When I eventually and finally reflected on my life as an overweight child, I became aware of the how much pain and sadness had consumed it. My struggle with food was a constant one I carried with me everywhere I went. The fact that I was overweight in a society which puts so much negative influence on weight wasn’t just a physical characteristic to me. It defined the person who I became in every area. Being fat became so much more than how I looked—it was the one characteristic I gauged my entire self worth on.

I was my own worst enemy, subjecting myself to a continuous barrage of negative self talk, demeaning myself, my appearance, and my social life. The truth be told, I had convinced myself that I had no redeeming qualities. My inner voiced convinced me that I wasn’t good enough or pretty enough. Not only did I view myself as fat and ugly, but I also managed to convince myself that I was a total failure. In my mind, I couldn’t do anything, or better stated, I couldn’t do anything right. I lived with the belief that no one loved me, even my parents. I’d somehow managed to believe that if I did something wrong, my parents would actually abandon me. Above all, I distanced myself from others by telling myself I wasn’t like other girls. In my mind, nobody liked me at home or at school.

The majority of my days were spent struggling with a modicum of self worth, which I’d disregard when I got back home where I could safely return to being my own worst enemy. The first thing I’d do when I walked in the door was choose my weapon—FOOD. Food made me feel better. I ate because I felt bad or hurt. I ate when I was sad or bored. I ate when I was depressed, and I ate when I was lonely. When I had something to eat, I had a companion. I ate for all those reasons and more. Food was the answer to everything that ailed me, and it was my reward whenever I was content or happy. It satisfied all of my emotional needs—but that satisfaction was short term. After I was finished stuffing my feelings with food, I immediately went to a place where I’d become all too familiar, a place of regret, discomfort, guilt, and, yes, even shame for what I’d eaten. Now, you can imagine the lengths I went to in order to remain in a continual state of feeling terrible about myself.

Looking back on it, if there was joy in my life, I rarely allowed myself to relish in it. I punished myself by habitually reinforcing the fact that I wasn’t worthy of being happy. This was a trait I took with me throughout my childhood and into my adult years. I knew that being fat sucked, but it was the only life I knew. Somehow, I convinced myself that it was the only life I would ever know.

My sudden, but revealing, awareness of my feelings about my weight and my life has made me much more observant about the truth. I found that in order to make long lasting changes in my life, it’s vital that I am honest with myself—100%, brutally honest. It was time for an honest assessment of who I was and what I really wanted. But, there was just one thing in the way—was I capable of exercising that degree of honesty? And if I was, did I even know the answer to those questions anymore?

When we talk about the truth, the box we open is often much larger than we imagined. Are slight misrepresentations considered to be falsehoods? Does the truth only pertain to the things we say to others, or does it apply to the things we tell ourselves, as well? Does being truthful go so far that we must examine our beliefs and whether or not they still honestly represent the person we’ve become, not the person we used to be? Does the truth hurt, and if it really does, why? Finding out those answers can provide you with some insight that will explain a lot about yourself and how you deal with many issues in your life.

How long has it been since you did some soul searching to reveal what the truth really means to you? It didn’t come easy or quickly for me. As a matter of fact, it’s something that I’ve struggled with for a long time. As I explored my beliefs, issues with the truth traced back to my childhood. Even as a child, I yearned to impress other people. So, I often manufactured myself to be someone better than I really was. Because I had self esteem issues, I didn’t have a very good opinion of myself and never thought of myself as anything very special. To make up for that, I told “stories.” To me, they weren’t lies—just little misrepresentations made so others would have a reason to accept and like me. The stories I told weren’t about other people and were never meant to hurt anyone, so I convinced myself that there was no harm done in embellishing my life a bit.

Frankly, my stories weren’t made up entirely to impress other people. Their purpose was also to impress myself, making me feel better about the real me by creating a new, more exciting me. The stories I told myself and others served to protect me from the hurt I would surely face if I came face to face with the truth. That hurt was there, but by lying, I didn’t have to deal with it.

What stories to you tell yourself?

My awakening had less to do with other people, though, than it had to do with me. You see, I had always viewed food as more than sustenance or nutrition for a healthy body. I thought food was sustenance for the body, mind, spirit, and ego. It was my medicine and my poison. I was never privy to a Nutrition 101 class, describing how the body works and the vital nutrients the body needs to maintain the delicate balance between my physical needs and requirements and my emotional health. If I had been, maybe it wouldn’t have taken me decades to realize that food was fast becoming my own worst enemy. Maybe I would have changed my eating habits and learned to eat enough to feel alive, healthy, and confident without overindulging.

But, I’m not so sure that would have been enough. For years, I continued to allow my weight to top the charts. As the battle of the bulge waged on, I became the main casualty. Far too much of my life was wasted by hiding behind a wall of fat. I protected myself from rejection by hiding behind that wall of fat—the very same wall of fat that kept other people from wanting to get close to me. As a result, I was the biggest loser, not knowing what it was like to wake up every day and feel absolutely fantastic about myself and my body. I never knew how good it felt to physically feel great and alive with energy. In short, life in the fat lane was a spectator sport, one I wasn’t participating in at all.

A lack of nutritional knowledge didn’t help me, but my attitude was what hurt me the most. If I had been a person who didn’t place the blame for my weight and life on other things, like moving, would I have been happier or even slimmer? Would I have been happier if I hadn’t beat myself up every time I picked up a fork? I think so. As far back as I can remember, my attitude has had a negative ring to it. When something went wrong, I berated myself for it. I belittled myself far more than anyone else ever could have. Most importantly, I didn’t realize that if I didn’t like myself, how could I expect anyone else to like me?

