Read an Excerpt

Love or Diet

Learn to Nurture Yourself and Release the Need to be Comforted by Food

John Hunt Publishing Ltd.

CHAPTER 1

Become a keeper of your inner life through journaling

Throughout this book you will see this symbol: * which represents an invitation for you to write about your inner landscape: your feelings, emotions, physical sensations and thoughts. Often we go through life trapped in our thinking, we become walking heads, we miss the moment, we dream, we catastrophize, we let our minds run riot with scenarios and we wind ourselves up into a frenzy of mental activity.

Keeping a journal is a way to ground ourselves into the here and now. It is a way for us to record our inner experience and bring awareness to our thoughts, feelings and observations, which might have previously remained fairly unconscious. Journaling is creative expression; it is a deep way to contact our wisest Self, our deepest, innermost being. Journaling can bring personal insight and with that we can take steps toward change and growth. Writing down our thoughts can also be cathartic, a way to release past hurts or painful emotions, it can open us up and shows us a depth we didn't know existed.

A few pointers:

* Buy yourself a journal that really 'speaks' to you. It might be really glittery and fancy or it might be plain, elegant or grungy. The paper might be lined, unlined, have margins or borders. Go with your gut and don't listen to the critical voice which may show up saying things like 'this is stupid,' 'that's too expensive,' 'this one is way too girlie,' 'this one is too exuberant, choose something simple,' 'that's way too plain, you're supposed to choose something funky.' Just take a deep breath, look at a variety of journals and reach out for the one that feels like you!

* Choose a pen that is delicious to write with, or buy a pack of colored pens – you can write in any color and any size. Doodling, drawing, sticking are all allowed in journals. You do whatever you like within those pages!

* This is a chance for you to be fearlessly honest with yourself. The pages do not need to be shared with anyone. That choice is yours. If you are worried about someone finding the journal can you think of a safe space to store it? If you are really concerned you could keep your journal electronically in a password-protected document. Personally I feel that writing a journal by hand is more expressive and creative, there is something more powerful about writing by hand; however if that isn't an option then write freely electronically with the spell-checker off and don't worry about grammar or formatting. You need to feel safe to write without fear.

* If you are finding the process challenging and difficult to cope with then stop. Speak to a trusted friend or seek some help from a counselor or therapist. Keep yourself feeling safe and supported.

* Write every day. Take time for yourself, pause, breathe and write. It doesn't matter how long you write for, it matters just that you write regardless of the parts of you that say it is a waste of time; acknowledge those voices and write anyway.

* Write about anything and everything: dreams, insights, problems, joys, images, feelings, events, people, places, wildlife. Whatever comes into your heart and mind. Journaling is a great way to set up a dialogue between the mind and the heart, it gets out of our heads and into a creative, expressive state. The one thing I urge you to always do is write a gratitude list for the day – I write more about why this is important later on.

* Enjoy the process! It isn't a test, you cannot do it wrong.

CHAPTER 2

My journey, the path as I see it now

The thing about memories is that they are subjective. We tend not to look back and see just the facts; we see a story, have feelings about the events and often give our own meanings to what we remember. The feelings and meanings come with us into the now and can impact us profoundly in the present; the memory is here with us, not stuck somewhere in the past (this is why the mystics and sages tell us there is only now, no past and no future). Looking back at the past and investigating our memories with a non-judgmental and open mind can be very healing; we might shed new light on an event and find healing in that way. Often with maturity we can look at memories with a 360 degree view, taking in the whole situation, the other people involved, how they might have felt, how their past may have impacted them and perhaps we will find compassion or a new set of eyes for seeing things with – all of this can bring sweet peace to us; we are free to re-write our story.

So, for now, this is my story as I see it. Here I include how I felt at the time and how I see things now. Looking back has helped me to understand where certain patterns came from and why I sometimes act the way I do. This understanding has meant I have been able to build support for myself in certain areas and have learned how to change my thinking and my reactions. It all takes time and I am certainly learning, growing and changing all the time!

Looking back at my childhood now I can see and appreciate that I was deeply, deeply loved. The blessed relationship I have with my mum and dad today is truly cherished, we have all grown, changed, become more conscious and are closer than ever. There is a true love between us all. For my part, I can see that this is testament to the inner work that I have done, the psychological and spiritual healing I have undertaken. I can look back now with no blame and with a healed and loving heart. There has been so much that I have learned over the years. It took me a good 10-12 years to reach this place of clarity and peace with the past and my continued conscious growth is a cherished, daily freedom, a lived and continuous journey. As the sages say, 'once you are awake you can never go back to sleep.'

