Self sabotage and why chocolate is a tool of satan. (a saga)

junoesque

Full Member
I have always been big. I was a plump baby, a chunky child and a substantial teenager. This is my story and a revelation I have had, that I just need to get out of my system. This very self-indulgent, so I apologise in advance.

I have walked 3 times now down the rocky, painful path of weightloss.
I have seen the bodies of the fallen at the side of the way and felt smug, even as I helped them up , because I could do this! And I could!
3 times..
So what goes wrong? Why do I have 100lbs+ to lose before I am at a "normal" size?

I'm not comfortable being thin. I like being thin, but it takes me so far out of my comfort zone that my survival instinct kicks in.. (which is where chocolate, the tool of satan comes in).

I don't know how to be a thin person.
I'm used to blending happily into the background. I'm used to walking past men without a backward glance from them. I'm used to being able to have male friends. I'm used to being able to have girl friends without boundaries..

When I became thin (the first time) my male friends started to look at me differently, and I hated it. My girlfriends looked at me differently, and I hated it.
My male friends were now would-be suitors and my girlfriends now saw me as the competition..
the problem was that I didn't know that. Everyone knew these social rules, but me!
When I was big it was as though I was invisible physically. People liked me because I was interesting and funny, not because they wanted to be seen with me, or fancied me.
When I lost weight and became socially visible, a whole other set of rules kicked in.

Thin people know these rules. They are learned in childhood and adolescence.
They are the rules of mating, flirtation and advancement in society. If you are fat then these rules don't apply.You know your place and can't challenge the beautiful, so you are harmless and tolerated (mostly).
So whilst I was young and fat (and exempt) all the thin and lovely girls around me were engaged in a pitched battle to find out where they fitted in the pecking order, which I was completely unaware of.
The battle fought, and the pecking order defined, they continued with their lives knowing their place in the order as beautiful or attractive, looks-good-with-makeup, tragically challenged or ugly-but-has-a-good-body.
When I lost weight I didn't know where I fit. I kept acting invisible.. but everyone could see me.
I was now attractive, but didn't know it and just carried on being the person I had always been. Thin girls learn to be mysterious. They learn to let someone notice them rather than having to grab them by the lapels.
I had always been invisible.. I didn't know what mysterious was!
So I carried on as normal, cracking jokes and being open with everyone. All the men loved me and all the girls hated me.. but no one like me as me anymore.

I had really uncomfortable moments when a dear friend (married, and I was friends with his wife too) made a pass at me. The really embarrassing thing was that I didn't recognise it. I had no idea why he was acting this way and pretty much made a fool of myself.
For years I had been able to share hotel rooms or meals out with this man without a problem..it never occurred to me things between us would change. I thought our relationship was defined but obviously it wasn't .

I was only looking at my change in isolation. Invisibility was so ingrained into me that I didn't ever think it would change how people felt about me because I looked better.. why would it? I hadn't changed.. I could just wear smaller clothes.
I had entered into a whole area of society that I was woefully under-equipped to manage.. so I got fat again.
I didn't realise that was why I got fat again. I just found I didn't really mind as I got bigger and bigger again..I slipped right back into the comfortable old shoes of largeness.

I met my husband, and decided to lose weight again.. and this time it was women who frightened me back into size 22.
I had babies, and we new mothers would all hang out together and discuss stuff (as you do..). except the stuff wasn't stuff I could join in with.
I couldn't really join the race to fit back into my size 12 jeans, because I'd only worn them for a nanosecond before getting pregnant..I wasn't that important to me.
I didn't know how to go clothes shopping with friends.
Clothes shopping was something that was done at dusk in special shops, or through catalogues.. and we bought what they allowed us to buy.
I knew nothing of going into changing rooms and trying things on together. Not in a million years would I have ever asked the question "does my bum look big in this"!!
I had lunch at a friends house one day, and after our quiche and salad she whispered conspiratorially " I have a special treat for pudding" and pulled 2 100ml pots of ice cream out of the freezer. 100 ml!! I could down a 500ml tub without breaking a sweat!
She was treating me like I was thin, but I was a fraud. I was really fat inside my head.
I was a stranger in a foreign land... and I got fat again.

