Daniel has Asperger’s Syndrome, Daniel will be 16 in July of 2008.
Again and again, I must be willing to bring my heart authentically to the Lord. I realize that what is here in these more recent blog entries, may jar many people who have a certain view of me, of my journey, of how a Christian *should* think, feel, act…
But the truth is, God has shown me that, at the heart of my journey to be free from obsessions regarding food, eating, my body, there must be an authentic willingness to admit my feelings to Him. To bring to Him the thoughts with which I struggle. When I am mad at Him, disappointed in Him, when I feel this sense that He has done wrong against me (even though God can do no wrong). He already *knows* how I feel. Denying how I feel just keeps me in chains, in captivity. As I admit to Him what I feel, He can clean it up and out. He will root out the cancer of bitterness before it becomes that defilement that Hebrews speaks of.
To say “Christians don’t feel that way” is to deny truth. Satan is the Father of lies. I believe that by being honest and presenting these heartaches to the Lord and sharing them here with you, my healing takes place. God can handle it when I complain to Him, when I rail on Him. He is perfectly able to defend Himself to me, so please don’t email me about how God can do no wrong and how sinful and incorrect I am for having these thoughts. God has called me to bring these thoughts *to* Him and to allow Him to work. We have been here before and I imagine we will be here again. And my horse, Harley, has often been the vehicle God has used to show me that we have this issue percolating again (go figure). (Maybe that is why I am considering selling Harley, in fact…because it is TOO painful to have this in my face every few months!)
So the words I share here are shared with trepidation and hesitance. I don’t want to do anything to fuel another’s rebellion against God. Please don’t use my confessions to justify resisting the Lord. If He calls you to face into your own truthful perceptions and mis-perceptions about Him and His character as He is calling to me, please allow Him to do it. Pleaes respond to His call. Tell Him how you feel. He can take it. I believe what he will not abide is our pretense. We insult Him when we pretend all is well and piously say “God is good all the time, all the time God is good” when inwardly we are screaming “WHY???” and shaking our fists at Him. It is my conviction that God wants us to bring our heartaches, anger, disappointment and shaking fists to Him…He will meet us where we are. He brings a heart of love, of compassion, and, yes, of holiness. He will straighten what is crooked, fix what is broken, mend what is torn, heal what is hurting, rebuke what needs rebuking, too. It is true. But how can we grow if we deny we have these feelings? How can I grow if I deny that these thoughts have resurfaced?
Anyhow, I hope something in this lengthy disclosure can minister to your heart…or to the heart of a friend of yours that you know needs to hear…Christians–even those in leadership–even those who love the Lord, know His Word–those who have been in ministry for decades–even those who God uses to write books! (HA!)–even those Christians have challenges they must identify and bring to the Lord. Like the hemorrhaging woman, I am falling in the dust, clinging to the hem of Jesus’ garment…for only a taste of His power to remove this bleeding of my heart. He will do it.
Here are some thoughts, some from an email to a friend…edited…that I hope might encourage others. I am really in a season of processing this…again. I keep needing to return here. Go figure. I long for redemption…
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If I am not at peace with Daniel’s “stuff” be it real and permanent, real and temporary, or in my head or whatever else, then I frankly am not at peace with God being God. This is the crux of all of my eating issues and, frankly, all of life for me.
Daniel has what doctors call a “developmental disorder.” Even the label flies in the face of the character of God. 1 Corinthians 14:33 says: “For God is not a God of disorder but of peace.” So where does that leave us when God formed and created Daniel in the womb and he has what man, anyhow, calls a “disorder?” This makes no sense to me. (Obviously, one answer is that GOD does NOT call it a “disorder!” I cling to that hope right now as I edit my words here!)
God has made Daniel autistic…he is incapable of being aware and sensitive of others’ needs and emotions. He is, by nature, self-centered and can’t possibly understand the “otherness” of other people (which is one aspect of autism).
If God would create my son this way, then how on earth can I trust God with other things in my life, let alone something that seems so relatively insignificant as my eating? Don’t get me wrong. I love Daniel dearly. But the fact is, life isn’t likely to ever be for him what it is for “normal” young men. No, I don’t know his future, I realize, but so many things are stacked against him. Why would God choose to do that to him–at birth? And why assign him a mother who has NO resources upon which to draw? (Yes, I know God enables and equips me–in theory–but how much better it would be, it seems, to call upon someone who is a nurturer by nature already, who was raised by a loving, compassionate mother, who had a decent example of living as a servant for others!)
