff. Life is life. And it goes on. People continue to be hungry, people continue to feel, to fall in love. Life still happens, no matter what."

No matter what. Whether I can walk into a store, like I did today, and afford to buy two bags of salt and vinegar potato chips and a half gallon of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Or whether I'm living in a van down by the river and eating out of garbage cans and going to soup kitchens every morning. Life goes on. Until it doesn't anymore - at least, for me. It will go on long after me, too - god willing.

The one with the most toys when they die - doesn't win. In fact, winning doesn't have anything to do with the stuff, with the food, with the consumption of anything at all. The only way to win this game - if you want to use that metaphor at all - is not to play. Because playing the consumerism game is nothing but a race against death, and it ironically gives you the life of the living-dead instead of the life of someone who is truly alive. You become a consumer zombie. It means burying yourself, your feelings, your entire life, under the stuff, the food, whatever your consumer-good of choice might be.

Remember that 80's movie, War Games, with Matthew Broderick? They're trying to teach the computer why nuclear war is a game you can't win, and to do that, they make it play tic-tac-toe over and over all by itself, until finally, finally the logic and light dawns. "The only winning move is not to play."

I'm really getting tired of this game. Aren't you?

*

Going to Extremes

Harley pointed out last night that we do a lot of "starting" and not a lot of "continuing" with this whole "diet" thing. And he also said we tend to begin going gangbusters and then sort of... peter out. Or conveniently "forget"... oh that's right, we were supposed to be eating low-carb weren't we? Oh, well, let's just order pizza... we won't eat the crust. Yeah. Right.

It's both good and bad having someone doing this thing with you. It's great support, but it can also be much easier to sabotage. So the current plan is to not go gung-ho jumping off the diet cliff this time, cleaning out the cupboards and going out to spend $500 on food like whey protein and almond flour that I'll never use anyway...

I'm tired of thinking and saying, "This time it's going to be different." This time is the same time. The only time. It's a long, continuous process of trying to figure it out and find something that works. No more "this time's" no more "No more's" either. Extremes have been, as Harley pointed out, part of the problem. I don't know that they can be part of the solution. I could "never" and "always" myself right to death - literally. What good is it really doing me?

I've always said I wished I was addicted to something I could quit. Cigarettes. Alcohol. Crack. Heroin. Anything but food. Something you could just cut out altogether and never have to deal with again. THAT I could do. But, of course, I didn't get those addictions. I got this one. I have to walk some sort of ambiguous line, and I've been doing it rather rebelliously and/or ambivilently over the years. I need food to live - but every time I make a choice about what to put in my mouth, I have to deal with the addiction. Either I give in to it, or I don't. So far, the addiction's winning. Way ahead.

And of course, having something I could just "quit" would be yet another extreme. That's part of it, too. I'm either perfect or I'm the worst at everything. I'm either eating the whole cake, or depriving myself completely. It's that pendulum swing between one and the other that I clearly have to learn to deal with. It's finding that middle way, not going to extremes, that seems to be the point.

Extreme-shmeme. :P I'd still rather be addicted to heroin.

Doctor, Doctor, It Hurts When I Do This...

Went to see a new primary care doc last Friday (3 days ago). Thin, pretty Romanian woman. With grave concern she soberly told me that I was going to die from diabetes complications and obesity if I didn't lose weight and manage my blood glucose levels better. I was shocked. Exploded the cuff on the blood pressure machine when she told me, I did. I just couldn't understand why no doc had ever told me these things before! Why hadn't I read, somewhere in the literature, that people actually died from the complications of uncontrolled diabetes and morbid obesity!

Why, I was flabbergasted, floored, shaken to my foundations! I had been liberated (yet again, for about the umpteenth time since I was a small boy) from my ignorance! I was free---free---freeeee! Finally, I could book that scuba expedition, buy that kayak, put that big order in with my broker for Speedo stock!