I tried one more time to be thin, but I just didn't know my way around.
I wasn't happy which everyone KNEW I must be, because everyone wants to be thin..don't they?, so even while they were congratulating me I was feeling like a fraud and sneaking chocolate into the house to eat furtively, like a mouse... and got bigger and bigger.
I tried various other diets but it was no use now.
I had lost the ability to succeed.
I would feel invincible in my ability to stick to a diet, but just when I was at my strongest I would find myself at the cupboard eating a jumbo packet of crisps.

I have never been able to work out why I fall just as it becomes apparent that what I am doing to lose weight works (which is a significant way into the diet.. I have added to my size with each cycle of loss and gain), but now I think it's because my subconscious wants to protect me from myself. It doesn't want me to be unhappy again.

So, now knowing the devil, and being that much older I can tackle this, and be happy and thin.

I am going to learn the thin rules of society. I've seen films. I can work it out. I am going to get a personal shopper to shop with me to show me how to dress, and I am going to learn how to be thin, so that this time I can enjoy it!

Losing the weight is half the battle, and knowing what to do with what you've won is the other..

..so on with the Battle!

Juno ..
 
Yes that was a very honest well written post. I wish I could be as open as you. I'll try to be for a moment!
I gained most of my weight just after i got married and had my daughter....and some after the birth....i was thin before and attractive....and i like being that way.....i know how to be that way....and i like being that way.......i like other men and women looking at me......i just don't like being fat. This is not comfortable to me....i seem to have the opposite problem to you....i just don't know how to act now that i am bigger. I have lost almost 2 stone, but i struggle everyday with food...i totally believe that i am a food addict! I love it...i could eat all day everyday.....i have also suffered with eating disorders and am a binge eater...and i hate it. I want to break my food habit, because i want to be thin again, but also have a healthy relationship with food.
 
I have always been big. I was a plump baby, a chunky child and a substantial teenager. This is my story and a revelation I have had, that I just need to get out of my system. This very self-indulgent, so I apologise in advance.

I have walked 3 times now down the rocky, painful path of weightloss.
I have seen the bodies of the fallen at the side of the way and felt smug, even as I helped them up , because I could do this! And I could!
3 times..
So what goes wrong? Why do I have 100lbs+ to lose before I am at a "normal" size?

I'm not comfortable being thin. I like being thin, but it takes me so far out of my comfort zone that my survival instinct kicks in.. (which is where chocolate, the tool of satan comes in).

I don't know how to be a thin person.
I'm used to blending happily into the background. I'm used to walking past men without a backward glance from them. I'm used to being able to have male friends. I'm used to being able to have girl friends without boundaries..

When I became thin (the first time) my male friends started to look at me differently, and I hated it. My girlfriends looked at me differently, and I hated it.
My male friends were now would-be suitors and my girlfriends now saw me as the competition..
the problem was that I didn't know that. Everyone knew these social rules, but me!
When I was big it was as though I was invisible physically. People liked me because I was interesting and funny, not because they wanted to be seen with me, or fancied me.
When I lost weight and became socially visible, a whole other set of rules kicked in.

Thin people know these rules. They are learned in childhood and adolescence.
They are the rules of mating, flirtation and advancement in society. If you are fat then these rules don't apply.You know your place and can't challenge the beautiful, so you are harmless and tolerated (mostly).
So whilst I was young and fat (and exempt) all the thin and lovely girls around me were engaged in a pitched battle to find out where they fitted in the pecking order, which I was completely unaware of.
The battle fought, and the pecking order defined, they continued with their lives knowing their place in the order as beautiful or attractive, looks-good-with-makeup, tragically challenged or ugly-but-has-a-good-body.
When I lost weight I didn't know where I fit. I kept acting invisible.. but everyone could see me.
I was now attractive, but didn't know it and just carried on being the person I had always been. Thin girls learn to be mysterious. They learn to let someone notice them rather than having to grab them by the lapels.
I had always been invisible.. I didn't know what mysterious was!
So I carried on as normal, cracking jokes and being open with everyone. All the men loved me and all the girls hated me.. but no one like me as me anymore.

