tl;dr After realizing that I haven’t healed from YEARS of trauma and the death of a loved one, I am finally ready to give myself the unconditional love and support and friendship that I give to everyone else in my life. It’s very scary.
I have thought about writing this-and consequently have put it off-over and over for months.
I’m not sure why the idea of writing this all out has seemed so daunting, other than perhaps the most obvious answer, which is that it’s not an easy thing to do.
I want to write about my weight loss goals and the support I’m hoping to find in this community, because I think it could really change the way I view and engage with my ambitions and beliefs about weight loss/ myself. But it feels like I can’t do that without explaining how I got here.
This may be long winded, but I really hope some of you read this. And I’ll do my best to keep it to only the most necessary details.
I sat in the doctor’s office (where I’m guessing so many of our epiphanies occur) the other day and was going in to meet a psychiatrist. I hadn’t expected to get weighed. Weigh ins have long been a source of complete and utter terror/anxiety for me. I am 26 now, and I remember being in middle school and having public weigh in’s in PE (which definitely should not be allowed????) and being completely sick over the prospect of it. This is a deep rooted anxiety, which goes far beyond the number on the scale. But more on that later. For now, I’m sitting in the plastic chair of the psychiatrist’s waiting room, being told it’s time for my vitals to be taken. I understand why it was necessary, but it was a real moment of heartbreak for me. That is something that I have really become aware of in my life-how my complete awareness of my body (and the way it looks and moves and the space it takes up) makes even the most innocuous tasks very emotional for me. I don’t have a single moment free from that. I am constantly perceiving the world through a lens that is hyper focused on my weight and my body. It’s led to an agoraphobia and fear of places and people that totally contradicts my personality. I’m a super social person and I love being out in the world. But I don’t want to be seen. I want to hide. I am….I’m sad. I’m sad.
She tells me my weight. 250. 250!!!!! There’s freedom in typing that. No one in my life would believe that number. Though this is by far the highest weight I’ve ever been, a lifetime of masking and over-compensating for my body has forced me to figure out how to camoflauge very well. I’m guessing most people would think I was 180 or so. Now that I think back on being 180 and thinking THEN that I was out of control, it all just makes me feel a little deflated. I sat there, actually very numb, and thought-”It’s okay, because this isn’t even your body. That’s just a number. It doesn’t reflect who you are and where you’re going.”
My protective mechanism is disassociation. I learned to do it when I was very young and living with a tragically and dangerously alcoholic parent. I was not abused, but I witnessed my mother attempting suicide, was forced to call 911 for her multiple times by the age of 9, had to learn to deal with her alcohol related seizures, grew up without the love of stable female figures in my early life (I’m a woman, since I failed to mention that earlier), etc etc. I love to write and paly music and act, so I genuinely began crafting fantasies of my future where I would be safe and loved and paid attention to. I should mention here that I have an INCREDIBLE father who has done a remarkable job in raising me. But as a single parent, he worked a lot and I definitely felt unloved and abandoned until I was old enough to understand the sacrifices he made for me. (Late teens, early twenties is when our relationship fully became the solid best friendship it is now. He’s my rock, and he honestly is the reason I’ve gotten this far. Love him SO much.)
I always had a lot of friends and was genuinely very loved, so I don’t want to make it seem like I was physically alone. I think there was more a deep, deep, feeling of abandonment and unworthiness, having to take care of a parent that young. I couldn’t understand why my mom couldn’t get better for me. She was a great mom when she was sober, and she was full of love. But her own hurt and pain from her own life got in the way. She was the youngest of 6 kids, born to Hollywood director and actor parents, very beautiful and smart, and she was put into dangerous positions at way too young of an age in the 70’s and 80’s. super interesting, and I will post about it one day. But her mother, my grandma, was an alcoholic (though she’s 55 years sober now! Go Grandma Josephine!) and she was the victim of alot of misjustice. I am not blaming her. But there was so much pain for me from such an early age. She felt very guilty about it, and when she was with me, she’d shower me in gifts and yummy food. Things my dad wouldn’t give me. I still remember my first McDonald’s hamburger and my first Jack In the Box hamburger when I was in kindergarten. That created the blueprint for the emotional relationship with food I only JUST realized I have!!!
