I am a woman who has struggled with being significantly overweight my entire life. I have been on most every diet & pill on the market with no success. With continued failure I began to hate myself, so I ate more, kept getting larger & less active to the point that I now hide in the house from society. I can't go to concerts, ball games, restaurants, or events because I can’t fit in the seats, make it through the turnstiles, or walk the distances required. Reaching this point of desperation I began to consider the very controversial, gastric bypass surgery. That’s when I was forced to take a long hard look at myself & face the real reason for my 30 year ordeal with morbid obesity. Only then did I finally figure out that 99% of my eating is to deal with emotions. My instinct told me then that surgery was not going to do anything to correct or change the reasons why eat! I had to admit that food was my best friend that I had allowed it to monopolize my ENTIRE life. Even with this realization I continue to battle through situations, good, bad and indifferent trying not to eat the feelings away, which in turn causes more stress & desires to eat.
My purpose in sharing this personal story is not for sympathy OR for negative input from a society that can’t begin to understand, but rather to locate others in same or similar situations. I am hoping that as a voluntary group consisting of both genders & all walks of life we can come together bringing our unique and complete understanding of this dilemma, a soulful commitment, knowledge, experience, strength & will together through networking, and support one another in our individual attempts make it through daily battles & emotional roller coaster rides. As we find new friendships with each other, maybe we can begin to replace the void that food is filling and start to find success in our endeavors of making better conscious decisions about how we utilize food.