I eat...

Yeah, once again I have found myself get completely off of the track when it comes to my battle of the bulge, or weight loss efforts.

I know this started around May when a certain co-worker was basically going Bat-shit crazy with her projects' problems—which some of them still have yet to be resolved—and the incredibly insane level of stress she was putting on me at the time. It pushed me off my diet and exercise regiment, soured my mood, and made it very difficult for me to even want to go to work. And Tim Horton's Oreo doughnuts are not exactly helping me win the battle anymore.

Because I have completely fallen off of the wagon of steps I gave myself this year, I am once again contemplating why I do all of these things.

Back in my mid-20s I was following the Dr. Phil's Weight Loss Challenge on his show. Those were the only episodes I would record of his show, and I even bought the book. Basically, the point of the book is you have to unlock seven keys in order to have effective weight loss and health, and the first four are all psychological. Hell, even the decision to give myself a nickname to Mell came out because one of the contestants on the show realized he had a negative attachment to his name, changed it and suddenly everything changed for him (he even won the challenge in the end). But as I was so accustomed to do at that point (and even to some extent today, for that matter), I didn't complete the book. I put it on my bookshelf and it's been collecting dust.

When I realized that I was again having problems with food, it made me realize that my problems with food are psychological. I now have a renewed interest in working through the book again. I really have no excuse for not doing the work. I don't have a demanding social life—or a life at all, really. My work isn't so demanding that I have to work overtime or anything like that, so there is definitely time. There is no way I can tell myself "I don't have the time."

This has renewed my interest in the book again. I have decided to pick it up and work through the keys, one at a time, until I get it right. I have to care about my health and care about myself. All too often I tend to use my weight as excuses for not doing things. I want to be able to dress up in Cosplay as anyone I want, but my weight makes me seriously self-conscious. I mean, I have never really liked my body image or the way I look, but the weight definitely adds more social anxiety to my life than I even realize there is at times.

So, why do I eat? What makes me crave the bad junk food so much. If you will bear with me for the rest of this blog, I will try to figure it out.

I eat because I am lonely.

I eat because I feel depressed.

I eat because I don't know what else to do.

I eat for comfort.

I eat for the temporary joy it gives me, but inevitably feel worse after I eat it.

I eat because I can.

I eat because I am sad.

I eat because I have avoided all other pleasures in life.

I think the last one there struck something with me as I thought of it, so I will attempt to explore that one a little further.

There is this huge side of me (no pun intended) that feels that I have not lived a life, or the life that I was meant to. I don't feel joyful in what I do for a living. I don't feel happy with many of the choices I have made.

When I was nine years old, I made a huge promise to myself that I would never smoke, drink, or do any drugs that weren't medically necessary for me to do—and even saying that, I hate our heavy reliance on prescription medications. It is something that I am proud of that I kept that promise to myself. It was important to me for various reasons. With smoking, I noted at that young of an age that all of the adults I knew who smoked (which growing up in Alberta in the 1980s was pretty much every adult I knew) all said they were going to quit some day, so naturally my childhood logic was if everyone who smokes wants to quit, why start in the first place?

The choice to not drink came out of a few reasons. First, I was around a lot of drunk adults as well as a kid and really didn't like how they acted both under the influence, and even the dreaded day after with their hangovers. It just seemed so pointless to me. There was also a thread that weaved its way through my family at times of alcoholics that it made me just not want to go there as an option. I already realized I had a sweet tooth as a kid, Hell I even had problems with thumb-sucking until I was around nine, so I knew I already had an oral fixation, even if I didn't know what that term was. And anyways, by the time I turned 18, I was on a medication in which I was advised I should never combine it with alcohol, so it made the ability to say no much easier to do, as I definitely had a good reason not to. There was also this part of me that had a little fear of drunk guys, as I heard many news stories at the time about guys using "I was drunk" as an excuse to get away with raping women, so I thought the less I could be around them the safer I would be.

Which leads me to the next pleasure I have been without. This is a huge secret that I have not told many people, as for some reason I feel weird about it. I'm even thinking of not writing it here, but I must as I think this secret weighs too much on my mind. I am still a virgin.

So, there it is. I know some who know me may scratch their heads and wonder how that is possible, as I have been married, but I will go on the record as saying nothing ever happened between us. It takes a lot for me to learn to trust someone, and my ex-husband definitely proved many times he was untrustworthy. Our marriage was not a healthy one, and it was one of the biggest mistakes I've ever made. I thought I wanted to at times, but there is this part of me that is afraid of it. I don't exactly know why I am afraid of it, but I am.

Over the years, I have tried to understand why I am afraid of it. Some of the ideas I have thought of as possibilities include:

• I am afraid of losing control of either myself or allowing someone to control me.

• I have no idea how to relate to people on emotional levels.

• I have often wondered if I might be gay and just don't know it, even though I feel like I am more drawn to guys (particularly hot Superhero actors and so forth), but have honestly wondered about it. Then I realize I'm not comfortable around women either.

• I have thought about the possibility that I may even be transgendered and am just uncomfortable in my own skin.

• I am like Sheldon Cooper on the Big Bang Theory and am asexual.

• I am too fat and unattractive.

Making this list just gave me a "BING!" moment. I just realized why I struggle with weight and why I keep eating.

When I was much younger, as you may have already read on my website, I had numerous years being bullied or made fun of in school and was called ugly every single day of my life since I moved to Strathmore at around the same age of nine. It began to really affect me when puberty started hitting me, and indeed was made to feel like my body wasn't acceptable. Two of the particularly mean girls I knew even tried to point out that in grade five I didn't need a training bra, making me feel really self-conscious about my body and how I looked. I even stopped changing in front of other people and would go to the bathroom stalls or shower stalls to change into or out of my gym clothes. It is still something I find myself struggling with today, which makes me avoid gyms and other similar things. I am definitely not comfortable about my body.

But being called ugly kind of struck a nerve with me. As most girls (and maybe even boys?) going through puberty and the ever daunting junior high school days (or maybe middle school for those who had different school systems), it is already a self-conscious age, but being called ugly makes it even worse. I do think I gained the weight almost as if it was a way to say, "If you thought I was ugly then, wait until you see me now!" kind of way, because when I was younger I didn't think I really was ugly.

So the weight gain became my excuse to not enjoy my life. I'm too fat to do [insert activity here]...

And of course, there is this part of me that struggles with the gender identity issues, because, for the most part, I like "guy stuff". I like superheroes and science fiction movies. I wish I could be Superman instead of Supergirl. The feminist in me does rage every once in awhile when I see the unfairness of how women are treated around the world, though, but I don't know if it means I a woman or just a sensitive "male". Or maybe I'm both.

It confuses me a lot. I also don't know if I really should be ashamed of very quickly becoming a 40-year-old virgin. Is it something I should be proud of or ashamed of?

Anyways, I just thought I would put in a blog post today, as I haven't in awhile. I will definitely be working through the book now and make double-sure I will complete it this time around. If I find I am really struggling, I may seek counselling for all of that other stuff.

Mell