onceafatgirl

Peace is better than chocolate

Archive for the category “Life”

08 Jul 2012

If you take your toys and go home, there is nobody to play with

In my last post I went on and on about how I have all of this self-confidence and self-assurance. So obviously this week life slapped me in the face and reminded me that I’m an insecure fat girl. You saw that coming, right? (I didn’t. Could you give a girl a heads up next time? ‘Preciate ya…)

I have mentioned before that for most of my life, I shut my heart down. Even with my food under control, I didn’t let anyone into my fortress. When I lost my fortress of fat, I still maintained a fortress of bitch. Over the years, I have mostly given that up. (Mostly.) It makes me feel bad to treat others badly. Protecting myself at the expense of someone else’s feelings makes me want to eat a chocolate cake. So I try to be gentle. To have room for other people’s humanity. To remember that they are just people in the world doing the best they can. Same as me.

But I also have another fortress.  This one is hard to let go of. Because it works so well. It keeps me so safe. It is a fortress of indifference. Of untouchability. It is an amazing ability I have to stop caring. Really. If I feel like you are going to hurt me, I can stop caring about you in an instant. I can turn it off and shut it down and put you away like an old shirt I don’t wear anymore. I call it “taking my toys and going home”. And I have a promise with God that I won’t do it anymore. Especially with men.

There’s this man that I like. We’re not seeing each other. You know, it’s complicated. It’s totally impractical. So technically, we’re friends. (I think.) But I have been thinking that maybe eventually we might be more than friends. Because as impractical as it is, I think he may be worth navigating the complications and the trouble. And I thought he was interested in me too. Which is hard for me to admit to you right now because I have Carrie’s mom doing that kaleidoscope thing in my head. The one right before Carrie goes all telekinetic. They’re all gonna laugh at you. They’re all gonna laugh at you. Especially because of the next part of the story.

I was on Facebook the other day. And there was a conversation between him and a friend of his. Was it any of my business? No. But it was out in the open on a social networking site. And I read it. And it made me feel awful. At first I didn’t register why. All I knew was that I wanted to go smoke a cigarette. More than that, for the first time in almost a month, I actually considered smoking a cigarette. But I don’t do that anymore. (Stupid promise with God…) So I had to look at the awful feeling. And I realized that it hurt because it sounded like the way he saw it, there was no room for me in his life. It made me feel invisible. Unseen. Like he didn’t even know that I existed. So I wanted to shut off my heart. I wanted to stop caring. I wanted to take my toys and go home. But I don’t do that anymore either. (More stupid promises with stupid God…) So I had to ask him about it. And in asking, I had to admit that I thought that he was interested in me. That I had entertained the notion that I might be good enough for another human being. One that I think has a lot to offer. And that was hard to do. That was frankly terrifying. But I did it. (Stupid God.)

The truth is, I still don’t know where I stand with him. And I don’t love that, but I can be with it. That’s between him and me. (And it is, by the way, between him and me. The purpose of this post is not to solicit love and/or dating advice. Especially from “the internet”. I have friends for that.) And what I decide to do about my relationship with him, for myself and my own life, is between God and me. The purpose of this post is to talk about the part that’s between me and me.

I was not wrong about my self-assurance in my last post. I was not exaggerating about my confidence level. When it comes to my integrity, I’m confident. When I ask myself if I’m the kind of person I want to be, the answer is definitely yes. If I ask myself if I like and respect myself, there is not a doubt in my mind that I do. I even think that I would make somebody a good companion and partner.

The insecurity that this brought up is about the belief that I have that I am fundamentally unlovable. Fundamentally. Like I’m broken. Damaged. Faulty.  And not that something happened to make me unlovable. But that I was made that way. Born that way. That never being loved is my inescapable destiny. I have held this belief for as long as I can remember.  It is not rational, of course. But is not meant to be. It does not even masquerade as rational. It lives in me like survival instinct.

To dare to like someone is shameful. To expect, or really even to hope, that someone would be interested in me feels unforgivable. But to have someone find out that I was so presumptuous as to believe that they would think I was worthy of being loved sets off warning signals in my brain. Danger! Retreat!

But here’s what else I know. Until recently, I never let any relationship with a man come to its natural conclusion. Until recently I never just went along and let myself feel about someone the way I felt about them. Or let someone feel about me the way they felt about me. I never just let myself be hurt if I was going to be hurt. I never risked the humiliation. At the first sign of trouble, I always took my toys and went home. I never stopped to face the danger.

When I was the one who walked away, I took the power away from any other person to hurt me. But I took the power away from them to love me too. So I didn’t get love. And I didn’t get companionship. And I didn’t stop being lonely. Instead of getting hurt by someone else, I suffered at my own hand. I fed that thought that says I’m broken. I fed that belief that says that I will be alone. Forever. That it is my destiny. (Yes. It’s totally in The Emperor’s voice, in case you were thinking that.)

See, I have all of these promises with God. No sugar. No cigarettes. No drama. No lying. No taking my toys and going home. No trying to escape life. No trying to escape being present. No trying to escape personal relationships. I have all of these promises with God that I will actually be in my life. But God has made me a promise too. A promise that’s scary to admit to you. Because what if I’m wrong. And what if I really am broken. But He promises that if I show up for love, that he’ll send me love. So here I am. And here are my toys. And I’m ready to play.

 

I would love for you to share my blog. Any time! And you can also follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5

Posted in Inspiration, Life, Relationships and tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment
01 Jul 2012

