I am doing well. Awesome, actually. I’m on a great path. I’m strong, I’m focused, and I’ve achieved great success. I feel amazing. To reward myself, I will eat whatever I want. I’ve earned it. I will eat beyond when I’m full. I will eat until I feel sick. And for a moment, it will feel good. Being overfull will be satisfying, comfortable, familiar. Then things will take a turn, and I will feel bad. I will feel guilty. I will feel worse, like a failure, and I will be disappointed. This is not a celebration.

Food is everywhere and it is meant for everything. At the very least, it is fuel for our bodies. This is true, but rarely do our feelings of food stop there. No, food is much more than that. Food is comfort. Food is love. Food is celebration. Food is home.

We bring food to comfort our loved ones through a hard time. We provide food to show appreciation. We have food to celebrate a big occasion. We use food to welcome our family home, to show our love, to share a piece of ourselves. Food is part of our memory base. We get nostalgic for home-cooked meals, or we describe an event by talking about how good the food was. In fact, most often, food is where we start when planning an occasion.

So, what happens when food turns on us? What happens when it’s no longer a celebration, but a downfall? When it no longer is exciting and feels good, but instead makes you feel out of control, shameful, and disgusting? How do we turn food back from foe to friend?

I’m someone who considers herself to have a food addiction. I’ve never had a doctor write that in my chart, but they don’t have to. My relationship with food is stronger than most of the relationships in my life, for better or for worse. I’ve had times when food has been my biggest enemy and times when food has been my most loyal friend. It has gotten me through my hardest times, and has also created some harder ones. To me, it isn’t a question of whether or not I’m hungry; it’s a question of whether or not something is missing from my life. And if so, my go-to experiment is to see if food can fix it.

With this confession, it should be no surprise that the decision to change my life, although the best decision I’ve made, has also been a hard one. It was me breaking up with the longest standing partner I had. It was me letting go the relationship to which I had been most loyal. And there are days I miss it.

I wouldn’t go back permanently, but there are times when I let myself visit “the ex.” I flirt with food that’s slightly off plan, look forward to the date I have set where there will be no restrictions, and allow myself to enjoy every second of it. I never feel guilty about these moments because they are allowed. After all, food is part of everything. We aren’t required to give up on its excitement just because we are choosing to be healthy. We are just required to stay in control of it, to practice moderation. So, I have no regrets after controlled decisions to enjoy the food celebration.

It’s the other moments I regret. The moments where food sneaks up on me, takes control, taunts me, and I allow myself to ignore my long-term goals for the sake of immediate, delicious satisfaction. The problem is the satisfaction is never as sweet as I think it will be, nor as long lasting. It’s painful and leaves destruction in its wake.

It’s after one of these moments that I find myself reflective. Yes, food is good, can be beautiful, and is a very big part of our culture, even in positive ways. It can, and perhaps should, be used to celebrate moments in life. But, we can’t let its power become confused. We can’t allow ourselves to assume that the more food we have, the better, as if we are soaking up more and more of the beauty of the moment. We can’t allow food to overshadow the actual celebration. Because make no mistake about it, feeling overfull, shameful, embarrassed, and sick is not a party. Feelings of being out of control and self-destructive are nothing to celebrate.

Tonight I remind myself that I have worked too hard for too long to get out of my one-sided, abusive, unhealthy relationship with food, and I will not simply run back to it because life throws a few obstacles my way that make me crave its familiar comfort. I will leave behind the notion that food is my companion- the one thing that always seems to be there- and I will instead remind myself that I am worth companions who can listen, speak, lend me a helping hand, express love and appreciation, and feel things I feel. I will continue forward on this path that will undoubtedly lead me to a place where food is once again part of the party, but the real celebration is the brilliant life I’ve created with loyal friends and loving family, unconditional love, and healthy, addictive, belly-aching laughter. Cheers to all the things that truly do make this a wonderful life!

For the longest time, I let what I could and couldn’t do define who I was. I was someone who didn’t like to shop, preferred to watch things on T.V. instead of going to a sports game or movie, didn’t like concerts or amusement parks, wasn’t a fan of swimming or the beach, would rather hang out at home in comfortable clothes instead of getting dolled up and hitting the town, and was afraid to fly. I often hesitated to commit to certain plans with friends or family, claiming to have a conflict, and even took control of plans to calm any anxiety I had about where we were going or what we were doing. My identity became very small, very limited. I still had a lot of friends and a lot of opportunity to participate in a variety of events, but, to me, the realistic choices were few and far between.

Although I may have not realized it at the time, nothing I was saying or claiming to be was true. The truth was: everything about me- my identity- was controlled by what I perceived to be something I could do (hang out at home in sweats with friends) or the millions of things I couldn’t (fit into certain chairs or tables, wear a swimsuit, find a cute outfit that fit, or fit into the seat on an airplane). After a while, it became easier to do nothing than to try to do anything. And even though I probably knew the truth on some level, I played it off as just being a “laid-back person who prefers the easy and casual to the superficial nightlife and overemphasis on appearances.”

