I cannot believe I am about to write this, but I have to. I HAVE to.
I am 35 years old, I weigh 260 lbs and I am addicted to food.
I have spent my whole life locked in a battle with my addiction to food. I have over the course of several very successful attempts, lost more than an entire persons worth of weight. Every time I have felt incredible, been able to express myself throght awesome activities like surfing, scuba diving, sky diving, etc... Every time something has happened in my life, sinking me into the depths of depression, compelling me to answer the siren's song of the sugar fairy. Twice I have weighed over 300 lbs, culminating in a tear jerking 313 about 7 years ago. The most humiliating, defeatest day of my life was the day that my dad asked me how much I weighed one morning while we were tying on the feed bag at the catering truck. The worst part was that I was honest with him and admitted that I was a knee shattering 313 lbs. I felt so horribly defeated. I lost. I lost the battle. How the hell had I gotten to this point? Was this really me?
No, absolutely, unequivocably, not, this was not the real me. I vowed to lose it, and I did, I also gained most of it back too. I am a perfect storm of obesity. Both of my parents are and were obese. My mom fought the same losing battle I do, up until the day she died. My dad has been on the yo-yo program for years also. Not only am I genetically predisposed to be overweight, but I also have a couple of other lovely traits, adhd, and depressive tendencies. Thank you very much for that mr. creator, just because you know I can handle it doesn't mean that I would prefer to have this battle, couldn't I just have wierd ears or something?
Many people have asked me how I was able to lose the 50 lbs I have lost since last August, easy answer: I cheated. I went on a narcotic to help me manage my ADHD and one of the delightful side effects has been appetite suppression. This is frickin awsome, except for the fact that the second that I am off my meds, I'm tackling a voracious, uncontrollable urge to start eating and never stop. Yay me, knee problems and diabetes, or stay on meds indefinitely.
Why my mind is chemically addicted to food, I honestly don't know. I am aware that the chemical cocktail that floods my brain when I eat Ice Cream is regulated by that same malfunctioning organ in my brain that controls so many other things related to my ADHD, the Hippocampus. The narcotics that I take to wake up my lazy hipplocampus help suppress my appetite, thus hopefully helping to avert type 2 diabetes, knee problems, an embarrassingly limited wardrobe, and the always pleasant, chronic lethargy. Based on my expereinces with this in the past, I know that once I actually do get more healthy, I will no longer actually crave the poison. But its the stomach shrinking, metabolism increasing, starvation pain enduring nightmare leading up to that point that makes me dread the process.
Why am I telling you all this? Well, I am doing a weight loss challenge with my good friend sam and I have committed to lose 45 pounds in 90 days. I will do it. I lost 40 pounds in 2 months in order to go skydiving, I can do 45 pounds in 3 months, I really just don't want to. I feel gyped. I watch people eating all of the things that I want to eat and I feel like I've been locked out of the club. I want my drug, after all,it's just food, right? I mean we're supposed to eat....
Well, I am better than this. I have been blessed with some of the most amazing gifts that a man could ever dream of. I love Alex and Annika and Trinity. Part of love is sacrificing what you want for the greater good. I need to train myself, again, to remember that that Snickers Ice Cream bar costs so much more than money, than the momentary creamy, caramelly ecstasy. It costs trust. Trust from the people that love me and want me happy and healthy, trust from the people that want to share my life and the things I do with me. I may never know why I have been blessed with such loving friends and family, but you aare all my salvation.
So, I have this favor to ask of anyone that reads this. Please, if you see me starting to slide, look me in the eyes, feel my struggle, and have the stones to tell me that you love me and want to see me make the right decisions for my future. Sometimes love means having the strength to say the difficult things. So please, ask me to go for a walk, or a bike ride. We can do this together, it would mean a great deal to me and the kids.
I love you all, and I need your help. :-)
Namaste
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Sunday, July 29, 2012
"What the hell is all this fortune cookie mumbo jumbo crap you keep posting?"
This question was posed to me the other day by one of my most cherished friends, who unfortunately I don't get to see as often as I would like. At first I was slightly offended and I was just going to ignore it, but after some consideration, it occurred to me that I was being asked by many to explain my seemingly bizarre behavior of late and he was just the one who had the stones to ask the question. So here it is, my explanation, to the best of my abilities. There are some details that will intentionally be omitted, but which I will be glad to talk about with any of you over a coffee, just call me.
No, I'm not going to be ringing anyone's doorbell in a white shirt and tie and trying to stuff a magazine in your hands.
A couple of months ago I was given a gift of incomprehensible proportions, which has come at a cost that many would not dream of attempting to pay. It's through this saga that I have come to understand/remember a great deal about the inner workings of spirituality (not religion) and relationships. Spirituality is merely your relationship with yourself, your environment, and others. It's understanding the flow of energy and its effect on everything, that's all. The term has taken on negative connotations but it is really a benign, albeit colossal, concept. It is a study that most people come to in times of strife, this will be my second, and final, time down this path because it is a discipline that will never be mastered.