Well, that was unexpected

The post I want to write today is about quitting smoking. And I’m having issues with that.  I keep thinking, “I don’t want this to turn into a quitting smoking blog.” But the truth is that smoking and eating have a lot to do with each other for me. I did them for basically the same reason. Because I don’t like to feel my feelings. So I am going to write this anyway.
There was a good reason why smoking took the edge off of the food cravings when I stopped eating sugar. It numbed the same feelings that sugar did. Actually it numbed some of the same feelings that sugar did. Over the past 3 weeks, which feelings those are has become apparent to me.
Before I get into cigarette feelings, there is something I want to explain.  When I stopped eating sugar/eating compulsively, I got this profound level of self-assurance. It did not happen overnight. It was a long and subtle process. But getting control of my food eliminated nearly all of my self-doubt. I have come to understand from looking back on the past 6 1/2 years, that it is the result of a combination of things. The rigorous honesty that I began to practice, first with my food, then with everything else. My commitment to keeping my promises. (Again it started with food and extended into all other areas of my life.) My willingness to be responsible for all of my actions, good, bad or indifferent, which I had to do because not doing so gave me feelings I couldn’t handle without eating cake. And finally the mental clarity that came from not being high anymore. All of these things came together and gave me a new relationship to the truth. Not just my honesty and my own truth, but to the truth in general.
When I was eating compulsively, I was a liar. And I was easy to lie to.  You know that saying “You can’t kid a kidder”? I think it’s wrong wrong wrong…It was like my own lies muddled up my brain and muddied my thinking.  They kept me from seeing reality. You could tell me something that obviously didn’t make sense, and I would notice, but I would always have to question myself. I always had to question my own thinking. But when I stopped lying, that stopped.  Also, I wasn’t high anymore. On either sugar, or the obsession with food. (Yes, for me the obsession was its own kind of high, related to, but not the same as, the sugar high.) I had a clear head, and I was telling the truth. It slowly but surely became clear to me that the truth was obvious. That it was silly to question myself.
The same thing happened with my own bad behavior. When I was being an a**hole, I had a hard time distinguishing bad behavior in others. The kind of actions that now occur to me as red flags, would totally escape my notice. But when I started treating myself and others with respect and honor, disrespect and dishonor became glaringly obvious. Sirens and flashing lights.
Getting control of my eating also had me become a person I liked and respected. So there was no question in my mind anymore that I didn’t deserve to be treated badly. That I deserved honesty, honor, and respect. It wasn’t that I never did anything wrong. It was that I knew when I did something wrong and when I didn’t.  And that when I had done something wrong, I was willing to own it and do the right thing. I stopped questioning myself. I stopped thinking myself in circles. I got an incredible confidence in my own judgment.
So back to cigarettes. And what kinds of feelings I used them to numb. They were “Good Girl” feelings. They were feelings about not being good enough. About wanting to be liked. About not wanting to do anything wrong. And not wanting to upset anyone.
Here is the pattern from when I was smoking. I would do something that seemed to me to be totally normal and not particularly worthy of notice. Someone would offer some subtle hint of disapproval. Subtle. Easy to pretend that I was not affected by it. I would tense up. I would not look to see if it had any merit. I would hold it in until I had a chance to smoke it. I would pretend it did not happen and I was not hurt.
The first time I went to the grocery store after I quit smoking, I left the store and immediately wanted to light a cigarette. I realized that I always lit a cigarette as soon as I left the store. I realized that I have been denying the fact that the checkout women at my grocery store are mean to me. The ways they show it are easy enough to ignore. If I can go smoke those feelings as soon as I’m out the door.
So that first time I had to face that those women are sneering and unpleasant with me, I cried. And then it hit me that I have been going to that store for years. And that I get a little panic and a little dread every time I go to check out. And that I have been doing all sorts of things to make myself more accommodating to them. And less annoying to them. Doing things to get through the checkout line faster. And that I have been stressed out about it. For years.
And when I couldn’t smoke it, and I had to face it, I finally thought, Why do I give a sh*t what these women think of me? I am giving their store my money. I’m not there to be liked. I’m there to do business. And I did, indeed, stop giving a sh*t. I stopped dreading. I stopped taking actions to make my shopping easier on them. I stopped stressing about checking out. I got peaceful.
I live in New York City where the streets are filled with people whose job it is to solicit donations for not-for-profits. I used to get really uptight when I would have to pass these people on the street. I would get edgy and stressed out wondering how to get past them without them talking to me. How to not make eye contact. How to look busy. How to look rushed or focused. How to get by unnoticed. And all of a sudden I am so calm when I walk by. I smile. I tell them I am not going to talk to them. I just say no and keep walking. No big deal. Just no.
These are seemingly small or trivial examples of the kind of shift that has gone on for me this past 3 weeks. But the peace and confidence that I’m describing does not occur in my life or my head or my heart as small.  Some parts of it make sense. Not smoking has meant I have had to look at things I was able to avoid by smoking them. But other parts of it don’t make rational sense to me right now. The generally being more calm and worrying less. I mean, isn’t that why I smoked? To calm down?
Maybe it’s being more present than I have ever been in my life that has me so self-assured. Maybe it’s that following through on my commitment has given me more self-esteem. Maybe, like when I stopped eating, as time goes by, the how and the why will become clear. But I like this whole happier, saner, more serene life. I am grateful I decided to quit smoking. I wish I could say I would have done it sooner if I had known it would be this emotionally freeing. But I know that’s not how it works. I know it’s everything in its own time.
Posted in Life and tagged , , , | Leave a comment
23 Jun 2012

Because sometimes life sucks and people are a**holes

I am a very ritualistic person. I always have been. I like structure. Rituals and structure have always made me feel safe. But since I got my eating under control, one of the things I had to learn was to create rituals and structures that allow me to feel safe when my rituals and structures get interrupted. Because life will be life. And sh*t will inevitably hit the fan. Maybe not today. But some day. And life will keep moving forward. And it will take me with it.

When life used to move forward, it took me kicking and screaming. I insisted that it drag me. There was a kind of heroic martyrdom to it in my twisted eating disorder brain. I was going to be unhappy on principle! It was how I showed that I was principled. That I was dedicated. It really did occur to me as noble to be so stubborn. It never registered for me that I was dedicated to my own unhappiness. And to making other people unhappy by my drama and complaining.

And I took everything personally. I took the weather personally. I felt like anything that didn’t go the way I intended, or really even just the way I wanted, was a slight from whatever poor schmuck happened to be involved. And if nobody was involved, it was a slight from God. I was incredibly self-centered, in case you hadn’t gathered that by now.

So now I have a very important ritual that I do every morning. I call it my morning meditation. And sometimes I do actually meditate. But the point of this ritual is very specific. It’s a time when I be still and remember that life is going exactly the way it is supposed to. That there is only one way for life to go, and that is the way that it is going. If there were any other way for it to go, it would be going that way instead. (I know. For someone who doesn’t spend much time actually meditating, it’s a very Zen philosophy.) There are a few different ways that I do this. But I do it every morning. Because it helps to keep me from martyrdom, panic, resentment. You know, all the things that make me want to eat a chocolate cake.

