Struggling

So I know that I am a person who is going to STRUGGLE to keep my weight off, and some days I am ready for the challenge.  But there are times when I can feel the weight of that reality just crushing me.   I am really trying to get over my LIFE LONG issues with food.  Binging, food addiction, closet eating, etc etc.  I go to therapy, but I don't seem to be making much progress.  I am still struggling to do the things that I know I need to go to be successful.  Its so frustrating. 

How can I be so scared of regain, yet still binge on foods I know I shouldn't??  Why do I still continue to bring things into my house knowing full well that I can't handle them?  I NEVER give out advise to anyone about how to "diet" and whatnot, because I cant even get it straight myself, why would anyone listen to me?!

What if I can't handle the struggle and gain everything back??  What if someday I just give up??

Sorry to be a bummer, I just sometimes feel so alone in all this.  I am SO HAPPY that there are so many people in here that are doing so great, and have really changed their eating habit and they are flourishing with this new lifestyle...while I am over here drowning.    Again, sorry, I just don't have anyone is "real life" that gets this...NO ONE.  And its tough going it alone sometimes. (uh oh ugly crying at work...never a good thing)

I'm sorry melissa. I don't have any super words of wisdom, but i can say you are strong and you can get through this!

I believe in my heart you can. Is there any activity that is more helpful to get your mind off food?

Do you feel the therapist is helping or do you need to find another one that might work better?

I can't tell if my therapist isn't helping, or if I am just failing miserably.  I will keep going and see what happens.

I think about food more now then I did when I was SMO.  It's crazy.  Not even so much cravings, but always having to think about what I need to eat...what I shouldn't be eating!  Then trying not to think TOO much about things like dense protein, that I should be eating, and don't have anything physically wrong with me to stop me (that they can figure out), yet still getting sick most of the time when I try.

You're probably doing what you need to do, so don't worry about that.

Do you think it's a focus problem or a craving problem?  If it's a focus problem (you're focused on what you can't have or you suffer from a food addiction) you might just need more distractors in your day to shift your focus.  If it's a craving problem you may not be absorbing enough of your vitamins/minerals--and, of course, your body is keenly aware that you are losing weight and it doesn't like that.  If your labs are all coming in normal, even though it may not be a You-focus problem, you may need some distractors in the day to keep your body from pinging you about your weight loss.

You said you're getting sick--do you have any food allergies or intolerances from before the surgery?  I have read here that several people became aware of their sensitivities after the surgery so you may want to talk to your doc about it.  I hear you about the sickness, though--I've been sick more in the last 10 months since surgery than the six years before it.  Everything makes me nauseous but some things just take me over the edge.  If this is you you have my sympathies because I haven't been able to figure it out.  I've done elimination diets, essentially, since the surgery trying to figure out what it is but it's just everything with some thing****ting me worse than others regardless of the quantity.

I hope you feel better!

I honestly don't know what the problem is.  And I have SO MANY distractors in my life, maybe too many, I am always busy.  It doesn't seem to help LOL 

I have a full time job, 4 kids, a house and husband....they all keep me so busy I am having trouble finding time to even work out, which is KNOW is a huge problem for my mental well being, not even physically. 

I have always had trouble eating dense protein, no matter how much I chew I get horrible slime...and will be miserable for hours after...until I finally throw everything up.  I stopped eating meat for a while, because I was just so sick of getting sick.  I had an endoscopy done, they said everything was fine.  So its not a pouch issue.  My therapist thinks its a mental thing, but i dont see how a mental problem could cause major slime and vomiting.  But what do I know.

Remember that distractors need to be personal to you! haha  No doubt you enjoy your work and family, but making time for yourself is crucial if you were an emotional eater before.  Your brain doesn't like dissonance--it doesn't like to be uncomfortable--so if there is even that small part of you that isn't getting its allotted time to itself you might want to try some self-care so that it doesn't overwhelm you.  Particularly for those of us who ate when we were feeling overwhelmed it's very important to take a breather because otherwise we slip back into those old habits.  I constantly have to remind my father (who also had GB WLS) that the reason he got so heavy is because while it is social sin to be overweight, eating is the now-socially acceptable way to be a lush: people are going to judge you for its effects but they're not going to question you while you're doing it.  If that was you before the surgery (eating for mini-breaks from the insanity/monotony/existence of life) you may need to think about some other ways you can reward yourself throughout the day instead of making your only breaks from eating your other obligations.  (That sounds so cruel, doesn't it?  That's the way our brain sees it, though, no matter how much we love what we do and who we do it with!) You obviously have developed the good habits, you just need good rewards to reinforce them! ^.^  You can tell your mind a hundred times that this is what you want and this is what you need but your body is built to consume and it will never, ever believe you.  You can't reason with machines!

