"I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well."
-Psalm 139:14
Pictures can do more than just hang on the wall. They can tell a story, the journey of a person's life, or say a thousand words. All you must do is take a moment to simply just look. Now that you know what a picture can do, what do you see in this picture?
Let me tell you a story of how you can start a healthy lifestyle change and end up in a dark place.
Her therapist is driving them to Chick-Fil-A. This wasn't in the plan for the day: the calories have been counted; the food has been made - she cannot drink a milkshake. Oh, how wonderful a milkshake sounds! A peach milkshake from Chick-Fil-A is the best! No one can make them better. But how on earth can she sit there and drink one now? The food for the day was planned, a milkshake wasn't in the plan. No, she can not drink one. When was the last time she had one? She can't even remember the taste - oh how she longs to drink one again. It was one of her favorite things to get in the summertime. But now, even the thought of holding one is sending her into a panic. She is shaking, sweating, and her heart feels as if it's going to jump out of her skin. No, there is no way she could ever drink one again. The closer they get the more the panic sets in. The next thing she knows her therapist is ordering two small peach milkshakes. So many calories in such a small cup. She needs to get out of the car but there is no way out, she is stuck. As she handles the cup she can feel the coldness, smell the peaches, and see the calories. All she has to do is take one small sip, that's easy, right? The more she looks at the drink the more she wants to throw up. She has to get out of the car. But there is no way out. As they pull back into the office building, she is ready to bolt, to run, and never look back. All because of one simple little milkshake.
Now as you read that maybe you don't understand where this is coming from. Maybe you can drink a milkshake and not even think about the calories. Oh, what a life you must have to be able to simply enjoy the food you eat. If you can't or don't understand, let me tell you a story of how I ended up in the scenario above.
In 2015 I started a healthy lifestyle change thinking I could learn to love myself if I was simply just skinny. I went on this journey to learn to eat healthy, cook, be active and be able to do God's work. I was tired of being the fat girl, I was tired of being tired.
But what I never dreamed would happen, happened in a blink of an eye. I became obsessed with food, tracking calories, working out, and making sure I would never gain another pound. I can tell you the number of calories in almost every food. I became obsessed with food to the point I would no longer eat more than 1,000 calories a day. Gaining one pound scared me so much that I took my work out to the extreme. Instead of working out for an hour a day, I would work out for hours making sure I burned the calories I consumed for the day. Working out became an addiction.
Along with the addiction of working out, food became the controller of my life. My world revolved around food. Food controlled my life to the point that if my food was already planned and someone asked me out for dinner I would not go. If I was even one calorie over, I would end up working out for hours. During the day my calories would be at the forefront of my mind, making me wonder if I would gain my weight back. Gaining weight scared me so badly that I stopped enjoying food and stopped eating things I loved. Just as the story above illustrates, milkshakes had become a fear for me. I know that sounds crazy, scared of a milkshake. How can someone fear something so simple? But here I sit scared to drink something I love, all because I do not want to gain weight.
Every day calories are part of my life from the smallest pieces of fruit to the last meal of the day. It simply started as wanting to get healthy, to lose weight so that I could do more work for God, and simply love myself. I longed for the day to be able to look at myself in the mirror and say, "You are beautiful". I thought once the weight was gone, I would be able to love myself. But that is not the case - you must learn to love yourself from the inside out.
When I look in the mirror, I do not see someone who is a size small. I still see that woman who was 245 pounds. I know in my head what I weigh but I do not see that weight. For most of my life, I was the fat girl. Even from an early age I would be teased, bullied, and told no man would ever want to date me. As I have grown into a young adult, I have learned to believe that I was not beautiful simply by hearing that from many people that would cross my path. I have learned to hate my body and cover the mirrors in my life. I have learned to hide behind the camera, make jokes "I can break your camera", and tell myself I will never be beautiful.
Beautiful means attractive, pretty, good-looking, pleasing, lovely, delightful, gorgeous, etc. I could go on with the different synonyms for the word beautiful, but I think you get the point. Out of all these words, I feel none of them. I feel nothing which to me equals ugly. I can't remember the last time I looked at myself and thought "you are beautiful". When I look in the mirror, I see a few things. I see a fat, ugly, fat-legged, short person looking back at me. I have lost over 100 pounds and still can't see that in the mirror. I long for the day to see what God sees, for He made me, and He does not make anything ugly. So why can't I see what God sees? The Bible even tells us that God made us beautiful. "You are Beautiful for you are Fearfully and Wonderfully Made." -Psalm 139:14. So why can't I believe that?
I have allowed the enemy to plant lies in my head. Letting him tell me that I am worthless. But that is just a lie. God does not believe any of us are worthless, that is far from the truth. God made each one of us in His image. God does not make ugly things and he does not make mistakes. The next time the enemy comes at you with lies, remember you are a child of God. Know that you were formed by God's hands, dreamed up in His heart, and placed in this world for a purpose.
What started as a simple goal ended up controlling my life. Changing from a healthy lifestyle too restrictive anorexia nervosa. The praise I received for my weight loss has helped to maintain my eating disorder. This doesn't mean the people who praised me were in the wrong, it was how I was taking the praise. I thought I was only receiving praise because I'm becoming skinny, and I won't be that fat girl anymore. I was ready to lose the title of fat girl, but I was not ready for the title of an eating disorder.
I have learned that if I can change my relationship with my body then I can change my relationship with food. We all deserve to enjoy food, exercise and have a life that doesn't revolve around these things. God does not want your world to revolve around these things, God wants you to stay focused on Him. The more I would focus on food and exercise the less time I had with God. Which means the enemy had more time to fill my head with lies of how unworthy I was. To stop the lies from coming I need to focus on God. With God that is how I will overcome this eating disorder.
But this eating disorder does not define who I am. For my worth is found in God, not the enemy. Because whenever I feel unloved, unimportant, or insecure, I remember to whom I belong. For I am a daughter of God. I am worthy of being loved not because of my looks, my beauty, or my charm, but because God made me precious. So precious that He even died for my sins. We must remember that we have someone standing beside us that is stronger than the one standing against us. It does not matter what size you are, loving what God created is what matters. We need to be able to look in the mirror and see what God sees.
The next time the enemy comes at you telling you that you are not beautiful, remember you were made by God, He created you without mistake, and no one can take value away from what God makes.
"You are beautiful there is no flaw in you"
-Song of Solomon 4:7
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