Feelings: To Feel Them Or Stuff Them Down, That Is THE Question!

Many years ago I had a pastor who impressed me with both his great wisdom and delightful sense of humor. He would often quip that he had been known to “cry at supermarket grand openings”!

I can relate to his comment — at least at times. Sometimes I cry with little or no provocation. At other times I do a pretty good job at “stuffing down” my feelings — ALL feelings — including feelings that lead to tears.

I’ve heard it said of food addicts that if we don’t “Face Our Stuff” we’ll (eventually) ”Stuff Our Face”. I’ve found this is VERY true in the sense that some of my most painful feelings have surfaced during periods of sane eating.

How vividly the lyrics of Simon And Garfunkel’s song I Am A Rock captures the emotional pain that many of us addicts have tried to stuff down…

“I am a rock.
I am an island.
I’ve built walls –
A fortress deep and mighty
That none may penetrate…
I have no need of friendship;
friendship causes pain.
Its laughter and its loving I disdain….
I touch no one and no one touches me…
And a rock feels no pain.
And an island never cries.”

As a recovering co-dependent, feeling MY feelings should NOT be too difficult a task to handle since (in active co-dependency) I had NO problem feeling EVERYone else’s feelings. But the reality has been that running from, denying and stuffing down (”stuffing” comes about with my ingesting EXCESS amounts of food) MY OWN feelings has been my pattern.

Many years ago I heard it explained that feelings, also referred to as “emotions” , are “energy-in-motion” (think “e-motions”). My understanding is that ingesting any any mood-or-mind-altering substance can (and does) “block” the processing of emotions. Hence the state of “emotional constipation” that many of us addicts experienced during out days of active addiction.

I don’t know why, but feeling MY feelings CAN seem overwhelming. At times I’ve found myself wondering if I was going to “e-mote to death” by allowing myself to feel my feelings!

The Overeaters Anonymous brochure entitled, A Plan Of Eating: A Tool for Living - One Day at a Time (Copyright 1988, 2001, 2005 Overeaters Anonymous, Incorporated. All rights reserved.), addresses the connection between food and emotions with these words:

“For a compulsive overeater, eating is attached to emotions. We are never fully satisfied, no matter how much we eat, because we are eating for emotional reasons rather than physical reasons. We eat for excitement, love celebration, loneliness, escape, pleasure and comfort. We devour food to anesthetize ourselves. We eat out of anger, resentment, envy, jealousy, fear, pride, guilt and grief.”

The good news is that, through working the 12 Steps, I’ve actually been able to discover/uncover whatever feelings I’ve been stuffing down with excess food. Through working the 12 Steps while working with other addicts I’ve found the strength to NOT act out with food in an addictve, compulsive or impulsive manner, despite feeling some intense and pretty crappy emotions!

Recovery doesn’t magically protect me from feeling painful feelings. Recovery gives me the strength and courage to discover, feel and then move beyond my feelings without the need to swallow excessive amounts of food or avoid physical exercise. How does all of this work? One Day, One Step and One Feeling at a time!

 

8 Calls Within 21 Hours…

I really should trust my gut more often.

I just knew that this friend who wanted  me to be her “Weight Loss Buddy” wasn’t playing with a “Regulation 52 Deck” (a/k/a “She was an order of French Fries short of a Happy Meal”). I could sense that it was a “co-dependent clingfest” just waiting to happen.

Not to gloat, but I was right about her!

This evening (Monday, January 7, 200 was to be the first time we were to attend a Weight Watchers meeting together…so SHE had dictiated to me. But the relationship was over even before it began, thanks to her calling me EIGHT TIMES WITHIN 21 HOURS — just to make sure that I was going to be at the meeting! Talk about “control issues”! 

Thanks, but I don’t need a nag, a cop or a stalker to be my Weight Loss Buddy!!!

I sent her an e-mail message late this afternoon stating that I’m not willing to attend Weight Watchers meetings with her at this time. I didn’t offer her a lengthy explanation about my decision since I figured that it would likely just end up in an argument. (Have you ever tried to argue with a person who is drunk on the need to control others? Talk about stressful conversations!)