Part of the reason many of us fell into the "reward" of eating breaks was because it could be done at our desks, in our cars, between or during activities, etc. so there was this constant (I don't want to say obsessive) habitual compulsion to keep doing it.  (Think about muscle memory and smoking.)  Food is extremely pleasurable to the brain on a cellular level beginning with the most basic functions--brain stem to tip food is just a wash of awesome--which is why it is so hard to break away.  It becomes harder when, as many of us do, food becomes tied to the profession, to the celebration, or the monotony.  Food is extremely tied to culture and if you came from any sort of place that stemmed from agriculture, food is a celebration and is tied to everything celebratory.  When it becomes tied to other things, those things tend to remind us of food--popcorn and theaters, the mall and the food court, co-worker's birthdays and cake, lunch breaks to get out of working at your desk, going out for a drink with your friends but not wanting to just drink you eat...  It goes downhill fast and that is because your brain is addicted to food even if you aren't.  So many with anorexia or bulimia truly struggle--their bodies and their brains are still saying DO IT while their minds are convincing them otherwise.  Most, if not all, of us here went the other way--we gave into what our brains and bodies wanted; our other halves were rewarded by throwing themselves into everything else in order to prevent themselves from eating but in an unhealthy way and for an unhealthy purpose.  Just like our behaviors become tied to our profession, our celebration, our monotony so does theirs--they have highly visible jobs, they celebrate their victories over food, and they get into ruts dependent on not eating.  Food hits the brain harder and easier than almost any drug and so when you have lived a life catering to your brain's wishes your smoker-like muscle memory says, "Remember when we used to eat those chips when we sat at our desks?" You are fighting basic biology in addition to your habits so take heart in every victory you make over it. Your brain is trying to get back to that place where it is just bathing in neurotransmitters (hormones in descending pathways) because that's what it used to do when we overate and constantly ate which is why it will never not be a battle.  But every time you win you should celebrate--create a built-in reward for yourself even if it's just a self-congratulatory "well done" to start building the new neuronal pathways that will help make it easier.

Do you do any arts and crafts that might lend itself to a fifteen-minute break at work?  Something you can do at your desk that you can put away and not have to bring out the whole kitchen sink to do?  Or maybe you like to journal?  Sometimes getting it out there can relieve the need, I have heard, but it's very individual.  The key is getting your amygdala and mirror neurons engaged--something that will get your pleasure and reward going while also re-training the brain to be reinforced when it doesn't see a behavior occurring.  (Mirror neurons are the monkey-see, monkey-do part of your brain, which is why social eating makes you even fatter.)  This is horrible, but I didn't do much television before and I have really gotten into it lately on YouTube.  To keep my endorphins up I have been watching 8 out of 10 cats does countdown which makes me laugh out loud (much to the judgment of my dog) and makes me realize I have a poor grasp on both English and basic math haha.  When I was watching one of the episodes, YouTube suggested a show called Super Size vs. Super Skinny.  Wow.  If you ever watched You Are What You Eat with Gillian McKeith, it's twice the judgment and none of the feces, exploring both sides of the eating disorder spectrum.  They bring Brits to the U.S. to show them what life would be like being incredibly heavy and in the episodes I have seen they talk to a surprisingly large number of bariatric patients.  If you ever need some positive punishment (the addition of a stressor to ensure compliance) you should watch a couple of those episodes because some of the Americans they talk to are bariatric failures weighing over 40 or 50 stone (which, I think, is something like 560+ pounds).  Plus, Dr. Jessen is a nice-looking bloke haha.

