Free from Weight Tyranny

it's amazing, but i really don't care what i weigh. i really don't.

of course, i don't always know what i weigh anymore, so what's to actually care about.

the thing is -- i look fine, and i'll look fine if i get bigger. i trust (trust, me?) that i probably won't get too much bigger,anyway, because i pretty much eat normal-esque portions when i'm hungry and don't often get too full. why don't i get too full -- because it doesn't feel great and i like to feel good.

i find i don't need to feel so filled with food because my life is richer. i love and adore my new apartment, my new friends, my new attitude toward life. i am appreciative and grateful and see where things were once so much worse. and there are wonderful people in my corner now.

sure, i re-visited eating-to-soothe in the first two weeks of my new job. but it was okay and even manageable. yes, i chewed a lot of gum and sucked a lot of hard candies to calm my nerves and anxiety. did it help -- in a way, yeah. now, i'm feeling calmer and pretty darn good.

as i mentioned in my last post, i did note a few extra pounderoos when i jumped on my friends scale last week. but then i jumped off the scale and had dinner with that friend. life went on, i ENJOYED the evening and i was fine.

when i say i "enjoyed" the evening, i mean that i could be present and part of the conversation. we watched a movie, and i saw the movie. i wasn't worrying about what i'd weighed or what i'd eaten or what i'd weigh tomorrow or what i'd eat tomorrow.

talk about freedom.

re; my weight. i obsessed over every ounce of it for most of my life. even as i was healing and allowing myself to settle at a healthy weight, i still watched that weight with every inch of my 20/20 vision. even as i stopped throwing up and taking laxatives and binging and starving, even then i lived by the digits. when they went up, i'd freak -- sometimes a little and sometimes a little more.

not now.

i'm dating someone new, and he seems perfectly happy with my body. for some odd and unknown reason, i've been getting asked out a lot lately, which as i said in an earlier post, i find bizarre. people, i'm going to be 47 in June! no one asked me out in my 20s or 30s, and i was thinner then.

and there you go. nobody liked me more when i was supermodel thin. not one person, although i really thought they would. they didn't.

i CERTAINLY DIDN'T LIKE ME at all when i was supermodel thin and obsessed with weight, then drugs and later, alcohol.

now there's some peace. is there perfection? absolutely not. i'm a work in progress but now, i see a lot of progress.

that's free.

Here I Am

Is it possible that i haven't posted in over a month in a half? Unbelievable.

Life has been busy. I did change jobs and am not sure at all that i made the right choice. This was a risk, and i knew it. i wasn't thrilled at my old job, and this new gig seemed like a potential opportunity. i wasn't all excited to start, but i thought it could be better than my last job AND it did seem to have potential.

the jury is out, way out, but i'm hanging in. to be continued i'm sure.

with the new job came some anxious times. prior to switching positions, i was sooo darn happy -- loving my wonderful new home, enjoying my freedom, loving my AA friends and feeling really free from my addictions, one and all.

once i started the new job, a lot changed and i've struggled some little bit with wanting to eat just to comfort myself. yet, i'm ok. i've begun finding balance again.

the schedule is really different. i have to be here at 7;30am, and i have nearly an hours drive. before, i got to work at 9;30 and it was 12 minutes away from the new home.

i'm a night person and dislike the morning. and i'm entirely bored at the job, so i started reaching for sucking candies and gum and coffee with my usual vats of cream. i'd suck and sip compulsively. yick.

for the first two weeks, i allowed myself to suck to my heart's content (discontent?). i had too much else to worry about.

and it was okay. was i thrilled? no. but i was thrilled that i could accept that i, temporarily, wanted external comfort, and it was okay that, temporarily, i gave in.

do i feel like i've gained a few? yup. and i'm still okay. in fact, i stepped on my friend's scale, and i saw that i did, indeed, gain a few. the miracle -- i'm still ok. i still don't have a scale at home. and that is, truly, a miracle.

i also had some thoughts of drinking, which i haven't had. it's been over six months (yay!). but i didn't drink. instead, i looked at my issues and worked on working them thru, versus trying to solve my issues thru a bottle, especially since that never worked anyway!

life isn't perfect. the important fact is learning i can cope -- without binging or starving or drinking or taking klonopin or ambien.

i'm okay. and that's wonderful.