Hey all. I’m not sure this is the right place to post this, or if I should be mostly in the Overeater’s Anonymous sub. I actually don’t think overeating is my huge issue. I do overeat, I’m sure, especially on calories. I’m actually a serious maintainer. It really seems as if I’ve gone through periods of my life where I’ve been in severe depression or something, gain a ton of weight, then I stay there.
My whole life has been about my weight. I became very heavy as a child. I was always bullied at school and at home (not by my parent, but everyone else). I remember being 134lbs in like second or third grade or something. I don’t know why I was allowed to get so overweight, especially because my family hates overweightness and are constant (but usually chubby/overweight) dieters. A huge family of eating disordered people who never shut up about what they eat or how they eat or how you should eat or how thin you should look. It used to make me nuts growing up. I think I was rebellious to it. My food was monitored by my grandmother who I lived with, my aunt would always NOT subliminally be teaching me how to lose weight and eat healthy: “whenever I eat pizza I always get one slice and a salad if the slice doesn’t fill me up!” 🙄I was once given a wedge of mozzarella cheese as a child by my uncle and my aunt said, “that’s lunch!” I’m in my early thirties but I remember how terrible it made me feel. Like I was fat and disgusting and my hunger after the wedge of cheese was not normal. My uncle once corned me to ask me how much I weighed and was trying to measure my waist with a tape measure, when I was twelve. My mother was an enabler. Always getting me whatever I wanted to eat, whenever. Naturally, my whole life, I go between extreme self loathing and then rewarding.
TW: Bulimia/Anorexia
When I hit twelve I got the grand idea to start throwing my food up. Then starving myself. I went from 245lbs as a twelve year old to 145lbs into being fourteen. I was mostly bulimic so never much lower than that number. I was like, super eating disordered. Very typical, ritualistic, stick to my guns on what I’m doing, scared of food and calories, starving myself all day, eating a ton of food at night to throw up, cracked out. Like a legitimate addict but with food. A chain smoker, etc. I was in two eating disorder hospitals because I was so bad, and even got left back a year in high school because of it. My weight has truly always ruined my life, even my lower weight. The obsession of weight. My family treated me so differently while I was thin. I had a lot of sexual attention from peers suddenly, even by male family members—yeah...it was an alternate reality. Suddenly I was hot, cute, sexy, pick up-able, a person, etc. I didn’t even get to enjoy my body because I was always wanting to be thinner. I wanted to be 120lbs. I wrote it on everything. On my wall. On my coffee cups. I was really sick.
Then when I was about sixteen, the pediatrician—eating disorder specialist—was closing in on me so much and threatening to send me back to a hospital that I became too exhausted and gave up. I had been chugging water before appointments for when I was weighed. Then I’d be sent right for bloodwork and she’d see my electrolytes were off and knew I was purging/starving myself. One visit she said, “you can still lose weight with eating,” I had just gotten out of the second hospital, and maybe I was too tired of obsessing, so for some reason I was like, “oh, okay!” And started eating again...but then I didn’t stop. I actually know now that it’s a common thing that happens to people coming out of starvation eating disorders. You’re supposed to be monitored by a therapist, and I was allowed to leave mine even though I shouldn’t have been. Long story short, it’s been about fifteen years since then and I am over 300lbs. I got to 260lbs within the first year and a half of eating again, though. Huge weight gain, then maintained and not lost.
