Why are you eating????

  People overeat and stuff themselves in order to feel good.  It's the pleasure factor that we are all after when we eat.  When we stuff ourselves or give ourselves sweets, we actually are feeding the hormones in our body that give us pleasure sensations and those are the same sensations we get when we feel loved.  We are as addicted to that sensation whenever we choose to overeat, get drunk or take drugs.  All of them give us pleasure and all of us are seeking it.  People just don't understand that food is an addiction just like alcohol and drugs. 

  I personally realized that I was stuffing myself because I never had the love of my parents.  My mother abandoned me because she chose to be an alcoholic and my father chose to love his second wife more than me and I ended up living with friends and other relatives all of my life.  My father died when I was 15 and my mother died when I was 20.  I harbored anger and bitterness towards them all of my life and chose to 'fill that void' with food because it made me feel good like being loved feels good.  When I realized that fact, it helped me deal with the whole overeating issue itself.  When I chose to forgive my parents and love them despite their failures, the desire to overeat went away.  Granted, the surgery happened before I did that and the weight came off but I've managed to overcome the 'food is my life' issue because I chose to forgive.   See, when you think about it, the people who have surgery are forced to first drink liquids the first week.  Then they graduate to more solid liquids the second week.  Then they graduate to soft foods after that and eventually get to regular food but in small increments from then on.  If you stop and think about it, if a person would eat like that without surgery they would lose just as much weight as if they didn't have the surgery in the first place.   People regain their weight because they never dealt with the issue of why they overate in the first place.  They thought that the surgery would cure the whole fat issue and it doesn't.  They learn how to graze all day or stretch their pouch back out and then wonder why they've regained most or all of their weight.    A person's weight issue will never be solved with surgery.  It can only be cured by finding out why you are overeating and deal with that first and then learn to LISTEN to your body and only eating WHAT and WHEN it wants to eat.  People think that 'mouth hunger' is real hunger but it isn't.  Overweight people usually don't know what it's like to feel a hunger pain because they don't get to that point.  Food is their life.  They live to eat instead of eating to live.  No one really realizes how little food the body needs for fuel each day.    If you ask me if I would have had the surgery again, I would tell you no.  Most WLSers aren't that way.  I would have chosen to cure myself mentally first and then listened to my body and learned what it really wanted and when it wanted it instead of just throwing food down it when I saw a commercial or smelled food cooking.    I don't know what decision is best for you but I do know that you must love yourself enough to cure the inside before you cure the outside, however you choose to do that is up to you.  

Hi MacRobin! 

I have to say I totally agree with your post. I am overeating too. I sat on my analysts couch yesterday and said I'm wondering WHAT this bite of food is representing. The hugs I felt I didn't get, or the pat on the back, or ...fill in the blanks. I tried to lose weight on my own before surgery and due to meds and lack of REAL interest I gained 30 pounds. Had the surgery, lost 80, play with 10 pounds for the past few years now and continue to struggle. Like you, IF I'd figured out my relationship to food pre-op, I doubt I'd have gone through  with it.  That being said, I now struggle with my diabetes, food addiction, my guilt from my FORMER obsession with exercise...(now I could care less), and when I think back...not much has changed.  :)  I had those struggles before surgery.  Life is a journey...ours just happens to include WLS.

I still have to work on self-acceptance and love of self. Not as simple as it sounds, but I'm finally feeling worthy of the work. :) THAT only took 51 years. 

Marie

I can related a 100% to what you have said. I am currently reading Love Hunger, a book about why we eat what we eat, and how to solve the food addiction that is killing up. That WLS is not forever if you do not address the emotional issues.

The author etc is in my last blog on my profile, if you want to get you a copy. It is a fantastic read.

I love what you did with, I wonder what this bite of food represents ....................blank. How true.

Jenny

I totally agree too.  But there are many of us that don't realize until after surgery that eating is a coping strategy.  That is me.  I wish I knew how much I ate due to unhappiness.  I always though I was unhappy because I was big.  No I was big because I ate because I was unhappy and never learned to handle it in a heather manner.  My DH doesn't get that this addiction not like smoking, or drinking.  We need food to live.  It toke over two years to admit it but when it comes to food I have no self control.  So I really need to stay way from all trigger foods.  And problems.  The surgery was the easy part.  The hard part is learning the new skills needed to stay healthy.  When I was in until weight loss mode. I was never hungry.  So even though I ate, I didn't work on the skill to sustained me for life.  So now I am 3 yr out hunger is back.  And emotional hunger back with revenge.  I have no life skills.  Looking back, I should of focused on healthy habits.  Ways to control my feelings.  Because now I can eat more.  There is no new habits just the old ones.  And I am more aware of them.  More sad because I have been where I always saw myself and now I am almost back to where I started.  To be truthful I feel hep-less.  I know it my responsibility.    UGH!

 Thanks for sharing your experience. The things you said are good and facts. The food consumed by overweight people will be reduce if this awareness come to their mind.Globally many nations have food problems, under nutrition.Over weight persons don't feel any problem as they have the addiction to sensation and ... as you said. If they have problem with over weight , pharmaceutical companies  made products for them like weight loss pills, oils, tea.Right pill is safe to use.Pills like stratzol burns fat in natural way.Some herbal tea are also useful.