Fearful

Jan 12, 2013

I go to support groups and browse the postings in the RNY forum and I find myself so jealous. All these people who have enjoyed the fabled "honeymoon" period after surgery, who have stuck to their programs and found themselves enjoying success. I had problems from the beginning and never had a "honeymoon."  I suppose I set myself up for failure from before the beginning and I have no one to blame but myself. My therapist strongly cautions me not to buy into defeatist thinking and I try to accept her advice, but the truth is that I can't help remembering a former therapist who wouldn't okay me for surgery. I can't help thinking that maybe she was right, that I shouldn't have had the surgery. But I did and, as promised, I've lost a lot of weight in the months since, but now I'm really struggling. My eating is totally out of control and my weight has began to slowly inch back up. I'm so afraid of gaining it all back, plus more, but that fear doesn't seem to be strong enough to do anything about it.

I've been in and out of Overeater's Anonymous for years. I always thought that I'd taken the first two steps, that I'd admitted I was powerless over food and that I believed my higher power (God) could help me. The other night, after a particularly bad binge, I got out my OA books and started reading them. I made it through the first two steps and stopped because I realized, for the first time, that I had NOT taken those first steps after all. I've always had an easy time admitting that I have a problem with food but I've never accepted it on a gut-deep level. Admitting I am powerless goes against everything I believe in. And the second step? I've never doubted the existence of God but apparently I don't believe He can help me. Now it feels like I'm stuck on a pin, like a butterfly in a science project. I can't go backward but I can't seem to go forward either. So I struggle.

These past months haven't been all bad. I had lost a total of 135 lbs from my high weight and a lot of my co-morbidities have eased or even gone completely away. I am more mobile, finding it easier to get around, and I can even go without my cane much of the time. I don't want to lose all this success, but if I don't get a grip on my eating and get with the program that's exactly what is going to happen.

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