IMHO, from a spiritual and mental health point of view, a relationship such as a “Weight Loss Buddy” should be more about trust than control. It should be about giving each other SPACE to ask for help, instead of one buddy assuming that s/he has ALL the answers for the other buddy. Each buddy should be responsible for making his own decisions, instead of one buddy acting as a dictator by announcing decisions they’ve made for the other person.

I come from a pretty dysfunctional alcoholic family, so returning to one isn’t one of the things I long for.

The relationship dynamics my friend had insisted on were majorly dysfunctional. Ya’ think!

To the best of my knowledge, my friend is not an alcoholic. But her behavior smacks of alcoholic personality issues (”Alcoholics don’t form relationships — They take hostages.”). Perhaps one (or both) of her parent(s) or her ex-husband were alcoholics — since we codependents seem to take on many characteristics of the addicts and otherwise out-of-control individuals who cross our path.

Over the course of many years of working on my recovery journey, I’ve seen this unhealthy relationship pattern repeated many times (e.g., control vs. trust). I too have been guilty of being a control freak, hence my ongoing membership in Al-Anon and the decision to work my 12 Step program of recovery on my codependency issues.

I certainly wish my friend well with her re-entry into the Weight Watchers fellowship. I just don’t care to be her Weight Loss Buddy, just for today!

 

“Weight Loss Buddy” Vs. “Weight Loss Control Freak”

I’m an addict — excessive amounts of food and avoidance of physical exercise are my “drugs of choice” — and my problem is Dave!

<<< Group Responds: “Hi, Dave and welcome!!!” >>>

Several days ago I received a call from a friend who shares my struggle with food addiction and exercise avoidance. She called to inform me that SHE DECIDED…

– that WE were going to be “Weight Loss Buddies” beginning the first week of January 2008.

– that WE would be attending TOGETHER the Monday Weight Watchers meeting in my neighborhood that takes place barely one block from where I live.

…that WE were pretty much going to eat and exercise ALIKE.

…It even sounded as if she expected US to even think ALIKE (or, more like I would think JUST LIKE HER!).

This ain’t a healthy relationship, people! What she proposes is more like a “codependent clingfest” where she is my Drill Sergeant! With a “friend” like her offering me “support” (as well meaning as she certainly is), I probably could easily cultivate TONS of resentments to lead me back to OVEReatomg and enough DEPRESSION to make me want to be even more lethargic than I already am!

I know: NO excuse will do for bad choices. I also know that my friend’s prouncements about this “weight loss buddy” thing sounds extremely co-dependent as evidenced by her DISrespect for my boundaries/choices.

If you read any of my other journal entries, you know that I believe it is a BIG NO NO for one addict to dictate to another addict about the choice of a food plan or exercise plan! I’ve found it best to leave to PROFESSIONALS (or at least Weight Watchers) decisions that should NEVER be made by a “fellow crazy person” (e.g., fellow addict — “When it comes to food, we are stragely INsane” = Don’t hire a pyromaniac to work as a fire fighter!).

The concept of a “weight loss buddy” is fine. In fact, it is a GOOD thing to have a friend in recovery to share experience, strength and hope with on a regular (if not daily basis).

But make decisions for their buddy?  Nope. Each addict is responsible for his own decisions. Smart decisions and dumb decisions. Healthy decisions and toxic decisions. Each of us addicts even have a right to make NO decision(s) — which is/are decision(s) in themselves!

In 12 Step recovery the concept that comes closest to what my friend calls a “weight loss buddy” is what is known as a “sponsor”. A sponsor is someone who usually has a longer term of recovery than their sponsee. My experience is that most people who work with a “buddy” usually have nearly the same length of recovery as the person they are working with (i.e., for overeaters this means that they both usually began their dieting effort at the same time).

Thanks, but I don’t “do diets” these days! I love the newest Weight Watchers slogan: “Stop dieting. Start living.” Amen!

For me, speaking as an addict, diets never really did work for me, don’t work for me now and NEVER will work for me. They make work for my friend and they may work for you (More power to y’all!), but they do NOT work for me.

What DOES work for me is experiencing a “spiritual awakening” followed by a “lifestyle change” and change of life philosophy — that, with God’s help and the support of other addicts — I work just ONE DAY AT A TIME. This is what is working for me NOW and what I’ve wittnessed working for countless other addicts over the years (regarless of their “drug of choice”).