I had really uncomfortable moments when a dear friend (married, and I was friends with his wife too) made a pass at me. The really embarrassing thing was that I didn't recognise it. I had no idea why he was acting this way and pretty much made a fool of myself.
For years I had been able to share hotel rooms or meals out with this man without a problem..it never occurred to me things between us would change. I thought our relationship was defined but obviously it wasn't .

I was only looking at my change in isolation. Invisibility was so ingrained into me that I didn't ever think it would change how people felt about me because I looked better.. why would it? I hadn't changed.. I could just wear smaller clothes.
I had entered into a whole area of society that I was woefully under-equipped to manage.. so I got fat again.
I didn't realise that was why I got fat again. I just found I didn't really mind as I got bigger and bigger again..I slipped right back into the comfortable old shoes of largeness.

I met my husband, and decided to lose weight again.. and this time it was women who frightened me back into size 22.
I had babies, and we new mothers would all hang out together and discuss stuff (as you do..). except the stuff wasn't stuff I could join in with.
I couldn't really join the race to fit back into my size 12 jeans, because I'd only worn them for a nanosecond before getting pregnant..I wasn't that important to me.
I didn't know how to go clothes shopping with friends.
Clothes shopping was something that was done at dusk in special shops, or through catalogues.. and we bought what they allowed us to buy.
I knew nothing of going into changing rooms and trying things on together. Not in a million years would I have ever asked the question "does my bum look big in this"!!
I had lunch at a friends house one day, and after our quiche and salad she whispered conspiratorially " I have a special treat for pudding" and pulled 2 100ml pots of ice cream out of the freezer. 100 ml!! I could down a 500ml tub without breaking a sweat!
She was treating me like I was thin, but I was a fraud. I was really fat inside my head.
I was a stranger in a foreign land... and I got fat again.

I tried one more time to be thin, but I just didn't know my way around.
I wasn't happy which everyone KNEW I must be, because everyone wants to be thin..don't they?, so even while they were congratulating me I was feeling like a fraud and sneaking chocolate into the house to eat furtively, like a mouse... and got bigger and bigger.
I tried various other diets but it was no use now.
I had lost the ability to succeed.
I would feel invincible in my ability to stick to a diet, but just when I was at my strongest I would find myself at the cupboard eating a jumbo packet of crisps.

I have never been able to work out why I fall just as it becomes apparent that what I am doing to lose weight works (which is a significant way into the diet.. I have added to my size with each cycle of loss and gain), but now I think it's because my subconscious wants to protect me from myself. It doesn't want me to be unhappy again.

So, now knowing the devil, and being that much older I can tackle this, and be happy and thin.

I am going to learn the thin rules of society. I've seen films. I can work it out. I am going to get a personal shopper to shop with me to show me how to dress, and I am going to learn how to be thin, so that this time I can enjoy it!

Losing the weight is half the battle, and knowing what to do with what you've won is the other..

..so on with the Battle!

Juno ..

Amazing post and so insightful and positive!! Thank you so much for sharing this with us :D

Isis x :)
 
Just stumbled across this as I usually just stick to Cambridge forum.
It is an amazingly honest and poignant post, I do relate to so much of it.
Sending you my warmest wishes for success with your weight loss x
 
Fab post really interesting, hopefully it will help me to recognise some of these self sabotaging techniques once i get to goal so i can quickly nip it in the bud if it happens to me, i shall begin observing the pecking order :)
 
one word - wow x
 
That was very well written.
I am at the beginning of my current journey and I am going in for weight loss surgery, so my weight loss should be vast and life changing.
I am one of those people that over thinks everything and I try to imagine my future as a slim person and nobody seems to understand my fears, so it is nice to read this thread.
I have always been fat and I know how to live as a fat person, I know my place in society and am nervous about how I will live as a slim person in the world when my mind is more likely to be fat forever (you dont just lose 32 years of being one way).
I say that I am nervous because I am used to just blending in and when men look at me I never take it as them appreciating my looks (though hubby assures me I do get SOME looks of interest) so how am I going to handle it if men do start to look once the weight comes off if I end up as actually being attractive (most people say that I am a pretty girl as I am so surely I will look decent slim too) yes it will be good for my ego to be looked at but I HATE people looking at me, I hate being the centre of attention, how in the world will I handle people paying me attention due to the weight loss.
I just dont know how to be a slim person in this world and it makes me nervous but not so many people understand me in these feelings, so it is nice to see people here that do understand.
It is a really daunting prospect.
Good luck with your weight loss Juno.
Steph xx
 
Thank you Steph,
I also hate being the centre of attention and I completely understand your fears, but fore-warned is for-armed.

