When Food Is Love

I once read this book entitled "WHEN FOOD IS LOVE"
written by Geneen Roth, in fact I pretty much own
all the books she has written.

I have always found myself in some kind of lost
world when it comes to food, after all you need
it to provide the nourishment it needs to keep
your internal engine running.

I can not recall when food was never on my mind
I have been through such a bad"love affair"
with food, I have always been a 'heavy gal","fat
"pleasantly plump"
by medical terms now labeled "obese"

I came from a childhood of eat everything on
your plate,"there are starving kids in China"
and I learned to eat fast so I could have
seconds.(won't deny my mother's cooking was
really good) or when I was upset I would get
cookies or something sweet for comfort to help
make my upset feelings go away."emotional eater"

I accepted it though, when I was in junior high school
I was put on weight watchers, and I would take
for lunch what I was supposed to while other
kids were eating what ever they wanted to
(weight watchers has really changed since then) it continued
and in my adult hood it was nutri -system ( the old one)
and diet pills, shakes, and even tried the famous
Oprah diet that was nothing
but liquid ( that one only lasted a few days!)

through my teen years and in to my mid 20's
I have been a closet binge & purge person
never labeled "Bulimic" but now labeled "Food Addict"
"compulsive Eater" ,"B.E.D." better known as "Binge eating disorder"

I had gastric bypass surgery almost 4 years ago but
not for the weight loss it was for other related health
issues, I lost approx 80 lbs, and it did serve it's purpose
for the medical issue but it felt like failure on the weight
issue. since then I have been an avid "yo-yo" person for
the last three years, and now when something food wise
does not agree with me, I automatically purge (guess you could
say from the gastric bypass surgery I know have a built in
purge machine in me)

at first the binge and purge issue was for weight loss
but I did not lose a lot of weight( OK, honesty check)
when my husband and I were stationed in Hawaii
I went from a size 16-to a size 5-6 in less than a year
then we came to visit and I was told how "good"
I looked and that I also looked "sick" I did not
care I loved getting the "good" compliment better
but after that visit something inside me began to
break, it was not wanting to be thin that I purged
I began to realize that I had been purging to feel
comfort , to self medicate, when I felt my life was
not in balance, sometimes I got to the point where
I would binge eat till I blacked out and then purge
to cleanse the pain and guilt feelings, I became quite
good at it and learned to hide it well.

I have kept this habit up for most of my life
there are times even now that I get the urge
but through a lot of hard work I have and still
am overcoming and accepting me whoever that maybe
my bad "love affair" with food isn't taking over my life
I am not a size 6 and will never be, just being
healthy spiritually and physically is more important
and if it takes me my life time to do it then so be it.

I still have weight to lose but at my age I don't
harbor on that I just try to make healthy choices
on a daily basis with out depriving myself
and never fall back into that crazy affair because
food is what we need to nourish the beautiful
internal engine inside and to make it glow on
the outside but I do not need it to nourish my
soul no matter what the size.

note: I have never expressed this private
part of my life to anyone, not family or friends
for fear of being judged and I hope that
since I am writing my expressions that
there will not being any judgements.