Since I can recall, I’ve had an unhealthy relationship with food. Up until I had my tonsils taken out in third grade, I could take it or leave it. I don’t remember it, but I’m told I hardly ate then. So what changed after surgery, other than the fact that I wasn’t sick as often? I learned to self-medicate with food. That feeling you get when you eat comfort food is soothing, especially for a little girl dealing with as many emotions as I was.

I had begun this blog intending on being more transparent about those emotions, but now I realize that’s not the point. The real point is: many of us turn to food for comfort at times – maybe even all of us. It became so natural to turn to food for comfort, that the early negative emotions became irrelevant. Honestly, I’ve dealt with those childhood traumas, so is it fair to keep blaming them now for my unhealthy relationship with food? Nope. I have to learn to process difficult current emotions and situations in a new way – without food being my go to. We all do.

In my own journey, and I hope in yours, I’ve discovered that there’s only one place to take these emotions – to Jesus. I do that now. I’m still not the best at it, but I’m learning and growing better all the time at allowing Him to heal me rather than to use food as a temporary band aid. Whether it’s a big or small issue I’m facing, He can be of greater comforter than food ever was.

These days, as I’m emotionally and spiritually healthier, I’ve noticed something: Turning to food is more of a habit than a necessity. Plus I eat when I’m bored. This journey of learning to tell myself no and end the internal conflict within has had its ups and downs. I do well most times, and I’ve failed a few times. Still, I keep going. I have to believe that the old habit will eventually give up and die. I’m determined to be the victor in this.

New habits I’ve adopted:

• I’m eating cleaner – less processed foods. That requires more cooking on my part, something I used to do only because my family expected food at various times. Now, I’m learning to enjoy cooking more and coming up with foods I like rather than choking down more broccoli.
• I’ve begun something called intermittent fasting. Though I fast at times for spiritual reasons, this isn’t the same. I won’t go into the many benefits of fasting on your body, but the more research I’ve done the more I understand why God, as the body’s Creator, called His people to fast so often. It’s mind-blowing the many positive effects that fasting has – even on aging (says the woman who will turn 49 next month).

Yes, I’m still way too focused on food, a fact that I hope will level out. This is still a learning curve that I’m on, so giving so much consideration to food is necessary. At least now I’m not allowing it to comfort me. I’m not eating when I’m bored. I’m not eating because an Oreo commercial tells me to. My basic goal is to control food rather than to allow it to control me. So I would say I’m making progress.

 

If you have any thoughts, I would love to hear them. Do you eat for comfort? Are you self-medicating a wound that only Jesus can truly heal?

Since I’m devoting this first month of the new year to my personal health, I figure that blogging about my progress makes sense. It helps me to keep track of my thoughts and progress. I hope it will help you, too. It’s nice to know we’re all in this together.

With week one behind me, I’m learning all kinds of things about myself and how to best stay on track:

1. For one, I still don’t gym. I keep trying it but will never be a gym kind of girl. When I’m there, I spend the entire time looking around at people. I’m way too ADD to make any progress. I have gone once with my husband this new year and plan to make that my one and only visit. Fortunately, I do have a treadmill here to walk on. That’s one of those “have to tell myself yes” situations. I’m doing well with that and sticking to consistent cardio.
2. Next, just as I suspected, I can actually tell myself no and stick to it. I want cookies but tell myself no. I want a pb&j sammie every single day, but I need veggies. Thing is, I’m not saying that I can never have one, just not every day like I want. Knowing I can have one another time seems to help.
3. Instead of going by a list of can and can’t haves as far as food goes, I’m better off to focus on each meal and what I can do to eat well in that given situation. If I know I can’t have fast food because it’s on some list of can’ts, of course I feel deprived and will eventually fail. Life is busy. Sometimes fast food is necessary. Heck, sometimes a burger is necessary, right? If I’m in that situation and have a burger, I’m learning to just have the burger – not the burger and fries. Every little victory counts.
4. I’ve learned that I won’t starve between meals. Instead, I’m finding that a few hunger pangs are helping me to learn when I’m hungry or eating out of boredom. Also, I’ve found that hunger pangs come in waves and then subside. If there’s only an hour until dinnertime and I feel a hunger pang, I can drink a big glass of water and ride out the wave. Soon, the grumbling is gone, and I easily make it until dinner.
5. The more I eat well, the more I’m enjoying it. I’m branching out and trying new ways of cooking foods and incorporating new veggies into my diet. Also, I’ve noticed that when I’m super hungry, enough for my stomach to growl, then healthy foods taste great. I’m surprised at times when I eat something healthy and think, wow, this is better than I expected. 
6. Veggies are the best bang for the calorie buck. With that in mind, I eat plenty and don’t indulge as much in breads and meats. But breads are still on my can list! If not, I would never last. Where most diets restrict potatoes, I don’t. Mashed potatoes are my favorite food. I’m not giving them up!
7. As with potatoes, I’ve come up with a list of foods and I can and can’t live without. Honestly, for me, life is too short to live on salads. I just don’t like them in the winter. I want warm comfort food. I’m learning I can eat well without salads being my go to. I’ve stopped eating foods I don’t particularly care for just because they’re healthy. Why waste calories on foods that are just okay when I can have mashed potatoes?
8. If I do mess up, I can begin again and not throw in the towel entirely like I used to do. If God’s mercies are new every morning toward us, shouldn’t ours be the same toward ourselves? I’m not punishing or coddling myself. If I blow it, I learn from it and move on. But I most certainly don’t say, “Oh, it’s okay. Here, have a cookie.” Babying myself has to stop.
9. The most important thing I’ve learned is that this is more of a journey of self-discovery. I’m learning about myself and my unhealthy relationship with food. (More on that next time – maybe.) For each of us who are making this effort in the new year to live healthier lives, we have to realize it’s a personal journey. What works for me may not work for you. A few things may, but not all will. My bestie, Leann, and I are constantly trying some new diet together. We’ve learned, though, we have different personalities and lifestyles. Technically, we have different goals. Her’s is more about weight loss and mine is more about freedom. I don’t want to be bound any longer. I have been since I was a little girl. Now, Leann and I just try to encourage each other. And never, ever, do we beat the other up when one fails.

Small victories are keeping me on track. I love the feeling of going to bed at night knowing I’ve had a successful day. Used to, I went to bed feeling like a failure more often than not. I don’t want to live in that same pattern that I’ve known most all of my life. I want to win against this inner conflict. I’m hoping (and praying) that 2017 will be my year.

If you’re goal this year is to make better choices, what have you learned about yourself as you go? Each time you share your story with me, I take it to heart and try to learn from it. Doing life together is the best way to get through this.

Many blessings and fewer calories to you. 🙂

In the coming days, all who blog will give you their take on ringing in the New Year. Most will encourage you to put the past behind you and begin anew. From dieting to becoming more spiritually grounded, everyone has something to say and advice to give. Here’s my rambling addition to the clamor of other voices.

After a month off from blogging, I had hoped I would return with something life altering to share with you. Instead of breaking new ground here, I find myself pointing you backward instead of forward. This time of year, as gyms fill for a small period of time and while diets are still a positive thing we’ve decided to tackle, many of us fill our lives with distractions to prevent us from looking at the truth. Whoever you were coming out of 2016, you will be that same person in 2017 unless you resolve past conflict. I don’t mean conflict as in with others, though that’s obviously important. I’m talking about inner conflict. Those thoughts and behaviors that keep you from being the you you want to be.

The bottom line is this: If you struggled with weight in 2016, you will still struggle in 2017. Bet you didn’t want to hear that. That’s not encouraging at all. I’m supposed to be nudging you toward positive thoughts and motivating you to stick to your goals.

Maybe our goals are the problem.

I’ve shared plenty of my own issues as I’ve posted here, especially about my negative self-dialogue. I’m super hard on myself. Most women are. I constantly beat myself up over decisions I’ve made, areas where I feel like a failure, and those changes I swear I will make but never do.

