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In the summer of my 14th year, I started a very bad habit. It was the last time I would visit my parents in New York where they lived. I would not see them for another 2 years. I somehow knew this at a cellular level.

On the day before I was scheduled to leave that summer, my mother had to go away to work so she would not be around to see us off. The morning of that day she must have said goodbye and my dad took us around for our requisite goodbye’s to everyone. I don’t remember much of that day besides the quantities of food I ate.

It started off in the morning at Blimpie’s with a breakfast sandwich. We went shopping for some last minute school supplies, and I had a couple New York franks while my brother enjoyed a slice. We went by a family friend where I had a full Sunday Trinidadian meal; rice and peas, callaloo (spinach and okra in a soup), stew chicken, roast pork, baked chicken, macaroni pie. Then we went to McDonald’s, and finally topped things off at Haagen Dazs.

All day long, every time I felt like crying I said I was hungry, and I ate. That day I learned to stuff my feelings with food.

Since that day, I tried several times to lose weight or curb my eating to no avail. I remember when I moved to Raleigh, eating a quart of ice cream every evening. I put on 50 lbs in 5 months, after losing 50 lbs in the year before. I was home sick and lonely, but rather than face the feelings, I just ate them.

Last year, when I started writing for this blog, I made a silent commitment to myself to be as authentic as I possibly could. By this time, I was aware that I had been stuffing my feelings thanks to a stint in Overeaters Anonymous. So, as part of my commitment, I said that I would only eat when hungry and until full.

It was the best that I could do, as I felt that I tried everything. I always wanted to go gung-ho and shave off every pound fast. I didn’t want to face anything that the weight was covering, but my commitment to only eat when hungry and until full forced me to uncover deep seated fears and emotions buried beneath at least 26 lbs of fat.

At first, it was just a matter of mechanics. Before I put anything in my mouth, I would ask myself, “Am I really hungry?” If the answer was yes, I would eat. If no, I wouldn’t. No further exploration needed. That was really easy for a long time. However, after about a month of not having my drug of choice available I started to get jittery and anxious. In the past, when I started lowering my calorie count, I would sleep off my problems as an alternative, or flip out irrationally. However, I reasoned that if I slept I would just be substituting one drug for another so I started to dig deeper.

If I realized that I wanted to eat, but wasn’t hungry, I dared to ask myself, “Why do you want to eat? What’s the deal here?” Feelings began erupting. Mostly I was tremendously pissed. So I dug deeper, “why are you so pissed?” Here I am, all Zen-like and blissful in my outer life, the perfect persona of poise, harboring so much anger and discontent. The anger ranged from the simplest things like not being able to find a pen when I needed one, to the state of my life. I was just pissed.

So I started walking, a more socially appropriate form of deflection to be sure, but deflection just the same. On my walks, though, I had these conversations with myself about my anger. By the end of a 40 minute walk, I had usually come to a place of calm on the subject of the anger. In addition to walking, I was writing and meditating as part of the Life Transformation Program. In short, I gave myself several avenues to deal with all the anger that was erupting.

Finally, one day, I think it was in late October, as I was entrenched in the Season of Gratitude, the anger relented. I can’t really say when exactly it happened, or how or why it happened, but I began to see very clearly what was happening inside, and I began to feel emotions outside of anger. I realized that I felt extremely lonely and alone.

By this point the urge to eat at any point other than hunger evaporated completely. In fact, sometimes I would feel the opposite. I would begin to feel agitated about something inconsequential and ask myself what the deal was to find out that my blood sugar was running low and I needed fuel.

Eating until full on the other hand, was more nuanced. I could convince myself of anything.

It helped that I was only eating when hungry, but once I started, if I wasn’t paying attention, I could finish whatever was in front of me. So I started eating salad for one meal a day. Yes, salad. Why salad? Because I hate salad. If I was hungry, not ravenous, I would sit in front of the best salad I could make filled with spinach and mushrooms and beans and bell peppers. I’ve never had an urge to eat one morsel beyond what was absolutely necessary for salad, and so I learned what it felt like to be full. I paid attention to the sensations in my body. The important thing was to become aware again, and do some brain rewiring, on what full was.

I learned that pasta made me feel really bloated within one cup, but an hour later I was empty. I learned that beans filled me up and kept me sated for hours after. I learned to honor my body when it was screaming steak, and not try to fill it up with sugar when it wanted protein. I learned how to order a portion that would fill me, not stuff me. I started to breath when I was halfway through whatever was in front of me and ask, “Am I full now?” I started to really savor food.

Along this journey, an amazing thing happened, I began to feel full. Not full of food, but full of life. Sounds corny, but I am now in touch with my feelings. I can tell when something is annoying me, and when I’m just annoyed for no reason. I can be sad and feel it. I cry, not completely freely, but I think I cried more in the last 6 months of my life than in the last 6 years. I also feel immense joy. I feel enfolded in love. I feel inspired, and peaceful, and free, and really, really FULL!

For the sake of authenticity, I want you all to know that I went from 271 lbs in November to 245 lbs today, so I still have a ways to go. Next year, I want to get more in touch with my body and make movement a part of my life. My environment can easily facilitate that now.

One parting story. Last night I wanted Italian food. I don’t know why. I haven’t had pasta in about 3 months because of that bloated feeling. Nonetheless, I was heading to a popular Italian chain, and on the way I was saying to myself that I really didn’t want all that food. I just wanted some pasta and the sauce. I realized that there was a better Italian place closer to my house that served normal portions, so I turned the car around. That, to me, is worth tons more than 26 lbs lost (although, I’m elated about that too )!

In Spirit,
Nneka