Healthy inside...Healthy outside!

Even though today I had a pretty awesome day, towards the end a few things came up that really bothered me, and immediately what I want to do when I get stressed out and upset is to eat. And when I say eat I mean eat a whole ton of crap that nobody should be putting in their bodies in the first place because it contains little to no nutritional value. I read in a weight loss magazine that food is fuel and fuel only. Food is around because our bodies need it to keep going, but like so many things we live in a society that has taken it to an extreme. There are sooooooooooooo many foods anymore that have nothing to do with fueling your body and have everything to do with fueling cravings and salty foods that bloat us, and sugar highs and then crashes...fueling our bodies to be not only fat but unhealthy! Luckily today I was upset, but still in control of myself, still with my eye on the prize, and so tonight it got me wondering what has changed? Why am I able to do this for myself now? Then I realized maybe before I didn't like myself enough to know I was worth it!

It is a proven fact that we learn our eating habits and develop our relationships with food at a young age. In my family food has always been a celebration, and event, a holiday. Something good happens or it's a special day and we reward ourselves with food. We are taught that cooking for people and feeding people is a way that we show them love, how we take care of them, how we make people feel comforted. Comfort is the key word here, because the comfort of food is what emotional eaters are seeking. And for many people it doesn't get out of hand...for me it does. I am an emotional eater, or sometimes an emotional non-eater to a fault. Sometimes when I get upset or angry or sad all I wanna do is drown my sorrows in Doritos and peanut butter cups and half gallons of ice cream (disgusting I know :/). Then there is the flip side where I  may be so upset that I can't bring myself to eat at all. Neither of these options is healthy of course, but I can't keep from wondering why it is that it has been so hard for me to find a healthy balance in between. I have done a lot of research on this and a lot of what I read basically says that people who are emotional eaters have 2 main reasons.

Reason #1-Food is replacing some sort of void that we have in our lives emotionally or in our relationships. I don't know how true that is but on some level it makes a bit of sense. People who have absent parents or no friends or maybe a significant other or husband where the relationship is lacking. I have watched countless weight loss shows where people say that they turn to food when they are upset because food doesn't let you down, it doesn't abandon you, it's always there to comfort! Here is where we have screwed up....damn right food doesn't leave you....food like that stays with you awhile if you aren't careful..in the form of chubby bellies and dimply thighs, and double chins,a sad but true reality. Eating might make you feel better in that moment, but in the long run it's going to make you feel worse if you are someone who struggles with your weight, because for those of us who do one of our main sources of stress or sadness comes from our struggles with our weight issues. So really we are running circles around ourselves...we get upset because we are not happy with our bodies...because we are upset we go on an eating binge...which in turn causes us to gain a few pounds............AND the cycle starts over. It can seem so hopeless. We have got to start coming up with better ways to deal with our emotions, internally....where they grew from!

Reason #2-So many times when we get upset, it's easy to get going on everything that makes you unhappy. So we start going down the entire list of things that are bothering us, everything that isn't perfect in our lives...things can start to seem hopeless when you do this stuff, then you decide you are just going to give up....and we over eat! It's almost as though we sabotage ourselves, maybe because we are afraid of the unknown of what might change if we succeed or maybe it's to punish ourselves for screwing up in the first place. Either way, it's a bad situation.

I don't know for sure because I am not quite a month in to my current weight loss journey and who is too say I'm going to be successful....but I have to say that I feel better this time, I feel like I still wanna keep going, and in the past I have wanted to give up way sooner than this, and I just wanted to put it out there that I really think it's because I am in a good place in my life, in all my relationships, in the person I am, emotionally I am a stable and happy person....much of which I owe to the amazing people around me, and some of which I  owe to getting older and wiser and more mature, and I even think some of it is my own growth, my own strength, and my own determination to want to be a better person in general. This last year has taught me a lot of things....what true friendship is, and what it's not....where my morals stand....how my family effects my life.....and I have learned to surround myself with people that matter, and people who care, and people who are positive and don't purposely do things to hurt me and others, and I have learned more about forgiveness and how to keep those things from dragging me down.

I know I have so many people beside me, rooting for me, wanting me to succeed, and more importantly I believe in myself now, and I believe that I am worth the work! We have to know that it's ok to do these things for yourself! And if you need help with that, let me know, because I'll tell you that your worth it!

I'm GOING TO DO THIS!!!!

I am a healthier person inside and now it's helping me to be a healthier person on the outside...healthier and sexier too ;)