Re: Negative Experiences this Weekend

November 9, 2009

Hi :

Cyber (((Hugs))) to you.

I think it sounds like you're making great progress! I bet you felt a whole lot

better after a good cry, right?

There will always be situations and people in our lives that remind us of

something uncomfortable. The moment you " gave in " and wept was sort of a

" surrender " I think. That's where real progress comes from. When you wept, you

gave up control and in doing so allowed yourself to become " naked " and

vulnerable. It is a scary feeling but also freeing and eventually very

peaceful.

Does that make any sense?

You dont really have to focus on trying to understand the situation so much.

Situations come and go like our emotions. But they have nothing to do with YOU.

By YOU I mean your inner self. The part of you that knows intuitively when

you're hungry. This is where your true strength comes from.

So, in my opinion, you had a tremendous breakthrough!

Love Deb

>

> All last week I was feeling really postive about myself and my relationship

with food. I felt like I was making some serious progress with IE and felt

really great. Then this weekend I went out of town to visit some friends from

college. It was like a switch was turned. All of a sudden I started feeling

really bad about the food I ate, compared what and how much I ate to those I was

with, and just felt incredibly anxious and stressed. I felt like I was ruining

all of my progress. I was very irritable and kept taking things out on my

boyfriend. When I got home, I kept looking at my stomach in the mirror and

thinking about how much fatter it looked. I was so upset I just sat on my floor

and cried. I feel a lot better today, but I'm just trying to figure out what

happened this weekend. It's so frustrating bc I was doing so well and feeling

really strong, and then all of a sudden I felt completely out of control. I know

when I was dieting, going out of town always caused huge amounts of anxiety in

me bc I was afraid I wouldn't be able to stick with my diet. I guess I'm just

still really afraid of gaining weight. I guess that's an issue I need to

continue working on (acceptance). I'm just trying to figure out what happened

this weekend. If anybody has any input, suggestions, or experience with this

please let me know! I want to learn as much as I can from this experience and

use it to make me stronger otherwise it'll probably continually get worse each

time I go out of town. Thank you!

>

November 11, 2009

Thank you for the response Deb! I feel much better now. I'm just a person, and

normal people sometimes eat differently than they normally do, especially when

out of town, drinking and hanging out with old friends. No need to beat myself

up or feel bad about it. It is what it is, and I'm still the same person. I

guess the main thing I had a problem with was the anxiety I felt about eating.

Feeling so anxious about what/when to eat and worrying about whether I'd gain

weight definitely impacted what and how much I ate. It is good to see that

connection and how the anxiety and worry didn't do me any good. It actually JUST

struck me now that the anxiety and worry about what/when I was going to eat and

what I had already ate made the situation more difficult to deal with. Making

that connection makes me feel much stronger. I feel great right now. It's crazy

how a previously " negative " experience just turned into a very positive one.

Only with IE!!

> >

> > All last week I was feeling really postive about myself and my relationship