A Mother's impact!

A big question that I find a lot of us with any kind of eating disorder asks ourselves is why and how did I turn out like this. You hear about people with EDs and you just think, what the hell is wrong with them. Just stop! Then one day you look in the mirror and that person is now you. You didn't even notice it happening.  It feels like you just woke up one day and this blanet of an ED is smothering you.

I have thought about it for years, what happened to make me like this? When did it happen? Who possibly had such a stong influance over my life to push me, (maybe a little, maybe a lot) to be so insecure, and think that weight and appearance is so important? Some times I feel like trying to 'blame' someone else is the coward's way out. I feel like pointing a finger at someone else is justifying my shameful behavior. The truth is there are many factors that can lead a person to pick up this horrible, painful issue. BUT.........

I have talked to so many ladies that are suffering from some kind of ED or body issues since I have put myself out there, and opened up about my struggle. I have blogged before about how so many women that I may know decent, or just know of them, or even complete strangers have opened up to me about some sort of inner demon they have, and most of them are about their bodies. The one thing that they all have in common is that they have reasons to feel that their mother's have contributed to them developing their insecurities. 

Some of their mothers did it so innocently, like just the constant weighing themselves, talking about dieting, talking about their weight, comments about other women's weight and appearnace, good or bad. Some moms even ate completely different food than what the rest of their family ate. Then there are other mothers who were more intense with pushing their daughters to insecurities. It could be telling them something negative about their appearance, or needing to loose weight. Even joking around about it, sometimes infront of others. There are moms that put their children on diets, put them down if they weren't skinny enough, making them feel less important and loved because they didn't meet up to their standards. 

I see how my relationship with my mother has had certain affects on me, and I know she never meant to give me any insecurities. But for my whole life, and memories of my mother, she constantly complained about her weight. Every morning she would weight herself right before her bath, (she probable still does today). She did weight watchers, and has wrote down her points for the longest time. She probably still does today. Oprah's new way of trying to loose weight was the new plan. On the phone with friends and sisters, complaining about her weight. Insecure of her body at the beach. I never saw her love her body. And my dad would pick on her about any extra weight she would gain. And this whole time, my bother and I were never taught about food control. My brother and I were both chubby, all of our family pets were fat too. We had no restrictions on food. We ate whatever we want, whenever we wanted. My favorite was cereal as I laid in bed. My aunt would make cakes, and I would get all the extra icing in containers to just eat by the spoonful. My brother and I would whip up a batch of cookie dough, just to eat, no baking. I heard about how small she was as a teen, when she was pregnant, and it seemed as if her whole adult life, she was never happy with herself, all because of a few extra lbs. What does that do to a daughter, and a son? Well it definitly teaches you what is important....the wrong things. And as for my brother, he's on the other side of the spectrum. That's a whole other blog. 

So I look back now, and I can connect this as a part of me and what I have become. But that is not the whole reason, and I don't know if I will ever know the whole reason. Sadly I do the same things that she did. I use to weigh myself all the time, had to toss that scale. I know I have talked many times about my weight, or others in front of my kids, thinking they don't pay attention to that. But they do. Since I am diabetic, they do know that certain foods are more unhealthy for me that others, so I use that for healthy talk. I never tell them certain foods will make them gain weight, but I try to use healthy and unhealthy for our bodies talk. But there is such a fine line. I don't want them to ever have an out of control food problem like me, but I also don't want them to have to struggle with their weight. I don't want them to think that size is a factor in how beautiful a person is. 

I don't want them to be me.