It’s not a secret that a person with low self-esteem is usually negative. By continuing to remain in the fat lane and by choosing to be my own worst critic, I failed to understand one critical point—that my thoughts, actions, and beliefs have a strong impact on my health. Nothing, nothing, in my life was going to change until I put the responsibility right square where it belonged. I was the responsible party here, and I enabled myself through my own thoughts, actions, and beliefs.

If I’d been a positive person who saw my life differently, would it have been different? You bet it would have. It would have been a cake walk compared to what I had created. I was too hard on myself and certainly took everything far too seriously. It wasn’t until I experienced my sudden awakening that I really got that—that it was time to ease up and be nice to myself (as well as to others!). Nothing in life is permanent so there’s no reason to mourn what could be for the rest of your life. I realized, and hope you do, too, that anything that is not working for me is something that I CAN change, and that change can start today, this very instant.

Why is it that so many of us want change right now and when we don’t get it (in a totally unrealistic and honest time frame), we totally abandon it? Our desire for instant results and gratification makes up completely give up and suspend our dreams and hopes of the life we really want to live! Is there a reason we punish ourselves like that? I think there is. It’s because we’re not being honest with ourselves and being 100 percent truthful about what we need to do to accomplish the changes we desire.

I found that out one day. In one sudden and unexpected moment, I got it. I woke up one day and really saw what I had allowed myself to become—fat, lazy, unhappy, unmotivated and above all, physically and mentally unhealthy! To be frank, it wasn’t the first time I’d woke up and seen myself like that. It had happened more times than I care to admit. But this day was different, really different.

Life in the Fat Lane

Being the last one picked by the team captain for kick ball sucks.  Not being able to zip your jeans sucks.  Name calling sucks.  Ugly clothes suck.  Being ignored really sucks.

But nothing sucks more that being fat.  Being fat sucks.  It really does.  I know what it feels like to be humiliated because no one wanted me on their team in gym class.  And let me tell you, the dates for prom weren’t exactly line up outside my door.  People have commented or whispered about my appearance an my size, and I spent years wishing that I could do anything, anything, besides try on another pair of jeans that didn’t fit.  I felt invisible, not included and not notices, when I was in a group.  Well, I guess you could say that I wasn’t quite invisible because, to be honest, it was hard to miss me.  I was fat.

Life in the fat lane sucks.  It’s a life that revolves around food.  Food was got the reason for my problems and the answer to my problems.  I used it for both punishment and reward.  My reliance on it as an emotional vice made it both my comfort and my misery.

Becoming a “big girl”, I was soon faced with self esteem issues that were directly related to my weight and my looks.  But, my weight and looks weren’t the problem, it was how I felt about them that was the most devastating.  The majority of those thoughts and feeling were self defeating and negative, creating even lower self esteem and continuing the cycle of feeling bad, eating, and then feeling even worse because I did.  The cycle repeated itself like shampoo directions, “lather, rinse, repeat”; except, my cycle read “eat, regret, repeat, eat, regret, repeat”.  There were no directions telling me how or when to stop.

Life in the fat lane slowed me down.  It killed my confidence as my weight continually subjected me to the intolerance and disapproval too many overweight people face every day.  I learned the hard way how it felt to be completely ignored by people, even if I was standing right next to them.  My opinions held little weight, simply because I was overweight.  Too often, I felt like the world had excused me from participating in life, dismissing my feeling, thoughts and presence.  And it was mostly because I was fat.

Hello!

Because when you hear someone say “ex”-husband or “ex”-lover or “ex”-roommate… do you think they are coming back?  No!  It’s done, it’ over, bye-bye!

If I say, I used to be fat, or I lost weight… that even sounds like it’s temporary.  When you lose something you long for it’s return… right?  When you used to be something, it’s usually something you value, like I used to be a marathon runner, but I can’t do that anymore… but you would love to return to that time in life… right?
Well, can I be perfectly honest with you? I never, ever, EVER want to be FAT again!!

The pain associated with being fat is something I do not want to experience in my life ever again.  The shame, the self loathing… and it’s not just when I was topping the scales at 200 lbs!  When I was 30 lbs overweight, I still looked at myself in the mirror with  judgment and disgust.  Hard as I tried to accept myself… I was always trying to cover up my fatness with clothing or being funny to be liked or just not going to events so I wouldn’t have to be seen or even worse, have to find clothes that don’t make me look fat!

Now, I am an ex-fat person…  Big X!

My mission in life is to create a whole network of ex-fat people who walk, talk and act like people who refuse to return to a life of pain, sadness, and shame. People who are no longer willing to be quiet about the huge problem fat is in a person’s life and in the lives of everyone they know and love!

In our society here in the US, we are conditioned to sugar coat the truth about health problems, money problems and even relationship problems.  We don’t want people to know we have problems or to upset them for fear they will think badly of us.  Am I right?

NO! In this country obesity is on the rise and no one is screaming about it… I am here today to scream about it.  Fat is not in!  Fat is ugly!  Fat is unhealthy!

It is so much easier to stay skinny than anything being fat ever was!!!

All adults:  133.6 million  (66%)
Women:  65 million  (61.6%)
Men:  68.3 million  (70.5%)

My mission is to bring FATness out in the open as a permanently reversible situation and form a strong, reality based group of people who want to become ex-fat people also!  In that process, introduce, mentor, coach and assist people who want to be thin and healthy to add the nutritional cleansing and replenishing program into their life to allow them to experience the unbelievably carefree, fun, confident, healthy lifestyle that goes along with losing the weight and maintaining it for a lifetime!

To learn more, enter your information below and you will be emailed a link to a website that will tell you more about it and help you decide if you are finally ready to make a permanent change and enjoy the benefits of being healthy both physically and mentally.

My intention in writing this book is to help people start talking honestly and frankly about the many ways being fat is killing our people emotionally, physically and psychologically!!!