Control

Using food as a coping mechanism is the easy way out.  Yea, yea, I know- who am I to say that?  Someone who has a history of being guilty of doing it.  I am learning other ways to cope with anger, fear, stress, rejection, disapproval, other people's crap, etc.  Historically speaking if I was dreading doing something in my personal life for instance, well maybe I should have a snack first.  Oh, I don't want to confront someone for having offended or upset me, well let's have a snack.  Using food is easy.  In the the moment. 

I do a lot of walking away now.  Or not saying anything.  Or clamping down hard on my jaw, so I don't say something until I have the time to think.  I used to work with young people as part of a youth work program that place at risk teens in the organization I was with.  I would encourage them to take the following as a mantra, a way of life:

"You cannot control what comes at you in life, only how you choose to respond to it"

I lived by that for a long time, and then I stopped and started using food to deal with life again.  How I respond is the core of my character and I am allowed to disagree, I am allowed to say you have hurt me, I am allowed to let you know I am unhappy, I am allowed to let you know I am angry, I am allowed to let you know that I think you are unethical...I am allowed to tell you what I feel and how what you are doing is affecting me.  I just have to do it repectfully and without emotion so that I am in control.

Like the young people I worked with, I am force to be reckoned with, I am intelligent, I am no better than you and I am no less than you.  I am your equal.  And I can be anybody in your life.  Your mother, your aunt, your sister, your best friend, you.  Each and every one of us who use food to deal with life must take back our control and choose how we respond to what we cannot control, because our response is all we can control.

Still at 25.5lbs down- no gain, no loss- Sunday will bring better things!  Have a healthy, happy, and safe day.