My story with food started about a decade ago.
My first memories of becoming keenly aware of my body trace back to my freshman year of college. Prior to this, I had never given food or my eating habits a second thought. I played three sports in high school, was always running from one practice to the next, and had an appetite that could have challenged that of a grown man’s. I played hard, but intuitively and consistently consumed the calories my body needed to sustain my rigorous level of activity.
My routines changed, however, once I left home. I was not pursuing a sport in college and, therefore, no longer had a built-in exercise regimen. My dietary habits were at the mercy of dining hall choices instead of my father’s home cooked meals, and I was blissfully unaware of how the two would impact my figure. Naturally, my new life consisting of decreased fitness demands and daily trips to the waffle bar caused me to gradually put on some weight. And suddenly, for the first time, I started to notice my body. I can vividly remember analyzing myself in the mirror- scrutinizing my half-naked reflection. I would grab at my tummy and evaluate how it looked fuller as I turned from side to side. My belly was getting softer, my clothing tighter and a panic I had never known before started to swell up inside of me. How could this happen? What would people think about me? What would they say when they saw me? I was embarrassed, ashamed and desperate for change.
As a typical type-A personality with perfectionist tendencies, I catapulted in to “self-correction” overdrive. But what did that look like for a complete nutrition novice, on my own for the very first time, with absolutely no idea what it really meant to live my life in a healthy, holistic fashion? It meant turning to culture’s ideas of beauty and societies standards of “health” and deciding that the food I ate and the time I spent in the gym needed to help me get back to a body size that was acceptable. I was convinced that the way I approached food and fitness needed to yield one result- skinny. I needed to lose the weight in order to fit the mold of what the world defined as beautiful; I needed to slim down to feel confident and worthy in my own skin again. And I’ll let you in on a little secret- what I would come to discover much later was that this seemingly innocent quest to drop 15 pounds was really a much more complicated cry out for approval, belonging and…love. And sadly, it was the beginning of a long, hard battle I’d fight within my own body for the next 7 years.
The remainder of my time in college was spent obsessing about what I was eating, how much I was working out and ultimately how those two together effected my body size. I suffered through stages of intense calorie tracking, periods of abusing laxatives to “rid” of extra water weight all the while consistently and purposely under-fueling and overexercising. I became a Group Fitness Instructor to monetize my workouts and prided myself on my ability to stick to strict meal plans. Friends and family would often comment about how “disciplined” I was or affirm how “committed” I was to my health. They’d tell me I looked “so good” and unbeknownst to them only continued to further validate my looming eating disorder. People were noticing, people were praising, and I was more motivated than ever to continue restricting food and pushing myself to extreme physical limits. This was the acknowledgement and acceptance I had been looking for after all… right?
While it seemed as though on the outside I was thriving, the truth was, everything inside me was falling apart. My new persona of “health” was actually the furthest state from healthy I had ever been. I was deteriorating physically, mentally, emotionally and socially. Under-fueling and overworking my body put immense strain on its systems, often forcing it in to what simulated starvation mode- wrecking my gut and seriously disrupting my hormones. I was consumed with thoughts of food at all times and allowed it to be a moral indicator of whether I was “good” or “bad” day in and day out. I replayed food logs in my head and tortured myself if I hadn’t eaten as clean or conserved the calories I had aspired to. I often declined meal-time invitations based on what was available to eat and let menus dictate whether I would attend events and outings. Food was in charge of my life and I had absolutely no idea how to take back the reigns.
Unfortunately, after graduating from school, things got a bit worse before they started to get better…
I took my first job as a nurse and in typical rookie RN fashion I was contracted to work night shift. The scheduling chaos of being asleep during the day and awake at night put further strain and pressure on my relationship with food and body. Meal times were weird (hello 2am lunch) and sometimes snacking seemed to be the only way to help my nocturnal employee-self stay awake and survive my shifts. So, more times than not, I ended up consuming more in a 24-hour period than I probably would have if working a typical day-time schedule. An increase in calories in combination with less sleep and a totally disrupted circadian rhythm tormented my body even more than I had ever experienced.
I was exhausted and miserable and remember genuinely wondering if I was destined to feel that way for the rest of my life.
In the years following, I would receive an answer to that rock bottom plea, which, praise be to God, was no. No, I would certainly not be a slave to food or suffer on account of my body forever- because right there in the midst of those darkest days and hardest hours was the presence and pursuit of Jesus.
You see, I can look back now on those college turned young adult days and see glimpses of how the Lord was staying near to me all along- how my underlying interest in faith, intermittent involvement in small groups or sporadic church attendance kept the door open for a relationship with Him. But it wasn’t until those treacherous night shift nursing days, in the deepest pit of my struggles with food, that God so graciously pulled me close and I finally started to gain momentum in watering the spiritual seeds that had been planted in my heart over the previous years.
I began routinely showing up for Sunday service at my local church, soaking up the incredible wisdom of the lead pastor, and diving in to the Word on my own for the very first time. I craved learning more about who God was and was captivated by the reality of what He had done for me.
That because He loved me so much, He sent His one and only Son in to the world to live a perfect and blameless life, yet die for me, my sins and the sins of all of humanity- that those who believe in Him should have eternal life in Heaven.
That because He loved me so much, Jesus, took up the cross for me, bearing my shortcomings and imperfections and righting the way for us to be in relationship forever.
And the best part about all of it? This unconditional and sacrificial love is a free gift God gives us. We don’t deserve it… but we don’t have to earn it. And in really receiving that, I could finally surrender the relentless striving to be enough in the eyes of man. Because I was more than enough in the eyes of my Father in Heaven. My innate desire to be accepted and valued was met and exceeded with the invitation to be a daughter of the Most High King.
Miraculously, as my faith accelerated, my bondage to my body dimmed. I confessed my seven-year-long secret sin to the two people I trusted most in my life and with their accountability and council, received the professional help I needed. It was in that program that I had to do the really hard work that battling my body required- the heart work. It got deep, it got personal, it got messy but in the end, praise Jesus, it yielded healing. By the grace of God and through the commitment of my counselor, I walked away from that experience 12 weeks later a changed person. Free.
Now, I won’t lie to you and say that everything was perfect after that- there of course were and still are hard days or moments that I notice negative feelings creep up when I look in the mirror or former thought patterns cross my mind as I order lunch out on-the-go. The difference is I have the tools now to turn down the volume on the old ways and walk forward in to a new life that doesn’t revolve around food or my body. The difference is I now know the truth of God’s overwhelming love for me and rest in his assuredness that I am fearfully and wonderfully made- no matter what my macros look like or what size pants I wear.
So, here we are, a decade later, with a story to tell but more than that, a person to testify to. And friend, I pray that through the words of my journey, you would see hope and healing, but most of all that you would see Him. God is for you and will fight with you and alongside you in any and every battle you face. Disordered eating and body image may be my battles, but with my eyes fixed on Jesus and my feet rooted in truth, I have and will continue to be victorious.