I never imagined myself getting to this point, ever. I was actually around 335lbs at my highest, that happened within the past five years, that I know of, could have been more at points because I stopped weighing myself. When I was in my mid twenties I fell chronically ill with an autoimmune disease that was not being diagnosed. Why? Well gee. Every doctor I went to said, “I’d lose some weight!” Or, “it could be your weight,” and did nothing more as my life fell into oblivion. It actually took my going to a rheumatologist who is also really overweight (I didn’t know before hand) for a dr to actually look at my symptoms and not my fat to diagnose me. I’m doing great now because it’s being treated, but I gained another fifty or so pounds while I was ill. I went through extreme trauma in the midsts of being chronically ill. I almost became homeless, practically was, and my family pretty much black sheeped me—though, I realize now that I was likely always predestined to be the black sheep. Fat black sheep. And even though I got better from the autoimmune disease, I almost died from Covid, and I’d bet THAT had to do with my weight. I’m doing fine now, lost some from being so sick actually. I’m still in the three hundreds, though. 307 last I checked. I was a long hauler for five months afterwards and just started feeling normal again about last month. Lost half my hair. It was a MESS. And I thought THAT would prompt weight loss, but all it ever prompts are weight loss thoughts without actually doing any work. I can think myself thin fantasizing about it.
The point of this post is that. I feel so stuck. I am totally disassociated from my body. I think I have always been because it’s always been the topic of conversation or a spectacle amongst everyone, especially in my family. I’ve always hated my body, yet it’s always been my number one focus. All I could ever think about since I’m young was my weight, how fat I am, how ugly I am, how bad I am because of the foods I eat, and how everyone thinks I’m so fat. Just constant and extreme shame + guilt.
Sometimes I sit and think about all I could have accomplished if my entire life wasn’t about my body. Maybe I could have went to Harvard or something. I didn’t even know I was capable of anything intelligent until I got to college, where bullying wasn’t really a factor anymore.
I’m so angry but also so numb. I want to lose weight so badly. It’s always a revenge body thing in my mind. I fantasize about running into people who bullied me. It’s never about my own health and happiness, it’s about appealing and impressing. I’ve wanted to lose weight my entire life but never actually do, unless I’m starving myself. Unless it’s extreme. I read a quote that said if what you fear is what the outcome is, it’s likely that trauma is at play. I feel like I’ve gone through trauma my whole life from being forced to feel uncomfortable in my own skin. Now I have stretch marks all over my body, my skin is disgusting, with acne everywhere since getting this overweight, and I know I’m going to have loose skin if I get down to the weight I want to be: 145. It makes everything feel worthless. Like it won’t be worth it because I’ll never be perfect. All I want to be is perfect with a smooth body and smooth skin, and no matter how hard I work, I will never ever have that. It’s such a hurdle to get over. I try to make it a metaphor for myself: maybe you can’t have $1,000,000, but wouldn’t you at least rather have $700,000 than nothing?? I would rather have $700,000 than nothing, but I have no drive.
It makes me feel so resentful that I’ve always been overweight or totally screwed up about eating. I just feel so gypped, used, and like I’ve wasted my entire life. I just can’t imagine anyone will ever want to be with me, and for so long I didn’t even want to be with anyone, but now I do. I’m in my early thirties and I just want a nice, happy life with a partner. Quarantine has made that especially clear to me. But I feel like I will never be good enough for anyone with my body. TMI, but I haven’t even been with anyone in over eleven years. No sex. No nothing. I will not be with anyone at this weight because I hate myself. I think I’ve always hated myself because I was taught to. That makes me feel resentful the most.
I’m not sure what I’m trying to get out of this, but I needed to vent, and I want help, or a community, or something. I don’t know, honestly. Bleh. Thanks for reading if you have.
Edit: I also wanted to add that I feel like I’m living the nightmare version of my life. I honestly thought I would be a healthy weight, in my career, financially independent, etc at this point. Chronic illness threw my whole life backwards. Instead of the revenge body, I am more overweight than I’ve even been or could have imagined. Instead of being financially dependent and in my career, I couldn’t work for four years, now five because of this stupid pandemic. And I still live with my mom! I also have no relationship with my family anymore. They treated me like I was a lazy POS while I was sick because I wasn’t being diagnosed, and they already thought I was a fat, lazy person before. My life is the nightmare version of what I thought it would be at this age, and I don’t know how to find myself or be who I want to be now.
I know I need therapy. Sigh.
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