Being more than just a number
I have been dealing with body image issues lately and have struggled with it more now than I remember in the past. I can't say that I have struggled with my weight my entire life because that is a lie, rather I started having issues when I went to college away from home for the first time. The stress of college life, and academics in particular led to my battle with Bulimia for nearly 3 years. Its not an easy thing to come to terms with, and even more difficult to face the demons within an eating disorder to fight back and regain control of your life.
Whats interesting (or what I thought was interesting until I started the path to recovery) was bulimia was never about body image for me. I was pretty happy with my body in high school, but who can complain being 101 lbs their senior year and fitting into a size 0. I was however labeled as athletic, skinny, slender, whatever you want to call it, and that label became difficult for me when I started to put on weight as a result of frequent binges as my bulimia really peaked into a daily part of my life. Being "skinny" had always come easy to me...in fact I had spent most of my life being the scrawny kid on the team, or the underweight member of my class. So to start a struggle with keeping weight off while I was also incredibly vulnerable and dealing with an eating disorder led to some pretty hard core body image issues. Even being binge/ purge free for 5 years, I have been suffering from something that is quite common to acquire during the battle with an eating disorder...body dismorphic disorder (BDD).
This post has been on my mind for quite some time and it is difficult to write this, but my initial goal with this blog was to help myself heal, internally from my struggles with depression, anxiety, and my former eating disorder. BDD is described as unreal perception of one's body image per Wikipedia, it "begins self-criticism of the personal appearance, from which develop atypical aesthetic-standards derived from the internal perceptual discrepancy between the person's ‘actual self’ and the ‘ideal self’". In essence you have a perceived ideal self that is usually very un-realistic and often "silly" perceptions of the physical self that either don't exist, or are not really as intense as the person believes them to be. Granted my BDD is not nearly as severe as it has been at its peak, but its something that is still a struggle for me especially since having my children.
One thing I think I did when starting my training plan for IM was having a idea in my head of how I would look as a result of my training, and what I would be able to achieve in terms of body changes. I really believed that I would go through a metamorphosis and lose tons of weight and be skinny as a rail...back to my old "ideal" self. As I have been training I have not achieved this ideal...and it has been difficult to bite off, chew, and swallow. Literally. Recently the BDD has started to rear its ugly head with me being overly obsessed with specific parts of my body (mainly my nose, my stomach, and the number I see on the scale). My friends who hear me knock myself down frequently over the past couple months have been trying to set me straight, and it made me realize just how real and how hard it is to overcome an eating disorder, and how hard it is to keep it from continuously rearing its ugly head. Especially when what you used it for is something that is also becoming more frequent and you want to as old adage says "fall back into old habits".
For me...bulimia was about control and stress relief. It didn't start out that way per Se...but its what it eventually evolved to, and is difficult to fight back as stress and feeling out of control do happen in life...and especially after having kids. I have to consciously remind myself at times to be mindful of what I am eating and not to go out of control. I also have to make sure that I am not getting secretive with my food as it is easy to fall into as well, and when I am not accountable to anyone, it becomes somewhat of a slippery slope. I have been trying to keep myself more accountable by logging my food on an application called myfitnesspal.com. I have friends that are on the site and it helps me to be accountable for what I am eating and also make sure I am trying to give my body "good fuel" for my training.
That being said I still struggle with the number on the scale. I don't know why it is such a mental thing, but having an ideal weight and then not being able to achieve it when you want has been extremely frustrating. I say I am going to try not to care about it...but the truth is I do. So as a college friend of mine once did...I am following suit and breaking up with my scale until after Boise. The number on the scale has absolutely nothing to do with my performance at Boise, nor does it measure my worth as a person. So I am breaking up with it. This is my official break-up notice...sorry Mr. Scale that I had to breakup with you publicly online, but I need this...Its not you...its me, and I think we need to see other people. Maybe now I can start to focus on who I am on the inside and measure my worth not by an arbitrary measurement.