Sometimes I make a promise to God that whatever happens that day, I will honor it as His will. I don’t promise to like it. I just promise to honor it. To accept that it is what it is. And that if it’s yucky, or upsetting, or painful, to not take it personally. That life is not always easy. That it’s like that for everybody.

And that includes everything. Train delays, people being rude, losing things, spilling coffee on myself, making mistakes. Sometimes life sucks. Sometimes people are a**holes. Sometimes I’m one of them.

The making mistakes/being an a**hole thing is the hardest for me to deal with. Since I have gotten control of my eating, I find it relatively easy to be philosophical when I have done my best to plan and prepare, to do good work and be a good person, and things just don’t work out anyway. But it’s not so easy for me to be calm about things going wrong when I have fallen short on my end. My first reaction is still to look for someone else to blame, or to torture and shame myself. But when I agree to honor whatever happens as God’s will, my only option is to accept it, fix it as best I can, and move on. To let it be and let it go. I am not always good at this. But by making this promise to God in the morning, I give up the right to get all dramatic about it. I’m not saying I never do. But I give up the right. I agree that there is no justification for resentment, martyrdom, or self-pity.

Sometimes I say the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi.  There are a few versions of it. But this is the one I say:

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace – that where there is hatred, I may bring love – that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness – that where there is discord, I may bring harmony – that where there is error, I may bring truth – that where there is doubt, I may bring faith – that where there is despair, I may bring hope – that where there are shadows, I may bring light – that where there is sadness, I may bring joy. Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted – to understand, than to be understood – to love, than to be loved. For it is by self-forgetting that one finds. It is by forgiving that one is forgiven. It is by dying that one awakens to Eternal Life. Amen.

The reason I like it is that it reminds me that if I want peace (and I do want peace), I have to bring the peace. That it’s my responsibility to bring the good stuff. Not to sit around and judge everybody else for not doing it. Not to try to micro-manage the world and point out how everybody else is doing it wrong. It is not “Lord, make everybody else peaceful so I don’t have to deal with their bullsh*t today.” It’s “Lord, make me a channel of thy peace. That where there is hatred I may bring love.” Again, I don’t always succeed at this. But when this is how I start my morning, I have a better chance of bringing something worthwhile into the world.

And sometimes I just be quiet and trust that God is taking care of me. And remember that God has always taken very good care of me when I have let Him. When I have stopped fighting, resisting, being angry. I remember that when I don’t insist on being dragged, kicking and screaming, there’s no dragging, kicking, or screaming. That there’s peace. And that I lead a pretty sweet life.

My morning meditation doesn’t take a lot of time. Between 5 and 15 minutes. Nothing really in terms of my time. But it makes a huge difference in my life. It helps me manage my feelings instead of eating them. Or drinking them. Or smoking them. And in case you are wondering, I have not had a cigarette since my birthday on the 6th. So hooray for morning meditation for that too!
You should always always feel free to share my blog! Or to follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5
Posted in Inspiration, Life and tagged , , , | Leave a comment
16 Jun 2012

Commitment, surrender, and God’s totally effed up sense of humor

There were two things that I had to figure out before I could make a lasting change for my life around food: commitment and surrender.

Commitment was where I had to agree, between me and God, that  circumstances and situations had no bearing on whether or not I would stay within my food boundaries. I had to recognize that there would always always be some reason to cross them. That even the most paltry excuse could be rationalized. That even the most valid reason would still lead me straight back to bulimia, 300 lbs, misery, and insanity.

And I have kept my food boundaries through some crazy things. 2 years ago my grandmother, who was the love of my life, got sick. She passed away about 4 months later. About a week after that, my favorite aunt, who was also my godmother, and way too young to die, was diagnosed with cancer, and again, was gone within about 4 months. That was a hard year for me. From April to November I did a lot of crying. But I stayed within my food boundaries. While they were in hospitals, nursing homes, hospice care. During regular updates from my parents about their rapid deteriorations. At their funerals. Throughout the traveling back and forth to my hometown. It didn’t matter that I was sad. It didn’t matter that life sucked. The only thing that mattered when it came to my food was that I had boundaries and a commitment to stay within them.

Would you have blamed me if I had eaten a chocolate cake? Probably not, right? But I had made an agreement with God. That circumstances and situations have nothing to do with my food. That my feelings have nothing to do with my food. That my life has nothing to do with my food.

The other part was surrender. Surrender was when I stopped asking why. Why me? Why do I have to give up sugar to be happy? Why do I have to have boundaries? Why can’t I just eat like a normal person? I stopped complaining. It’s not fair. It’s hard. It’s too much. It’s too rigid. Nobody else has to do this. People are going to think I’m weird. I stopped looking for it to be easy. I stopped wishing for it to be convenient. I accepted that I had been given a solution, and stopped trying to renegotiate the terms. I surrendered to it exactly the way it was. And surrender brought me peace. Is there something better or easier or more convenient out there? The truth is I don’t know. And I don’t care. I have no desire to give up my solution for even a moment in order to find out. That’s what I mean by surrender.

So let’s get to God, and His totally effed up sense of humor.

If you don’t know, I quit smoking 11 days ago. I made a commitment to myself and God. And I surrendered to the fact that smoking is just not something I do anymore. I think having a point of reference with food probably made it easier to do it with cigarettes. But commitments get tested. That’s actually the definition of a commitment if you think about it. If it didn’t take something, some strength or honor, to make and keep it, it would be called something else.

Ok, backtrack two weeks. I was still smoking at the time. One night, I was physically threatened, by a man I was becoming friends with. He told me he had no reservations about punching me in the face. (Over this blog, actually. Which I still don’t understand…) Needless to say, I walked away. It was obvious that we weren’t going to be friends, and I didn’t think too much about it after that.

A few days later, on my 35th birthday, I quit smoking, as was the plan. The smoking itself wasn’t so hard to give up. I didn’t miss it. I had already changed my thinking about it. I had committed and surrendered. But the feelings were pretty awful. Just regular life feelings. But they were hard to deal with. It became clear to me that I had been smoking those feelings. And now I didn’t have cigarettes to numb them anymore.

And then a week after I quit, I got a text message from the guy who threatened me. He wanted to know if we could reconcile. I was gracious. But I told him no. And I went to bed.

I woke up to a series of progressively more upsetting texts from him. Amorous texts. Too forward. Too intimate to come from someone I had never touched or kissed or even been on a date with. Or whose last words to me had been violent. The texts scared me. So much that I went to the police station after work. (After dinner actually. Because food first. Always.) I filed a harassment report.

