onceafatgirl

Peace is better than chocolate

Archive for the category “Relationships”

05 Dec 2015
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Commitment and cleanliness

It is my experience that life will test you. Especially when you make a commitment. When you really want to recreate some aspect of your life. 
If you are committed to drinking 8 glasses of water a day, suddenly, all of the bathrooms in your office are out of order except one. On a different floor. For a week. And you have to decide if you want to keep that commitment.

Recently, I decided that I wanted to leave my current job like a grownup. I want to go on good terms. I put in my two weeks notice just yesterday morning, in fact. (Yay!)

But when I got my schedule for the week I don’t have a day off for six straight days. And I have two assignments for my new dream job as a writer due on Tuesday morning, 8 am. 

I knew immediately that it was a test from life, but it took me a minute to figure out what the test was. It was not, in fact, to test if I was committed to my new job. It was to test if I was committed to leaving my old job like a responsible adult. 

And I assure you, when I saw that I wasn’t going to get a day off, it crossed my mind to say screw this, I have a super sexy writing job now. I’m not going to my crappy food service job.

But there is another story I want to share with you. Many years ago, before I was reunited with my boyfriend, I was going on a lot of dates. And that often meant packing a dinner and eating it in the city at a Starbucks before I met the guy.

Now, I have a person who helps me when something happens with my food. One evening right before a date, I was eating my strictly portioned dinner and I dropped a speck. Seriously a speck. I called my friend and I told her. She said that I didn’t need to call for a speck, but I said I was about to go on a date, and I wanted to be as “clean” as I could be. I wanted my integrity to be solid. I was looking for love. I was looking for an awesome relationship. I did not want a speck of food to get in my way.

The truth is, the date was horrible. I ended up telling him that I was not having a good time because he was not being nice to me. Then he tried to make out with me. (Apparently that’s how he showed how nice he was? Ew. Whatever…)

I left that date. I didn’t stay longer out of politeness. I didn’t let him drive me home. I saw that I wasn’t getting treated the way I deserved, and I ended it right there.

I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t called in that I dropped a speck of my food. Maybe the same thing. But maybe, if I thought my integrity had a crack in it, I would have stayed and let myself be treated poorly.

So here I am, fulfilling my commitment to write my own blog. And I will fulfill my commitment to get my writing assignments for my new job in on time. And I will also fulfill my commitment to stick it out at my other job for the next two weeks. So I can leave knowing I did the right thing. Not for them, but for me. Because I want to start this new job as clean as I can be. I don’t want cracks in my integrity while I am fulfilling my dreams.

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21 Nov 2015

To hang out in the uncomfortable unknown and trust

First, for those of you who were wondering if that internal growth spurt I mentioned last week meant I was pregnant, I am not.

I was referring to a spiritual/emotional/personal kind of growth spurt. I am talking about getting better and better. I mean becoming more and more my authentic self.

Perhaps it does have some similarities to being pregnant, though. Like in how I forget the pain and I get excited to do it again.

For some reason, every time I make a move and take action to grow and change, I expect it to be easy. I expect the experience to be that of getting consistently happier, and more confident, with a steady acquisition of new skills.

Yeah…not so much. The truth is, while I am in the middle of it, it sucks. It’s painful and humiliating. And before I am graceful and happy and better than I have ever been before, I have to stumble and fall, fail and persevere. I forget that, like having a baby, it takes the blood, sweat, and tears of labor.

And there’s something else I have noticed. Life will always, always, ALWAYS give me a chance to backtrack. Usually more than once. Life makes me choose change over and over again, depending on how committed I am. It makes me say out loud, ‘I want something better.’

When I made the decision that I wanted to be in a serious, committed relationship, I took actions and made different choices. And out of the blue, multiple men from my past started calling and texting me. Seriously. Guys I had not heard from in months or years decided that they were curious about me.

Maybe that doesn’t seem like such a hard test, but familiar relationships are comfortable. Even if they are bad, or mediocre, or unfulfilling, there is such a temptation to go backwards into a set of circumstances you already know. Especially if what you want hasn’t shown up yet.

I didn’t know that my current boyfriend would turn out to be the love of my life. It was an act of faith in the benevolence of Life to turn away from men from my past. But I did it. I told Life that I wanted something more. And that I was willing to hang out in the uncomfortable unknown and trust.

