Feeling my emotions

Feelings. Emotions. According to comedians, men don't have them and women have a plethora. Well, I'm a woman and I am working hard on allowing myself to having feelings and emotions. See, a big part of binge eating disorder is an inability to deal with what is emotionally going on in your life, and so you turn to food to help quell the fear, pain, sadness, anxiety, etc. Even I can logically see that binging doesn't address or solve whatever problem or emotion causes me to eat a tremendous amount of food. But, when I don't know how (or don't believe I have a right) to access my emotions, how else do I deal with a situation?

Since September, but really in the past month I have been working on allowing myself to feel life and to express my emotions. For instance, I messed up with a friend, took responsibility for my actions once I was made aware that I had messed up and apologized multiple times via email and in person. My friend didn't speak to me for about a week. I felt horrible for what I had said, which embarrassed and upset her, and I was full of angst over it. I talked to my husband about it and I cried and when I felt like binging I asked myself why I wanted to eat. This caused me to acknowledge that I was hurting and to give myself permission to hurt.

It's a weird concept, letting myself feel sadness and hurt and longing. It's sometimes very hard for me to figure out what I feel. A few nights ago my husband, on a business trip, called and as he was talking I got angry. I didn't understand why or where this anger was coming from, but it washed all over me. In the past I would have picked a fight (and I almost did this time, but he called me out on it and asked, "Are you trying to start a fight?"). I told him that I didn't understand why I was angry, but I was and needed to figure it out, so I'd call him back later. An hour later I called back because what I realized was that his call had interrupted my first blog, which was stirring up all sorts of emotions. I needed to finish blogging to restore equilibrium, and then I could call and talk. In the past, if a wave of negative emotion washed over me it would lead to a fight or to me feeling guilty for almost starting a fight or me feeling alienated because of the conversation. I would not have dealt with any of those feelings. I would have gone straight to the kitchen and started eating. This ability to step back, allow myself to feel something, try to figure out what I feel and then to take appropriate action, is all ridiculously new to me.

This new-found vulnerability is actually good for me. I think that I'm finding that the more vulnerable I am, the nicer my husband is (or maybe I'm just better able to see what has always been there). For the first 9 years of our marriage I would not have ever thought that could be the case. My husband is very logical and I thought that to be a better person (maybe even in the hopes that he would love/like me more) I worked on being more logical. Except, I was unable to be logical without killing my emotions when interacting with him. And when I almost completely killed my emotions, I felt even worse about myself, him, and our relationship. It was a vicious cycle that was leading me to eat more and more--part of me was screaming at him to notice how miserable I was, but I wasn't actually telling him any of this. It's hard for people to read minds and since I binged in secret and quickly replaced what I ate, it's not as if he saw this downward spiral firsthand. What made a difference for me was twofold. 1) He cut down on his traveling and it became very obvious that he was doing this so he could be home with me because that is important to me. 2) I felt God tell me, while I was praying, that I should make our house a home for my husband. I got the sense that this meant keeping things tidy and having food prepared. That kind of household stuff never seemed to affect him positively or negatively, but I did it. I think that it served two purposes. It showed my husband that I was trying to do something to make him more comfortable and in the process of doing it, I started to get in touch with my own emotions.

So, here I am feeling things. It's weird and it's sometimes scary. I still have to give myself permission to feel. But in taking this big step, I really seem to be helping curb my binges. For that, I'm grateful.