I love the concept of sponsorship as it is taught and practiced within Narcotics Anonymous. My approach to working with my “Weight Loss Buddy” (Yes, I’m going to work with her — one meeting and one day at a time!) is influenced by the following quotes from N.A. literature…

“Over time, being a sponsor can help us learn how to listen without judgment, accept without conditions, and love without expectations. In many ways, sponsorship teaches us how to develop and maintain healthy relationships.”

Wow! “Listen withOUT judgment”, “accept withOUT conditions and love withOUT expectations — what concepts! Not only can this approach help me “develop and maintain healthy relationships” (with my Weight Loss Buddy and others), it also goes a long way to helping me overcome tendencies to become a “control freak” — Hey, I’m an Adult Child of an Alcoholic, so I learned how to be a “control freak” at an early age (at least I got these tendencies “honestly”, huh?).

When I first laid eyes on a checklist of common characteristics of Adult Children of Alcoholics back in the mid-1980’s), I thought it was a PERFECT description of myself as well as MOST of the folks I’d met in the meeting of Overeaters Anonymous. Hence to this day I believe that the “primary addiction” most of us addicts have is the addiction to CONTROL others (which sounds a like codependency to moi!) and our “drug(s) of choice” is more of a “secondary issue”.

Back to Narcotics Anonymous literature as it discusses the concept of sponorship…

“A sponsor is a recovering addict in the program of Narcotics Anonymous; someone we can trust to share our life experiences with (both good and bad); a person to whom we can go with our problems that may be too personal to share with the group. It is suggested that a sponsor be someone who has practice in working the Twelve Steps and is involved in the program. Primarily, a sponsor is a guide through the Twelve Steps of recovery.”

It sounds like to me that a sponsor must have a gentle spirit — one that allows their sponsee to be honest/real/transparent.  without fear of recrimination. Could it be that a sponsee should never fear being scolded,  nagged or screamed at by their sponsor? Me thinks so.

Sponsors (and even Weight Loss Buddies) must keep their own recovery as their primary focus. Sponsors have a right to maintain their own boundaries (“We carry the message, not the addict.”) Sponsor then “are not reformers, preachers of the gospel, welfare workers, part-time social workers, marriage counselors, money lenders, employment counselors, or parole officers.”

I have this knot in the pit of my stomach accompanied by the intutitive sense that tells me that that sooner (rather than later) I’ll need to gently confront my Weight Loss Buddy about my boundaries and about what IS MY business and where she needs to let go of control.

I’ll let you know how this relationship works out.

 

“Some Say LOVE It Is A HUNGER…”

Who would have thought that lyrics of a popular song could have held such insight?

Many years ago I attended an Overeaters Anonymous retreat where a recording of Bette Midler’s song The Rose was used as a meditation. The Rose is also featured as a on one of Richard Simmons’ Sweatin’ To The Oldies videos.

Why The Rose? What is it’s connection to food addiction/exercise avoidance?

One line from that song speaks volumes to me: “Some say love, it is a hunger an endless aching need…” Ain’t that the truth!

“What the world needs now” (and our ”addict within” can use daily) is to feel loved. A Co-Dependents Anonymous affirmation addresses this very basic of human needs with the reminder that: “I am lovable, loving and loved.”

So easy to affirm, yet so much harder for me to feel!

What happens when I don’t “feel the love”? What happens when I feel rejection (a/k/a the “withdrawal of love”)? I grab for the food! I attempt to fill my “inner hunger” with something that might taste delicious — but still can’t fill the hole that I want -desperately need - it to fill.

Yet when I use food to be the “lover of my soul” my self-esteem is ultimately decreased and what self-love I have disappears. What a painful paradox: trying to (over)fill the hole in my soul leaves me only more empty.

Ultimately, I believe only God can fill the emptiness (which includes the feeling/belief that deep down we are ”UNlovable”) that fills our soul. I also believe that God created me (and all of us) to be “social creatures” who also need the love and acceptance of others, to some degree, in order to be truly happy.

