Eating Disorder - have to face up to this and ask for some help

[feedbackforfree]

Hi, (I'm not expecting anyone to read this as it is epic but I need to document how I feel today.)

I've had a 30 year battle with food and I want to get better and I don't want this to blight the rest of my life. I am 50.

I was a pretty teenager, never skinny but at 5' 8" since I was 11 years old (never grew any taller!) I was a size 12/14. Trouble was, my taller sister 5' 10" was a size 8 and inevetiably, comparisons were drawn. (She's no longer with us sadly.) Had a baby very young and then maintained at about size 16, 11 stone. Because of my height, I believe (although my memory is skewed) that I probably looked OK. Met a couple of friends in my late teens and early twenties that were weight obsessive and I think at this age, I was very easily influenced and I began to see myself as entirely different. Huge in fact. One friend I met when I had my second child and I remember her talking about her upper arms and wobbling them about. I thought, goodness, I must look gross. (I was actually just over 11 stone post pregnancy, 20 years old and I'm certain now that I didn't have huge arms - but at the time, I took on board her issues about her own body and absorbed them as mine also.)

Gained a stone a year throughout my twenties until I reached about 16 stone. Then gained another 4 in my thirties. A bad relationship ended and I managed to lose 3 - 4 stone and I have struggled to keep my weight at around 16 stones for the last 10 years but within this last 10 year period, I have been higher than 18 when going through an operation and also a period of depression. The lowest I have been is 15.5 stone last year. Currently struggling at 16 10. I've put a lot of stuff about numbers here, probably the accountant in me and actually, they probably don't mean much apart from the fact that my bad relationship with food has lasted all my adult life and it's making me unhappy.

Today, I have not gone to work. I've got an op booked to get my gall bladder removed next week and am supposed to be following a low fat diet. I ate chinese food last night knowing that I would be ill. I went to bed absolutely stuffed full of food and I got up at midnight, heated more chinese up, ate it and couldn't go to work this morning because an attack of biliary colic. (Very painful for anyone that doesn't know what it is but it is related to the gall bladder problem.) But I knew it would happen. I was in hospital a few weekends ago because of this. This behaviour is a form of self harm and I need to get to the bottom of it.

So, not sure whether I go to the GP and ask for a referral or whether I find a counsellor myself. I'm scared, or is it resistant? Food has been an emotional crutch all my life but I have wept almost every day since Christmas and I can feel this problem escalating to match the increasing numbers on the scales. What I do know is that I need help.

I have no issue acknowledging a mental illness. Depression has also been a bit of a constant companion throughout my life although I have never taken medication but have put myself through counselling a few years back. My "issues" have not held me back professionally and I have had a reasonably good life albeit by taking a difficult route. My "issues"have effected relationships though.

That's it really, "feedbackforfree" has bared her soul today and taken an important decision to get some help.

[Red2011]

Hi Feedback

I don't really have any advice but I didn't want to read and run. It does sound as though your negative relationship with food is founded in self-esteem problems, and linked to your depression.

Do you take any exercise or have any hobbies of a musical or creative nature? I ask because either of these types of activities could improve your mood, and lift some of the 'darker' moments.

I have a friend who is engaged in an ongoing battle with health problems which mainly originate from her having been bullimic in her teens; she's now in her 40s and her problems had died down, but remanifested a few years ago when her long-term relationship broke down entirely. She actually got herself sectioned temporarily after a suicide attempt, it was that serious.

I would say that you will need to go to your GP first, but you probably need to keep some sort of food/emotional diary to help you with this. It doesn't have to be anything in depth, but simply something along the lines of,
Monday - felt tired & depressed. Ate three doughnuts. Sunshine at lunchtime made me happy. Ate tuna salad. Evening ate chinese food. Stomach ache at 10pm.

Hopefully a few more people with far more experience will respond to your post, but I'm on and off here if you just want to vent/chat. :)

[feedbackforfree]

Thank you Red. I didn't really expect anyone to read this as it was so long. I don't really have time for hobbies but I am fit and active. (That is a problem in itself - "me time" feels indulgent and I always put everyone else before myself.) Go to exercise class at least three times week and am actually far fitter in my later forties and now fiftieth year than I ever was in my twenties. I'm outwardly confident and have faith in my own abilities but acknowledge that I am crap at relationships. (My family, friends and colleague relationships are all really positive so this kind of feels that it is limited to the men in my life!)

I agree that there is a self esteem issue but I don't know when it started, or why, or whether some of us are just made this way. I have a feeling it has always been there. Had a close family upbringing although there has been a lot of loss in the family and being brought up by paranoid parents thinking another child may be taken from them is probably not healthy, even if entirely understandable. (Their worst fears were confirmed when my eldest sister died so there were three of us and now just me.)

I do remember thinking in my early twenties that I had lost my spirit. I'd been a teenage mum, not finished my education (although made up for that later), married young and divorced by 25. Lots to cope with but I managed it and brought up two lovely children and they have turned out well.

I've got my spirit back (and realise after all this time, it never really left me) so this is my last issue to deal with.

This is actually quite therapuetic writing this down. Hope no-one minds as I know in comparison, my issues are not serious but I don't want this to influence the rest of my life. I don't want my last thoughts to be about my bloody weight!!!