Whats interesting (or what I thought was interesting until I started the path to recovery) was bulimia was never about body image for me. I was pretty happy with my body in high school, but who can complain being 101 lbs their senior year and fitting into a size 0. I was however labeled as athletic, skinny, slender, whatever you want to call it, and that label became difficult for me when I started to put on weight as a result of frequent binges as my bulimia really peaked into a daily part of my life. Being "skinny" had always come easy to me...in fact I had spent most of my life being the scrawny kid on the team, or the underweight member of my class. So to start a struggle with keeping weight off while I was also incredibly vulnerable and dealing with an eating disorder led to some pretty hard core body image issues. Even being binge/ purge free for 5 years, I have been suffering from something that is quite common to acquire during the battle with an eating disorder...body dismorphic disorder (BDD).
This post has been on my mind for quite some time and it is difficult to write this, but my initial goal with this blog was to help myself heal, internally from my struggles with depression, anxiety, and my former eating disorder. BDD is described as unreal perception of one's body image per Wikipedia, it "begins self-criticism of the personal appearance, from which develop atypical aesthetic-standards derived from the internal perceptual discrepancy between the person's ‘actual self’ and the ‘ideal self’". In essence you have a perceived ideal self that is usually very un-realistic and often "silly" perceptions of the physical self that either don't exist, or are not really as intense as the person believes them to be. Granted my BDD is not nearly as severe as it has been at its peak, but its something that is still a struggle for me especially since having my children.
One thing I think I did when starting my training plan for IM was having a idea in my head of how I would look as a result of my training, and what I would be able to achieve in terms of body changes. I really believed that I would go through a metamorphosis and lose tons of weight and be skinny as a rail...back to my old "ideal" self. As I have been training I have not achieved this ideal...and it has been difficult to bite off, chew, and swallow. Literally. Recently the BDD has started to rear its ugly head with me being overly obsessed with specific parts of my body (mainly my nose, my stomach, and the number I see on the scale). My friends who hear me knock myself down frequently over the past couple months have been trying to set me straight, and it made me realize just how real and how hard it is to overcome an eating disorder, and how hard it is to keep it from continuously rearing its ugly head. Especially when what you used it for is something that is also becoming more frequent and you want to as old adage says "fall back into old habits".
For me...bulimia was about control and stress relief. It didn't start out that way per Se...but its what it eventually evolved to, and is difficult to fight back as stress and feeling out of control do happen in life...and especially after having kids. I have to consciously remind myself at times to be mindful of what I am eating and not to go out of control. I also have to make sure that I am not getting secretive with my food as it is easy to fall into as well, and when I am not accountable to anyone, it becomes somewhat of a slippery slope. I have been trying to keep myself more accountable by logging my food on an application called myfitnesspal.com. I have friends that are on the site and it helps me to be accountable for what I am eating and also make sure I am trying to give my body "good fuel" for my training.
That being said I still struggle with the number on the scale. I don't know why it is such a mental thing, but having an ideal weight and then not being able to achieve it when you want has been extremely frustrating. I say I am going to try not to care about it...but the truth is I do. So as a college friend of mine once did...I am following suit and breaking up with my scale until after Boise. The number on the scale has absolutely nothing to do with my performance at Boise, nor does it measure my worth as a person. So I am breaking up with it. This is my official break-up notice...sorry Mr. Scale that I had to breakup with you publicly online, but I need this...Its not you...its me, and I think we need to see other people. Maybe now I can start to focus on who I am on the inside and measure my worth not by an arbitrary measurement.
You are beautiful, and you are amazing. And you are amazing in so many ways that have absolutely nothing to do with your beauty. Love you, friend and sister. xoxo
ReplyDeleteYou are a wonderfully beautiful and brave person for facing all of this down head-on. It is not easy to struggle with things like this and you are, I think, doing the right thing by laying them out there.
ReplyDeleteAnd on the physical front, I think you're doing great. You're as pretty as any picture and hotter than sliced and fried sin. Don't think for a minute that you're less than a wonderful person.