The Past

The past makes us what we are in the present, so I've always believed... So in order to make peace and accept the past, I'm going to write about my past struggle with my weight.
   My weight became a struggle with me,when I turned 14 and my Pediatric Endocrinologist (the doc I saw for my TS), told me for the first time that I needed to start losing weight. I don't think my mom was too concerned at that time and after I may have tried eating healthier foods for awhile (don't really remember). Anyways, that's when the paranoia about my weight and self-conscience began. After that apt. I was always asking myself, "Am I fat?", "Does everyone else think I'm fat". It was always in the back of my mind. Now I may have weighed 100 lbs. at that time and looking back on it, I don't think I was that heavy. So this became the routine every other month when I had to see Dr. Zanganeth at  the Charleston Women and Children's Hospital. He would constantly tell me I lose weight and that any breast tissue I was getting was "fat". I guess I just began to not care and soon found myself going to college and working part time at K-Mart. This was when the fast food eating began. I would grab something quick to eat on the way home from school or work . It didn't help that a Long John Silver's  was next door to where I worked. I started to really pack on the weight and it got up to 160 lbs after my Freshman year at Marshall ( You could say I gained the Freshman 15 plus a lot more).
           In 1995 things started to change. I was fed up. I saw a picture of me hugging my sister at my birthday party and didn't even recognize myself. I knew then, that I had to do something.....That something is a part of my life that very few people know about. I became almost bulimic.  How did it start? Well, it started out with me taking diet pills, exercising constantly when I could, and eating very little. After I lost 20 lbs (in a month), it became harder. So I started taking laxatives. I know it's disgusting. I would take 2 to just get everything out of me ( I wasn't purging though, I was still only eating green beans for dinner and I was still exercising constantly). Many people around me, friends and family kept commenting on how great I looked and how wonderful it was that I was losing all of this weight. So I started taking more diet pills,  more laxatives and exercising more (even going to the gym at Marshall between classes). I got to the point where I could take the laxatives (sometimes 4-6 at a time) and it would make me so nauseous that I would throw everything up. I did force myself to vomit after eating a couple of times, but that never got to be a habit. Anyways, I went from 160 to 94 lbs. I started this diet in Sept/Oct. and I weighed 94 lbs by early March. Dieting consumed so much of my life that I made excuses not to see friends and I never went out. I stayed home and exercised. Finally, I got fed up with it all and just stopped. Of course, I also gained back the weight in the following year. I don't know why I let myself get like that. All I know is that I badly wanted this guy to love me again and felt he'd stopped liking me, because I was fat. And I did get him back during all the dieting, but that relationship faded out and of course I dealt with the pain by eating.Over the years till the present, I have tried dieting (I've tried Atkins and several others to no avail) and exercising, losing 20-30 lbs at times (no drastic ways like before).
    So that is my "dark" past so to speak. I'm not the same person as I was then.NO ONE needs to tell me how terrible it was and what a horrible way to try and lose weight. I know now that you have to eat in moderation and the longer it takes to lose the weight, the better you are able to keep it off. I live with a Dr. who would not allow me to be the way I was. I couldn't do it. Even the thought of being the way I was then exhausts me. It's not who I am now and I'm not going to become that way again. I am going to lose this weight by eating healthy and exercising. NO PILLS or crazy diets at all. To me I know it's a life change  and that it impacts everything.
     Now about today. I did awesome! 45 minutes on Wii fit and a walk after dinner. Drank my 2.2 liters of water and I'm feeling great. Here's what I ate:
Breakfast- Egg Beaters with 2 slices of bacon
Lunch- same as yesterday, without the crackers.
Dinner- Grilled Lemon Pepper Chicken and Lima beans (I LOVE MY LIMAS- lol)

Tomorrow after work, I'm going to go by the Jazzercise class and talk to them about classes. For years I have been wanting to dance (not on a stage or in a recital- just to dance again) and this will be a great way to combine my love of dancing with exercise. Can't wait.