The first time I began to search for answers was when mom died back in 2001. I was a total disaster and I was completely directionless, with a pile of money and no resources. I spent 2 years blowing an inordinate amount of money trying to find peace for my tortured soul. Why, why was the foundation ripped out from under me? Why was this person who had poured so much light into me taken from me so soon, what am I supposed to do from here? The answers came from the most unlikely place, a cd set that an acquaintance chose to share with me. "The Power of Kabbalah"??!! What the hell is this, it sounds like a cult. I put my reservations aside and listened to it with an open heart and the tumblers inside my soul clicked into place, opening a door to understanding.
Many of the basic concepts that are discussed, we already understand through common sense. Much of the material covered appears across the boards in many different religions, but it is just referred to in different terms, with different vocabulary. I'm not going to get into the basics, i'd love to tell you, so ask me. This isn't what this post is about though.
The resulting studies gave me the tools to come to grips with my loss and they laid dormant within me until they were needed again. Fast forward to May. In May, yet again, I felt like I had something torn away from me, something that ultimately is more valuable than almost anything I could conceive of. I was rocked to my core and something inside me told me to ask for help, so I fell back on my tools and realized what I needed to do. I sat my dad and a co-worker down and explained to them about light, and chaos, about energy flow and the power of intent. Though they didn't entirely believe everything, I asked for one thing, that no matter what, no matter what they saw me go through and no matter how much it made them nervous, that I needed them to believe in me. That I needed their positive energy in order to pull off what they felt was impossible. Predictably, the "but I love you and I don't want to see you hurt" came next. I explained that no amount of persuasion was going to dissuade me from doing what I knew was necessary and that their love would have to come in the form of unconditional support. And for the first time in my adult life my father begrudgingly agreed and began to understand that I'm not crazy and that there is much more than meets the eye. This moment was a vital turning point in my life.
What many people haven't been taught yet is that thoughts become physical manifestations and whether or not he knew it, my father was helping me by aligning his thoughts with mine and reinforcing them with positive energy. How could I ask for anything more from him? This actually opened up a blockage that has severely hampered my life for a while. My father did a selfless, incredible thing for me that required his blind trust in something that he doesn't even understand. Since then our relationship has improved dramatically. I love my dad, he isn't perfect by any means, but he has finally shown that he believes in me, which is all I have ever wanted.
From there, everything else has been a blur. The next month I really delved into completely remodeling my house in order to keep myself so busy that my overwhelmed mind couldn't focus on the difficulties that I was enduring and trying so hard to hide from everyone. Throughout that process I began to listen to the very same audiobook that redeemed me the first time and things began to make sense to me again, that I was the cause of my own difficulties and that my consciousness was desperately in need of an adjustment. So that's what I have been doing. Many of the negative thoughts and patterns that we find ourselves in are of our own manufacture and therefore are under our control to change, we just make it a priority and change it. See, part of what happened to me involves the fact that my emotional state can be felt by another and if I am a wreck or angry, she can feel it. None of us ever want to hurt the one we love, so I had the perfect motivation to make the changes I needed to make.
We all make choices with regards to the words we choose when we interact with others. "How are you?", "Same shit, different day". would be a perfect example. The person who cared to ask, now feels awful because of something you said, and you feel no better either. Even if you are faking it, start saying something positive instead... thoughts become things. I have been making changes like this and reading alot and have realized that my true enemy is my own ego. That the way I have seen myself for most of my life has been a fallacy, that I really do love people and that I enjoy talking to complete strangers and that I love to smile! The best part about this is that as I interact more with others, their joy and energy affect me in a positive way. I am actually happy now.
When I made the choice to change the way that I view my world, everything changed. I'm not sure exactly how things have progressed since then, but I can tell you that I take every opportunity I can to keep my ego in check, to watch my speech and that of others around me and to improve the overall energy of my surroundings. If you see me posting a lot of "fortune cookie mumbo jumbo", it's because those things are often what I am feeling and I hope that reposting some of them will potentially help someone I care about. I can tell you that when someone reposts something that really touched them, it always makes me smile.
So, in a nutshell, I have made a conscious choice to change the way that I affect the world and the effects that I will let it have on me. I love you all and I will no longer hide my true feelings of love and compassion. Some of you may not understand the changes that have been made and some of you may want to make similar changes in your own lives. To both groups, I like my tea with milk and a little bit of sugar and nothing would bring me more joy than to meet up with you and talk about it. Life is a beautiful gift and it's a matter of choice to live every day to the fullest.
"There are two ways to live your life: One is as though nothing is a miracle,
The other is as though everything is a miracle"
Albert Einstein
Namaste
No, I'm not going to be ringing anyone's doorbell in a white shirt and tie and trying to stuff a magazine in your hands.