But I could practically hear God. “It’s only been a week. So I’m wondering. How committed are you, Kate? How about if I make you scared for your safety? Those are some pretty intense feelings, huh? You still not gonna smoke?”

Yes, God. I’m still not gonna smoke. But you do realize that you are totally twisted, right?

“Oh, yeah. I know. But I’m proud of you, Kate. I honor your commitment and surrender. You’re doing good work.”

Part of me wants to tell God to go to hell, of course. But there is another part of me that is grateful. Because this experience has actually been an opportunity. Because by honoring my commitment not to smoke in the face of real fear, I get a look at how powerful I am. I get a boost to my self-esteem. And I get to recognize that I can make the choice that no circumstance, situation, and maybe more importantly, no person, gets a say in how I live my life.

Of course I would love it if you would share this blog! Or follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5

Posted in Inspiration, Life, Relationships and tagged , , , , | Leave a comment
09 Jun 2012
1 Comment

If I love food so much, why don’t I marry it?

I love to eat. I love to eat now even more than when I was eating sugar. Because now I eat without guilt or shame. I am not one of those people who used to “live to eat”, but learned how to “eat to live”. I still live to eat. I did not suddenly stop caring about food. I’m pretty sure that I will never become indifferent to eating. It’s just that now I eat within my strict boundaries. Besides not eating sugar and simple carbohydrates, one of my rules (I have many food rules, by the way) is that I eat 3 meals a day. Breakfast, lunch and dinner. That’s it. I don’t eat in between those meals. So in between those meals, I have a life. Usually that’s good. Sometimes it’s hard. But whether it’s good or it’s hard, my life between meals is not about being obsessed with food. And that is a miracle. That affords me the opportunity to absolutely love to eat! When it’s time to eat.

When I was eating compulsively, food and I were in an abusive relationship. I let food be my best friend, my lover, my closest companion. But it made me miserable. It made me hate myself. The food I was eating gave me a body that I hated and was ashamed of. But I “loved” my food. I couldn’t live without it, even though it was beating me up emotionally and physically. So every time I ate, I was simultaneously comforted and tortured. Relieved and anxious. Quieted and tormented. And I ate constantly. Or if I wasn’t eating, I was thinking about eating. So I was in a constant state of confusion. I was having a love/hate relationship with both food and myself. 24 hours a day.

And then there were the rare “diets”. I didn’t go on many of them in my life. But I did go on a few. When you grow up morbidly obese, you end up getting “put” on a few diets. And they always occurred to me as a punishment for being fat, not as an opportunity to be healthy. I never felt like I was being offered help or kindness. And I always hated the food. Partly because I wanted sugar to get me high. I was used to getting high from eating. And partly because eating a diet consisting almost entirely of sugar and simple carbohydrates for most of my life deadened my palate. Fruits and vegetables had no taste. In fact, for much of my life, fruit was not sweet. I didn’t just eat grapefruit with sugar, I ate strawberries with sugar. When people would say something was “too sweet”, I couldn’t understand what that could possibly mean. Sweet was the most important trait of a food. That was like saying something was “too delicious”.

Plus, on these diets, it was often explained to me (by doctors or nutritionists, etc.) that I didn’t have to give up sugar.  I just had to eat it in moderation.  But I could never eat sugar or simple carbohydrates “in moderation”. That is a skill I do not possess. So once I ate a moderate portion of something, it was followed by…well, basically, a chocolate cake. And the diet was over.

It took a while for my palate to change back to normal when I stopped eating sugar. Eating real food was not entirely satisfying, flavor-wise, in the beginning. I think the reason I stuck with it was that my head started to clear and the obsession with food lifted. But, of course, the longer I went without sugar, the better real food tasted. By now, six plus years later, vegetables have become food-orgasmic.

But you know what? I still refuse to eat lettuce, celery, or raw carrots. (Cooked carrots are another matter. Cooked in butter? Roasted maybe? Ahem, I digress…) Maybe it’s psychological, and they still occur to me as “diet food”. But I don’t like them. And you know what else? I don’t have to eat them. If I want a delicious salad, there are radishes, mushrooms, arugula, artichokes, onions, cucumbers. There are so many foods that make my mouth water. And I’m not on a diet. I’m not being punished. I don’t eat anything because I “should”. Because it’s “healthy” or “good for me”. I eat foods that I love. I eat meals that make me happy. And this time really happy. Not some weird combination of trepidatious happiness and shame. There is no guilt in my pleasure. All because my meals are within my set boundaries. The three times a day that I eat are pure bliss. I don’t answer the phone. I don’t worry about the future. I just enjoy eating. Wow!

My point in all of this is that boundaries have created freedom for me. It’s a cliché paradox, I know.  But if you have experienced it, you know how profound it is. Living within a strict set of rules has made it possible for me to not only not have a bad relationship with food, but to have a fan-freaking-tastic relationship with food. I don’t just get a life in between my meals, but I get to glory in eating three times a day.

 

It’s true that there are things about the way I eat that are inconvenient. I can’t just grab a slice of pizza on the go. I can’t just walk into any old restaurant and order off the menu. But I am not sorry. Because what I get instead is self-respect, a body I love, and to eat with gusto three times a day anyway. Not too shabby for the “poor girl” who had to give up sugar.

As always, I would love it if you would share this blog. Or follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5

Posted in Inspiration, Life and tagged , , ,
02 Jun 2012

I have to grow up? Again?!?!

Basically, I have 3 vices left. Sunbathing (in the natural sun), artificial sweetener, and cigarettes. And for my birthday, I’m going to quit smoking. Because 35 seems like a good age to grow the eff up.

I started smoking pretty young. By 16 I was a full-on smoker. I quit once before, when I was in my late 20s. For a year and a half. But I quit while I was eating compulsively, and about a year later, got control of my eating. My first Halloween with my food under control was when I started again. That was six years ago. I don’t think I expected to go back to being a smoker. I think I thought I would stop smoking again the next day. Or I wasn’t thinking about the consequences at all. But everyone was drinking and eating, and I couldn’t do those things. And it was a party, and I wanted to feel like I wasn’t missing out. So I had that first cigarette that night, and it took the edge off. The food edge. The urge to eat edge. And I never stopped.