When I look back, I can see that as a child I never remember feeling very close to my parents, I remember loving my mum so much and wanting her constant attention and her love but not feeling like I was really seen. My dad went away a lot on business for long stretches of time. He worked tirelessly to support our family, but as a child I didn't understand that. Mum was alone with my older brother, my younger sister and me. It must have been exceptionally tough and lonely for her. With the wisdom of age and growth, I understand my childhood in an entirely different way, but back then; I just remember desperately wanting affection and attention. I took on 'the good girl,' pleaser, mentality very early on, being mummy's little helper, always wanting to do what I could to be useful. At school I strived to be the best pupil, the helpful one, the 'teachers-pet.' Part of this early mindset involved food. I remember being praised for my clean plate, good appetite and lack of fussiness when it came to eating. I internalized not being fussy, clearing my plate and being helpful with being loveable.

My ideas about how loveable I was were very black and white, very conditional. I didn't believe that I was unconditionally loveable. If I was 'good,' helpful, quiet, polite and well mannered, then I was loveable (I might even go to heaven). If I was 'bad,' spoke back, was fussy, showed anger, then I was unlovable, unseen, nothing, a sinner (and perhaps I was destined for hell) – and in a child's mind that is very frightening.

As I grew up, it became my mission to be unconditionally loving toward other people, I didn't yet believe I was unconditionally loveable myself but I did believe that everyone else was. The problem was, I didn't know that unconditional love does have physical and psychological safety boundaries – so during my late teenage and early adult years I allowed myself to be a doormat, I was naive and I had no balance. Looking back I see that I was desperate to be loved unconditionally, to be cherished even when I made mistakes – but the problem was I didn't unconditionally love myself, so I kept drawing unhealthy situations to me because I didn't believe I deserved better. Pointing the finger or blaming anyone, including myself, is not what I want to do here – that is a sure-fire way to self-destruction, pity and resentment. Relationship and friendship dynamics are a complex phenomenon and they evolve and change as we evolve and grow. What I have chosen to do is learn the lessons from the past and remember the love.

Anyway, I have digressed, so back to the story. Each of us begins to use food as a support system for different reasons. Early on in my life, food wasn't my 'thing.' I wasn't fussy with food and I didn't raid cupboards as a child. I ate what was on my plate with relish and gusto. As I mentioned, I do remember feeling proud that I was 'the good girl' who ate what she was given and was praised for not being fussy with food. Much later on, in my 20s, when untangling my eating issues with a therapist and in my own process, I realized that the early unconscious pattern did impact me and that I associated eating food with being praised and loved. However, until the age of about 13, I didn't really think about food, not consciously anyway. Body size/shape was something I had no concept of, we didn't watch much TV at home and my mum didn't read women's magazines, so I was spared that as a child. I spent a lot of time playing in the garden with my older brother and younger sister.

When I began secondary school, an all girls' school, I was horribly bullied. Sensitive and intelligent, I was labeled as 'nerdy.' For weeks at a time I was off school with illnesses that were medically real but which I am sure occurred due to the stress and torment I was going through (but not telling anyone because I didn't want to cause problems or trouble). Still, at this time I had no problems with food, probably because I was socially isolated. When I was around 12 years old my mum began work as a teacher, after having been a stay at home parent. She wasn't home when I got home from school and I started to help with cooking the evening meals. Again this slotted into my pattern of wanting to be helpful, to be recognized and loved. Cooking soon developed into being a creative passion for me and I found that I actually had a natural flair in the kitchen, following recipes and improvising with ingredients too.

My steady, healthy, relationship with food and eating changed when I was about 13/14. Finally I had found some friends at school and I was relieved and grateful to be free of my bullies and accepted by three lovely girls. However, being part of a friendship circle catapulted me into the world of teenaged girls and dieting. Unknowingly, the bullies had 'protected' me and kept me separate from the world of food and image issues. Suddenly I learned that 90% of my classmates were on diets, including my three new friends (one of whom was bulimic); the other 10% were the sporting heroes and had athletic bodies that were revered.

Almost overnight I decided I needed to lose weight, but I had no idea about dieting so I did nothing about it apart from listen to my friends talk. Then, a few weeks after meeting my friends, I got sick with a really nasty stomach bug that was going around the school. The chronic diarrhea and sickness, coupled with my inability to consume anything more than water and a bit of soup, meant that my weight fell. I personally didn't notice, I was too busy being unwell.

