Holidays Are a Nightmare for Disordered Eating

Do I have an eating disorder anymore? No.

Do I struggle every day with my food intake and body image? Absolutely.

I’m a creature of habit and routine. It’s probably an autism thing. When I have dinner plans, I always look at the menu online to strategize because I can’t decide on the fly if it’s somewhere new. If I’m at home, I eat the same meals almost every day.

The holidays are the absolute worst. It’s a wildcard in my world of tight-gripped eating.

I traveled with my kids for almost two weeks. I tried to exercise but my only area of privacy was the size of two pillows. When your family is overly traditional, you’re chastised for things like healthy eating and exercising so I wanted to do it in private. I’m in my forties and my mother still criticizes me, I didn’t feel like adding fuel to the fire.

Since the new year, I’m having a tough time with the weight gain. Even worse? The weight gain is five pounds.

I know. I know. Some people poop that much in the morning.

But for my disordered-eating brain, it’s a lot. In my defense, it’s 5% of my body weight which makes me go up a size so this isn’t just a number on a scale; my clothes squeeze my stomach and I feel icky in my skin.

I wish I could be someone who is confident and happy at whatever their natural weight state is. I’ve obsessed about my weight for over thirty-five years and it’s safe to say, it’s not leaving my psyche despite copious copays to therapists.

Right now, I need to work out. I average around three times a week. My brain mentally beats my body, screaming at it for being lazy and mushy for not at least doing five days a week. The enemy of exercise is procrastination.

I handled the procrastination with ultra-late workouts (midnight) but that’s when I had a job where I spent days barely checking my email when working from home. Now my job is like, actual work, and my days are packed with meetings. I feel good when I can squeeze in a workout but sometimes it’s tough between the meetings and scrambling to pick up my kids.

There’s no excuse for today. It’s 7:00 pm and my anxiety over life is too high for me to do anything other than write. If it weren’t for writing, I’d be curled in a ball counting carpet fibers. I need to change into workout clothes and trek into the garage.

Ugh. The garage. Another reminder that I lost a home in the divorce that had plenty of room to work out inside and an indoor laundry room. Working out in there makes me feel like I’m trekking to the outdoor gym in the prison yard.

I’m not in a committed relationship (that’s another story for the latest on that mental clusterfuck) and the number one compliment I’ve received during my whore phase known as “dating” is how small I am. Not about my looks or intelligence. It’s always how much they love my body. It cemented my eating-disordered brain into believing that’s all I have to offer.

At the root of eating disorders is a web of psychological traumas that take dozens of forensic detectives to unravel. I still struggle with my divorce. I hate not having two incomes or a big house. It aches to be demoted like a punishment to being a Part-Time Parent (it’s like being branded with a scarlet letter). Pile on top of that a job that isn’t what was promised and I went from being quasi-happy with life to spiraling down.

That’s the thing about eating disorders. Its fire is fueled by the lighter held by the Depression Monster that always lurks inside. “Spiraling down” paradoxically means that the beast is climbing back up from the depths of my soul where I smushed it down.

With so many areas of my life failing, having the visual success of a flat stomach is all I have each day to feel accomplished. It’s what prevents me from having a sobbing, hysterical meltdown. Like the one I’m having right now as I type.

I don’t hold anyone else to this standard. I give zero fucks how big my friends are. Even Jeremy, who does sports almost daily, has a slight gut when he’s not in ultra gym mode; he is still the hottest man I’ve dated and I couldn’t care less if he gains a few pounds.

My daughter gained a lot of weight during the lockdown. She loves snacking but offset it with school sports before the pandemic. I don’t discuss my weight or food around my kids because I know the impact it makes on them. She adorably rubs her stomach and says, “I love my belly”. I cheer her on, telling her that she has the best belly in the whole world and she’s so cuddly as I hug her.

Inside, my heart breaks because one day an asshole will make a rude comment to her. And she won’t lovingly look in the mirror after her shower sticking out her belly and laughing at how it looks. I wish I could bottle her body positivity and keep it with her forever so she never experiences even a hint of feeling body shame.

It’s different for me. Everyone else can get merit on their achievements, personality, and in Jeremy’s case, excessively attractive face combined with an intelligent brain. For me, all I have is this body that I cram into a mold like Play-Doh with the hope that nothing spills over.

Every day. Every. Single. Day.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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