Saturday, August 20, 2016

Learning all about me!

This week has been a very self reflective kind of week.  Beyond the daily excitement and chaos of the preparations of the upcoming school year, I started listening to an amazing book.  It was a recommendation by my friend/coach Krystle.  It is called, "It was me all Along" by Andie Mitchell.

Get a copy here

The book is about a woman and her struggles with her lifelong battle with obesity and eating disorder.  She grew up with an alcoholic father, and a hard working mother.  Most of her childhood was comforted by the food she consumed, which in turn consumed her.  Reading her thoughts about food and the NEED for comfort through the food she ate was absolutely enlightening.  What was even more incredible was how she turned her obsessive need for unhealthy snack into a healthy obession with trying new ways to eat.
This book took me back to my childhood.... which was hard.  My mother taught me early on that food could fill my stomach and my heart.  I found great comfort in eating a whole block of cheddar cheese on my own.... I specifically recall my mother being upset I ate it all.  In my family they were less kind to a growing roundness of a girl.  My grandmother was always very forward bless her heart, and quick to tell me to "suck in my gut".  The minute I began to get "chubby" they would mention it in the household and I would instantly be insecure about my looks.  I began hiding my eating as early as 7-8 years old. I would sneak into the pantry and eat a whole bag of chips to myself while no one was around.  I would scarf any nutterbutter or any little debbie cake I could find inhaling it before anyone could witness it.

I began trying to "diet" as young as 12.  When all the girls had no "pooch" in their little gut, I was super self-concious about mine. I became a "vegetarian" at 12 and didn't eat meat for 6 months. Not because I felt sad for animals or anything like that. I would sneak my moms diet pills....I was boy crazy on top of it all. I moved from food to boys.  I started smoking to "look cool" and it helped me not want to eat as much. Yes, I was only 13.


This book has really inspired to reflect on my eating patterns, my life patterns, and why I was the way I was and how that resulted into me today.  203 lbs of messed up mental images. I want my girls to grow up so differently.

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