I did a lot of things to take the edge off the food cravings in the beginning. Diet soda, coffee, tea, sugarless gum. Cigarettes. Anything I could put in my mouth that wasn’t food. And it helped. It got me through. And I still do that. Besides smoking, I drink herbal drinks with artificial sweetener all day long.

But in my life, I have learned how to give things up. I gave up sugar, of course. Grains and starches and alcohol as well, because my body reacts to them like sugar, and once I start I can’t stop. Then I stopped eating foods that I loved (like tomatoes and peppers and certain soy products) because they make me break out or give me indigestion. I stopped doing drugs. I stopped drinking diet soda and chewing gum. I stopped drinking caffeine after noon. I stopped staying up all night. (I did that before I stopped drinking caffeine after noon, not because. I could (and did) drink coffee from the moment I woke up until the moment I went to sleep and still get 8 hours a night.) I stopped biting my nails. I stopped watching TV.

And every time I gave something up, I fought it. I have fought growing up at every turn. I was always terrified of what I was going to miss out on. How I was going to suffer. How my life was going to suck because there was something I didn’t have anymore. Because something would be missing.

And every time, I got more life. More peace. More freedom. Every time I grew up, I was grateful that I did.

There is a bit of chatter in my head right now. And I need to name it. I need to tell on myself. It is about fear of losing control of my food. It is about how smoking takes the edge off. And what if I can’t handle the void and I pick up sugar. And I need to acknowledge this as bullshit. I need to say that I don’t need to smoke to keep my food under control. And also, that if I were to renege, and not quit smoking, or to pick up cigarettes again with the excuse of not wanting to eat compulsively, it would still just be an excuse. It would just be bullshit.

And I want to say I have another fear. A fear of gaining weight. Not because of over eating. But because I have heard that smoking speeds up your metabolism. Frankly, I don’t know if it’s true. But I’ve heard it. And the part of me that doesn’t want to quit smoking keeps bringing it up. What if I gain weight? What if I get fat? Better keep smoking and not risk it. But if I keep my food boundaries (which I am committed to doing no matter what, in spite of what I just said above, because that’s just BS anyway…), then rational Kate knows that any weight gain would be negligible. 2 lbs? 5? Not worth considering really. And not worth feeling like I need a crutch to get through my day.

So I need to declare to you that all of this “fear” fidgeting around in my head is actually just me being a whiner and a drama queen. But I don’t stand for whining and drama anymore. So my head makes it seem like a justified fear. Oh no! Oh no! It’s scary! You could lose everything! Cigarettes are holding your life together!

Right…Here’s what’s really underneath all that panic: But look at everything I’ve given up already! Why me? Why do I have to? You can’t make me! I won’t! Poor me…

And I don’t have to. It’s my choice, after all. I’m quitting because I want to. I’m quitting because I’m vain. Because being a smoker is starting to feel pathetic. Because instead of making me feel like a bad-ass, like a super-cool, caution-to-the-wind, it’s-my-life-and-I-do-what-I-want rebel, it’s making me feel like a grown woman who doesn’t have her shit together. (You can say what you like about the health consequences of smoking. But you should know that my health has never moved me to make a positive change in my life. So far, the only thing that has ever been an effective kick in the ass to me is vanity. And that is ok with me. As long as I get there in the end, I don’t worry so much about how I got there…)

So rather than bolster my righteousness, and dig my heels in, and weave a story around how it’s just the way I am, and you can’t stop me, I would rather be happy. And free. And peaceful. I would rather not be a slave.

I’m going to use the patch. I don’t need to be miserable just to prove that I’m strong enough to do it on my own. I don’t need to do it by willpower, which I don’t have much of anyway. I don’t want to be a martyr. I happen to know that only makes me resentful. And that resentment is a short road to me punishing myself. Possibly with more cigarettes. And I don’t deal well with discomfort. Which is ok with me. When confronted with the question “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be happy?”, now I always choose happy. Ok, almost always. (Still stuck with this humanity of mine…) So I’ve decided it’s better to be a non-smoker than worry about how I quit.

I’m big into baby steps. I like doing one thing at a time. Gently. Slowly. I find that that’s what works. So maybe someday I’ll start walking around with an oversized sun hat and using stevia, but for right now, quitting cigarettes seems like an appropriate means of continuing my journey into adulthood. And I’ll say, for a girl who didn’t start growing up until she was 28, I’m not doing so bad.
You should always feel free to share my blog. I would love that. Or follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5
Posted in Life and tagged , , , | Leave a comment
26 May 2012

What I *don’t* want for my birthday is Botox

My birthday is coming up. I’ll turn 35 the first week in June. And…Yay! I’m really excited! I love my birthday. And I love getting older. No, seriously. My life (and my looks) get better and better the older I get.

For several years now, I have been noticing the people in my life start to freak out about getting older. More and more of them every year.  I can almost understand it. Almost. I mean most of my friends are in their 30s, like me. But it does not escape me that we live in a culture that glorifies youth and shames aging. As if we have any control over it. Like if we were good boys and girls time would stop at 23. (By the way, you could not pay me to be 23 again!)

When I was 30, I was a personal assistant. My boss and I were shopping at a fancy department store, when this woman walked up to me and spread something on the lines around my mouth. It started to burn. As I tried to wipe it off, I demanded, “What is that!?” She said it was a wrinkle reducer. Botox without the injection. Then she asked how old I was. When I said I was 30, she looked surprised. “You look good!” I was appalled! I wanted to yell at her You think I’m in my 20s and you want to give me skin irritant to reduce my wrinkles!?!? Are you out of your effing mind!?!? But I was at work. So I held my tongue.

Shortly after that I had a conversation that had me start to understand why this was a thing. Why so many people didn’t like getting older. And why I didn’t get it. I was dancing with a modern dance company. I was back stage with one of the other dancers. We were about the same age. She sighed and asked, “Remember when you were 16 and your body was perfect and the world was yours?” Of course I laughed. I said, “Um yeah, no. That’s not how my life went.”

That was the first time it had occurred to me that not everybody’s life gets better and better. Because, personally, entering my 30s was the second greatest thing that ever happened to me. (Getting control of my eating was by far the greatest.) I had finally come into my own. I was finally understanding who I was and what I wanted. And I was suddenly capable of getting what I wanted. Emotionally and physically capable. Plus I got hot! Who knew!?!? So this passing comment from a fellow dancer was a wake-up call as to how lucky I was. While I was better at 30 than at 16 (and better looking), most people were having the opposite experience. At least they felt like they were.