The pivotal moment came when I overheard a conversation between my mum and someone whom I loved and trusted very much. My mum had expressed concern over the amount of weight I'd lost and this trusted individual, probably in order to just stop my mum from worrying said, 'don't worry, she's getting better now and more able to eat, the weight she has lost is not the end of the world, she was starting to get a bit plump anyway.' WOW. I had never thought of myself as plump. I was only 13 and was showing signs of going into puberty; I am guessing I had begun to develop hips and a bum. I certainly don't think I was in any way 'plump.' That comment stuck in my mind, again there is no blame here but children can be incredibly susceptible to so-called throwaway comments that they overhear.

* You may well have overheard many comments yourself and taken them to heart, internalized them and brought them with you as you grew into an adult.

After the sickness bug had left me, my natural feelings of hunger had returned. However, I decided to squash those hunger pangs and continue on with my water and soup, after-all it had helped me to lose weight. The hunger that I felt was intense but I somehow rode out those pains and each time I did eat a tiny amount of food, I began to feel guilt and shame, feelings I had never associated with food before. These feelings now seemed inextricably linked with food, and it would take me years of noticing and awareness before I could dismantle them and see food as food. That was it; I had begun to obsessively cut my food intake. I also began to take more notice of the diet conversations at school and I took more control over the kitchen at home – cooking elaborate meals for the family, which I didn't eat. My passion for cooking remained but I no longer allowed myself to enjoy my creations. After years of secret shame, I can now openly admit that I also made myself sick. My menstrual periods didn't begin until I was almost 16, I had no body fat to be able to produce hormones, still I had no idea how thin I was and I believed I needed to be thinner in order to be accepted and loved.

The world felt overwhelming to me at the best of times. As a sensitive introvert I just wanted to hide out by myself. From a very early age I felt quite a connection to The Mystery, the Divine, my spirituality, but it felt like I had no one to talk to about that. Having a body felt strange to me, I wanted to fly and have the feelings I had in my quiet times, the feeling of being held by something greater than me, but that was me and consumed me all at the same time. It was, and is, ineffable. Being hungry and underweight gave me feelings of being 'high' and without a body. That was a feeling I enjoyed. It felt safe, safer than being out there in the world.

At age 16, I changed schools and my food obsession quietened down, though I was still eating small portions. My obsession changed toward academic success. I did well in my A levels and went on to University, my first time living away from home. My aim was to get a first class honors degree. I wanted to prove that I was intelligent, worthy of life I guess. Working hard, I pushed myself, I got sick with a virus and then post-viral fatigue and lupus spectrum disorder (though that wasn't diagnosed until years later). However tired I was, I just couldn't seem to stop pushing myself. I did get my first class honors degree and in the process I gained an obsession with exercise and fitness as well. However, I also picked up a deep insight and passion for nutrition and health and went on to get my masters degree in nutritional medicine. Looking back, I can see that life was leading me toward where I am now.

After finishing my studies, I moved into Central London and began working as a self-employed nutrition writer, which I loved. However, I was quite isolated and hadn't really dealt with my past issues and kept going through bouts of worry about my shape and size, which was really just anxiety about deep hurts over other issues that I had squashed down. My confidence was low and I just had no love for myself. I was in pain and going through immense agoraphobia and internal distress, which I managed to hide from everyone.

A vital part of my own journey involved learning to love and care for myself, to have self-compassion and to really believe in my own right to happiness. Loving my precious self was something I always knew was important, deep down I wanted it but I wasn't sure I was allowed. Did I have permission? Wasn't it selfish to love and nurture myself? How would I even go about changing my patterns in order to love all of who I was? I was sure that people in my life would decide to leave me if I started to deeply love myself (and yes, some of them did leave).

In the past I was Ani, the girl who would do anything and everything for people she knew. 'No' was not something I knew how to say, I hadn't learned how to have boundaries and assertiveness was not in my personal dictionary. I was a give, give, giver and a do, do doer. My relationships with men were unhealthy. Many of my friendships were not authentic and I had a job where I was continually depleting myself. Being a 'good person' and a 'people pleaser' was my, somewhat unconscious, self-imposed label. The thing about self-imposed labels is that we can bust out of them when we choose to; it can cause a bit of a tidal wave amongst people who don't want you to change and grow, but it is worth it!
(Continues...)

---

Excerpted from Love or Diet by Ani Richardson. Copyright © 2013 Ani Richardson. Excerpted by permission of John Hunt Publishing Ltd..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---