Latest / The Reformed Tired Girls Club Podcast / Desperate Times Call for Extreme Food Restrictions
Transcript
- Heather Copfer: Hi you guys, welcome back to another episode of the Reformed Tired Girls Club podcast. I am your host, Heather. And if you like this podcast episode, want to subscribe, comment, like, leave a review, all that good stuff that really helps me out, helps the podcast out. I'd really appreciate it. But anywho, ⁓ today we're gonna be getting into how shame and lack of control influences our eating habits. And, you know. This podcast is all about really that deep stuff that goes on beneath those surface level symptoms that really impacts our lives, impacts our relationships and our mental health. And this is a little bit of a, I don't want to say a tricky subject. I think it's a very sensitive subject because talking about extreme food restriction. ⁓ especially if you are somebody who has gone through it can open up old wounds. And I want to acknowledge that and just let you know that if you have gone through this and and you can relate to this topic and this podcast episode, just know that you are 1000% not alone and that you are really, really strong. Okay. Just wanna put that out there first and foremost. And I'm gonna be sharing my experiences here today because Hopefully this helps somebody and just lets you know that again, you're not alone and you can get through it. And you know, whatever health issue that you have dealt with, are dealing with, you know, in my case, this is chronic acne and and depression and body shame. What do we do in response to that? Well, we have these things that feel so out of our control that we go, okay, what can I control? And let me be on freaking ball about it. So specifically, there was a time in my life, and this was around when I was a sophomore and a junior in high school, where my acne was just so bad. It was just so bad. And you know, I think if you're someone who has dealt with acne, You you go through the motions of whether that is restricting sugar or restricting dairy or gluten. You think it's food related. You think it's food related, and you're like, okay, so I have bad acne. What's what's the appropriate response? Let's cut out sugar. Let's cut out dairy. Let's cut out gluten. And in my case, I was like, I'm not looking at or I'm not touching a single cookie, a brownie cake. Any any processed sugar, sugar in general, I was like, I cannot touch this stuff. Because in my mind, I was like, this is what's causing my acne. I need to cut it out completely. And so for a whole year, I had that extreme food restriction where I wouldn't let myself have any of that stuff. I was like, this is what's gonna help. Let's let's cut it out. And you know. It wasn't the answer. I I couldn't tell you if it helped even a little bit, but I can tell you that it wasn't the answer because I continued to have problems with acne until after high school when I was 18 and I went on hormonal birth control. So at this time where I was cutting out all the sugar, I also got to a point where I was also dealing with a lot of shame around my body. You know, going through puberty, especially as a teenage girl, when you start getting curves and your body changes. And in my experience, ⁓ it was like I grew hips overnight. It was like I grew hips, I had curves, and I couldn't fit into my jeans anymore. And you know, that felt very much out of my control. I didn't know how to handle that. And on top of that, it also got me a lot of unwanted attention, if I'll say. And I also didn't know how to deal with that. And so my response to all of this was I need to control my food even more. I need to control how much food I am consuming. even more. And so what I did in response to all of this was I started doing things like counting the amount of Cheez Its that I let myself eat. I remember looking at, you know, the nutrition label and seeing what was a serving size. And I would count as I put the Cheez Its into my mouth. I was like, okay, one, two, and and I did that for everything. I did that for everything. And And I got to a point to where I just wasn't eating much at all. And in fact, my my hunger cues kind of died off. And I just got to the point to where I just wasn't hungry like ever. And so one night in the midst of all of this, I it was dinner time, I hadn't eaten anything, and I was like, okay, I have to eat something. And so I drove myself to the gas station and got a bag of those like what is the brand like planters, planters peanuts or something. Got a bag of peanuts, got back in my car, and I was driving back home. And I just I pulled over into a bank parking lot. And I remember just sitting in my car holding this bag of peanuts, and I was just sobbing. I was just sobbing holding this bag of peanuts because I I just didn't want to eat them. I wasn't I I I I I restricted myself from food so drastically that I got to this point where I just wasn't hungry for food. And it was it was it was such a whirlwind to be in dealing with the lack of control, the shame around my face and my body. And and being confused as to if this was the answer and the right way to go about it. Because with this extreme food restriction, I wasn't feeling any better, if anything, I was feeling worse. I was feeling worse. And and I'm just in my car just bawling with this bag of peanuts. And I'm like, this isn't the answer. I know I'm trying so desperately to have some sort of control over something because everything feels so far out of my control. But this isn't the answer. And I just knew that then and there. And and I I've talked about this briefly before, but I I don't know what you want to call it, divine awareness, divine intervention of some capacity, but I've gotten to these points in my life where I was just on my way down a a very dangerous road. And I got to a point where I just realized that this wasn't the path. And I couldn't continue down this road I was on. And so I sat in my car and I forced myself to eat this whole bag of peanuts. And that's what I continued to do from that point on, was just force myself to eat. And that's how I started regulating my eating habits again and getting my hunger back. And it, you know, it is just it it really is just such a hard thing. And it doesn't It doesn't have to be acne or or or body shame. It could be whatever you are going through in your life that you feel like you don't have control over. You try to find something else that you do have control over and you hyperfixate on it. And it's not the healthiest route. Again, just speaking on my experience, it's it's not the way to go about things, but You know, again in my my circumstance and and at that point in my life, I didn't I didn't have anybody I could talk to about this. I I couldn't talk to parents about this. I was really just trying to figure it out on my own. And yeah, it was really it was a really hard time, r hard point in my life right there. And so to this day I do not I do not let myself restrict food and have this food fear ever. ever. And I never work out to punish myself for food that I ate because I have been down that road and it is not fun. It is not fun. I hate, I hate it when people say, ⁓ I have to work off the the takeout I had last night or I have to work off the pie I had last night because we don't we don't work out to punish our body. We don't we don't restrict food from our life to To punish ourselves. I mean, we shouldn't. We shouldn't. It happens. I've been there. But when I hear that stuff, it really just strikes a nerve with me. And and it it it it's makes me so angry and it makes me sad. And you know, if you're someone who's experienced this or you're current you currently are experiencing this, my heart really does go out to you and I'm just sending you so much love because that's a really hard thing. But just know that you are not alone. And that you can get through it. It's not easy, but you absolutely can. And even if you want to share your experience in the comments, I would really, really love to hear from you. And, you know, that would have helped me so much at that point in my life if I had just somebody to talk to, if I had somebody to to just hear me and see me. So if that's also something you're looking for, I would love to hear from you. So thank guys for tuning in to another episode of the Reformed Tired Girls Club podcast, and I'll see you next week.