And I don’t know if it’s their perception or the reality. Or if their perception is creating the reality. Because I keep getting more beautiful. No, really. I wasn’t just better looking at 30 than 16 because I had been fat and got thin. I was better looking at 33 than 30. I’m better looking at (almost) 35 than 33. And I even asked a friend to make sure I wasn’t crazy. “Am I better looking now than I was when you met me 2 1/2 years ago?” Her reply was “Absolutely!” (And I trust her. She’s not the kind of friend who blows sunshine up your ass.)

So I started to think about why. What is it about my life that makes me get better with age? And I have decided that it’s several things. But, (in case you couldn’t guess) they all come down to getting control of my eating.

First, of course, my body works better. At 16, and probably about 270 lbs (the truth is, I don’t know what I weighed then. Not quite 300 by that point, but not too far off), living in my body was a chore. An exhausting chore. To be thin and beautiful now is an incredible gift. And to be more fit, more agile, and stronger at 35 than 16 makes me feel great about my body. I don’t see all of the things I can’t do (or can’t do as easily) anymore. Everything is easier. Everything feels better. Everything about my body is improved compared to 19 years ago.

Also, I eat really well. Real food. Lots of it. Protein, fruit and vegetables. And lots of fat. Real fat. Butter, olive oil, egg yolks, whole milk, bacon. My body is nourished. Regularly. Not over fed. I’m quite thin. But not under fed, either. I’m not “on a diet”, I have a diet. I eat. I just don’t eat compulsively. And I think that eating well keeps me looking young. Don’t get me wrong. I have laugh lines (that I love) and worry lines (those I could do without) and some gray hair (meh, it doesn’t bother me) but I am regularly told that I look younger than I am. And I’m very open about my age. I earned my age. I’m not about to cheat myself out of even one year!

But there’s something else that I think contributes to me looking young, and it, too, is a direct result of getting control of my eating. I have a sparkle. You can see it in my eyes. I glow. And I think it is a combination of being present, confident, and free. Carefree.

I am present because I don’t live in a sugar fog anymore. I don’t even visit the sugar fog. I’m confident because I love my body. I love my life! Because not eating compulsively allows me to maintain my personal integrity. Keeping control of the food gives me self-respect. And liking and respecting myself makes me feel beautiful.

And my heart is free. I am not a slave to food anymore. Or to self-loathing. Of course, I’m still neurotic. I am a New Yorker after all. I’ve got a lot of chatter in my head. About all of the things that could possibly go wrong in the next moment, or the forseeable future…or the unforeseeable future. But getting a handle on my eating changed the frequency of that chatter. Now it’s like a radio tuned between stations. Sometimes it comes in clearly, but sometimes it’s just scratchy noise in the background. I reclaimed my innocence when I stopped eating compulsively. Or rather, I acquired a whole new innocence. A kind of trust in the benevolence of life and the world. I got peace. So sometimes when people are surprised by my age, I think more than my face and body looking young, it’s that my heart looks young. That my aura looks young. I think they are seeing my freedom.

I was in a lot of pain growing up. I had a very unhappy life. But I think there is something of a gift in having your joy, happiness, confidence and peace work Benjamin Button style. (And beauty! Yes, I’m vain…) When I think about the fact that so many people in my life are sorry for their age, and pining for their youth, I can’t regret that my own youth made aging a blessing. I don’t expect to look young forever. I’m not a fool. But I do expect to grow old gracefully. And to be beautiful for the rest of my life. And I don’t think that’s expecting too much.

Feel free to share this blog! Or follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5

Posted in beauty, Life and tagged , , , | Leave a comment
19 May 2012

I need to take this…it’s my calling calling

My life eating compulsively was like an extended childhood. Not in a good way. I didn’t have a particularly enjoyable childhood. What I mean is that I didn’t really start growing up until I got my eating under control. Sugar made it possible for me to let my life slip through the cracks for the first 28 years. That was why I used it. Not because it tasted good. But because it made me not have to feel my overwhelming feelings. That was useful when I was small and too vulnerable to process them. But as I got older, it became a detriment. It inhibited me. It allowed me to be numb enough that I could refuse to look at issues and responsibilities that needed to be dealt with. That I needed to deal with. Until they became emergencies. And then I dealt with them by throwing them into someone else’s lap. Someone who loved me. Usually my mother. But anyone would do.

And the truth is that I would become so incapacitated by the time something positively had to be dealt with, that people would feel sorry for me.  They would feel compelled to help me. Not help. That’s not the word. Because I ask for help now. In a healthy, responsible way. I love help! I am grateful for help. I can accomplish so much with help. But when I was eating compulsively and burying my head in the sand (really more like burying my face in a chocolate cake) other people were assuming responsibility for my failures and ineptitudes. And letting me off the hook without my having to live with the consequences of my actions, or inactions. At the time, this was a relief. Or it seemed like a relief. It wasn’t, really. It fed the thoughts that told me I wasn’t good enough. That I wasn’t capable. It reinforced my ideas about my worthlessness. But I didn’t have any other context. Neglecting my life until the looming consequences left me in a state of paralyzed terror, and then having my cookies hauled out of the fire by somebody else, was all I knew. It took the immediate pressure off, but it never made me wise. First, because I was selfish and couldn’t have cared less that someone else was being deprived of something (time, money, resources) for my benefit. And second because I was numb. Getting high on sugar made it possible for me to never feel the impact of my choices. Sugar made it so that I never had to feel anything.

There was a strange paradox to my life when I was eating compulsively. I was simultaneously disgustingly arrogant and pathetically low on self-esteem. I felt totally entitled without feeling like I should have to honor my word or my commitments. Because I “couldn’t”. Because that required being worthwhile and able. Which I “obviously” wasn’t.

When I got a handle on my food, it became a necessity to start dealing with my responsibilities. Not being numb from sugar meant actually feeling the pressure to maintain my integrity. It meant caring about my future. About my reputation. About my relationships. Having clarity made me feel bad about hurting and abusing the people in my life. It made me want to be someone I respected and liked, because feeling like the asshole I was being made me uncomfortable. And there was no more cake to numb the discomfort. And besides, being someone I liked was suddenly an option. And then I discovered that I loved it! It wasn’t just a relief. It was joy.

