is tough.
I’m not sure if I’m ready to talk about what I’ve been going through the last couple of weeks. I’m still trying to figure out where my mind was going with some of the decisions I was making. What I can tell you (because this is about being honest right) is that I had stopped making healthy choices in the food I was consuming (and simultaneously working out too much). I don’t mean I was binging on foods full of calories with ingredients I can’t pronounce. I mean I stopped eating. Literally. I was getting calories in but in unhealthy amounts.
At the end of March I weighed 157 pounds.
Less than three weeks later I weighed 150 pounds.
(I would have kept going)
I don’t know why I started to push food away. I do know that there are certain behaviors that were fueling my desire to not eat food. One of them being challenging myself to go longer durations before eating. First it was an hour after I left gym, then it was challenging myself to go two hours after leaving the gym before eating. Three hours followed close behind until I was trying to go up to four hours. It was to keep my panic in check. It was a good plan to work through the panic but it was poorly planned and executed.
Another behavior was throwing food away. In the beginning the #100daychipquest challenge was set forth to help me understand that no matter where I was I had access to food. Throwing it away was like telling the panic it didn’t have a place in my life anymore and over the past 29 days it was doing exactly what I was hoping…dissapating the panic.
It was also taking away necessary calories.
As time went on, the amount of food I was packing for the day was getting smaller.
But the food I was throwing away was staying the same.
The final behavior is my relationship with the scale. It is unhealthy. I weigh myself multiple times a day…when I say multiple I mean double-digit amounts. Upwards to 15 a day. I don’t know why. A fear of gaining: maybe. A desire to keep losing: maybe. Habit: maybe…whatever the reason, it’s not a good enough one to justify what I was doing…
Not eating enough over the last couple of weeks has left my body weak. I don’t look healthy. I don’t feel healthy. I am not healthy. I can’t complete a workout without getting light-headed. I’ve had to stop doing whatever activity I was doing multiple times because I’m on the verge of passing out. My heart rate is up. My stomach hurts all the time. Eating is painful (emotionally). I don’t want to chew. I don’t want to swallow. I don’t want eat.
Period.
The reason I am writing this post is because over the course of the last couple of days, someone in my life came forward and called me on my shit. At some point in our conversations she asked me the following question: “If I was told I had to eat more in order to keep working out would I?”…I answered honestly: No.
Red Flag
She told me I had two choices – I could either go down the road to living healthy in all aspects of my life or I could go down the road of not living healthy. That I needed to choose. You’d think the choice would be easy but again let me be absolutely honest: I didn’t know at that moment of being asked where I wanted to go. I was thinking like an addict and if you’ve ever been one you know we don’t make the best choices…Before I could answer she sent the following text:
“I’m only going to hold your hand and walk with you down the road to strength and health. I can’t stand by you if you choose the other direction“
Being on the receiving end of tough love is hard.
(Difficult Difficult)
But it’s all I needed.
I’m giving up the #100daychipquest as soon as this posts to my blog. I thought about just giving up the throwing away food portion of the challenge but decided that right now I shouldn’t be involved with any challenges. I have other things I need to focus on in order to get my mind right and more importantly get my body back to being healthy.
I need to eat.
I need to eat often.
The other thing I’ve done is given up my scale. I didn’t put it somewhere in the house or give it to my husband to hide. I gave it away. When I walked into Godfather’s gym yesterday morning I did so with scale in hand. The only thing I can liken it too was when I had to give up my paraphernalia when I was getting clean. This morning when I woke up I stood where my scale would normally be and cried. I’ve already thought about sneaking off to my local Fred Meyer store and weighing myself in the bath department (Hello my name is Tara and I am an addict…).
Not only did my friend call me out on my shit and make boundaries for her own emotional well being, so did Godfather. He said if I continued down this unhealthy path, then the trainings would discontinue. To have two of the most important people in my life draw that line and stand firmly on one side waiting for me to decide which path I was choosing made the decision pretty easy…
I don’t want to be on this side of unhealthy.
Alone.
I want to be on their side of healthy.
Together.
