before and after red dress

I can remember one Boxing Day my children were at their dad’s house; I was very anxious without them being at home and felt very alone without them in our home.

As it was Christmas Time the house was full of chocolate and the children   had received so many chocolate selection boxes. As the day went on, the feelings of anxiety and overwhelm grew worse. As a food addict what did I do? I opened one of the children’s selection boxes and started eating it, the way in which I ate during a binge was extremely fast and very frantic.

Before I could blink, I looked down and I had eaten the entire selection box. I felt so ashamed of myself eating my children’s chocolate and that made me feel worse, so what did I do to numb that emotion of guilt?

I opened the next one, I must have eaten around 6 selection boxes, and the addiction had really kicked in, I opened a tin of chocolates and began cramming them in my mouth, I could not get the wrappers off fast enough and crammed in several all at once.

Once I hade eaten all my favourites, I then started on the flavours that I was not so keen on, by this point I felt disgusted with myself and had tears of shame rolling down my cheeks. I stopped eating the chocolate and berated myself internalising all my self-hatred and put the lid on the tin of chocolates and took them outside and put them in my dustbin.

I went back in the lounge and the feeling of overwhelm washed over me and after about 10 minutes the craving for chocolate took over and I went to the dustbin and got the rest of the tin of chocolates out of the dustbin took them back indoors and ate them.

By this point I had a very swollen stomach, tears were streaming down my face, and my heart was beating so fast due to all the sugar I had consumed. I started sweating perilously and went to the bathroom as I felt so unwell. I felt exhausted and the next thing I remember is I woke up on the bathroom floor.

I crawled into my bed and slept for hours, I woke up feeling hungover and with stomach cramps, I had brain fog and felt confused and blamed myself for not being able to stop eating my children’s chocolate, I felt disgusted and ashamed of myself.

This destructive cycle began aged 14 when I had started my first diet, and the diet industry introduced me to the restriction/binge habit of eating. I would eat hardly anything all day and then when I got home from school, I would eat secretly in my bedroom lots of sugary food. This habit continued and ended up with me damaging my health and ending up weighing 21stone 10 pounds. My GP had weighed me aged 24 years old and told me I would not make age 40 as I was eating myself to death.

I had a very lonely and isolated weight-loss journey as I never shared my destructive relationship with food with anybody and kept my “shameful secret” to myself.

Fast forward to today and I am now aged 53 years old and a dress size 10, I have educated myself about Nutrition and the negative effect of processed foods on our physical and mental health.

I remember early on in my journey talking to my GP and bravely shared that I thought I was addicted to food. I was very harshly told there is “no way” you can be addicted to food as there are no addictive chemicals in food.

I was so pleased that Dr Chris Van Tulleken wrote the book “Ultra processed people.” Where he talks about Food manufacturing companies adding chemicals to our food to make them addictive so therefore, we as consumers buy more.

I am incredibly open about my Addiction to Food and share my story to break the stigma and shame around it so sufferers can stop blaming themselves like I did.

I now work as a Coach supporting others and my support group is called “Step by step with Sarah-Jane”.

Does my article sound like you?

If so, then please reach out as you are not alone, and your uncontrollable eating is not your fault.

 

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