Fact is, addicts are never motivated by death, fear of death, or loss of this, that or the other. I'm an addict. I know this from experience. I have the most beautiful amazing children and wife in the world, yet neither fear of loss of them, nor fear of the pain I would cause them to die so meaningless a death from complications of diabetes and morbid obesity, have motivated me to get healthy.

Sorry, doc.

So fear of death and loss ain't gonna do it for me. Oh, and I should mention that my mother and father tried to instill deep shame and guilt in me, and even though they were quite successful, shame and guilt have not done it for me, either.

What's the motivator? It would be easy to give the histrionic cry of, "I don't know!" But that ain't it, either.

What I know, in the depths of my heart, is that the only motivator is feeling in my heart the real truth that I am part of something greater than myself...god, love, the Infinite Heart. The last chapter of the book in the 12 Steps is revealed to us in the first five words of Step 12, "Having had a spiritual awakening..."

So, that makes my primary sin pride, self-centeredness, hubris. I cut myself off from god, love, the Infinite Heart that connects us all and everything as one. I continue to cut myself off from that Source because I believe that I am less worthy of that love than everyone...anyone...else. How twisted is that? My imperfection is worse than everyone else's imperfection, my shadow is darker and deeper than your shadow, my demons are bigger than your demons!

Hell, that's obnoxious and annoying - even to me. What a childish ass. I wouldn't want to give love in any form to that guy. Yet that's exactly what he needs. He needs someone (a father would be good) who would stand there and wait for eternity for him to bow his head to the least of himself so he can free himself from the prison of being cut off from what he loves most. God.

I would like to write that I have a plan and I am going to follow it come hell or high water. I could, I suppose...both write it and do it. Despite the stereotype of fat people, I am not weak-willed, stupid or lazy. I don't need victory. I need surrender. I need to feel in my bones that this is the only battle in my life in which surrender is the only way to "win." I need humility to accept what I don't want to accept, that I am no lesser or greater a part of this amazing universe than anyone or anything else. I also need a plan, but that's secondary. If I devise a cunning plan and follow it with addict's pride and no real humilty, I will subvert my own cunning plan and set myself up to prove that I'm just a worthless unlovable addict.

So, as I started out writing about the evil ol' doc visit at the start of this "diet," I end up realizing that this path, for me, is a spiritual awakening, or at least an opportunity for one, an opportunity to step outside of my broken-record addictive thinking that seeks only safety, comfort and security.

Now, what are those first 11 steps again...

*Sigh*...I give up. I think I'll go Google 'Navy Seal OA Sponsors from Hell.'

Semi-funny self-deprecating humor aside, I would be grateful for any prayers.

Also, so as to do something along with praying while I am stuck in a rowboat in the middle of the ocean, I'll row. Two things have worked for me in the past: 1) a low-carb, high protein food plan and way of eating and 2) Eckhart Tolle. I'll try and bring a plan and a spiritual practice together in my next entry and see what happens. Finally, a sponsor would be a good thing to add...oh, and maybe OA meetings. There's a concept. More on that later, too.

In this moment, I want God and vast quantitites of venison jerky.

The King has left the building.

Off to See the Wizard

I'm a smart girl. I've got a bachelors in mumblemumble and a Masters in blahblah. I know quite a lot about nutrition, actually. I know the basics, of course: eat less, exercise more. But I also know all the other stuff, about transfat and omega 3's and 6's and good carbs and bad carbs and mixing up your exercise and... well, all that stuff. I'm not stupid. I listen, I pay attention, I'm teachable. I learn. I've managed to pull a near 4.0 in a college degree program and write a Masters thesis.

So why is it that, when I decide to change my eating habits for the better, because all the logical signs point to doing so, I start out with the best of intentions, and end up with this:

What is this, you ask?

It's a plate that used to hold the rest of my fourteen-year-old son's birthday cake. I ate the rest of the cake last night. After my best-laid plans changed, and we ended up taking the fourteen year old out to dinner (to celebrate his report card - all A's and B's for the first time since kindergarten!) where I tried to be "good" but ended up eating fries and a burger. Then, we picked up the seventeen-year-old and went out for "dessert" at McDonald's, so she could hang out and play with the Prince and Princess in the playplace. I didn't intend to get anything. But somehow ended up with a Reese's McFlurry in my hands.