This is going to happen, and you are going to be much much more noticed than you are now. Start thinking now (before your transformation) about how you will handle it. Normally, I would say talk to your family and your husband, but that can be difficult if they haven't spent 32 years being conditioned to keep in the background.. but you can talk to me, and all of the others on this forum who really do understand how difficult it is to lose weight in your mind.
But you must do it. You only have one life to live and I wasted such a lot of mine feeling second best and retreating into my comfort zone.
The whole point is that when you are thin and men notice you, you just laugh it off, or are flattered and feel a little self esteem rise. When you are big and someone notices you, you feel unworthy and embarrassed. That somehow they got it wrong.
Well, get used to feeling flattered. Practise in front of the mirror so that when it happens you know how to smile and say "thank you" because that's all you have to do.. Not crack a joke, or wonder what they want from you..
When you are thin and someone expresses admiration, they don't (always ;)) have an ulterior motive.. so just smile and feel good.
And when it happens (as it will, more and more often!) you have a tool. You know what to do.

You'll be fine. Embrace the new situation you find yourself in as though you've gone to a foreign country and have to learn their culture, but don't run away from it as I did.

Please learn from my mistakes, and be happy!

Juno ..
 
Thank you everyone, for your kind messages and support.

I really appreciate it, and it was pretty cathartic for me to get that out of my head, where it has been lurking for years.

It's a bit like having a baby - everything..book, course, programme is based around actually having the baby, and then what a shock to the system it is when you've had it and have to relearn how to do everything with a baby in tow.

Maybe we need to pay more attention to learning to LIVE as a slim person, not just getting slim!

Juno ..
 
Juno, you seem like a REALLLLLLY nice person :)
I am really trying to address the changes that are to come, that is what is making people a little frustrated with me because they feel that I should just deal with things as they happen but as you said, forewarned is forearmed and I am that sort of person, I plan for eventualities and am not willing to just wing it, I want to be in the right place mentally, which can only stand me in good stead later on.
There is NO way that I am going to not go forward with the weight loss, it is going to happen and I plan to be ready for all of the changes, which should really start now when hubby compliments me, right now when he does compliment me inside I think mannnnn he must be crazy, I need to start just accepting it and that will be a good start.
Thank you for your reply and I hope that I can keep in close contact with you, being on the same wavelength as one another is lovely and I need a friend that TRULY understands.
Steph xx
 
Stephy, I'm here for the long run too, and I'd love to have you as a friend!

We need to keep telling each other to be graceful not grateful!!

Juno ..
 
That is a nice way to think Juno xx
I have started to try to change on the inside, when hubby has complimented me, which is often, I have just said thank you and blushed and allowed myself to glow inside because of it, I think that that is a great start.
Well if you have facebook you are more than welcome to add me.:)
Steph xx
 
What a brillant post can relate so much to the inner thoughts and feelings Mia
 
Hello Juno

You have a great insight. i'm sorry it has been gained in such difficult ways.
You sound like a really genuine person.
The problem with men is the Terrorist in the Trousers!
You are so right, all the time we are fat we are either invisible or uattractive and people either like us or not because of our personality.
When we become slim the world of attractive clothes opens up to us rather than a world of black trousers.
Suddenly others react differently towards us - women see us as a potential threat and men see us as a potential mate.
We are no longer invisible.
Sometimes it's fun andd sometimes it's uncomfortable.
But you can't pretend it doesn't happen.
You are right. It's a whole new set of behaviours to learn. But it is worth it.
Being slim is so much healthier.
Learn those lessons and enjoy your slim future.
You deserve it. You sound like a lovely lady.
One day you'll post your picture on here and be proud of who you are xx
 
Thank you so much for your kind words.

It means a lot to see people who have successfully made the transition into slender beautiful women..

It truely gives me hope!

(..and you're absolutely right about photographs. I cringe! But maybe not forever :))

Juno ..
 
Back
Top