johjen
My Poor Wife...
Nov 04, 2012
As I am beginning this journey two things are happening, 1 I am obsessed with the journey, I want to know everything, and I am reasearching like a mad woman, thus it is all I am talking about, planning for etc. #2 I am trying to work out how I got to be so fat, I want to make sure that when I get the surgery I am prepared with the emotional triggers that lead me to over eat.
Having said that I don't think I am an emotional eater the way others are emotional eaters. I tend to eat as a celebration, at gatherings or when something is going well. on those occasions I binge eat, I also eat if I am board (which is weird because I am never board... I always have things to do) but if I get the opportunity to sit and read a book watch a movie I tend to take a trip to the store for "snacks" first.
I had a good childhood with good parents, there is no history of childhood abuse for me that has lead me to food as a means to "stuff" history. My mother came from a family of 8 and had some childhood issues and as a result of those issues she overate. My sister and I grew up in an overeating house. I believe we just learned to eat more than we needed because we learned how to eat from over eaters.
Anywho....
In my process of figuring out what I am going to have to change about myself to make this journey successful for me I have come to some conclusions about how I allow myself to be treated as a result of my weight. Unfortunately I have allowed myself to be treated in these ways for all of my life... the reolization that I have allowed and even promoted this mistreatment has got me so emotional and angry. I am suddenly reacting to things that I have allowed with a smile for all of my life. For example, this weekend my wife invited a friend over for the day, My wife and this friend both don;'t drive. So I as voluntold that "we" were going to pick this friend up. Now for the most part I don't mind picking non drivers up, but here is the problem with this situation. First, I was not asked in advance if I would pick the friend up, I was just told that we offered minutes before, Second is that my wife and our non driving friends get to spend the day having a few drinks etc, while I have been made the designated driver (AGAIN) and have to watch them have their drinks, so I can then drive the friend back home again and then listen to the same friends and my wife tell me that I need to "get my groove back" meaning I need to relax and enjoy some drinks with them (Ummm hello you are making me drive), Third, my friends EXPECT that I will do this stuff because I have always allowed it.
I think the third point is the one that bothers me the most. I have been the fat kid for most of my life, I have for most of my life put everyone else ahead of me. I offered up my parents to take me and my friends where ever we wanted to go, I was the kid who was doing everything for my friends growing up while they took advantage of me. I allowed it because I wanted them to like me.
Now in my adult life I am still doing it, and I am angry with myself. When my wife wakes up in the morning and asks me to make coffee (which I don't drink) I am feeling a burst of frusteration, which is not fair to her, I have always made her coffee in the morning,
I am starting to bring these things out into the light and look at them, then I am sharing them with my wife. I need the dynamic of my relationships with other people to change BEFORE my surgery, I need to stop allowing people to take advantage of me all the time. Now just to find the right ways to express my need for this change without making the other people in my life feel like a$$ holes. It is not their fault, it is mine, I know that. The people in my life today are good people, I have in some ways insisted that others take advantage of me and I set that presidence. Now I have to work on breaking that.