Then, when we got home, I felt sick. So what did I do? I followed my inner Marie Antoinette all the way to the kitchen and decided to eat cake. Except "decided" isn't really the word. It's more like I was possessed. Like the girl in the Exorcist. I wasn't myself. Ask Harley - my head was spinning, and I looked like I could spew pea soup at any minute. Really. So what happened was, my inner Linda Blair followed my inner Marie Antoinette and they had a little celebrity pig-out party at my expense...

And this morning, I'm feeling sick and guilty and ashamed and disappointed and defeated. Again. Again. Again. How does this keep happening? How can I be so smart and so stupid all at the same time? Logic seems to say, if I was a normal person, I could do this. I could set goals and accomplish them. That I can't seem to do something so incredibly simple makes me wonder. Is it me? Is it something else? Is something in me just... broken?

I know I'm a food addict. And "addiction" has a huge relapse rate, no matter what the substance. In fact, relapse seems to be part of the process of what they call "recovery." I tried doing OA (Overeaters Anonymous) for a while. You know - meetings, the Big Book, the Twelve Steps, getting a sponsor. The whole kit and kaboodle. I threw myself into it as hard as I ever did at Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig or Medical Weight Loss or the Cabbage Diet. I lost (like I always do!) 10-20 pounds. And then I started "cheating." And gaining again.

But something from that particular program stuck with me. The first three steps of the twelve. (That was as far as I got... step three!)

1. We admitted we were powerless over food — that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

Now, I have to tell you... I struggled with these three steps. I struggled with the concept that these three steps even existed in a world of medical and biological "cures" to our every ailment. But something else in me, something deeper than my inner Marie Antoinette and Linda Blair - something in me said, "Hey, stupid! Pay attention!"

I could argue with these steps from now until the cows come home (or until I die, 500 lbs and still eating cake, of a heart attack.) I've even given it a shot. The first step makes me wince. What do you mean I'm 'powerless' over food? I can stop any time I want! )Why does that sound so familiar? Hmmm) It goes straight to the heart of willpower and control. Of which, I clearly have none. My will has gotten me absolutely nowhere. Or, more to the point, it's gotten me straight into the cookie jar.

Step two introduces the concept of a "higher power." Eek! I've never been a big "God" person. I have sisters who are extremely, fundamentally religious, and the concept has always been shoved down my throat strongly proselytized in my family. However, over the years, I've come slowly to my own version of spirituality. It doesn't involve a big, scary parental God, but it does acknowledge something greater than myself. So step 2 finally became do-able for me.

Step three, on the other hand. *sigh* I get rather stuck there, I admit. Turn my life over... to someone else? Ack! Where's that cake?

Back to step one. Admit you have a problem. Okay, it's true. I'm a food addict. I seem to have no control over that. I have no control over food, and my life has become almost three hundred pounds high cholesterol thyroid disease very unmanageable. I need help. If I'm not going to resort to weight loss surgery, I'm going to have to go even higher. Hello, God, Are You Out There, It's Me, Queen B!

Now it's just the matter of turning my will over... How does a control freak let go of control? *sigh* Good question. Anyone have an answer? I told myself I was going to keep blogging, even if I slipped. Even if I was ashamed, even if I f---ed up failed. I was going to keep blogging. I read all sorts of blogs about people doing it, succeeding, and I desperately want to be one of them... but I know I have to find my way. This process has to be useful to someone. Somehow.

It's a matter of life and death for me. I have to find a way. Maybe the answer really is to stop looking for a way and let go. Surrender my "will" to something greater than myself. Because my will seems to get me into nothing but trouble. Stop trying to lead and just follow. Follow the yellow brick road. Follow, follow, follow.

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain...

Here we go again.

