Imma Need a Favor
Imma need you, you who are overweight sitting there reading this, I need you to listen to me. You who may not even think you have an eating disorder. Listen.
I like comfort food, soul food. Sometimes I just eat more if I'm emotional. (That's compulsive eating. That's an eating disorder.) I don't have stashes of food in the bedroom or some weird place. I do have stashes of food in a drawer that I won't share with my family but I don't binge on it. I don't purge. I don't have an eating disorder, I just have a slow metabolism. I know lots of people like me who just like to eat. I don't order 12 hamburgers at the drive-through. There's nothing wrong with me. I'm normal.
These are the things I told myself. Told friends. Told family. I'm normal. If I shined a light too closely on what my motivations were for eating, I might wind up hating myself more than I already do. Because I am thoroughly ashamed of myself. I should be ashamed. This is what society told me and I interalized it. I am shameful. Lazy. No will power. Disgusting. Untrustworthy. I should hate myself for letting myself get this fat. This obese. Horrible. So disappointed in myself. I told myself all of this and more. Last week.
This week I read a book that you need to read. If you have said those things above to yourself. To friends. To family. I need you to know something: You've been lied to. You are not shameful. You are precious. A wonderful human that deserves compassion. Kindness. Gentleness. You are not disgusting. Those are lies and I bet, like me, you've told yourself those lies so much that you believe them.
Imma need a favor from you. If you eat for any other reason besides being hungry, go to the library and get this book: When Food is Love by Geneen Roth.
Last week I told myself the same lies I'd heard for decades. I fell for it too. This week I told myself the truth. I am not shameful. Shame is a bully. Grace is a shield.
I will promise you something: If you read the book, you won't have to go on a diet. Reading the book may be painful. I'm not saying it won't be. I have cried. I have also laughed. Because I recognized myself. I am learning, as Geneen says, to be INFINITELY GENTLE with every part of myself that I despise. Even the fat. It will take me a while. I am still learning. But I have begun.
I love you.
ReplyDeleteAnd comment #2. You are lovely and amazing.
ReplyDeleteAnd you just made me cry. A good cry. I love you too, darling woman.
ReplyDelete:) Love you, baby.
ReplyDeleteI love you, too. and you are truly what Kimmy said and more. You are brave.
ReplyDeleteWhat Kimmy said. Add me to the list of your loving fans.
ReplyDeleteLove y'all back. :-D Bop, I don't know about being brave...I feel fear and terror more than I'd like to admit but, at least I'm feeling something now. At least I'm feeling all the things now, the good and the bad and not numbing anymore with food.
ReplyDelete"The difference between Karen Russell and hundreds of thousands of people who are struggling with their weight or any other addiction is that Karen began, as she calls it, "sitting with herself" when she binged instead of turning against herself. She began using overeating as a way to gain access to her feelings instead of as proof that she was worthless and would never get it right. It was as if she had been an outsider to her own life, sitting in merciless judgment of herself, and now she was going to let herself into her heart. It is the difference between kicking a child who is in pain or rocking her." - Geneen Roth, When Food is Love
She may have well to have been talking about me.
Wow wow WOW. "It is the difference between kicking a child who is in pain or rocking her."
ReplyDelete