This is the first part in a series
Okay, so I don't think my weight had anything to do with why the toilet seat broke, but considering that I already feel uncomfortable with my weight and struggle with a diagnosed eating disorder, it certainly didn't help to make me feel any more comfortable than I'm already NOT.
When people hear the words, "eating disorder," they think of anorexia or bulimia. I admit that I thought there were only two types of eating disorders. Most people never hear about the third one: Binge Eating Disorder. It's also known as "compulsive overeating," but most people don't think of this as an eating disorder. Like me, I think a lot of people just assume that binge eating is simply a lack of self-control, not a disorder.
I grew up in a family that has a deep appreciation for food. We've all been in the food industry in one way or another. My mom was a candy maker and my parents owned a catering business and bakery for many years, my husband I owned a catering business for 6 years, I've waitressed and worked in bakeries, my sister is a waitress, one brother owns a bakery, and the other brother works as a chef. It's in our blood. We love food, entertaining, and creating amazingness for the tastebuds.
I also grew up without any sort of balance when it came to food. My Oma (German grandmother) would sneak downstairs at night to feed my siblings and me green grapes dipped in white sugar. She was always baking something fatty and laden with calories and made sure that we never went back downstairs hungry from her house upstairs. We all have hearty appeptites and were never short of Pizza Hut pizza when my dad was a manager there in my younger years. When my parents were food salespeople for a food distributor, there were always samples brought home and they would order our favorite snacks in case loads. When they opened their bakery, any leftovers were quickly polished off by the four of us kids. We would think nothing of sitting at the table to devour a chocolate torte with a gallon of milk to wash it down. There were never any limits to what we could eat and my parents never set their feet down. Food was a free-for-all in our house. We were never taught good habits, balance, and nutritional wisdom.
This all changed when my parents became raw foodies and vegetarians. I was 17 years old and after all those years of eating whatever I wanted were brought to an ubrupt halt. My parents have always been all or nothing, though they've mellowed considerably on this lately. When they decided to go 80% raw fruits and veggies, vegetarian, and gave up all refined foods, my siblings and I didn't have a choice but to go along with their decision. Actually, we didn't go along with it - we were forced into it. While sparing you the details of the strict religious movement my parents got into in 1991, it's easier just to tell you that none of us were allowed a job outside the home or a driver's license. We didn't go to public school and we had no money of our own so even if we wanted to eat differently, there was no way for us to get food other than what was in the house. In fact, if we had been found eating outside of the prescribed vegan/no-refined-foods plan, we would have had hell to pay. As much as I would like to say that it was "all or nothing," we only had one option. All. Just as we had no balance before this way of eating started, we had no balance in this diet either. It may not have been a free-for-all, but it was just as extreme on the other end. I got myself down to a healthy 140 pounds. Everyone in my family lost a substantial amount of weight, but there was no balance.
A couple of years went by in this eating lifestyle and I found myself in a deep depression due to living under extreme athoritarian parents that were fully immersed in neo-conservative Christian patriarchy. Food became a way for me to have something I could control. It was the one thing that I could control, seeing as everything else in my life was dictated by my parents. At least, I thought I could control it. I started restricting myself and over-exercised. I counted every calorie and weighed myself mutiple times throughout the day, especially after a bowel movement. By the time my husband and I got engaged (I was 20 years old), I had started throwing up some of what I ate and found myself at 105 pounds (I'm 5 foot, 7 1/2 inches). We were married 2 1/2 months after we got engaged and I actually gained 10 pounds so that I could fit into the wedding dress my sister made for me.
I hid my scant frame under the gaudy and oversized clothes that my parents required me to wear as part of their religious standards. No one could see my ribs this way. They saw my sunken cheeks and tiny wrists, but most people didn't say anything about them. In fact, my parents held me up as a great success story for this diet (the Hallelujah Diet). My grandmother told me that I looked sickly and was too skinny, but my weight has never been to her liking no matter what state it's at. I've always been too skinny or too fat to her, so I've never heeded her admonishments when it comes to my weight.
In Part 2, I'll share how things changed with my eating after I got married.