What in the wide, wide world of sports makes me bring up the “hunger for love” topic? Probably because I’ve recently (again) come to the realization that I “don’t handle rejection” all that well. Then again, WHO DOES “handle it well”? While rejection doesn’t have to totally devistate me, when it happens I nonetheless feel a great deal of pain.

I’ve been working on healing from rejection — two wounds, or occasions, in particular. One rejection took place in 1995 and the other around 1981/1982. I can usually “make sense” of “why” someone rejects me. But when it is out-of-the-blue, when it (from my point of view) appears to be totally UNprovoked, then I don’t handle it terribly well.

Maybe the best I can do is to “feel my feelings” — including the massive amount of pain that rejection causes. “Stuffing it down” with excess amounts of food certainly hasn’t healed it. I’m hoping that writing about it here and in my 12 Step work and talking it through with my therapist can also help bring about healing.

As an addict who’s drug of choice is excess food and exercise avoidance, today I’m making a choice to “love myself enough” to eat healthy and exercise appropriately so that maybe some of the emotional pain will subside.

 

Addict-To-Addict Judgmentalism

An earlier topic I posted on had to do with just how cruel we food addicts can be to one another. One aspect of the unkindness we are capable of acting out with has to do with how judgmental we food addicts can be about other addict’s food choices. I find it rather ironic that those of us who have been out-of-control with our food intake can be awfully high and mighty — yeah, in a word: “judgmental” — when it comes to rating what and/or how much  other addicts (addicts who self-identify as being “in recovery”) eat.

And you (and I) certainly are NOT judgmental toward other addicts, right? Then tell me about that fellow who is pictured above (the guy wearing the red shirt). Did you assume that he is at his TOP weight ever? Or did you wonder if he had already lost 50, 75, 100 or more pounds? How do you emperically KNOW that he is as overweight as he has ever been? Answer: You can NOT know for sure if you just met someone. Why is it OK to assume the worst about them? Answer: It isn’t.

So to any food addict (not to metion to every exercise avoider as well) who has been negatively judged becuase of recovery effort, please know that you aren’t alone!  I, too, have had to endure nurerous judgmental comments (and hateful glances) over the years — and those words and looks definitely can hurt!

My “recovery puzzle” includes wisdom gleaned from various 12 Step fellowships, including Narcotics Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon. One of my favorite lines from the A.A. Big Book says, “Where alcohol has been involced, we are stragely insane.” And I can solemnly assure you that when it comes to food (and exercise) I too have a well-documented history of being “strangely insane”.

So when I hear a fellow food addict pontificate to me or other addicts about nutrition (let alone exercise) I try to NOT over-react and remember to “consider the source”. Trusting a food addict to be a dietician is about illogical as trusting a pyromaniac to work as a fireman. It just ain’t a smart idea!!!

Could you make “better” food choices than some other addict? Good for you! Did you loose weight faster than another addict did? Whoopie!!!

What’s the point of being a know-it-all with one another? Can’t we all support one another while walking DIFFERENT paths to achieve our recovery? Since when did my mouth get attached to yours? Our own individual results are absolutely nothing to be ashamed of! Remember the famous disclaimer: “Your results may vary”. My experience is that our individual results often DO vary from that of another addict!

If you want “competition” go park your butt in front of your TV and watch those weight loss reality series. On the other hand, if you want to be “supportive”, then work your own program of recovery while affirming others for their sincere efforts at recovery.

Being overly critical of fellow addicts is all-too-typical behavior for those who have (and rumor has it that ALL of us addicts have this issue, to one degree or another) chronically low self-esteem. This problem is what 12 Step writer John Bradshaw refers to as “Toxic Shame”. When we who have for so long judged ourselves without mercy, it is all-too-easy to act out this way when we interact with others who share our addiction.

The tendency toward addict-to-addict judgmentalism is why I’ve decided to NOT post a whole lot of truly personal recovery information (e.g., my weight loss, food intake and accoiunting for physical exercise) on Overactive Fork. I don’t need the hateful remarks that come with shame-based addicts projecting their shame on me. NOT that I’ve ever projected ME shame on any other addicts! HA! I only (honestly) wish that were so.

Just for today I wont judge other addict’s attempts at (and results from their) recovery journey. My rate of weight loss (and yours) is God’s business (not mine or yours).