I am slow. Not intellectually. But personally. I change slowly. I need a lot of time to adapt to new things. I need to sit with things for a long time before I can integrate them into my thinking and actions. Before I can get acclimated to them. What to do in a situation is rarely obvious to me. Maybe this is the result of living in fear and stagnation for the vast majority of my life. But it doesn’t matter why, really. It’s what is so. And I have learned to accept this about myself. I am learning to be patient with myself. To be still and present and listen to my inner voice. With its long silences and pauses. With its string of I-don’t-know-yets. (How ’bout now? Nope, not yet.) I am learning not to rush, or to judge myself. Because when I look back at where I was, (not just at 19 when I weighed 300 lbs, or 7 years ago when I was bulimic and food obsessed, but even 3 years ago, or 1 year ago, or 6 months ago) I can see that I do change. That I am changing. And that it’s ok that it takes years. I have learned that there will never be a “done”. So what’s the rush?

When I started writing this blog, I did it for me. I wanted to let my crazy out. I wanted to get the poison out. I wanted to say, out loud, that there were things about my past and my thinking that kept me living in fear and shame. Even though there was nothing to be afraid or ashamed of anymore. But recently, I’ve found that my inner voice, the one that speaks to me when I’m still and quiet, is telling me it’s time to think bigger. After years of simply dealing with my responsibilities and my integrity, one situation at a time, one moment at a time, it’s telling me that just honoring my word is not enough. It’s important. It’s huge. But it’s not enough. That there’s work for me to do. That this is my work. My story. My learning to honor myself and my body. My life, honest and uncensored. The sad and the joyful and (hopefully) the inspiring, on the page for you. That it’s time to hustle a little. To take some initiative in sharing it with the world. And what’s more, just as my inner voice started telling me it was time to expand my horizons, as if right on cue, life sent opportunities. And help. Information. Advice. Encouragement. Support. Reinforcements. So much love! And right now, you are participating in my work. You are witnessing my calling. So thank you. I am honored. I feel so blessed. I’m so incredibly grateful. I’m scared shitless, by the way…But grateful…

I am not clear yet where this will lead or what it will end up looking like in the future. That’s still another I-don’t-know-yet. But I can be with the I-don’t-know-yet. I can trust it. And honor it. I can listen for the next thing I’m supposed to do. I can wait patiently to find out what that is. But if you’d like to help me share my work, feel free to share this blog. Or follow me on twitter @onceafatgirl5

Posted in Inspiration, Life and tagged , , , , | Leave a comment
12 May 2012

Can I pick my pedestal?

There’s something that I have been thinking about regarding this blog. It has probably become clear to you if you’ve been reading a while, but it’s on my mind, none the less. My blog is called onceafatgirl, and I regularly talk about the fact that I’ve lost 165 or so lbs. And that’s important. But it’s not really the point. For me, it’s not about going from fat to thin, but more about having been fat. And why I was fat. And what being fat meant to me. And what it did to me. And what it was like. And what I had to go through to get my eating under control. And how growing up fat and with food addiction affected my head and my heart and my life. And still does.

Most people consider losing that much weight impressive. People are impressed. It’s not like I hold it against them. But from my point of view, it’s misguided. My weight loss does not particularly impress me.

I am addicted to sugar. The way crack addicts are addicted to crack. When I eat it, my body wants more. It thinks it needs more. It thinks it will die without more. And I also have eating disorders that are about my thinking. Before I got control of my eating, I was obsessed with food. And also my weight and my body. At first, my body obsession was about how horrible it was to be fat. But eventually, after I lost a lot of weight counting calories and working out (which was not control of my eating the way I refer to it now), it was about how to eat and not get fat again. How to eat so that nobody noticed. What to eat and when. And how to get the body and life I wanted without having to give up eating the way I wanted to eat. See, I have never really had a weight problem. Being morbidly obese was just a symptom. It wasn’t like I was lazy and just hadn’t gotten around to getting thin. I had a food problem. I still do. It’s just arrested.

I am very open about my eating disorders, and hence, my weight loss. Not just in this blog, but in my everyday life. I kind of have to be. It comes up a lot. And I am not ashamed of having eating disorders. It’s just the simple truth.

It may not occur to you if you don’t have food issues, but people talk about food constantly. They want to know if I’ve tried that new restaurant. They want to know why I don’t want a free sample of cake. Why I don’t want the piece of chocolate they are offering. They want to wax poetic about what they ate recently. With many adjectives and sound effects. They want to know what I’m eating. (They’re called vegetables. They are a kind of food. I’m eating food.)

Sarcasm aside, it’s really fine with me. I get it. I don’t mind people talking to me about food. I don’t worry about what anybody else is eating. I don’t get offended or upset if people eat in front of me. Or offer me foods I don’t eat. Even if they know about my food boundaries. People forget. It’s second nature for most people to be hospitable with food. I don’t need to make a big stink about saying no. “No thank you” usually suffices. (If it doesn’t, and I get harassed about it, well, yes. That annoys the hell out of me.) But I don’t crave the foods I have stopped eating. I don’t pine, or feel deprived. I have entirely altered the way I see food. It is now either mine, or not mine. If it’s not mine, it’s just not. I keep my eyes on my own plate.

But there is a thing that I’ve noticed because I am so open about my food issues. Most people don’t register that I have food issues. Even if I tell them I do. What they hear is that I overcame a weight problem. It doesn’t occur to them that I was fat because I was eating my own self-hatred. They don’t have any concept of the kind of punishment I was inflicting on myself with food. They cannot fathom that I lost weight because I made a decision to stop abusing myself. And they look at me and see a beautiful, happy woman, and they have no idea that there’s a fat girl who lives in my head who wants me to hate myself again so she can have her cake back. (I am not condemning them. How could they know?)

There is one thing in particular that I hear a lot that makes it clear to me that most people don’t understand. That they think it’s about weight. And in the past tense: “You should be really proud of yourself.”

I am not proud of myself for losing 165 lbs. I am not even proud of myself for getting control of my eating. Not that it was a breeze. Not that it didn’t suck to give up sugar. (No, seriously. It sucked. The withdrawal was excruciating. I sincerely pray that I will never have to do it again.) But being proud is the last thing I need. It implies that it’s done. Whew! Glad that’s over! (Yes. That’s more sarcasm.)

