I can't remember ever being happy with my body. I look back on my childhood and I always felt so embarrassed by who I was and how I looked.
My father, was always on at me about my weight. He obsessed over it, I always found it strange because he was over weight himself. He would always make some kind of comment, any time I asked for a snack or something to eat. He wasn't the only one, but I won't go any further into that side of things just now.
I was made do all kinds of diets from maybe the age of 13, because he was doing them. He weighed roughly 300lbs and would tell me i was the same size as him. I wasn't at all, obviously. So anyway he had me on all kinds of diets like the Atkins, grapefruit etc... Now I'm the oldest of four kids, and the only one he ever made diet. So, that had to mean something, right? I must have been disgustingly overweight.
This is when my relationship with food got messed up. I was a young girl, and had it drummed into my head that I was disgusting and fat.
Except I wasn't 'fat'. Not then anyway.
I remember seeing pictures a few years ago of me round about the age of 15. My first thought was 'wtf I wasn't fat'. I had thighs, and hips and was probably a little more developed for my age than I should of been- but I wasn't fat.
I felt sad seeing the picture of myself, I remember that time. I was making myself sick every day. I'd eat at school and have dinner when I came home. Then I'd wait an hour and go to the upstairs bathroom and make myself sick. I'd be sick till I couldn't be sick anymore.
There's this kind of misconception that only deathly thin people can have an eating disorder.
"I'm too fat to have an eating disorder." - I would reassure myself.
I'd read an article in my magazine about a girl who was bulimic. I'm sure they articles were in the magazine to show other young girls that eating disorders were bad for you. Not me, I'd read them and try pick up tips from them. The girl telling the story was always really skinny, and of course I'd stop before I got that skinny. I just needed to lose weight.
For me, feeling disgustingly obese, seeing a picture of a thin girl with an eating disorder - didn't work as a scare tactic like it was supposed to. That skinny girl in the magazine represented something I could never be.
Being skinny seemed to be more socially accepted. I figured if I lost weight I'd make more friends and maybe my dad would start liking me. As utterly ridiculous as that sounds, it's still very much how I think.
I was sticking my fingers down my throat after food, taking weight loss aids, drinking warm water mixed with freshly squeezed grape fruit juice, or id starve- all trying to lose weight.
I moved out of the house when I was 17/18. Worked in bars and restaurants for a few years while working in a hair salon through the day. I started work in a call center when I was 19 and met a girl who sold diet tablets. She explained that if I took them I wouldn't get hungry ever. Sounded amazing to me.
I started taking the diet tablets, and she was right - I wasn't ever hungry. The weight was falling off me. I think the lowest I got down to was 9 and a half stone which is roughly 130lbs.
I still felt disgusting and obese. It wasn't my body that was the problem it was my mind and the way I was perceiving myself. I could of been 90lbs and I probably would've still seen myself the same.
Let's fast forward a few years. I'm settled down in a relationship, we lived together and he hated me taking the tablets. So I stopped taking the tablets and I started eating. I over ate, I put it down to feeling relaxed. No dad in my life screaming how fat and disgusting I am every time I eat. Almost like a sense of freedom- I could eat what I want when I want.
Another few years down the line - I'd had two pregnancies and was still over eating. I didn't have a care in the world until the kids gran made a photo album. The picture I seen of myself shocked me to the core. I was massive! Huge! I couldn't believe that's how I looked.
The image I'm using above? The picture on the left - is me Feb 2012 weighing way over 300lbs. The one on the right is me a few weeks ago.
That was it for me, crash diet it was. Pills, making myself sick, starving myself- all of it started up again. I became obsessed with calories. At one point I limited myself to 200 calories a day. In a matter of months I'd halved my body weight. I got pregnant with my daughter and managed to maintain my weight I didn't gain much at all. As soon as she was born I was back to my old habits. When she was a few months old I'd lost everything I gained then some more on top of it.
I was excersizing too, while starving myself I made myself ill. I obsessed over food. I was always starving, but would never eat.
All my crash dieting has messed up my metabolism. If I eat I gain weight, even small amounts. My weight is so difficult to maintain and my relationship with food is terrible.
I go days without eating and take pills to kill my hunger. I sometimes binge eat, so there is maybe a few days a month I pig out, and when I do I hate myself. I feel disgusting after I've eaten. I sometimes feel sick with hunger so I eat then make myself sick because I panic about gaining weight.
It's unhealthy, I know but I can't help it. I've had my kids ask me why I'm not eating. They've made comments about me not always having dinner. One thing I never want is for any of my kids to ever feel anything less than beautiful. I make sure I tell them everyday. I don't want my little diva growing up feeling like I did. She's full to the brim with confidence and I don't want her to ever lose that.
I hate my body and I can't bare looking in a mirror some days. I hate people telling me there's nothing wrong with me or I'm beautiful, or any other kind of compliment. It makes me uncomfortable. My weight is up and down constantly. Food is like an enemy almost. I can't ever find my balance. I either eat too much or not at all. Its a vicious cycle.
I'm working on it though.