It's a "growing" problem with me also...

Oh yeah. Love food....Hate food....Love my body.....Hate my body..... Depends on the day. At least that is the way I was up until 10 years ago. Know what changed me? I went on Paxil and gained 100 pounds. Yup, you read that right...100 pounds! It was awful. So.... I had a choice to either love myself the way I was or... end everything. It took some effort but I learned to love myself no matter what my size was. That is not to say I don't still struggle with weight issues. I do. I want to be thin but for different reasons now.

Food was my coping mechanism when I was going through the abuse. It was my friend, my love, my comfort... It's hard to get rid of that so easily.

This is my "Food" poem. It's ugly. Trigger warning.

Food is a wonderful thing,
a mouth full of sweetness and pleasure
like a mothers breast, it makes me feel
like an infant who knows that she treasured

When pain swells my aching heart
and fear jangles through my body
food tranquilizes me
like a loving mommy and daddy.

And food is a gift that keeps giving
twenty four hours a day
it blankets my body in snowy folds
and hide my curves away.

But on the other hand

have I not sealed up within me
the picture of me in your eyes
pneumatic and helpless and there to be used
not a person: a thing to despise.
a place to act out the filth
that youd rather not know is true
a she-bitch reduced to a silence
that echoes only YOU.

And when that crippled being
whose confidence you crushed
whose separate voice you murdered
whose separate self you snuffed
writhes within my body,
and tries to make herself heard
I bury her under food and flesh
until silence is assured.

It's a problem I've had for years. :(
But I'm slowly trying to work on it. One minute I love my body the next, i think it's the most disgusting thing on earth. The next I'll eat healthy...the next I'm somewhere crying while devouring a few McDoubles from Mcdonalds.

I'm glad to know I am not alone.

Donna W, that is a VERY powerful poem. You have inspired me to give it a try.

I have always acknowledged that I have food /body/weight issues. I haven't ever really looked at it though. It is like a powder keg for me.

My weight has gone up and down over the years ( by up to a hundred pounds at a time)

As I have gotten older the excess weight has become a health issue as well as not allowing me to do things I enjoy.

How do I give up my protector, my best frenemy, my go to coping skill?

I have heard that it simply needs to be replaced with a more positive behavior....says someone who has never really experienced a compulsive, addictive, dog on your back kinda thing.

For me there is so much shame attached to it. It is so hard to REALLY talk about it. I pretend 100 pounds of me doesn't exist. I feel like my body betrayed me or I betrayed my body. The whole subject is just so messy.

Please share whatever you figure out - seriously! I am in exactly the same situation. It's not just the addiction, it's the wall of protection, the physical vulnerability, the fear of acting out without boundaries or being acted upon without boundaries .... I thought martial arts would address my physical fears only to come up against my boundary issues and physical shame in the martial arts context. Plus physical success = rape - that's what the adolescent believes. Guess I have to heal the child before the woman makes any progress with this ... Hope I get that done before advanced age results in health issues. Sorry to hijack your post with a tornado of my own issues!

To me food can be like any other addiction... Especially processed foods or food high in fat, sugar, or salt. Or just feelings associated withbeing empty or full.

I know a survivor who purposely made herself bigger as she felt no one would mess with her if she was fat. She has skewed ideas about health for this reason as well.

I am the opposite, I refuse to be over weight. Or a healthy weight for that matter sometimes. I'll over eat sometimes, painfully so, but i used to make myself sick, now I'll just not eat for days after.

I'll take things to not eat, drink excess amounts of coffee and just drink water, sometimes I've even thought about going back to smoking cigs because it helps you not be hungry... But so do other healthier things. I'm obsessed with nutrition and health, I restrict what I eat but amounts are up and down. I have always had an eating issue of some form, the only time I had a healthy relationship with food I was exercising twice a day at least, and getting underweight so maybe it wasn't the healthiest, but I didn't think about food all the time so that was nice.

There are prescription drugs now if you feel your health is being compromised and the benefits of drug therapy out weigh the risks. I do think there are ways to be more mindful and in control of eating habits, and finding substitutes and peace, but it's like overcoming any attachment or addiction, or making huge lifestyle changes, it's hard to stick to but possible. Your health matters.

