Hiding Behind Food

I used to hide. I used to not want to be seen. I used to dim my light and silence myself.

Can you relate?

I was so afraid of being judged by others. Of being laughed at, ridiculed, and dismissed.

I was terrified to speak up, express my opinion, share my thoughts and ideas.

Showing my truth felt way too vulnerable. It felt way too unsafe.

So I ate instead…..

I turned to food to escape the pain of feeling so trapped inside my own self.

I ate to protect myself from the fear of being judged, of being rejected, of being shamed.

I overate to avoid facing the vulnerability I felt around others. And I felt so much shame about what I was doing that I just wanted to hide even more.

The more I ate the more shame I felt. And the more shame I felt the more I wanted to eat to escape it.

Emotional eating is a painful cycle.

As much as we want to stop doing it, as much as we tell ourselves that today we will remain in control, that we won’t overeat, we won’t binge, that we’ll follow our diet & we’ll resist our cravings and temptations, we always seem to end up in the same place….

Stuffing all the shame, pain, and vulnerability down with food.

I thought I just needed more willpower, more discipline, a stricter diet program.

What I learned though was that none of these things were the problem.

No amount of willpower or discipline could stop my overeating cycle and no diet could control my urges to turn to food instead of feel.

They actually only perpetuated the problem.

The more I tried to resist and fight my urges to overeat, the stronger they became.

In order to stop the cycle, I had to look much deeper than the food I felt so obsessed with.

I had to start addressing the cause of my overeating instead of just trying to manage its symptoms with willpower and diets.

I had to go deeper than the food, deeper than my cravings, deeper than changing what, how, or when I ate. Deeper than just replacing my overeating with self-care activities like bubble baths, massages, and pedicures as some of the “experts” suggested.

I had to actually learn how to open up, to allow, to feel.

To be with shame, pain, and vulnerability instead of stuffing them down with food

I had to uncover my unconscious thought programs, belief systems, and social conditioning behind it all.

I had to learn how to trust myself again, respect myself again, and love myself again.

I had to stop hiding from others.

I had to stop hiding from myself.