Being proud is a dangerous place for me to hang out. Pride goeth before a fall and all. I can’t afford to start believing I’m too good for my food boundaries. That I don’t need them because I’m special. That I accomplished something great, so I shouldn’t have to be so strict anymore. If I get proud, I might forget that I don’t have any willpower. (That’s not sarcasm, just so you know.) If I get too big for my britches figuratively, I will surely do so literally.

What I really do, every single solitary day, is protect my relationship with food. It is an ongoing, never-ending process. So I am not proud. I am humbled. I am grateful. I am so effing relieved that I don’t have to eat compulsively today, that I do whatever it takes. I do the work. And then I do it again. And again. It is not glamorous. But it is the most important thing I do in a day.

I didn’t get peace in my heart because I got thin. I got thin because I got peace. I didn’t start loving myself because I lost 165 lbs. I lost 165 lbs because I started loving myself. I guess my point in all of this is that if I got to choose what impressed you about me, I would not choose my weight loss. I would choose for you to be impressed by how I learned to honor myself. And how I continue to cultivate that honor every day. How I do the work even though it can be inconvenient. Even though it is not fancy or sexy. Because it gives me a joyful life. That I figured out that I deserve to have a joyful life. That I went from being a girl who was killing herself with food and self-loathing, to being a woman who celebrates herself with love and kindness. At least that is what impresses me about me.

Posted in Life and tagged , , | Leave a comment
05 May 2012
1 Comment

My place or yours?

There is a joke that I have heard many times. It makes me cringe with shame every time I hear it. Yes, even now. How are fat girls like mopeds? They’re both fun to ride as long as nobody sees you.

As a fat girl, I always knew my place. There are rules that fat girls live by. We all seem to understand these rules, though they are rarely expressed openly. The general gist is “You are an embarrassment. Take what you are given, be thankful, and don’t expect anything more. You don’t deserve it.” This is a fat girl’s place. A friend of mine refers to it as “taking crumbs.”

The first lesson I remember about knowing my place came when I was 13. I was friends with this guy. He was 14, QB of his HS football team, popular, and really good-looking. I had a big crush on him. We used to hang out a lot that year. We’d sit around his house, or wander the suburban streets. His mom and little brother loved me. I remember going to his games and sitting with them. And then one day, alone in my house, he kissed me. Really kissed me. You know, we made out. I was so shocked and so pleased. I told 3 girls. But they didn’t believe me. Because he was hot and popular, and I was…well…fat. One of them asked him if it were true. He denied it. And there it was. Fun to ride (not quite…I was only 13), as long as nobody sees you. I, of course, still wanted to be his friend. (Apparently I was glutton for all sorts of things!) But he drifted away until his mom sent him out of state to go live with his dad. I thought he stopped talking to me because he was mad at me for telling people and humiliating him. Which, to a 13-year-old fat girl, seemed well within his rights. I was sorry for him. Sorry that I was so fat that he had to hide the fact that he kissed me. Sorry that I wasn’t the kind of girl he could brag about. Or even just tell the truth about.

But when it came down to me, I was not sorry that I had been abused or mistreated. I didn’t blame him for lying at the expense of my feelings and honor. I did not feel outraged that he had denied my humanity. I didn’t see my own humanity. I didn’t think it was worth honoring.

I learned my lesson well. I didn’t kiss anyone else until I was in college. And even then I knew my place. I knew not to tell anyone. I knew not to embarrass any man who was gracious enough to throw me crumbs. I shut my heart down. I was prepared to keep it idle forever. After all, I didn’t like me. I certainly didn’t expect any man to like me either.

When I look back on that experience over 20 years later, I can see that boy differently. I can imagine that his embarrassment about kissing me stemmed from his own insecurity. And I can imagine that he stopped being my friend because he didn’t want to face me after throwing me to the wolves. But his lie seemed so legitimate at the time. I was fat and he was cool.

At 34, I can finally look back at 13-year-old Kate and see that she didn’t deserve that. I didn’t deserve that. That it was cruel for him to lie at my expense. To make me seem like a liar so that he didn’t have to admit that he had kissed a fat girl. That he was attracted to a fat girl. (Of course I was a liar. Just not about that.)

But when it comes to liking someone, even as a beautiful, sane woman, I still occur to myself as an embarrassment. And while I managed to change the size and shape of my body, my brain still remembers that I have a place, and it reminds me that when I forget my place, I am punished with shame. And there are feelings that accompany those thoughts. Despair and fear and a kind of pathetic resignation toward the futility of loving.

I don’t know how to unthink those thoughts and stop feeling those feelings yet. With regard to love, I don’t know how to see myself as a human being worthy of being honored. I have stopped taking crumbs. Which rational Kate knows is an important first step to being loved. But the fat girl in my head doesn’t know how to accept actual love. She doesn’t see how actual love could be a possibility for her, and subsequently, me. She keeps telling me that I have two options. Crumbs, or eternal loneliness. Which is redundant, really. Because taking crumbs is its own kind of eternal loneliness. Worse than a life alone, it even keeps me separated from myself.

I do not want to be alone forever. I have a ridiculous amount of love to give away. But neglecting my own heart and humanity for a little affection is not a channel for love. Charity begins at home.

I wish that I had loved myself growing up, even though I was fat. I wish I had not spent my life continually putting myself back in the place I was told I belonged at 13. But if I had loved myself then, I wouldn’t have been fat, and I wouldn’t have been put in a fat girl’s place. I ate to numb the self-loathing and disgrace. Self-hatred and food have always been tied together in my life. Or at least as far back as I can remember. I don’t know which came first, the hatred or the eating. But I suppose it doesn’t matter. I cannot change the past with wishes. And today my food is under control, and my body is beautiful. Because I did the work. Because I continue to do it every day.

In order to change what I did with my food, I had to change what I did with my food. It stands to reason that in order to change what I do with my love, I will have to change what I do with my love. I don’t really know how to do that yet. There are things about my life that exist in my blind spot, and I don’t know how to see them. But I guess the first step is knowing that I have a blind spot. And that I want to look at those things I can’t see so I can create something better for myself. So I can change how I see myself, my humanity, and my love. So I can stop living like my place is small, dark, and hidden. I want to start walking in the sunshine. It’s my sun too.

Posted in Life and tagged , ,

Post Navigation

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →