This time of year tends to stir up memories, reminding people of events and experiences in their past, particularly those that involve treatment by family members. This week I came upon three blog posts that were essentially laundry lists of pain. Bloggers wrote out in excruciating detail the torment they’ve endured at the hands of abusers, including those of their own blood, as well as a legion of misfortunes that have befallen them.
There are glimmers of light that peek out from these posts since, obviously, each had been written by a survivor but I see a slight pall that brings a dimming to these flickers. Each blogger presents her past as the “explanation” and the cause for why she became very overweight later in her life. Each seems to find a kind of solace in having what she considers a justification for developing a body she knows society deems worthy of disdain and disparagement. Each blog post was a supplication for sympathy; an entreaty for forgiveness and understanding for violating an oppressive beauty standard.
A mentor once asked me how would I make my passion into a movement. This is it. In a twist of irony, many of us have allowed prejudice and bias to heap shame and blame upon ourselves. Many of us believe that our overweight bodies are “proof” that we’ve failed to heal from past wounds, the kinds of wounds that any of us could face. We take all this blame upon ourselves, desperate for some measure of sympathy for our failure to be beautiful and thin.
The cause of obesity is complex with many factors and influences; for each of us these factors act upon our lives and interact with our own genetics, biology, and lifestyles in a unique way. There is no definitive factor that “causes” and drives obesity.
Consider this possibility. If you believe something in your past was the “reason” you abused food and became overweight, imagine if it could be magically wiped from your memory. Do you think you’d suddenly lose all interest in your favorite meal and snacks? However you may have fallen into various habits and behaviors, at some point food takes over. Food is its own driver. And as you put on the pounds, weight is its own stressor.
Taking control of your weight problem on its own will bring a powerful sense of control to your life overall. Managing your weight really becomes “Job One” that opens a path to working on other aspects of your life.
It’s time to forgive yourself and move forward.
