The mental struggle of dieting.

Our bodies are wonderful things.  We can abuse them with food, and laziness, and can recover from it with a little hard work.  Our bodies have this amazing ability to recover, and heal itself. There is a quote that is in the movie "Here comes the boom" that actually rings very true with this subject.  In the movie Kevin James talks about stagnant cells, and how when one cells starts to die, the other cells take suit and follow and they start to die off.  But when one cell tries to regenerate, or heal itself, the other cells will follow suit.  When you abuse your body, with food, or whatever, the cells start to die, and more die, and illness and disease set in.  If you let if continue, and you keep on abusing your body, the death will continue.  But here is the miraculous part, the body can also reverse damage. If you take initiative and make changes and try to heal yourself, your body will take suit and follow.  It just takes one cell, then another, and you can restore what you have destroyed.

The physical part has always been easier than the mental aspect.  I sabotage myself.  I cant get out of my own head and I give up.  Its a struggle to constantly fight yourself.  After all food has always been there for me.  It has always given me comfort.  My mom used food as both a reward and a bribe.  So what do I do? I reward myself with food, like a dog.  My father was my worse critic, he hated my weight.  He would criticize me in the worse ways. His voice is stronger than my own, it always has been.  So the voice in my head, is very critical.  These are the mental hurdles I am trying to climb right now.  I have immense amounts of self doubt, and self criticism. The other day, I tried on my workout outfit.  The very first one I bought 4 years ago, when I really started this journey towards weight loss. Before the surgeries, and pregnancy.  Before I let other people take over my life, my home, and my sanity. The last few years have been tough.  I punished myself for not handling everything better, by binge eating.  That outfit that used to fit, that is worn out and stretched out, IS TIGHT.  So tight I fought to put it on.  I cried. I felt sorry for myself.  I went into a downward spiral of self hatred. I told myself GIVE UP ITS TOO HARD.  I told myself "your suffering for nothing, you will never lose that much weight again" I told myself "i am fat, and gross, go eat it will make you feel better" Ya know what I did? I stuck to my diet, I worked out every single night.  I hated the machines, I hated my body, and I punished the machines instead of myself.  I punished my body, with hard workouts, that lifted my mood.  I started to turn myself back around.  But I fight my brain, my moods, all the thoughts inside my head that are negative.  That is the hardest part of this all.

Last night I was up until 3:30 am watching my 600 lb life.  I felt so sorry for those people.  Even though I am no where near 600 lbs, I related so much to what they were going through.  The mental part of this is so hard. Overcoming the damage other people did to you.  Overcoming what you did to yourself.  Learning to LOVE YOURSELF enough to repair all that damage you have done.  Loving yourself enough to say NO to the drug that once fed your addiction... food. Loving yourself enough to get on a machine that feels like its trying to kill you, because you know it will make you feel better in the long run.

I struggle every single day with just being good to myself.  I want to eat chips, and fast food, and salt.  Some times the cravings get so bad, I turn into super bitch.  Then I go in the kitchen and fix myself something healthy to try and calm down the bitchiness. I try to keep my body fed and full, so that I don't feel like I am starving myself to death. So I eat several small meals and snacks throughout the day.  I workout 7 days a week, because I know if I skip a day, that can turn into skipping 2 days, then 3 then 4, then altogether quitting.  I know all my triggers, and I try to avoid them.  I know what foods to avoid, what people to avoid, and I know how to stop the mindless eating.  I just dont know how to love myself enough.   Not yet.  I dont know how not to beat myself up for slipping.  I dont know how to love myself even though clothes dont fit.  I dont know how to not beat myself up over slipping up once in a while.  I am a huge work in progress.