I have found that taking betaine hydrochloride before and after eating meat helps, and that taking a chewable enzyme (with papain, etc.) also really helps with both meat and fruit/veg.  I haven't done a ton of research into it, I just now the BH supplements the stomach acid we no longer have access to until much later in the digestive tract and the enzymes are naturally designed to break down food matter.  They can be a little pricey in-town where I live so I order them from Amazon subscribe and save.  They have made me go from sick to just nauseous.  I get the same way as you so I can only eat meat once or twice a week unless it is fish.  I have to plan going out, etc. because now that I'm losing weight people find it strange that I don't eat more meat and it's just easier to make that the time I eat it than during the rest of the week. 

Is the slime mucous?  I have seen a few people use that term here.  You may want to try a couple days of Mucinex.  I know that that sounds really weird but if you have affected (not necessarily infected) mucous along your digestive tract that hasn't cleared out it could be helping trap things in.  There are several places in your digestive tract that have mucous and weight loss is one way to throw it out of whack so you may need to take a couple of expectorants to try and "reset" yourself.  Not in the GB WLS setting but in other weight-loss settings I have seen some who feel better after only a couple of days.  (I used to belong to a TOPS group and two of the women who had lost over 100 pounds got the suggestion from their mutual doctor.  They did it once and didn't have problems after that.)  I don't know if that's what you're experiencing, though.

I completely agree, though, about the vomitting and slime.  Remember that doctors and therapists are not always right--they stick to what they know that way we stick to what we know.  My doctor asked me the same thing about my getting sick, whether I was just getting too much anxiety about eating.  When it first started I wanted to eat--I would smell food and I wanted to put it in or around my mouth but my stomach just couldn't handle much--quantity or variety.  I'll be honest, though, after having to re-smell or re-taste some things so many times it just hasn't been worth trying again.  I've recently started getting sick with even my protein drinks so I'm taking a breather from them for awhile so I don't put it into my mind that I don't want to drink them.  I measure my portions by one of those Yoplait greek yogurt cups (6 oz) and make that last at least a half-hour to an hour with constant chewing so it's not like I'm getting much in and it's not like it's not getting torn to bits.  I've seen many people here who at the stage I am at have been able to eat much more with far less consequences so I don't know what I'm doing wrong.  Something has fundamentally changed that I can't seem to fix and my nutritionist the last time I talked to her told me I just needed to "get over it" and do it.  (Sorry, I already did the throwing-up twice a day every day for six months thing with my gluten problem, I'll pass.)  I cannot eat any vegetables that have not been stewed and can only have them in very limited quantities period.  I can't have meat more than twice a week.  I have to start and end each day with a coffee mug of ho****er.  I have to dissolve my vitamins in water to take in the morning so I can take my thyroid pill at night.  I physically cannot drink within an hour of eating so snacking has completely gone because I otherwise can't get my water in.  I get my 64 ounces of water in a day.  The ONE thing that did not make me sick was oatcake with goat cheese but we're not supposed to have cheese and there's practically no protein in three crackers and an ounce of cheese so I have to pass on that, don't I?  [haha I just re-read this, I sound 5 years old again with what I eat.]

Oh, Melissa.    I want you to know that I struggle mightily, too.  Every day, **** EVERY minute, I have to make a choice whether I'm going to eat that bagel or have that drink.  Sometimes I come out on top and sometimes I don't.  Confession:  there's a Kit Kat bar in my dresser drawer.  In my bedroom.  So I can eat it in secret.  It's been there for like a week, but it's still there and I can guarantee I will eat it at some point.  Old habits die hard, and I guess sometimes they don't die at all.  We just have to fight the best fight we can and have faith in ourselves.  Because I have faith in you.

And listen, you are not alone.  We may live in your computer, but we are still real life people.  And we are in this together, whether you like it or not. 

That kitkat would have been gone minutes after me buying it.  lol 

I am glad I have you all, for real, I would be even worse off without you.   It's so hard being surrounded by people who have never had any problems with binging...or don't even understand why anyone would do that, and they dont understand why its so hard for me. 

I knew this surgery thing wasnt going to be easy, but man, I was in such denial about how ****** up I am when it comes to food.  How could I have been so blind?  What did I think caused me to be 330 lbs??? 

Wise words.

PS. I'm at your house and can't find the KitKat. Which drawer is it in?

Oh Grim, I am laughing so hard i'm tearing up.   Don't tell a bunch of sugar deprived people that there is a Kit Kat out there unless you want to be stormed.