And here I am right now, once again in the middle of a huge transition. Learning how to drive. Writing samples and interviewing for a dream job. Staying at a job that I absolutely abhor while working my way into a bigger, richer, gooier life. And sometimes it hurts so bad that I cry. And sometimes I hate it so much that I behave badly, like a little brat. And sometimes I am terrified that I will get stuck in the middle of the transition and never reach the other side. But somehow, I always manage to make it. And I live to forget how terrible the pain was. And again, like childbirth, I have this person that I love more than I thought I could. Only, in my case, that person is me.

Having boundaries around my eating is not the reason I can change. But it puts the whole thing on a fast track. Not being able to numb my disappointments and dissatisfactions means that I either have to live with them or change them. So I usually choose change, because I am very bad at sitting in discomfort. And that is a very special gift, because it has given that incredibly unhappy little fat girl a life beyond her wildest dreams.

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04 Oct 2015

If you need the wood, I’ll be off the cross in a minute.

One of the ways I keep my eating under control is by focusing on my part of a situation. With food it’s about keeping my eyes on my own plate. I don’t worry about what anyone else is eating. With life, it’s about minding my own business. And keeping peace in my own heart and mind. Other people’s behavior and relationships are also none of my concern. I keep my eyes on my own life.
But another way I help myself keep my eating under control is by being authentic, and speaking up for myself. I do not let myself be abused. I do not please others at my own expense.

There are some people at work, both customers and fellow employees, who are really not nice people. (No seriously. Not like normal people having a bad day. Like people who actively try to make others unhappy. Like total jerks.) And it’s hard for me to find a balance between taking care of myself, and being peaceful, regardless of the situation.

The other part of this is finding the best way to keep the Good Girl in me on a short leash. She let people abuse her for a long time. Her worth was in how far she could diminish herself for the happiness and use of others. 

Look, the Good Girl, when she is right-sized, and in her proper place, is part of the reason I am so good at my customer service job. When I am not being a martyr, I genuinely like giving people a great experience. I aim to leave people at least satisfied, and hopefully even happier, as a result of their time spent with me.

But just like I wrote in last week’s installment, the Good Girl can have me agree to do things that end up leaving me feeling resentful and frustrated. I can wind up feeling taken advantage of, often forgetting that I allowed myself to be put in the situation in the first place.

I am not going to eat compulsively over these feelings of resentment. But that is a luxury that I cultivate. Resentment is exactly the danger to an addict like me. It is just the thing to convince me that I totally deserve that chocolate cake, damn it!

Last week, I was doing what needed to be done for the store/my department, and neglecting to care for my own self. I forgot that integrity means keeping my word, but it doesn’t have to mean volunteering at the expense of my own peace. I was doing what was requested of me, simply because I was asked. I agreed knowing I didn’t want to. And that was dangerous. I was putting myself and my eating disorders in a dangerous situation.

I know that I need to keep my food boundaries at the center of my life. Keeping my sugar addiction and my eating disorders at bay is the most important thing I do in my life. Part of that is never letting any resentment, judgment, or torment grab a hold of me. It means I have to shake them off quickly. I have to be grateful for what I have. I have to remember that all things pass eventually. And if I am unhappy, I am the one who must change.

In parting, I will leave you with the Serenity Prayer. (If you don’t already know it, I promise it’s a good one. By the way, it’s not just a prayer. It’s a way of life.)
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

The courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

AMEN!

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19 Sep 2015
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In Defense of Giving A S*** (Please note, I use the “s” word freely in this post)

A friend of mine recently posted pictures from her trip to Burning Man this year. In one, she has a button that says “Give A Shit.”

I used to have a skill that I cultivated. It was the ability to not flinch. It was part of my “cool” persona. I was very good at it. When people did things to try to get a start out of me, I would barely react.

Not just friends playing pranks. Even when I was mugged and punched in the face when I was about 24 years old, I can still remember the look in the eyes of the guy who punched me. It clearly freaked him out that I didn’t scream or cry, or even cower. In fact, I remember looking at him with a disgusted look. I made him flinch. (Of course, I would later realize that I was a bloody mess because he punched my teeth right through my lip. I suppose that would be scary if you punched a seemingly weak girl in the face and all she did was look angry at you…)

From the time I was a very small child, I was very good at building fortresses. My fat body was a kind of fortress against intimacy. So was smoking. So was that unflinching bitch attitude. And being high on sugar.

Sugar may, in fact, have been the most useful tool I had against giving a shit. Because it made everything foggy. And surreal. And it made life-moments incidental. My real life lay in food and eating and getting high. Everything else was simply something to be endured until I could get my next fix.