So that’s where I am today. Figuring out how I got here and figuring out how to not stay here. Loving myself enough to know that while eating right now is difficult it is necessary. Standing in the place where once my scale was and trying through wishful thinking to make it reappear knowing it won’t. Crying and laughing, then quickly going back to crying. Then taking a deep breath and moving on to the best of my ability.
With my friend by my side.
(Thank you)
xoxo
Thank God YOU listened!
Personally, I have been waiting for this post for months, just like I did with our mutual friend that I know in my heart came to the same conclusions!
Maybe those magic wands worked after all……but YOU are SO WORTH this sweetie! Addictions just switch and run over us until we learn and believe and ACT on the love we deserve FROM OURSELVES…..
xoxo
Interesting to see you say you packed less and less and yet threw the same amount away. I’m starting to do the same where I try to only eat 75% of what I have in front of me. It’s going OK, and I haven’t got to the point where I’m packing less but I can see that happening and I can see still not eating everything. At this point, it’s all good – I know my portions are still too big. But it’s important for me to remember that at some point my portions will be sized correctly and that’s where I have to be careful I’m not going overboard.
Long way to go before I get there though.
I have tried to post xoxo to this three times.
Your blog keeps telling me its a duplicate entry.
I must have posted that before…
xoxo
I love watching you walk this journey. I always learn something that I can apply to my own life. COngrats on making the healthy and HARD choice.
I HAVE studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.
For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.
And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.
To put meaning in one’s life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.
Posts like this make me realize this journey is not one that ends – just because you are further down the road doesn’t mean it’s any easier, just different.
I don’t know what I can do to help, but know that I am here cheering you on and lifting you up from afar.
You have amazing strength and courage – thank you for sharing.
Tara, I’m so relieved to read this. I’ve followed you on your journey for most of a year and watched your intensity increase to a recent crescendo. I know you will find balance at a level that’s healthy and sustainable over time. Be well and take good care of yourself. You’ve got this!
Together!!!!
Please know that you are not alone on this journey. I feel like I could have written your last post, practically word for word.
I struggle every single day. I wish I could say that it gets easier with time, but that has not been the case for me.
I don’t comment even though I read almost every post (eventually … which is why I tend not to comment because I’m always so late to the party … but whatever.). I have to thank you for this. For being so open and honest and mostly for taking the steps to take care of you. Some cut & run when they’re struggling leaving the rest of us to wonder (I’m pretty sure you know at least one or two). Please don’t ever do that.
you will find the balance you need, my friend. The road has not been an easy one–this will be no different. We often replace one addiction for a other, then another, (we are quite smart and manipulative; we’ve had to be to survive) — until we get to the last one. This is your fork in the road–where you can finally trust where you need to be. And it’s ok.
Let go. Let it all go.
I’m really happy for you that you’ve come to some realizations about compulsive over exercising and under-eating.
Eating disorders come in all shapes and sizes. Congratulations for recognizing this and committing to work on it before it’s too late.
Your continued courage is just stunning. You’re evolving — you’re not just changing, you’re evolving into a better version of yourself slowly. I hope you see that. Wow, it’s inspiring.
I have been following your blog for awhile and always find it so honest and today is the perfect example. I am always convinced if I could just lose the weight every other issue I have would magically disappear….which is just not realistic. Thank you for your ongoing honesty and I wish you nothing but contentment…because it will never be perfect but being content is close 🙂
I am so glad to read this post, T-bear. I know it’s hard to STOP the choices that have gotten you this far because they’re now taking you TOO far. And I also know that MANY of us go through similar things, where we replace addictive unhealthy behaviors with addictive “healthy” behaviors. Only they’re not “healthy” because addiction isn’t healthy.
I hope you end up in a place where there is no room for addiction in your heart because you are so filled with love for yourself that it crowds out everything else.
Your honesty is amazing! As is your commitment to finding the balance in your life. I applaud you and I send you love…
I’ve said this here before but it needs to be said again: your awareness will take you far. It won’t make everything perfect…it doesn’t mean that you’ll never make mistakes. It just means that you’ll catch yourself sooner and that is the greatest victory of all.
This is a fantastic post. Seriously. It takes a lot to admit these things and I’m glad you have great friends and Godfather.
Speaking of Godfather, I haven’t been able to get a hold of him since he left AllStar. I really wanted to talk to him. Do you have any of his contact info?