The Fats Of Life - part 5

After all these insights into my life, you might be wondering about my relationship with food.

It's like an abusive relationship, I think I'm free and that the cycle is finally broken, but then I'm pulled back in, I don't want to be, I know it's wrong but I can't help myself,

In short, food scares me, it's a terrifying reality that I can't avoid, a mixed-up fear and fascination

I need it to live but any moment it may become my cause of death

Here lies Amy, ate herself to death, that can't be the legacy I leave, but I'm scared it will be

Yet I have often used food as a punishment, if I had done something I thought of as wrong or stupid and it could be anything, a fight with a friend or didn't pass a test, just any situation where I thought I had failed, I would just stuff my face, chips, chocolate, ice cream and lollies, I knew I would be hurting myself but it was another kind of self-harm.

I always had my favourite go-to snacks,

Bluebird Tangy Biguns, (why don't they make these anymore) 50 cents a bag, I would stock up on these chips, (ok probably good they don't still make these)

Chocolate, lots of chocolate, for a while there before they brought back Caramilk chocolate I thought I had hallucinated it since no one seemed to remember it

And cheese, I love cheese, it goes with everything

Everything except my expanding waistline.

After meeting Victoria, things became clearer. I know now that what I have is called Binge Eating Disorder. I never knew it existed, when you hear about eating disorders you think of anorexia or bulimia, you don't think it's something a fat person may have, or at least I didn't, I always thought I just had no self-control and ate like a pig

So that's something I'm learning more about.

I have often thought I would do well being denied complete access to food, having someone in charge of making my meals and giving me just what I need, no extra and no junk food.

I have previously been addicted to Coke Zero, at least 3 or 4, 2-litre bottles a week but I quit, cold turkey, the first week I had a blinding headache and was so fidgety and tense but now I'm nearly 2 years fizzy drink free, so I have proven to myself I can do it, that I have the willpower, so why is it that much harder with food?

You ever notice that as soon as you start trying to eat healthy that suddenly you are super aware of the amount of fast-food and junk food ads you see on tv.

For me it's torture, I see an ad and then I crave that food, the craving stays until I have had the food, it's not all foods just things I know I like.

Living alone doesn't help since I don't have to hide this behaviour, only when friends come over do I hide the evidence

I don't for sure know when it all started, that's something I'm hoping to explore, maybe writing these blogs will be a form of therapy for me.

Learning more about myself as I go

But I want to reach others with the same thoughts, feelings and experiences as well. I think it's important for us all to feel we aren't alone in this struggle, this fight for food freedom.