But then I got my eating under control and I quit sugar all together. And then slowly, (very, very slowly…one at a time, after years of being sober from food) I dismantled my fortresses.

Because you can’t have love without pain. Because you don’t get to pick and choose what you let in. A fortress doesn’t keep the bad things out. It keeps EVERYTHING out. All of it. Not just the sadness of rejection and the pain of being wounded, but also the love and the joy and the trust and the intimacy.

I made a choice when I decided that I wanted to let myself fall in love and be loved. I made the choice to give a shit. I knew that it meant getting hurt. I was a grown woman in my 30’s. I didn’t have fairytale delusions about how love made everything easy. I was quite clear that the life I had chosen until then, behind my very secure, safe walls, was the easy way. Not giving a shit is, by far, the easier way. Love is not safe. Intimacy is not easy. It is complicated and messy.

Admitting you are wrong is scary. Making amends is scary. Restoring a broken relationship is scary. Being vulnerable is just plain terrifying.

I could make all of it go away by just not giving a shit. Still can.

But that would make the love go away too. And the joy that comes from loving. And the warmth that comes from being loved. Because ultimately, love is giving a shit.

I choose love, so I choose to give a shit. And I wish the same for you.

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29 Aug 2015

Vulnerable, unpredictable, and intense – just as it should be

When I was in New York last weekend, I was with a group of people who make it their lives’ work to be present and honest. And it’s intense.

Now, it is also my life’s work to be present and honest, so quite frankly, I loved being there. But it was still really intense.

When I strip away the pretense of day-to-day living – like wanting to be liked, wanting to look cool, wanting to be acknowledged for being “good” or “right,” or any of the things that I do out of fear so that I don’t have to acknowledge my truth or be present for my life – what I am left with is unguarded love. To love and to be loved in return.

Here’s a secret. Love is scary. It’s vulnerable and unpredictable. It’s intense. Sometimes it can feel like it’s too intense.

I wouldn’t understand until years after I got my eating under control and got sober from sugar, but food was my main defense against being present and honest. And it was my first fortress against love. It did not matter how much love was sent my way. I had a wall up, and that wall allowed me to filter how much of it got in. I could take my love in easy-to-swallow, palatable doses. A lot of the love meant for me went to waste.

Being with this group of people was also interesting because I met them before I got sober from food. One of them was the one who sent me to get sober. Because of having known them for so long, I have memories, in my body, of how uncomfortable I was when I was eating compulsively. I could feel very clearly how free and peaceful I have become in the last 9+ years. I remembered how much I thought I had to hide then. I could feel so clearly, in contrast, how open I am now.

Another dear friend of mine talks about how getting sober from sugar and compulsive eating lets her discover who she really is, as opposed to who she was trying to be. And how she really likes the person she is discovering. That is my experience too. That in being who I am, I really like and love me. That I am happier being my flawed self than I was trying to be a perfect someone else.

So I am posing a question to you. (Yes, you. Who else?) Who would you be if you were totally yourself? What would it look like if you could let that true self be loved without filtering how much of the love you let in?

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23 Aug 2015

Serene, warm, squishy joy.

This is a super short blog today because I am visiting New York City, and I have people to see and things to do.I am here for an event. A Bat Mitzvah. I am seeing old friends I have not seen in a long time.

And I am totally unselfconscious. I am available to show and accept love. I am able to be in the moment without hesitation or fear. I am free to have fun. But most importantly, I am able to let the celebration be about the Bat Mitzvah, herself. Even in my own head.

A friend of mine recently pointed out that “it’s all about relationships.” I am able to be available because I have my eating under control. I am not high. I am not ashamed. I am not thinking about food, and how much I want, or how to hide how much I am eating. I am not worried about what my body looks like. I am present in the moment in the physical world outside of my own head. All because I have my eating taken care of.

I am always grateful. But on this trip, the results are so profoundly laid out in front of me. 

This is joy. Serene, warm, squishy joy.

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25 Jul 2015

Principles before Personalities 

“Principles before personalities” is a 12-step concept. The idea being that you don’t have to like everyone, but you have to support everyone on their journey to stay sober, even the people who have really irritating personalities.  I try to practice this in all areas of my life. For me, it’s not just about sobriety. It’s about humans getting through life surrounded by one another. We have to deal with each other every single day. My principles include being part of the solution, minding my own business, helping when I am asked and can provide help, and keeping my integrity in tact. I want to do this regardless of the person I am dealing with.

