Scrutiny Makes Me Squirm (Trying Not to Eat All the Things)

Intuitive eating has left the building. What the heck happened? A couple months ago I felt like I was on the path to emotional and physical wellness.  Now I feel like a pathetic hot mess.

You know I try very hard to maintain transparency here on Randomocity. When I'm happy, I say so. When I was grieving and struggling with depression, I wrote about it. If I have a confession to make, you're probably going to hear about that, too. It takes courage to be vulnerable, and I am trying to be as brave as possible. The honesty has to start with me, and what I tell myself, and if I'm being totally honest, I've been avoiding some big stuff lately.

I can't be honest about the things I refuse to consider. I've been in denial for far too long, and today, I'm facing the music, and exploring the thoughts I've been stuffing into the dark recesses of my mind. 

I have not weighed myself in weeks. (I see this as a plus. I used to be a slave to the scale.) Although my clothes still fit, I can feel a shift in the way they fit. (I can still get them on; that counts, right?) My face looks fuller in the photographs Chuck takes of me. (Notice how hard I am trying to not attach a value of good or bad on any of these subtle changes.) I can tell that I am avoiding dealing with uncomfortable feelings, and that emotionally, something needs to give. I have craved sugary, creamy things for days on end. I wake up in the morning fantasizing about eating entire cartons of ice cream, and baking dozens of cookies to store in the freezer, just in case. 

Just in case of WHAT? There is no shortage of food, either in my house or in our community. No one is going to prevent me from eating what I want, but for some reason, I am operating as though there were some terrible lack, not the reality of the abundance available to me. So what the heck is going on?

I am acting like I used to the day before I started a diet. I want to eat ALL. THE. THINGS. Like, any day now, I'm going to tell myself "Stop. No more. Eat only THIS. Stop eating THAT." I feel anxious and uncertain about food. I don't trust myself to make wise choices. I'm not taking care of myself the way I would a good friend. 

There are two personalities at play in my head; the spoiled child who won't take no for an answer, and the namby-pamby adult who won't tell the child no anyway. I feel a need for control when I am out of control like this; I want a list to follow of foods I SHOULD eat, and foods I should avoid. I don't trust myself to know what I need to be healthy. 

I'm so jealous of friends who have just joined Weight Watchers, or are losing weight by following a prescribed diet. I have so many doubts about this intuitive eating right now because something is off-kilter inside me. 

Intuitive eating requires using our intuition. I'm not sure I can hear that little voice inside my head when I'm drowning it out with my defense mechanisms of stuffing down bad feelings with eating and shopping. It has taken me weeks to muster the courage to admit that something is wrong.  

Recognizing there is a problem is the first step. I know that by exposing my anxiety and fears to the light, I will remove any power they have over me. Until today, I have not been willing to evaluate what's going on. I'm getting to the bottom of this, no matter how much personal scrutiny makes me squirm. 

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The next blog post continues in this series with TRYING TO FEEL ALL THE FEELS.