Shopping

I went shopping yesterday. I went shopping because I now have only one pair of pants that fits. One. My thighs have destroyed all of my others. I think I could power most of the Eastern seaboard with the friction caused between my thighs rubbing together when I walk. :)

I hate clothes shopping. I hate the thought of spending outrageous amounts of money on clothes made overseas by people making pennies a day. I hate that the clothes fall apart withing months. I also hate not being able to go into secondhand stores with the hopes of finding anything that might fit me. Not an option.

Because, as I discovered yesterday in the Plus side of Fashion Bug, I'm now a 28W. I have never been a 28. The highest I've been was a 26. The lowest, at least in adulthood, was an 18. I miss 18. But 28? There's just no higher to go. Yes, there's the elusive 30/32, whatever that is. I hardly ever glance at that size, thinking, "Oh, that's not me."

But it could be. It's just the next size up. Another twenty pounds or so. Three more candy bars and four cokes a day. That's nothing. Easy.

I also spent a while looking longingly at 14/16's on the clearance rack. It's always those left at the end. Because, really, why would you be in a Plus size store if you're a 14? You'd shop in a regular store. Or, at least, I would, if I could. But I haven't been in a regular clothing store since I was a teenager. Even then, nothing in TJ Maxx fit me anyway.

I remember my ex husband's mother once saying, on the occasion of her friend seeing her Lane Bryant charge card in her wallet, "Oh I don't shop there for myself. I use it to buy clothes for my daughter-in-law." She didn't want anything to think she shopped at a fat person's store - god forbid!

I don't even think about the "other side" of the store anymore, honestly. When I was younger, I spent the whole time wishing I could shop on that side, where all the cute clothes were. The fashionable, trendy little dresses, the tiny panties. Who fits in those? Barbie? I can't even imagine being that girl, the one who could fit into a 10, an 8... a 6? Feh! Are you kidding?

I remember being in a mall when I was a kid, shopping with a girlfriend who went into the 5, 7, 9 store. It was the first time I had ever seen a size "0." It was like baby clothes to me. Bizarre, strange, completely out of reach.

I don't know if there's a thin person in me trying to get out. I really don't know.

Well, that's not completely true. There IS a thin person in there who wants to wear a size six and be able to fit in airplane seats without the seatbelt extension and movie theater seats without wedging myself in. Sure. I just don't know if I can find her under all the candy bar wrappers and cheesecake boxes. It seems like an overwhelming task, when you look at it from a distance, like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

Is she in there? I think so.

My secret truth is... I hope so.

And most importantly... I really do hope I get to meet her some day.

Waking Up Is Hard To Do

Welcome to my part of our weight-loss, health, diet, eating blog.

This may be a little unorthodox. Just a warning, not an apology.

I'm an addict, but I'm also a lot more than an addict. I deeply feel that each one of us is truly a particularly formed and miraculous manifestation of god, of the source from which we came, to which we will ultimately return, and which we are a unique expression of in this present moment.

I wish I treated myself as if that were true.

I'm very smart, yet I don't fully grasp how it is that I treat myself as less of a person than I treat others most of the time. My calling in life, and my current occupation, is to help others really feel the truth of who they are, their divine source and nature, their unity as part of all that was, is and will ever be. I do this with other addicts whose substances of "choice" are drugs and alcohol, and with people dealing with various forms of mental illness, from the severe to the amusingly neurotic. I feel hypocritical about this sometimes, but, the thing is, I'm very good at it, I help people on a deep level to make change in their lives.

I'm also quite cocky in some ways (if you didn't notice) despite my shortcomings...as a matter of fact, I have a secret part of myself that feels I'm so special that I'm both worse and better than other people. I've got both ends of the spectrum covered! That part of me isn't in charge as often as it used to be, but one minute with that arrogant prick at the helm can wreak enough havok for 100 years. I've hurt a lot of people that I love, including myslef. That part of me is actually the little boy part I will speak of in a moment or two pretending to be a mature man.