Donna - Excellent Poem. I can relate to it so well.

Cecil - there is hope. I have finally come to a point in my healing process where I understand the link between repressing my emotions and eating. I always noticed that after I unloaded lots of feelings that I felt lighter and didn't feel the need to engulf myself in the comforting effects of food. But even though I noticed it that didn't mean I stopped eating. It has come from lots and lots of un-crapping (my techie term for therapy) that I no longer need the coping mechanism any more.

There were also many times during the healing process when I allowed myself to eat everything in sight because I understood it was still my coping mechanism. I guess you could say I found other ways to cope because I dealt with the emotions by letting them out in the form of crying, screaming and punching. When I did that - I didn't need the food. But... the habit of eating remains. That will be my next thing to tackle.

Hi Love Singer,

I remember the days of no eating. I actually got to the point I was unable to swallow. Obviously I have "recovered" from that.

Do you think your food issues are about control?

Hi Lucky,
I think for me there is an instant gratification element to it as well.
After my sexual abuse started at 8 I began over eating. I would eat until the point of vomiting. Of course my parents never intervened.

If i am remembering correctly I felt like food was the only thing i could call mine...vague needy feeling....hard to think about.

I also would eat until I felt like I would throw up but since I have a phobia about thowing up I never did. One time I mentiond to my therapist that these urges would come over me and she asked "what part of you is trying to punish you". I was surprised when she said this because I never thought of it as I was punishing myself so I really paid attention the next time and the feeling was "I deserve this. I deserve to be sick". I was stunned.

I never had enough food and they did all they could to keep me skinny and when I did eat I had junk food to eat which kept me hiper and on a sugar high of sorts. So whenever I had candy I would eat and eat. Chocolate and eat to much. I think subconsciously out of survival . Burying feelings. I took me along time to realize that it is ok to have an opinon or have someone be mad at me without them hurting me . I do not hate myself anymore. God is given me a new name and a new beginning I call it. God is so good and his saving grace is awesome and he is redeeming my life a piece at a time. John 3:16 "For God so loved the world , that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoover believeth in him should not perish , but have everlasting life."

You hit the nail on the head....." I have the eating habits of an unsupervised child. "

I am the exact same way. I is so crazy !!!!

"The eating habits of an unsupervised child" Brilliant...this is the case for me at the moment...I am on Prednisone for some medical issues, and weight gain is just a fact of Prednisone, and there is a little part inside of me who feels free to eat whatever and as much, whenever, because we are gaining weight with the Prednisone anyway...

However, I have in the past, during intense periods of therapy, gained weight on purpose, to make myself look what I considered unattractive and therefore less likely to get assaulted again.

I hate weight/food issues...I quit smoking, don't mind not drinking b/c of all my meds, but you can't quit food.

Thanks for posting this...I had no idea so many people has similar issues

Best, Anna

Welcome to the ups and downs. I have lost so much weight by using a nutribullet, but I think this is a very common them with sexual assault victims. It's "if you're bigger, then no one wants you" idea. Society (on TV and magazines) says that if you are bigger that you are "undesirable". So we feel safer if we are bigger. But that's actually not what sexual assault or rape is about. It's about power, perversions. The man who went after me sexually when I was a 5 year old tiny little girl, ALSO went after his own mother when she was old, very heavy, grey haired and bed ridden and unable to fight him off. It's about power and control.
As of now- I am still a chunky lady- I used to be about a 100 pounds heavier- but I'm happy with my curves now. I'm not even close to pencil thin and probably never will be, but I have learned to like my body now. I am pretty, even if I do have some extra padding. It's so cold here right now, you need it anyway. :).
But I've stayed away from McDonalds- they are the devil- and GMOs. They say that eating healthy costs more but if you eliminate buying as much meat and more vegetables, then you are spending less anyway. :) be happy, be healthy, and be you! You don't have to come in a size 2. I remember being a size 8, and guess what? I was unhappy, I still had flashbacks and nightmares. Size has nothing to do with it. Go for health and forget the rest! BE AMAZING, BE BEAUTIFUL, AND BE YOU!