On a conscious level, I didn’t really know this was happening. Or, maybe I did, but I forgot. I was never trying to be fake. To the contrary, I considered myself to be a real and genuine person who cared to be honest and of good character. I guess the reality was I had a secret, I had a problem, and I didn’t know how to fix it so I did what I could to cover it up. And I highly doubt I was alone.

In this world, there are real and natural limits that prevent overweight people from participating in a lot of things. Those at a healthy weight probably never think about these things, and likely take for granted the fact that they don’t have to. For the rest of us, we are painfully aware of weight limits, how wide a chair is, whether we are going to be able to get an arm rest down on a plane or in a movie theater, if the seatbelt will fit, whether there’s enough room in the booth at a restaurant, or if the clothing store even carries the sizes that we need. We live in fear of humiliation and often protect ourselves by passing on an event entirely. After all, I can deal with the sadness of missing out on a vacation or not going to an amusement park with friends. I’m not sure, however, how I would handle the public shame if the flight attendant thought I needed to buy a second seat or the ride conductor at six flags needed me to get off the ride because he couldn’t get the safety bar down. After a while, these fears multiply, and pretty soon we’ve convinced ourselves there’s more we cannot do than things we can.

The driving force behind my personal success this year has been the desire to get to know myself separate from my weight. I no longer wanted my identity to be defined by the limitations my weight problem placed on my life. I wanted to really get to know myself, not just what I could and couldn’t do. This, of course, requires some work. On the one hand, there are certain things I can’t change. I can’t make designers carry bigger sizes, and I’m fairly confident the major airlines care more about making as much money as possible than they do about making customers a little more comfortable with wider seats. So, whether I like it or not, I have to get myself to a healthy weight to rid myself of these natural limitations. On the other hand, I have to stop waiting to live life. There’s nothing that says you can only have fun, feel good, be sexy, happy, have confidence, be adventurous, be desirable, spontaneous, and love yourself if you have fall within a normal body mass index. I let myself feel that way for a long time, but it’s not true, so I have to shake it. I have to get out of my comfort zone now, try new things, put myself out there, and start to learn what I actually like and dislike regardless of how much I weigh.

What I’m learning now is getting to know myself is spectacular. It is probably the most fun thing I’ve done with my life thus far. Turns out, I like shopping, I like wearing new clothes, and getting to feel a little fancy. I also still like nights at home in sweatpants, but now it feels like a choice instead of my only option. I’ve learned that I like going to sporting events every now and then, but will likely choose to watch it on T.V. most of the time because it’s a lot warmer and less expensive. I’ve learned that amusement parks aren’t really my thing because once you fit in the ride, it throws you around in the air with nothing but a tiny safety bar preventing you from plummeting to your death, and let’s be honest- how often are those rides really inspected? I’ve learned that some restaurants have really tiny booths (they must share notes with the airlines) and it’s okay if I’d prefer a table instead. And finally, I’ve learned that I’m not really too afraid to fly.

I’m not saying it’s easy, and I detest the judgmental, blaming comments of those who couldn’t possibly understand. But, I am saying that we have the control to decide we don’t want to miss out on life anymore. We can decide we are worth everything we want, even if our wants are as simple as riding a rollercoaster or finally getting to splurge on a new outfit. Life is absolutely worth living, even at 300 pounds. In fact, I live it brilliantly just as I am.

I just can’t tell anyone. I won’t. It’s embarrassing. It’s annoying. It’s too personal. They would look at me differently. They wouldn’t understand. They will judge me, and then I’ll be too exposed. This is my secret, and nobody else needs to know. I’m fine. I can take care of myself.

How often do you find yourself thinking about something you’re struggling with in life? How often is something bothering you? How often do you stay in that place- that hole of mental anguish- alone? Or, maybe you do reach out to someone and attempt to talk about it, but there’s always something you’re not saying. Perhaps you’re talking about someone else’s actions and how those actions made you feel, but you’re silent as to why someone’s actions made you feel that way. How often is the truth of most feelings the fact that you’re lonely, you feel like nobody really understands you, and you don’t know how to change any of it?

Hopeless- 1. a : having no expectation of good or success : despairing. b : not susceptible to remedy or cure. c : incapable of redemption or improvement. And hopelessness? To me it’s a suffocating sense of being; it’s a psychological realm that causes physical pain and mental conflict. It defines itself. It’s hopeless.

I haven’t figured out what it is, but somewhere along the way we learn to keep our deepest and most vulnerable feelings a secret. Perhaps it’s the old lesson of not airing your dirty laundry. Perhaps it’s the art of being respectful and having manners, never wanting to be inappropriate by bringing down the conversation with talk of personal struggles. Maybe it’s an act of self-preservation. To talk about your struggle is to admit a weakness, and we would rather be strong, superficial, and misunderstood than risk vulnerability, pity, and exposure. Regardless of its origin, this lesson is one we hold dear, a habit that is hard to break, yet one that should be destroyed as soon as possible.