I'm resentful about having this particular problem in life....obesity, compulsive overeating, an unconscious alcoholic, sexually and physically abused, sadistic and passively abusive mother who raised me and shoved food down my throat so she would feel she existed, was loved, in control of everything and wouldn't have to deal with her own feelings.

I realize that, even if my Hansel-and-Gretel Witch of a mother was to blame for making me morbidly obese, I am 100% fully responsible for my mind, body, soul, spirit and heart in this and every moment. No one can attend to me but me. I also realize I am not that little boy anymore, and that my mother is a whole person and the Devouring Witch is only part of who she is, the part she needed to pretend she was in order to make herself feel safe and in control. I also realize that the people-pleasing, love-seeking, spoiled and stubborn boy was what I became in order to survive the emotional and physical abuse that my mother unconsciously passed onto me.

My father is a dependent and physically small man (5'3" and only slightly overweight when he ran the ice cream parlor on the aircraft carrier on which he served in the navy, just at the end of the Korean war) and wasn't willing to challenge my mother's over-feeding of me for fear she would be angry at him. My father's father died when my father was very young, and my father was raised by a stepfather. His stepfather was a good man, but I know that men who didn't know their fathers are left with a hole inside that is hard to heal and they feel as if they are lost, incompetent and don't have what it takes to live their best lives. That's my dad...he is a good man, but didn't psychologically leave his mother and grow up, so now my mother is his mother.

I think every ounce of unnecessary fat is an ounce of sadness, anger, hurt and unlived life.

I think I'm using more resources in the world than I'm giving.

My life is ruled by the message that I have to choose between myself and others, and only one of us gets to exist. I have to manipulate, steal, cheat and lie in order to get any love for myself, which I have done ad nauseum. I know that my obesity and compulsive overeating in large part (pun intended) is an unconscious assertion of my right to exist and take up space in the world.

That's right, in my heart, there is a part of me behind the curtain that feels like I have no right to exist, so I keep getting and staying large as a way to say Fuck You! to a world that rejects and doesn't want me for anything but a garbage can.

Here's some history:

I'm an almost-40-yr-old caucasian male, married, with children. I'm 390 pounds and 5'11". I've been diagnosed as an insulin dependent Type 1 diabetic since age 20 (I have poor blood sugar control).

I was born fat and have just kept getting fatter since then. Although, I seem to have plateaued at about 390.

Maybe I'll insert more of my childhood history in the future.

I played sports my entire childhood and was very good at them, despite being 215 pounds by the end of high school. Being exceptionally good at everything I did...hockey, wrestling, baseball, academics, art, socializing...blah blah blah...helped me stay in denial of my addiction and health problems until pretty recently, when my life began to unravel and fall apart in many ways (perhaps to be discussed in more detail later). Don't let anyone ever tell you that hitting bottom is about losing things in life...it's about waking up from denial.

I consider my addiction a battle in which the only way of winning is to surrender, and the only enemy is denial, not food, eating, or my body. As long as I live with the belief that I have one iota of control in life I am at risk of allowing my addiction to run my life.

My mother was morbidly obese by the time she was a teenager, and then she lost wieght through diet and exercise, achieved a "normalish" weight, and hasn't really been obese since then. My maternal grandmother, Nanna, was morbidly obese, diabetic, and died of a heart attack due to diabetes. My mother's side of the family has serious obesity, as well as alcoholism, various and sundry kinds of abuse, and paranoid schizophrenia.

My father's side has diabetes, heart disease, multiple sclerosis, a little bit of cancer, and a massive heaping helping of downright evil codependency.

That's enough for now. I have this strange paradox of working very hard and yet not doing enough. I'm tired and Queenie is nudging me from our bed.

That's another thing...life really is beautiful and amazing, and I have an amazing wife and children. I'm deeply grateful for what the universe has given me...yet, I'm also deeply unsatisfied with the resevoir of unlived life I've hoarded.

What do you call two MD's standing next to each other?

A paradox...get it...a pair-a-docs!

If I can only learn to use my powers for good instead of e-ville!