Anyway, fast forward through the early years. I became an adolescent with no mom and very little contact with her side of the family. My hips started to grow. My breasts started to grow. My dad did his best, but he was a punk rock guy with a 12 year old girl. He had NO idea how to tell me what was happening to my body. He bought me my first bra and first box of tampons and never made me feel embarrassed, but he also didn’t really know how to talk about it with me. (Once again, I totally understand. Lmao. Bless my dad. I still remember phone calls with him from the tampon aisle asking me if I wanted the “blue flavor or the green flavor” which was nervous dad for “regular or super.” He’s a precious man.)
I truly began to compartmentalize. I was happy, in general, and very bubbly and social-but all the while this deep, soul, wound felt as if it was growing and growing. I struggled with weight, but it hurts my heart to think of it, because I was perfect how I was. I was a kid.
People have talked about my body since I can remember. I am black/french and Italian, which basically means Black and White, and from the time I was 5 years old, I was aware of how different I supposedly was. When I was 5, I remember playing house with two classmates in my kindergarten class, and there was a discussion of who was going to be mommy, daddy, and baby. It was myself, another little girl, and a boy named Matthew Fuller. I’ll never forget his name or his face. I and the other little girl both wanted to be “mommy” (EW at this gendered nuclear family bullshit, btw. It’s so gross to think back on how conditioned we are from a young age to place ourselves in these roles and be seen as a wife and mother. UGH...but I digress) but Matthew made the choice. He told me I was fat and my skin was too brown. LITERALLY. THAT IS WHAT HE SAID.
I was a baby...he was a baby! But I carried that with me through out my LIFE, man. I really did. And the microaggressions of being a mixed girl with a white mama and a black dad in the 90’s and 2000’s really played a role in how I saw myself. And by extension, how I treated myself.
By my teen years, I felt ugly and fat. I have had the same group of best friends since I was 11. I got SO lucky. They’re the best people on Earth. And they are BEAUTIFUL. I’m not just saying that. Like, my friends are incredibly beautiful. And I always felt like I was the funny one, or the smart one, or definitely the artistic one-but that seemed to pale in comparison to always being the one the cute boys wanted to talk to. And again, I want to stress-looking back, it hurts me how hard I’ve always been on myself. I was beautiful, too. I have always been smaller in terms of bone structure and height. At that time I was probably 5 feet tall or so. And I was around 150 pounds. I have an hourglass figure, so I carried the weight pretty well. But I also was comparing myself to my friends with completely different genetics, and I felt like I was hideous in comparison. It completely changed my life. I had panic attacks before things that were supposed to be fun, like parties and outings. When we were younger, my more neurotypical friends struggled to understand this, and thought it was dramatic of me to decide I literally could not go out if I couldn’t find something to wear. But again, I didn’t have the tools or comprehension to explain how much deeper it was than just not liking my outfit.
I was sexually assaulted at 16 by a close friend. The situation was awful and nobody really understood that rape could happen even if you were drinking and even if it was your friend. My experience was invalidated and ignored. It took a really long time to heal from that. Not sure if I have, to be honest.
Feeling unlovable, I then lost my virginity at 17 to my friend’s older brother who was much older and was super sketchy. I continued that pattern, of weaponizing my body to combat the voice inside of me telling me I wasn’t good enough.
The things that happened to me sexually as a result of that still really hurt me. I told no one.
I have dedicated my life to being the best friend and daughter I can possibly be to distract everyone from the fact that I am so afraid I will never find my person. I feel so much love for everyone that it feels like my heart is going to explode. But that is also my biggest weakness, because sometimes I feel so much it just hurts. It makes my eyes water writing that.
I’ve thought of killing myself constantly since I was like, 19.