But now I am working in a grocery store, constantly surrounded by customers, and coworkers. And seriously, people make that shit hard! 

No, no. I am exaggerating. I find that most people rank on the scale somewhere between awesome and harmless. But then there are the ones who fall on the spectrum between manipulative (that pathetic manipulation in order to save their own asses) and down right malicious. And that is hard for me.

Perhaps the hardest part is that I was once that kind of person. When I was actively in my sugar/food addiction, I often tried to manipulate people and situations to save myself. And when I got angry, I became cruel. I didn’t have a means of expressing my feelings. I didn’t know I even had feelings. I was numbing them with cake. And being angry felt like enough justification to harm others. I was in pain, so you were going to be in pain too.

Now that I have my eating disorders under control, I can deal with people who are hurt or angry or feel treated unfairly. I can apologize for a bad experience, even if it’s not specifically my fault. And even when it is. I can empathize with people in pain, and I can make it better. 

But getting attacked is not easy for me. I am the same sensitive person I was at 5 years old, under the covers in the night, praying that life would get less painful, because I didn’t think I would be able to do it if it didn’t get easier. And people do attack. Sometimes with a smile, or a smirk, as if it were a joke. Sometimes with a snarl like a wild animal. 

I want to say, You’re at a high end grocery store in a first world country where you can afford to buy meat for $25/lb. Or, You have a union job in a nice suburb. Why do you need to be so malicious, obnoxious, or cruel? Why do you need to hurt someone else?

But, like I said. I was like that too. Until I learned another principle when I got sober from sugar. Gratitude. I didn’t know how lucky I was when I was eating compulsively. I only looked for the ways I was disappointed. I only saw what I thought was wrong.

So I have to go into work today. I’m grateful that it’s a good job. I’m grateful I’m good at it. I’m grateful I’m appreciated there by my coworkers and management. And I am especially grateful the most people fall somewhere between awesome and harmless. 

As for the rest, I am grateful that I practice the ideal of principles before personalities.

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05 Jul 2015

One of those times history did not repeat itself. Maybe because I didn’t backtrack.

I had my first day at my new job yesterday. It went really well. I think I will be just fine at it.
I only get a 15 minute break per shift, so that means packing the smallest possible meal when I have to work through a meal time. But it’s manageable. 

I had a handful of rough days worrying. First about meals. Now that I have the experience of having eaten one meal in my 15 minute break, it seems like a non-issue. But mostly I had been worried about scheduling. Or more specifically, asking for what I need in terms of my schedule, from someone I don’t know.

I have a history of working for power-crazy bosses. Not all of them. I have had plenty of kind, considerate, honorable employers. But I have also had a lot of bosses who liked to demonstrate their position as the person in charge of my money.

And I historically, I have let them.

I am the person in charge of my money. I always have been. But I lived for many years as if it were not the case. And I was easy to manipulate, because I was a people-pleaser who thought her job was to make the boss happy. I thought that I didn’t deserve money for less than that.

It turns out that all that time, my job was my job. And the boss being happy was not in my control. 

I do my best. I am committed to integrity. But my best isn’t going to make everyone happy. And I need to live with that.

So right, scheduling. I was hired with the understanding that I could not work after 4 pm on Thursdays. But I got my schedule and I was immediately scheduled for Thursday night. And I was so upset.

So the “Good Girl” in me wanted to just accept it and work Thursday night, so that she didn’t have to be humiliated by making requests on her first day. And that fear of humiliation made me angry. I wasn’t sleeping well. I was even more anxious than usual.

And there is another part of it. I spent most of my life alone. And that meant that my choices had limited reach. But now I’m in a relationship. So money is not mine anymore. It’s ours. In the past, if I felt uncomfortable with the way I was being treated in a job, it was my right to walk away. But now walking away from a job would at least require a conversation with my boyfriend. 

But Thankfully, I was at least present enough to know that I didn’t know what was going to happen. (Being sober helps in that way.) I knew enough to know that I needed to take care of this one step at a time and not get ahead of myself. 

So I walked in on my first day and I did my best. I also made my requests. And my boss was great. He told me he never got my availability schedule, so he didn’t know about my Thursday nights. He rescheduled me that day. He even accommodated another request, that I specifically told him was not a necessity, but would be nice since I had planned something before I got the job. In other words, he’s a good boss and also a nice guy.

