Compulsion and Obsession

Now I know its not a good idea to weigh oneself daily, I know that weight doesn't come off evenly, I know that I will drive myself crazy if I keep doing it...so why do I do it? I am an obsessive person - anything can be done to death if its done by me. I have even had a knitting compulsion that was both bizarre and dangerous at one time. Dangerous? Have you ever tried knitting and cooking at the same time? It gets ugly real quick.

Mercifully my obsessions come and go, I'm completely over online poker now that I play Second Life. I always seem to have one or two on the trot at one time and never have I been without something. Maybe they are just hobbies? Normal people have hobbies right? Stamp collecting? Ugh! I contemplated stamp collecting once and worked out that there are so many stamps in the world over a long period of time I didn't stand a chance of getting all of them - so why bother. And when does a normal activity become an obsessive compulsion? I don't know the answer to this question as this is how I have always been.

My compulsive eating is what got me into this shape in the first place, and to me it was normal. I have always been a little crazy around food, and a little nudge of emotional upset could lead to complete eating meltdown. When I was medicating myself with alcohol and other substances, food wasn't too much of an issue, my crazy eating was sporadic as alcohol mainly did the trick. But I do remember many years ago getting up in the middle of the night and grabbing the jar with the icing sugar in it and putting a whole tablespoon in my mouth as I heard someone coming. I jammed like the whole tablespoon in! And discovered it wasn't the icing sugar jar at all. It was the cornflour jar. Oh, btw, cornflour is not nice when you have a whole tablespoon in your mouth!

When I stopped drinking is when I started eating in earnest. Its not just about stuffing the pain down either. I wanted my body to be fat and hideous, to match the way I felt about myself on the inside, and also because I could not deal with being attractive to men. I had huge issues around that. I was deeply conflicted about men. I loved them and detested them. I wanted power over them and fell victim to them over and over again. I limped from one short term encounter to the next. My one long term relationship in my twenties was completely dysfunctional. My body in those days, when I was drinking, was the wide hipped big breasted variety that was lusted after by seemingly every man that came along. I always got sucked into thinking that someone might just care for me and want to be with me. Very sad really. And so my body image became distorted and I piled on the fat as a protection from the pain I felt inside. The longing and loneliness got buried. What I wanted and what I felt was of no value at all and I denied myself - everything. Everything but food it seems.

Can I leave the protection of the fat behind? Have I grown enough to not be pushed around by the actions of others? Its a scary thought.