Sometimes people have an emotional relationship with food, and I am no different when it come to that. I have felt that at times I felt that I ate out of boredom or to be emotionally pleasured and not having something to fill the void of my empty time, but in reality it is defining my relationship with food and not linking it to a behavior.
Since I was a child, I have always sought food as a way to feel good. It was something that made me happy and was oftentimes the cause for gathering and feeling good. Taking psychotropic medications that cause appetite and weight gain for over two decades has not helped in this regard. For years when I lived with my parents, when they would not be in the house, I would find my way to the refrigerator to find something that found me joy and made me happy, even if it was just something at random, as if I could not understand that I could not know when it was time to eat.
I was always nourished, but with the medicine and also not being able to properly entertain myself and constantly seeking my parents for entertainment purposes, when they were not there, I would find comfort in food. Looking now to finally being on my own for almost two and a half years, I am slowly seeing that I do not need to turn to food for comfort and that I am on my own and do not have to use a sneaky behavior that I once did in order to find comfort as there are many other ways that comfort and pleasure can be found other than food.
Now, I won’t deny that I do like some food, but the reality is that in 2023 I have been tracking my calories regularly and as such only eat food If I have the calories to do so. Living independently also provides me the opportunity to not have foods that are triggering to overeating or weight gain in my home and food that I should have limited quantities of are kept out of sight and as such I have to work towards having them if I want them. Frankly, food is not the top priority of my life anymore and as such it has taken having to reframe my brain in order to understand that I have to eat to live and not live to eat.
Having activity in my life when I can is another crucial point that had to be addressed in the last few months and it can be hard to actually put forth the effort and actually want to go out and do what I need to do. But, there is a part of me that actually wants to be somewhat thinner, because I know I want to be healthier and as time has gone on this month, the progress has been showing by clothes fitting easier and being able to move much better than I have previously many years ago.
Progress is happening and I know I have to keep it up as time goes on. I am not striving for perfection, rather for me to be healthy so my brain can properly work and I can do things that I enjoy. But I can’t help but admit that being able to wear nicer clothes wouldn’t be something that I would like to be able to do sometime down the road.
I have always been told that if I want the weight to come off, I will have to want to make the change and I think that I have stated to want to make the change for the better because I want it, not because someone is telling me that I have to do it or pressuring me into doing it, but because i want to do it. For I know I can do anything that I put my mind up to.
Dustin's Dynasty 