My dream was-and is still-to be a writer and entertainer. I want to be able to perform live without fear. I want to be able to act. And yet I feel like my weight is keeping me from my dreams.
I know that isn’t true. But the idea of failing to achieve my dreams is genuinely worse than death. And sometimes I think it would be easier not to exist. But I know how much it would hurt the people who love me and depend on me. So I never, ever will. I love life so much that it makes me want to die. Because I feel everything so deeply I sometimes can’t bear it.
My friend died in June almost 2 years ago. He was one of my best friends ever. I loved him deeply. I was always partially in love with him. I even thought one day, maybe, maybe MAYBE we might end up together. He felt like my soul mate sometimes. We met when we were 15 and he died at 24. He was super, super, wounded. In ways I didn’t even know the extent of. He OD’ed. He had just gotten out of rehab. I was supposed to take him to a meeting that day. Instead he died. I spoke to him the night before. I still can’t think about it. I cry, and I cry and I cry. I love you, J. I miss you.
I got a DUI. It was just a really dark time for me. I am SO FUCKING PROUD of coming out of that. My friend was dead and I found myself in the deepest well I’d ever been in. I think that trauma literally changed the chemistry of my brain. Nothing made sense anymore. Couldn’t focus. My eating went to hell. I mean….I feel like I lost those 2 years of my life. I don’t even remember them. I was in so much pain that I didn’t address.
Throughout those years, I abused my body, starved it, harmed it, you name it. I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety as well as body dismorphia. I'm pretty sure I have a form of PTSD, but I've never been officially diagnosed.
Fast forward to now. I’m 26. I have done so much mental and emotional healing. All of the times I’d tried to lose weight in the past, it was about the physical. It was about a number on the scale. It was about the attention of men. It was about trivial things. Surface things. I never addressed the pain beneath. I never EVER gave myself grace or love or compassion, even though I am an incredibly loving and compassionate person.
It just kind of dawned on me the other day, even before the doctor’s visit, that I have begun to heal myself in a deep and personal way. I am unlearning my conditioned toxic beliefs each day. I truly love myself. I want a good life for myself. I know how capable and deserving I am. I have handled everything so far-and it can’t be for nothing. I am currently working on finishing an album and publishing my second zine of artwork and poetry. I look in the mirror and although I still feel triggered and sad-I know that isn’t the objective reality. I AM a beautiful person. And luckily, I’m actually very healthy. I just got a full panel of blood tests. I have no physical illnesses other than PCOS, which explains a lot of my weight gain and metabolism issues. I'm on medication for that as well as mental health meds.
I am on medication for my depression and anxiety, which is giving me the motivation to actually get out of bed in the morning. I am LUCKY. I have a father who loves me. Friends who are an amazing support system.
I have all of the tools to be successful. I saved up money, quit my job, and moved back home. I am safe here. I have the time and means to eat well and exercise. I am writing and working on my art. I am talking to my mom again, with my own boundaries set.
All that’s left is this. To care about myself enough to make my life better. To take control over my disordered eating. To be present and actively participate in my wonderful life.
I deserve it. We all fucking deserve that!!!!! So. I’m going to do it. It’s never felt like this before.
I guess, I’m just ready. I’m sure I left stuff out, but I’ve already written a fucking novel. I’m sorry about that. I needed to get that all out.
If you made it this far-you are amazing. Seriously. You had no reason to care, but the fact that you did makes me feel seen. Please, please, engage with me. Let me know if you have any thoughts, feelings, shared emotions, whatever! I truly look forward to the community I can build here, and hopefully it will help me with accountability and encouragement.
Lastly, I will show you my starting pictures. I plan to update later, so I really want to have the initial photos here to compare to eventually. There are also some areas I'm kind of fixated on that I hope I can gain a more objective perspective on. Yikes, this part is really scary. But I want to be transparent about this process. I'm just gonna throw in some pictures I took right now....so excuse my crazy hair and blah blah blah.
I’m terrified! Wish me luck! My life awaits!
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