At A Snail's Pace

Recently I have been trying to figure out what my emotional triggers for binge eating are and I can say with some certainty that I still have little idea.  Admittedly, I've been thinking about it less frequently than I had been when I first started my blog and I should get back to working on that.

However, I have identified some physical triggers and one of them had been eating too quickly.  I use to scarf my food down like it was some sort of race as to how quickly I could eat everything on my plate.  When it was gone, I would go back for more, because in the five minutes it took me to eat my brain would still think it was hungry because it still hadn't registered that the stomach was full.  So I could get seconds and eat a whole additional second plateful of food and by the time it starts registering that I've had enough, my stomach actually hurts because I've eaten far more than I need to.

This is the cycle that always happening, but I never caught on to what was occurring.  It was only after starting my therapy and my visits to the dietitian that I started hearing about the importance of eating slowly and chewing thoroughly.  I felt embarrassed, and I told my dietitian this, because it sounded like something that I probably should have known but she said that it's something that people don't automatically realize when they're relearning how to eat properly.

I did feel a bit better hearing that it was more common than I thought and started putting it into practice immediately.  It actually was harder than it sounds when you've spent your entire life eating really fast, but it's been about a month now that I've been doing it successfully.  Now I don't even have to think about it.  It takes me about a half an hour to eat dinner, I'm full before I finish eating, I eat less and I never go back for seconds.  All of these things I'm happy about.

Some practices that helped me during that month were setting my fork down between bites, and I still do that actually because it's become a habit.  I chew much more slowly and thoroughly.  I did use to have to think about it before, because it had always been food was swallowed barely after being chewed as if I were some sort of wild animal.  One more thing I found helpful was to stop trying to put as much food on the fork as possible.  For some reason I would always try to stuff as much into my mouth as it could hold.  I am not a chipmunk.

Now, I don't even think about it when it comes to meals and today I realized that I don't even stress out anymore when I'm eating.  That made me really happy and I hope that it continues to stay that way.

Going Down?

So I've been trying to stay off the scale, because sometimes it triggers binge eating and that's never good.  But Monday morning I decided to pull it out and weigh myself because with the loss of some of my pants I needed to know where I was hovering.  The magic number was 417lbs.

Let me explain why this was exciting for me.  In 2008, I tried to go through the process for gastric bypass surgery and was actually approved (and thank goodness I didn't have the surgery, knowing what I do now about myself).  At the start of that attempt I was 416lbs so I'm really excited about getting down to the weight I was two years ago in such a short amount of time.

One of the things I feared about weight loss is how long it would take for the weight to come off.  It took a long time for me to get heavy, but the weight actually comes off much more quickly than it does to put on I'm finding.  I like this.  As long as I continue my healthy eating, my exercise (slacking recently, post for another day) and going to my therapy sessions for my binge eating I know that I can be successful.  The longer I do this, the easier it is to be positive about it.

Looking forward to my next therapy session, I have so many positive things to share with my therapist.

The Number You Have Dialed Has Been Disconnected

Part of my therapy process has been trying to learn what my triggers are for binge eating.  Sometimes it's simple things like having a food item in the house that I just want to eat and the go overboard with it.  More often for me, it's tied to emotions.  I use food as a way to feel better and for someone who already has has a mood disorder you can probably guess, this is a really bad way to cope for someone who frequently rides the EOE (Emotional Overload Express).

Many times I set myself up for binging episodes without thinking about the consequences of my actions.  It involves dealing with people I care about and expecting them to behave towards me or my requests in a particular way.  When they let me down, I get upset, it triggers that compulsive eating and there I am, feeling physically an emotionally sick because I just ate myself stupid once again.

Ok, now that is an oversimplified explanation and only someone who has been through this (surely just about everyone, right?) and identified and dealt with the pain of constant rejection of a family member (or someone you care about) who you expect to be there or to follow through with something they're going to do or say is going to really understand the kind of hurt I am talking about here.  I am not talking about a random occasion, I am talking about years of consistent and repeated events of being let down with no attempts of apologies or remorse when truly having made a mistake.

So, I thought that the easy solution for myself was, "Don't set yourself up for these kinds of disappointments, Rachael, by expecting things from others and simply just don't interact with that person at all."  (I don't take complete credit for that, I have a therapist you know!)  This only kind of works, because I have to be willing to commit to the cutting that person out of my life completely.  I don't want to do that, because I love that person even if they have faults.

This leaves me with a solution of accepting their faults, knowing they're more than likely going to let me down or not meet my expectations again in the future, because that's what they do and learn how to let these things roll off my back and not send me packing on at trip down the EOE.  (Again, thank you therapy.)

My only problem here is I don't know how to stop desperately wanting the person who lets me down the most to stop letting me down and just be there.  I think, "That would stop some binging episodes, right?"  I also know it would not teach me how to control the binging at all, nor would it teach me how to deal with the shattering disappointment that comes with being let down when expecting a certain outcome.

So there it is, I have my answer, I know what I have to do, but now I have to accept it.  That's the hard part and I'm working on it.  Life needs an on switch for everything.  "I need to change a behavior? Oh let me just flip the switch for that right over .... here.... got it!  All better."  I'll get it figure out eventually, I figure.

Before I go, I have to add that I have considered that my expectations of my family might be unreasonable and I haven't realized that yet - or is thinking about it possibly realizing it?  Either way, I'm not ruling anything out this early in the game and I am considering it more.