Weight Loss: Perception and Reality

Losing weight without a motivational “switch” for an emotional eater is frustrating and just plain futile. Recently I have been in a far more serious weight battle, one that has me thinking outside of myself and it has given me what I believe is my “Emotional switch”.

I have been helping a charming, intelligent, and immensely talented young lady deal in a small way with the perception that she is fat. I am 320 pounds you see and have been battling with my weight since high school. She however has been struggling with an entirely different battle. My dear friend is only 17 and 110 pounds. The problem with this particular young woman is the fact that I am her father! Having to deal with school, peer pressure and adolescence is “mad crazy hard” as she would say. However try to imagine that every time that you even think of eating you get angry with yourself! However that is nothing compared to the fear and loathing that envelopes “my little girl” when she finally does eat something. Her natural hunger takes her to a place that she dreads more than pimples and and “F” on her English test combined! When she eats she doesn’t want to stop. But that is not the end, because when she stops that is when the real battle begins. You see as you eat, it takes your body twenty minutes to a half hour to register and process what you have taken in. So when my daughter stops eating and realizes that, in her opinion, she has over-indulged, she begins to get angry and depressed. Probably in some small way, most teens, even most people of any age, experience this sensation to a small degree. However, my daughter experiences this with a meal of as little as 300 calories or more. To give you an idea, a kids meal from MacDonalds has more calories than that!

So when I noticed this and other more typical gliches in what for some is the “happiest days of their lives”, I decided to be proactive and give her a boost in her confidence at the same time. I told my daughter that I would join her in her struggle to figure out this weight, food and anger situation. In other words she would no longer be alone. I asked her to promise me something: If I lowered my caloric intake and started losing weight, that she would try to increase her caloric intake and try to eat more. And so we began. 2 weeks into our experiment I have lost 20 pounds and my daughter has not gotten fiercely angry at eating. It is a work in progress to be sure but I believe I have found my “emotional switch” and I have my daughter to thank for it. Its true what they say that you can really learn from your children.

Alan “Bud” Speaker is a full time hospital worker, part-time writer and a full time dad. Sharing his life with his daughter and only child has been his greatest joy to date.

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