I was worried and upset because of history. Because I didn’t know what to expect, and I was afraid of getting the worst of what I have gotten before. But it’s also about confronting the worst of myself. The doormat. The Good Girl. The martyr. It’s scary to go head to head with those aspects of my personality. I was that way because I got something out of it. And even though I get more out of being honest and straightforward and taking care of myself, the fear of losing something by not being obliging can still be intense.

But now I have another reference point for self-care, where it worked out perfectly in the end. So it turns out that history does not always repeat itself.

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28 Jun 2015

I don’t want Kevin Bacon making choices for me.

Slow week for eating disorders in my house. How nice is that?

What has been on my mind is letting people make their own decisions. How other people’s decisions might affect me, and yet I still have to let them make them.

For me, autonomy is a gift of having my eating disorders under control. I have mentioned before that I remember when I first intellectually understood that I was responsible for my own life, no matter what happened to me or who did it. It wouldn’t be until after many years of being sober from sugar that I would understand how to implement that knowledge. But I still recall grasping the idea that even if someone were to “blame” for something, they could not be responsible for how it affected my life. Even if they wanted to take responsibility. Even if I wanted to give them the responsibility. 

It’s a free way to live. Scary, but also much more peaceful. Life is scary. Less so when you stare it down, rather than blinking. Or, eating a chocolate cake and passing out in a food coma.

When I got my eating disorders under control, so many people wanted me to do it differently, or not at all. They thought it was extreme to do what I do. Or unhealthy. Or that I was going to miss out on things. Some of them were subtle. Some of them were blatant. But it made a lot of people uncomfortable. And they wanted to make sure I knew it.

When I do something for myself, it makes it easy to do it for others. I don’t know how it works. But because I was willing to ignore other people’s opinions and make my own choices, I am able to let go of making judgments about other people’s choices. Even if they affect me. 

We all affect one another. We are all connected. Life is just a big game of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. And I don’t want Kevin Bacon, or anyone else for that matter, trying to make my choices for me. 

And I don’t want to make choices for him. Or you. Or the people I love. Or even the people I thoroughly dislike.

The addict in me always wanted to make all the decisions, and pass off the consequences. The addict in me never stopped to wonder if that were even possible. The sober woman I get to be a day at a time, knows that it’s not. Life happens, you accept it, readjust, and move on. Sometimes (usually) the life that happens is rubbing up against another life. Doesn’t matter. Same rules apply.

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14 Jun 2015
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Egos or I go. (Yes, I am aware of how bad that pun is.)

I had another week of intense feelings. They are still not my favorite. I didn’t want to eat this week.

I ate my meals. Because it’s part of my boundaries. It’s how I roll, if you will. But it was not easy. It was not fun. I did not enjoy it.

As a compulsive eater, it is rare to not want to eat. I usually love every bite of my meals. Sometimes I’m even a little sad when they end. But just like how I feel doesn’t change whether or not I eat more, it doesn’t change whether or not I eat less either.

My boyfriend had some things to point out about me and my behavior this week. He wasn’t wrong. And it was hard to hear.

Look, I know that I write a lot about making changes to myself and being a part of the solution. Yadda yadda yadda. Of course, what I write is true. But for the most part I am writing about it after the fact. After I have already done the hard part. That might make you think that kind of thing is easy for me. Perhaps you are under the impression that I am naturally humble.

I’m not. At all.

I do the things I do because I want things. I want peace. I want to be in a great relationship. I want to be a person I like and respect. I want to sleep easily at night.

But I have an ego. And it really wants to argue. It wants to make excuses. It wants to manipulate and put others on the defensive when it feels threatened.

It is work not follow my ego. It is painful. It is uncomfortable and humiliating. I do it, even though it is not easy, because I want to be happy more than I want to be right. Or seen as right. Admitting I am being a jerk sucks. And I will have to do it again. And again. Until I’m dead. Because I don’t imagine I will ever entirely rid myself of jerkiness.

I only know what I want because I have my eating disorders under control. Because I am sober from sugar. Because I eat my committed meals, whether I want to or not. I only have the ability to keep my ego in check because of this. I can only look at myself honestly, as painful as it may be, because of this. And I can only change myself because of this.

Putting boundaries around my food took a specific kind of honesty. And keeping my integrity around my food requires me to bring that honesty to all areas of my life.

For a long time, I ate compulsively, and it fed my ego. Here is the irony. It is my vanity that has me check my ego. It is my desire to be, and be seen as, my authentic self, that allowed me to put my ego in its place.

There is a saying (you know how I love my sayings): You can’t save your face and your ass at the same time. My face is always just fine. It’s my ass that sometimes needs saving.

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