Balance

Balance

Something I have observed in myself and in a large number of my WLS friends is that there are those of us who have found that when we were heavier we needed to or we felt compelled to give significantly more of ourselves emotionally than we expected back from the important people in our lives.  Was being morbidly obese such an affront to the important people in my life that I felt had to provide some balance in those relationships by forgoing some of my own needs in order to be tolerated or accepted?  What a horrible question to have bouncing around in your head!

When the weight came off it is as if those relationship balances shifted abruptly and I could suddenly see that I had to have higher expectations of both myself and those important people in my life if I hoped to survive as a thinner person over the long term.  It seems to me that if a person’s needs aren’t being met because they are ashamed of voicing their true needs or they don’t feel worthy of having those needs met, that there is a tremendous temptation to compensate by overeating, overindulging with alcohol, or engaging in some other self-destructive behavior in order to distract or numb yourself.  I didn’t want to risk going down any of those paths, so I have been working, in fits and starts, toward changing some of the relationships in my life. Unfortunately, it is far easier to recognize that relationships need to change significantly than it is to actually work through the process of changing them.

The biggest problem is that relationship changes take a lot of time and emotional effort and you constantly wonder if whatever changes you succeed in making will be enough for your as yet unsatisfied heart.  I think I have figured out what most of my unfulfilled needs are (some of which I used to feel ashamed about) and I am trying to communicate those needs to others while hoping that they will treat me gently in response.  Seeking a more suitable balance between meeting someone else’s needs and having my own needs met has already improved some of my important relationships, but there is still a long way to go.  I can’t change other people, so I am trying to be patient while they figure out if they want to change how they interact with me.  Some days when my patience wears thin I think it would be easier to focus my efforts on becoming a hermit.  Nevertheless, I persist…..and hope for the best because I really am worth it.

RP