2011

It has been over a year since I posted on this blog.

I am 50 pounds heavier than when I last posted.

But I am not discouraged.

In 2010, I focused a lot on my weight. I blogged about it. I talked about it. I dreamed about it.

I loved watching the numbers drop on the scale. I loved that my measuring tape got smaller each week.

What I didn't love was the junk: the gross, emotional baggage that opened up and spilled my personal effects all over the kitchen floor.

I had determined that 2010 would be a year when my "weight issues" would be dealt with. It turns out my weight issues had very little to do with my actual weight.

Did I achieve my goal weight? No.

Did I keep off what little weight I lost? No.

Did I gain back all of that weight plus some? Yes.

Did I learn a whole lot in the meantime? Absolutely.

At the end of 2010, I realized something: I was completely incapable of living a life without "comfort foods."

I could diet with the best of 'em when life was easy and stress was low. But give me one bad day at work, one argument with my husband, one hurtful comment from a friend, and my only - did you hear that? MY. ONLY. - coping mechanism was food.

When the 2010 dieting took that food away from me, I was completely helpless against the waves of emotion and hurt that crashed against my psyche.

In that realization, I made a decision for the next year: 2011 would not be about my weight. In 2011, I would eat what I wanted to eat when I wanted to eat it, without concern for calories or fat content. In 2011, I would not wake up in the morning obsessing about what I could or couldn't eat for breakfast. In 2011, I would not go to bed hungry in the name of self restraint.

But... in 2011, I would not binge to fulfill emotional emptiness. In 2011, I would not stuff food down my throat in an attempt to swallow tears. In 2011, I would cry. In 2011, I would feel what I needed to feel and I would feel it without food to get in the way. In 2011, I would learn to turn to the Lord, to my friends, to my mom, to my husband, when life became overwhelming. In 2011, I would not numb myself to my failures and insecurities; I would embrace them and love them as a "small beginning" in my path towards wholeness.

In 2011, food would become neither the friend nor the enemy. Food would become... just food.

So I abandoned my blog. I stashed the measuring tape in the back of some drawer that I never opened. I bought some clothes that actually fit me (rather than one size too small). And I gave myself permission - for one year - to simply be. To exist. To be neither fat nor skinny. To define myself as neither "gaining weight" nor "losing weight." I was, and am, simply me.

2011 is quickly coming to an end, and I think I will forever look back on it as the year that changed everything. It could have been horrible. I gained 50 pounds. I got fired. I felt homesick. I strained under financial stress. I had days when getting out of bed felt difficult.

But... I have not binged since December of last year. At all. Not even a little. I have spent more time in the Word. I have "clung" to my husband when I couldn't stand on my own. I have cried, and I have prayed, and I have come out stronger on the other side.

I have learned that fulfillment can come from loving my children, from serving in my church, from cooking a healthy meal, from sipping coffee in the early morning hours. I don't need food for fulfillment.

From all appearances, 2011 should have been the worst year of my adult life. In all reality, it has changed my life in all the right ways.

And I can't wait to see what 2012 holds. More to come...