Sharing my story of recovery

TW - fasting details, weight related name calling

Ii was [weight] at 24 y/o—after a life long struggle of yoyo-dieting, starvation, binge eating, then purging. It was always the same cycle of look at myself in the mirror, feel bad about my weight, then starving myself. I hated how I looked and how I felt because of how I looked—body dysmorphia was strong in my very round-shaped family. (I.E. the entire family self-deprecatingly called pigs our cousins whenever we were all together). It came to a point where every reflective surface was a painful reminder of my growing self-hate.

Today, I’m at around [weight] (ish) kilos at 30. Recently, I have been able to love myself more authentically than I have ever in my entire life.

Starvation, binging/purging, or diets are not the answer. They left me feeling too weak to do anything and ashamed at very little external progress for all. None of this ever works nor lasts for a long time.

The key for me was, like a switch in my head, I decided one day look at the mirror and verbally tell myself “I LOVE YOU”. It didn’t matter to me that I was faking it in the start because I was disgusted by my fat-ness. That was the day I promised to love myself completely 100%—which meant I had to heal from my self-deprecating hate and replacing the words ”I hate me because xyz” to “I love me even with xyz”. It wasn’t an overnight thing; it was a slow and steady process.

No one is perfect so why was I holding myself to such a high standard? Why did I want to look more like that *** model or that sexy actress? Why did I envy Taylor Swift’s modelesque stature (I am 5-feet tall) or Megan D’Stallion’s busty *** and big ***? I wasn’t happy about my old self because old me was constantly comparing myself to absurd standards of beauty. Not everyone is born with insane genetics or has money/time/energy for a physical trainer and nutritionist. No one should—not me, nor you.

Two books which have helped me reframe my mindset are;

(1) Five Agreements (Miguel Ruiz)

(2) Power of Habit (Charles Duhigg)

Ruiz opened my eyes to the truth if myself—how much of the self-depreciation was my own voice versus the echoes of my familial environment? How much of the self-doubt and comparison to others was from society (I.E. media/social media, tv, etc.)? What were the lies that I used to console myself (I.E. beauty is on the inside, you can be beautiful but dumb, or personality over physical)? Point is—if I can choose to believe in those then the converse is equally true; I can choose to change the things I believed about myself too. I can’t control how others think but I can control me … so I started with that.

Duhigg gave me a tool that helped me reshape myself both mentally and physically—the habit loop; cue, routine, and reward. Replacing something with something else is easier than removing just removing something. I worked on looking at my self-hate/self-deprecating habit and finding their self-loving counterparts. I didn’t realize it at first but saying “I love you” instead of negative self-talk at my mirror reflection was the first of pillar habit of my transformation.

I experimented with different things like a cup of water within the first two hours of waking, no more cold drinks, stairs instead of the elevator, eating when satisfied instead of full, and eating only when hungry instead of whenever my mouth was bored. I ate more too, believe it or not, but I was also moving a lot more and feeling stronger than ever once I had the proper nutrients. I stopped throwing up my meals. Slowly. I regained the more energy to become more active.

i did try something that might seem drastic to some because I needed to break my habit of eating without being hungry (I.E. for the sake of eating or boredom)—I maintain an intermittent fasting schedule. I researched which one worked best of my Endomorph body-type, and fast on a 12-12 schedule. I eat from 2pm-8pm, and sleep around 11pm-12md. It gives me 3-4 hours to digest my food before knocking-out. It was hard to deny the hunger at the start. I used all sorts of distractions and rewarded myself when I could eat by eating until I was satisfied (read: no longer hungry not full-full to the point of throwing up). If I got hungry within the eating hours, I ate until the hunger subsided. I also ate very slow to give my stomach time to register the food and stop the hungry-signal to my brain.

The weight has come off slowly but surely in the past 6-years. It might not have been the lose [a lot of weight] in a week but the lost weight has been finding it hard to come back because my new habits are keeping them at bay. It’s really discipline and self-love. I found my motivation to keep my discipline from the deep love which was griwn inside of me.

Sorry for such a long post… I hope my sincerity in sharing this success story could rekindle your journey. I wrote this as a response and felt like maybe sharing my story on a thread could inspire a few more people who struggle with the same issues.

Please, LOVE YOURSELF first.

As cliched as it sounds, I’ll be corny and say “LOVE IS THE ANSWER”.

I’ll be rooting for you random internet stranger. I hope one day that we can hear your success story too. The scales do not define us—we define ourselves.

Love,

SakuraBlossom23