I'm not sure why I've waited three days to actually put down any thoughts about starving myself, again. Again. How many times have I done this. I have no idea. I do know it goes back to my early 20s. I love food and I hate food. I love the comfort it instantly gives when I hurt. The emptiness doesn't go away when I binge, but the pain does ease.
It eases for those few minutes I lose control. Even though even while eating, I think about how much I hate myself. I think about how I hate myself for letting go and eating. I hate myself for eating anything. In the past three days I have kept my food intake as low as possible. Any lower and I wouldn't be eating anything at all.
Day one, always no food at all. Day two, one very small sausage patty as soon as I got up. Day three, the same. Now there is weakness. A lot of weakness. Over the years I found that the initial weakness lessens. The desire doesn't though. The desire to sit down with a bag of potato chips, or ice cream, or a couple of really big cheeseburgers, and let the pain ease, doesn't lessen.
Believe me, at 47 I have heard and read everything. What's healthy to eat, when and how to eat. How the metabolism slows down and starts storing what it needs while starving. I know these things, but that makes no difference. Right thinking doesn't apply.
An apple a day keeps the doctor away.
But one single apple can make me feel a great deal of guilt. Eating, even healthy foods wouldn't let me feel the punishment I feel I need for being the way I am. This is something I feel I need and deserve. Being overweight was the cause of so much isolation. All those feeling of feeling different, and being less than everyone I saw each day at school.
As I think about someone reading this, I picture them shaking their head. Thinking how messed up I am. Which is most certainly true. I do have my issues. I am trying though. "If" I'm able to stay the course, as I lose weight, I will gradually allow myself a little more food. My greatest hope. Learning more. Understanding everything I feel that is missing within myself. How to let go of hurt and accept me for who I am.
Labels: Binge eating, Eating disorders, Food addiction