Funny how someone who can be the meanest person I know to me – me – can pamper me way too much in other areas.

My conflict is and always has been with food and my love of it. I think about food most all of the time. Either what I am or am not going to eat, it’s always in the forefront of my mind. (I promise you while I’m writing this blog post, I stopped to look up a recipe.) Sugar is my greatest downfall. More about that another time since today’s message is about the overall conflict I face.

My true conflict: More often than not, I won’t tell myself no. The tiniest little stomach rumble and I’m running to the kitchen for an unneeded snack. If I see a commercial for a favorite food – hungry or not – I will go get that food if I have it in the house. Oreos are a great example. Last week while watching TV, a commercial prompted me to eat five Oreos with milk. That doesn’t sound like such a bad thing, but the fact was, not only was I not hungry, I was already stuffed. (No pun intended.) I knew I didn’t need cookies on an already full stomach, but I ignored me and went to get them anyway. For the life of me I can’t tell you why I did it, other than the commercial told me to and my flesh jumped right on board. Whatever flesh says I want to eat, I’m gonna eat it or be grumpy because I can’t. Why can’t I beat that part of me up a few times to show me who’s boss?

This year, I plan to learn to tell myself no and stick to it. I want to focus on better health and what foods I’m fueling myself with. If left up to me and my flesh, I would live on sweets and wash them down with milkshakes. No kidding. If I could eat cheese without my tummy hurting and blowing up like I’m six months pregnant, I would eat pizza every meal. I’m not joking about any of this. I have a five-year-old pallet.

Thing is, I’m a grown woman who needs to make better choices. I need to know that no is for my own good more often than not. It really is okay to wait a few hours between meals until I eat again. I once teased a friend of mine when she was talking about the latest diet she was doing. She mentioned something about not being able to have an afternoon snack – like it was life or death. I laughed and asked if she was in preschool. Come to think of it, though, I’m exactly like that. If it’s 3:00 in the afternoon and I have the slightest feeling of hunger, I go get food. Rarely is it good food. Snacks should be fun, right? What’s fun about carrots or celery? I would rather have chips or a snack bar of some kind. When the truth is, I can wait that extra few hours without dying. I’ve been proving that to myself here lately. I look at the clock and remind myself that I’m a very big girl now, and I can wait until dinnertime.

Back to being the same in 2017 as 2016 statement. I know for a fact that if I don’t address this inner conflict of how I overindulge myself and give in to the slightest whim, then my new year will look exactly like the old. I will keep beating myself up over having no will power. I will stay in the ugly sugar cycles I get into that cause my moods to swing and my emotions to be volatile. I have to learn to treat myself with as much love and care as I would my own children. When I know something isn’t good for them, I say no because I love them. Instead, fearing I will throw a big lie-in-the-grocery-story-floor-kicking-and-screaming fit, I quickly hand myself a cookie to shut me up.

Earlier I said that maybe our goals are the problem. Rather than setting a goal to work out more or to eat less, my goal is to finally learn to tell myself no when needed. Or maybe to tell myself yes when needed, like, oh yes you are walking today!

So I know my personal journey may not be the most interesting blog for you, but you will likely see more about this going forward. I want to share this part of me with you. Maybe doing so will keep me accountable. Maybe it will even prompt you to look at the 2016 you and decide that girl needs to resolve some inner conflict of her own as she heads into 2017. Typically, I write more about spiritual things. This is spiritual to me. I get one body and one life to impact the Kingdom. If I’m not fueling this body well, it won’t perform well. I need energy and clear thoughts. The only way to get those is by making better food choices.

This blog is dedicated to my favorite diet buddy, who was eating a lunch of cheese puffs and beanie weenies as we decided on our 2017 better eating plan. We both already cheated on day one. Maybe day two and beyond will get better.

I would love to hear your thoughts. Do you have this same conflict – the inability to tell yourself no? Want to do this together?

Remember, Unmending the Veil is available for free on Kindle through the 5th, and all other books are discounted at $2.99 for the month of January. Tell a friend.