Finding your "WHY"......here is mine! (no one has to read this, just for healing.
I wrote this email right now, and I thought that I would paste it as more healing for myself:
Dee, I think this is beautiful!!....I literally have journals in which I have written the "same" speech to myself.[/I] I think it's so important that you wrote this, and to bring it back to our attention that it is a stronger reason, a stronger "Why" that we need in order to launch us there.
...I know for me, my "Why" starting was to rid myself of Cervical Cancer. That is now done. now, it's just maintenance.
...Then my "why" became to get thin, but that was vanity, and that's not motivating enough for me...and I failed with many attempts.
...Then my "why" became to be a Marathoner..Done, now it's just maintenance. ...Now I need a stronger "why"...
...I found it after reading this last book I just finished that I recommended to you guys, called "When Food is Love" by Geneen Roth? I think.
...My new "why" has moved to "releasing the past"... in this I mean, I have been using food and weight for years now as a way to hurt myself and others and as a sheild. I am realizing a lot now, that I had no real idea about until I started focusing at the core of my actions. I get sad thinking about it, but am ready to face all these things in order to shed myself of the unecessary, and to step by step...reformulate my "self script" of myself into a positive healthy one.
For example, my life...
Ages of 5-10: My mom was never home because she had to allow us to survive and would work 2 waitressing jobs and would clean houses as well to make sure we could make it. We struggled financially and she had a baby when I was 5 1/2 and my father left us then. It got harder, because immedietly, we couldn't afford a babysitter, and at a young age of 5 1/2 I was forced to take care of my new born brother all bymyself, an lie to everyone that we were alone, my grandma included. It was our secret. I felt alone, and sad, and overwhelmed, and had a huge lists of things to do to keep me busy all the time. My mom would call us constantly, and leave us lots of "food in the fridge" showing us she cared, and would tell us to eat and warm something yummy up. I missed my mom, and I would see her in the fridge. Food was my mom, food was my missing love,...food kept me and my brother safe. Food took away our fear and lonliness. (just writing this makes me cry...I hadn't taken the time to realize things until after this book)
Ages 6-15: My mom, needed to save money during the summers, so she would send us every single summer to live with my grandma for 3 months. My grandpa was a dietician in the "navy" and very strict on his thoughts of weight, and would force me against my will ..with tears and all to go for early morning runs because I was fat and chubby. They would have whole kitchen cabinets "full of sweets and junk food"...which everyone was allowed to eat, except for me because of my weight. I felt sad and rejected by them, and as if they didn't want to share the same love with me, and I would sneak food and eat and eat and eat...and hide it behind their backs..because I wanted their love. And to me, love can be found in food. I would feel sad that I wasn't like them and couldn't be part of the "normal" family. I was talked about behind my back, "resticted in many ways"...which caused that restiction to blow up in massive binging. It wasn't food that I wanted,...it was their love and care and affection that I wanted, but because I didn't feel it was the same as the family's....I felt I could find it in the food, jut like I would when I was at home...and my mom would be off working and give us a call...that "Love aka Food was in the Fridge". I continued those actions throughout my life.
Ages 11-18: I stopped wanting to go visit my grandma and grandpa summers now because I hated how I was forced to try and fit this model of a thin child and do a million workouts during the summers when other kids, just laid around and had good times. I started growing the feeling that everyone wanted to change me for something I wasn't. I knew that they all wanted me to "stay away from food and lose weight" so I would use that...to hurt them (in essence hurting myself not knowingly) ...by "not doing" what they wanted, I would gain control of them loving me as me...and I would eat more and more. It was a punishment for them because they didn't love me as is. And they didn't deserve for me to follow their orders just like that, without the proper love and acceptance of me as me,..no different than my chubby self. I stopped going at about 16 years old. And when I would come home after every summer,...it was back to comfort and allowing love back...cause my mom would leave love in the fridge cause she wasn't home...and it would keep the lonliness away...cause we could walk to the fridge and find traces of her there. I loved that.
Ages 11-18: My dad started playing more of a role in our lives, every other weekend, we would go stay with him. We loved that he would take us...it was an escape, every other weekend. We would have fun, and he would take us out...and it was much differnt than being at home. That was only for Friday night that he picked us up though. The next day, again, we had no baby sitter and I was left not only with my brother, but what now became my two little 1/2 sisters to take care of when I would go visit him every two weeks. He had 2 businesses to maintain, and had to work. No option. Again, he would kiss us goodbye early morning and leave us $20 to order food..and Pizza and Buffalo Wings became our Love and attention and caring for the Saturday until they would get home at 9:00 pm. This was normal for me by now. I knew that priorities came over being with us, and this is how it was. I still have a "fond fond" love for pizza and buffalo wings to this day. I missed my dad, I missed my mom. I wanted people to love me for "me"..and stop putting so much pressure on me. Food releived the pressure. I could hide myself away in it. I resolved, that this was "me". I am just a fat chubby girl,...and I am not meant to be "skinny" like everyone else...and I am not doing anything about it, because though everyone else wants to change me...I love me. I accept me. I am fat and I'm STAYING THAT WAY whether you like it or NOT! ...
Ages 18-21: I continued my habits of looking for love in food. My friends would come over sometimes on weekends and since nomal families would all be home gathering...sharing love together....I would show them...that "oh even though they aren't here, look at all the love we have here. I mean if they didn't love us, would they fill the kitchen with all these goodies and treats and cookies and food?"...Of course not...we are a normal family too..and here is our love. Have some, let me serve you on a plate. See...normal love. They would all come over and say "Wow, you have the Best STuff!!!...Your mom and dad is the BEST! Lucky you,...we wish our mom and dad were so cool!"... I thought so sometimes, yet they didn't see the whole story. My mom demanded a lot from me. The lists of "Tasks to do" still continued ...years later. I always had something to do, and never seemed to finish. This hurts, because I see how I rebel now in my present day on "to do lists"...I want to do them, but I don't at the same time, yet now it's me I'm rebelling, not her. I used to hate when she would leave these lists of to do things,...all over the house, every day of my life it seemed...when she wasn't even there to see it all be done and appreciate it anyway. Who cared about the damn lists!...Let me be! Leave me alone! I'm tired. (since 8-21) I was content with who I was, and would laugh and smile....because I wasn't changing a drop of me. I was overweight and now I was drinking and partying with other drugs to add to it. Drinking helped me escape it all, I would get trashed to the point of Blackouts ALL THE TIME... 2001...I went to jail and got a DUI. I spent 3 days there. I was 18. I don't even know how I got home alive so many nights. I would hang out with all the friends my mom wouldn not approve of. I lied about who I hung out with, and still used food as a safety ...a mobile safety...cause love can come with me.
Ages 21-23: I am an adult, definitely.. I now realize that I am going in a horrible direction,..and that I need to change my life. My family is in pain, they know that I smoke weed, that I drink, that I am overweight, that I went to jail because of bad people in my life, that I am hanging on by a string in college, and they expect me to be great...yet see me as a failure. I now realized, that I needed to take control. I needed to face things and stop hiding...I got on "herbalife"...and I quit drinking...completely...and I started running. In 8 months I lost 50 lbs. I got to 142. Everyone seemed to Love me more now. ...I still felt the same, more critical actually, so worse. I should have accomplished so much more by this time. I have wasted a lot of time. I am a failure still. I got stuck in weight. At 22, I met my bf. He rescued me from lonliness. We were two lonely souls when we found each other. It was perfect. He loved me for me. To this day, doesn't ever want to change me.
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