WFG Workshop Week 3: Ending the War

It's been a very busy week.  I've tried really hard not to stress eat (or drink) but yesterday was tough.  I had to decide what I was going to do about my relationship with my parents and after talking to a friend in the mental health field....I decided that tough love was going to be the way to go.

I find it interesting that this week's chapter is called Ending the War because I feel like that's what I'm trying to do with my parents too. I'm tired of fighting and feeling badly.  I think this book came along at the perfect time for me because I'm learning about my relationship with food and also my family.  They go hand in hand.

1. Author Geneen Roth begins the chapter telling her students that their relationships with food are the greatest blessings in their lives. That they are not going to fix this relationship, but should walk through the door and see what's behind it. When you think about this—that what you thought was a curse is actually a blessing—how do you respond? Do you feel like throwing the book against the wall or feeding it to your dog, or does it make you curious about the possibilities of using your relationship with food as an opening to the rest of your life?

I already feel like I've opened a door to the rest of my life since reading this book.  I'm facing my fears and the demons from my past and letting them go.  I've realized that many of my food issues go back to things that happened in my childhood and the fact that my relationship with my parents has been going through changes right now has allowed me to really take a hard look and be honest about that.  Doing this is hard....but necessary.


2. What would it mean to see your relationship with food as the greatest blessing of your life? What would need to change in your thinking? Your eating?

I would need to think of food as fuel and not has a drug.  I would still want to enjoy food...but not overdose on it.


3. Geneen describes her struggle of gaining and losing 1,000 pounds, loathing herself and becoming suicidal. She came to the realization that she had two choices—to stop dieting or to kill herself. Ultimately, she writes, it's about not fixing yourself. In Women, Food and God, she urges readers to end the war with themselves and with food. How long have you been fighting with yourself about your relationship with food? And…has fighting with yourself ever led to truly changing yourself? Are you willing to stop the struggle? What do you think you'll find? How would giving up this fight make you feel?

I think giving up this fight with food would feel freeing. That I would be letting myself off the hook for years of abusing myself with food.

4. Do you believe that engaging in the endless loops of gaining and losing weight keeps you connected to your friends and family, who are also engaged in the diet-binge cycle?

I suppose it does.  Weight has always been a topic of conversation with my family and my husband's family.  Every time I've ever lost weight people notice and comment on it. 

5. On page 29, Geneen mentions the UCLA study on the effectiveness of dieting. Among those who were followed for fewer than two years, 83 percent gained back more weight than they had lost. If you were ill and the doctor suggested a cure that would make you worse, would you follow it nonetheless? How does it affect you to see that diets are not a cure?

I wish someone had told me 20 years ago that dieting was not a cure.  I also wish that my parents had taught me good eating habits so that I wouldn't have to be like this.

6. On pages 30–31, Geneen writes about a woman who focused on her desire to feel lean and trim rather than feel the loss of the love of her life. She confessed that she "always" gets abandoned, and in her mind being lean enough meant being strong enough to face the feelings she does not want to experience. What have you always believed you will have if you finally lose the weight? What power have you given away to being thin?

For years, I've struggled to make friends and I'm always the *big* friend.  I've always thought if I was thinner...people would like me and want to be my friend.


7. On page 32, Geneen writes that "women turn to food when they are not hungry because they are hungry for something they can’t name." A connection to the sacred, to what they find holy in their lives. If you had to define what is sacred or holy in your life, what would that be? What do you cherish most of all? Can you remember a time when you just the way you are, regardless of your size, was enough?

It all come back to being loved and accepted. I don't know that I've ever felt like I was good enough or that I could tear down the walls that I use to protect my heart. If your own mother doesn't love you...then why would anyone else? Food has always been there for me....