I've Lost 30 pounds. My soul is bare.

I've lost 30 pounds in the past 2 months.  This has never happened.  Everyone is asking me HOW I am losing weight, so I'm going to write about it and invite you on this very scary journey with me.  The easy part is over.  Now, the very hard work begins.  I have 85 more pounds to lose.  I am on two diabetes medications, high blood pressure, high cholesterol etc. etc.  

I am pruning and starting with

 the very basics.  Weeding, pruning, deadheading and tearing down.

To be honest with you, I'm so scared I will fail.  Then I will have to climb back on this platform to tell you....  just joking.  "I really can't do this."  I'm afraid I will wake up and the pounds will be back.

I have had an eating problem since a time of great stress and abuse as a girl.  Shame, guilt and condemnation became permanent clothing items that I pulled over my head every day like a weighted vest.  Honestly, the weight is just too much to bear.

I binge eat.  I compulsively eat.  I have such an addictive personality, if I eat one cookie...I eat the package.  I hide my eating, the same way an alcoholic hides in the alley to drink.  When I was young, my Mom bought ice cream sandwiches from the Swan man and kept them in the deep freeze.  There were two giant freezers in the garage filled for a very large ranching family.  When I was overwhelmed with life, I would sneak into the garage to eat ice cream or anything else that offered any comfort.  As an adult, I hid candybar wrapper under my vehicle seat.  How embarrassing to find comfort in bar shoved in my mouth and the hidden remains by my feet.

This winter I had rewritten my life plan.  As I was writing my goals for my future and noting what kind of Grandmother I want to be and what my obituary will say...I realized the truth.  I will never meet any of these goals.  I will be dead.

Honestly, I thought I wouldn't live past 30 anyway and God has allowed me to raise my boys.  So here I am realizing...life goes on after my boys have grown up.  All I know to be true in my head never seeped in to my heart.

What did I do?  I googled it.  I looked up treatment facilities for fat people.  Guess what?  They exist.  A place for people to go who are trapped within the prisons of their own bodies.  In a moment of courage, I called the number.

They answered.  They ran my insurance and took some information.  "Congratulations, you qualify for our program."

I called my husband to tell him I was going away for two months.  I had two months to save my life. Typical of my husband, he was quiet.  He told me we would do whatever we needed, but he thought we could do it.

He wouldn't let me have surgery and now this?  I was mad.  "If I could do it, don't you think I would?" I asked him.

My very faithful husband replied and said, "No, I don't.  I think you believe you can't so you don't."

What the heck?!!!!!

But, he was right.  I am the queen of convincing myself I can't do it.  I am smart, capable and courageous and yet most of the time, I have sold myself the lie of "well, I can't do it anyway."  

So we studied and prayed.  I found some different models.  My boys continued to grow up and not need me anymore.  "Good.  I thought.  They are all strong, capable and independent men.  They will be o.k. without me if I can't do this."

I know they worry about me and I hate that I put more on them.  They don't know what a mess their mom is, they just know I'm unhealthy.  They encourage and promote. "Mom, you can do this."  I would say, "I know.  I know."  And then cry when they were gone.

THEN.... my oldest son called.  He is one of the bravest people I know.  He just left a safe, promising and "very cool" career of being a survival instructor to move to an unknown city to start a new business and life, that he knows will be difficult and he could fail.

He was renting a room from a family for two months until he found an apartment.  They were in the same business as he is and she is also a health specialist.  Together, they used the health products from their business and the eating and health plan from her practice and he was eating healthy and feeling great.

"Mom," he said, "we can do this together."  So my husband and my boys are all behind me.  Friends are encouraging me.  Trying to stay honest and real.

So how have I lost weight?  It has started with the work on my heart.