A couple of months ago I was given a gift of incomprehensible proportions, which has come at a cost that many would not dream of attempting to pay. It's through this saga that I have come to understand/remember a great deal about the inner workings of spirituality (not religion) and relationships. Spirituality is merely your relationship with yourself, your environment, and others. It's understanding the flow of energy and its effect on everything, that's all. The term has taken on negative connotations but it is really a benign, albeit colossal, concept. It is a study that most people come to in times of strife, this will be my second, and final, time down this path because it is a discipline that will never be mastered.
The first time I began to search for answers was when mom died back in 2001. I was a total disaster and I was completely directionless, with a pile of money and no resources. I spent 2 years blowing an inordinate amount of money trying to find peace for my tortured soul. Why, why was the foundation ripped out from under me? Why was this person who had poured so much light into me taken from me so soon, what am I supposed to do from here? The answers came from the most unlikely place, a cd set that an acquaintance chose to share with me. "The Power of Kabbalah"??!! What the hell is this, it sounds like a cult. I put my reservations aside and listened to it with an open heart and the tumblers inside my soul clicked into place, opening a door to understanding.
Many of the basic concepts that are discussed, we already understand through common sense. Much of the material covered appears across the boards in many different religions, but it is just referred to in different terms, with different vocabulary. I'm not going to get into the basics, i'd love to tell you, so ask me. This isn't what this post is about though.
The resulting studies gave me the tools to come to grips with my loss and they laid dormant within me until they were needed again. Fast forward to May. In May, yet again, I felt like I had something torn away from me, something that ultimately is more valuable than almost anything I could conceive of. I was rocked to my core and something inside me told me to ask for help, so I fell back on my tools and realized what I needed to do. I sat my dad and a co-worker down and explained to them about light, and chaos, about energy flow and the power of intent. Though they didn't entirely believe everything, I asked for one thing, that no matter what, no matter what they saw me go through and no matter how much it made them nervous, that I needed them to believe in me. That I needed their positive energy in order to pull off what they felt was impossible. Predictably, the "but I love you and I don't want to see you hurt" came next. I explained that no amount of persuasion was going to dissuade me from doing what I knew was necessary and that their love would have to come in the form of unconditional support. And for the first time in my adult life my father begrudgingly agreed and began to understand that I'm not crazy and that there is much more than meets the eye. This moment was a vital turning point in my life.
What many people haven't been taught yet is that thoughts become physical manifestations and whether or not he knew it, my father was helping me by aligning his thoughts with mine and reinforcing them with positive energy. How could I ask for anything more from him? This actually opened up a blockage that has severely hampered my life for a while. My father did a selfless, incredible thing for me that required his blind trust in something that he doesn't even understand. Since then our relationship has improved dramatically. I love my dad, he isn't perfect by any means, but he has finally shown that he believes in me, which is all I have ever wanted.
From there, everything else has been a blur. The next month I really delved into completely remodeling my house in order to keep myself so busy that my overwhelmed mind couldn't focus on the difficulties that I was enduring and trying so hard to hide from everyone. Throughout that process I began to listen to the very same audiobook that redeemed me the first time and things began to make sense to me again, that I was the cause of my own difficulties and that my consciousness was desperately in need of an adjustment. So that's what I have been doing. Many of the negative thoughts and patterns that we find ourselves in are of our own manufacture and therefore are under our control to change, we just make it a priority and change it. See, part of what happened to me involves the fact that my emotional state can be felt by another and if I am a wreck or angry, she can feel it. None of us ever want to hurt the one we love, so I had the perfect motivation to make the changes I needed to make.
We all make choices with regards to the words we choose when we interact with others. "How are you?", "Same shit, different day". would be a perfect example. The person who cared to ask, now feels awful because of something you said, and you feel no better either. Even if you are faking it, start saying something positive instead... thoughts become things. I have been making changes like this and reading alot and have realized that my true enemy is my own ego. That the way I have seen myself for most of my life has been a fallacy, that I really do love people and that I enjoy talking to complete strangers and that I love to smile! The best part about this is that as I interact more with others, their joy and energy affect me in a positive way. I am actually happy now.
When I made the choice to change the way that I view my world, everything changed. I'm not sure exactly how things have progressed since then, but I can tell you that I take every opportunity I can to keep my ego in check, to watch my speech and that of others around me and to improve the overall energy of my surroundings. If you see me posting a lot of "fortune cookie mumbo jumbo", it's because those things are often what I am feeling and I hope that reposting some of them will potentially help someone I care about. I can tell you that when someone reposts something that really touched them, it always makes me smile.
So, in a nutshell, I have made a conscious choice to change the way that I affect the world and the effects that I will let it have on me. I love you all and I will no longer hide my true feelings of love and compassion. Some of you may not understand the changes that have been made and some of you may want to make similar changes in your own lives. To both groups, I like my tea with milk and a little bit of sugar and nothing would bring me more joy than to meet up with you and talk about it. Life is a beautiful gift and it's a matter of choice to live every day to the fullest.
"There are two ways to live your life: One is as though nothing is a miracle,
The other is as though everything is a miracle"
Albert Einstein
Namaste
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