I have always known how to talk about feelings. I often counsel friends and loved ones through their break-ups, help people get back on their feet during a hard time, listen, understand, and have always felt comfortable with whatever mess people need to turn into. I don’t judge. I am the ultimate glue and pride myself on being someone who can hold others together. As a writer, I even analyze feelings. I give them words, explore them, and then turn them into poetry in an attempt to understand them. I’ve done this for years. Recently, however, I’ve realized that I was never talking about my own feelings.

I could talk about my day forever. I could talk about the endless situations that I was in and how those situations made me feel. I would dwell on one particular problem, often involving a struggling relationship, and put my listeners through a daily replay of my inner monologue. Why would he say that? Why wouldn’t she care? How can they be so selfish? What is so wrong with me that I keep ending up in these situations? I would analyze and then reanalyze until I thought I had figured out how to move on, and then a few minutes later I would start over again. It was never satisfying. It never felt healthy or productive. And as much as I thought I was being open, I realize now that all the banter was my way of talking about what I was comfortable with so I didn’t have to address the rest of it, the truth.

The truth was I was lonely. I didn’t feel like anybody really understood me, or even cared to try to. Even deeper, I didn’t feel worth anybody’s real time to try to understand me, because I had no idea what there was to understand. I’ve talked about this before. To feel loved, understood, and accepted by other people, you have to start with yourself. You have to love yourself, understand yourself, and accept yourself. You have to KNOW that you are worth everything you want. The best part is, once you get there you no longer need other people to love, understand, or accept you. You are no longer looking for that satisfaction. Don’t get me wrong, though, they will absolutely fall in love, because self-love = happiness, and people are drawn to happiness.

The point here, though, is not another lesson on how to fix your loneliness. Instead, my intention is to discuss our pattern of keeping it a secret. When I was in that place, I didn’t talk about it because I assumed nobody else would understand. I assumed nobody else felt it, and as soon as I opened my mouth I would be ruining my image forever. I had this fear of people hearing everything I had to say and then just looking at me puzzled before responding “hmmm…I’ve never felt that.” And then what? I try to laugh it off? I try to act like it’s no big deal and we can just pretend I never said anything? No. At that point, I would be the puddle of a person running down the gutter that everybody else would jump over to avoid ruining their shoes. Right?

I still don’t know how common this feeling might be. Even writing this now, there’s that old voice in my head that is screaming “WE CAN’T TELL PEOPLE THIS!!!” But, “we” have to. In my opinion, the biggest problem with this feeling is that it leaves people with the impression that not only are they alone in their struggle, but they are also weird. They aren’t normal like the rest of functional and happy society. It’s just another thing that ostracizes them. The loneliness facilitates the feeling, and then the feeling perpetuates the loneliness. It’s a vicious cycle.

How do we break it? How do we escape? We rip it open, pour it out, speak up, and create the expectation for ourselves that we will no longer struggle alone.

Here’s what I’ve learned: I’m not alone. One of my mentors- a woman I respect dearly- once stood before a class of individuals who were trying to change their lives and said “stop thinking you’re special…right now… because you’re not.” She was right. You are not so special that you’re the only one to ever struggle with whatever problem you’re struggling with, and as soon as you actually start talking about your struggle, you’re going to learn just how common you are. You’re going to learn that you’re not alone. You’re going to learn that people have been studying your problem for years and have theories on what caused it and how to fix it, people have gone through your problem and have gotten themselves out of it, people are in your problem right now and still surviving, and some people are worse off than you are. The best part: you’re going to learn that you’re normal.

In my life, I have a new rule that I don’t struggle alone. No matter what problem I’m feeling, whether it’s an emotional breakdown or simply not wanting to go to the gym, I talk about it. It no longer lives deep within me, eating away at my well-being, and gaining power as a preciously protected secret. It’s immediately exposed in a 5-minute phone call or a simple text message, or a blog post, or a status update, and stripped of whatever control it may otherwise have had over my life. To my surprise, this simple rule has greatly reduced the struggles I carry on a daily basis to nearly zero. I’m not saying it’s eliminated all of life’s problems, but it has silenced the inner monologue and allowed my energy to be spent on healthier, happier, and more productive things. I now have super friends who literally know all my secrets. So, instead of spending my time trying not to give away any clues of loneliness or insecurity, I spend my time laughing, having fun, getting to know people, letting them get to know me, building relationships free of conflict, exploring, trying new things, and simply feeling good.

I highly doubt that I’ve stumbled upon the cure to all of life’s unhappiness- after all, I’m probably not that special. But, I have absolutely discovered the cure to my own unhappiness and I think that makes me a superhero. I encourage you all to discover your superpower and then use it to slowly change the world, even if it’s only your own.