It is hard for me, in light of these things, to believe God at His Word…”Open wide your mouth and I will fill it.” How can He nourish my soul, my heart, my neediness, when at the very heart of who I am, I feel as though He has kicked me in the teeth and my child, too? If I can’t trust God with my CHILDREN, the really important things in life…then where does that leave these other things? Like eating?
For me, accepting my child’s “truth”–my “truth”–is at the heart of all of this eating and body image stuff. Sounds crazy, but it is connected. It isn’t just about “emotional eating” when I get thinking about this. For me, it is much more involved and deep than that. And this is what I had to begin to deal with before the eating thing (and a host of other things) could be put into perspective back in November of 2006. And this is also why, when I have a meal eaten in rebellion, I know to stop and evaluate, “Who do I need to forgive?” Sometimes the answer is God.
It is still a process. Every now and then, God and I dialog this way about it, He brings the truth home to me (very lovingly and tenderly), and I work through it with Him, ultimately, surrendering my objections. Then, I am at peace again. I am able to recognize it now, when the objections emerge, and I dialog with Him about it–it makes a big difference.
I tried to avoid these heart challenges for a long time, not wanting to recognize I had an issue with God being God…and one way of avoiding it was to try to focus on anything else, including losing weight, of “giving the food thing to God.” Truthfully, that was avoidance via performance…I kept pointing at my attempts to do what God wanted with regard to food and my body and earnestly say “See? God? I am working on this…” and I think somehow I felt like it would “convince” God…that I was “ok”…but I reasoned that if God would give me a son who is “disordered” that it was a punishment (I know in my head this isn’t true) and that God would give Daniel a Mom like me…that, too, seems so wrong. Thus, my need to “forgive” God. I had the most dysfunctional upbringing that parenting even a “normal” child would be a challenge…I was running from facing into what I had to face into and daily still need to:
“God is God and I am not.”
He showed me that, for a season, all my attempts to lose weight and let go of out-of-control eating were just another way of avoiding His call to allow Him to help me with what was at the ROOT of my “issues.” My lack of faith, my rejection of God as God, my insistence that God “behave.” He isn’t a tame lion…he will blow the lid off of all my boxes.
When I returned to the Thin Within “approach” in Nov. 2006, God specifically said, “First, I want this taken care of…” It was challenging, but it turned things around. I still have to work to walk in humility with this (not doing so well right now, as you can see). I simply do not fathom his ways…and sometimes that ticks me off. 🙁
I keep hoping that God will use my story in some way…the uglier part of it…to reach out to someone else who feels disconnected from Him…maybe angry, numb, unbearably disappointed in God…and that maybe the ugliness of who I am and have been and how He is working with me faithfully on that…maybe it can bring hope. About more than weight loss. Weight loss really is so *unimportant* when it comes to this stuff…but about reconciliation, restoration…with Abba…
Lord, you alone know what your purposes are for pairing Daniel and me together. I still can’t pretend that I understand how, as you wove him together in my womb, you chose to weave him in such a way that he would have so many challenges. That *I* would have challenges in providing him what he needs. Lord, I fear *ruining* him…messing up his entire life…all because you paired me with him…it doesn’t seem fair that he wouldn’t have a wonderful loving nurturing mom who is able to believe the best, structure Daniel’s life for success. All my baggage, Lord…it stands in the way of opening my arms wide to your provision for this situation. Lord, help me to release what is familiar. It doesn’t serve your divine purposes. Lord I want to be who you want me to be for Daniel. Please help me to let go of my unmet needs, my expectations, my disappointments. Lord, I am disappointed in you. I confess this. I am disappointed that after all these years, I still haven’t experienced the infusion of the “Good Mom Gene.” Something that would enable me to be that loving, nurturing person that all kids need, let alone those who feel the world is out to get them. Lord, I bring this to you today. In honesty, I offer it here at the blog where I am really hanging myself out to be quite vulnerable, to be rebuked by people who are well-meaning, but feel my theology is wrong. Lord protect me. Help them to see any truth in their own lives…and heal us all, Lord. You can take all of who we are and redeem it all. I offer myself to you. Jesus died for my sin and my shame and I am covered with both today. I offer this to you as well. In the Name of my Savior, Shepherd, Lord and King, Amen.
This morning, during my quiet time, I turned to Stormie Omartian’s book, The Prayer That Changes Everything. I often use this book to help me focus some praying time on praising God, using the sample prayers and verses to pray in a way that focuses my heart and mind on lifting God up and bowing humbly before Him. I don’t usually take time to reread any of the chapters in the book. But today, I noticed that my book mark was in the chapter on suffering loss, disappointment, or failure and knew it was more than a “coincidence.” My eyes fell on two paragraphs. Both were highlighted and one had the word “horses” written in the margin next to it. …no… definitely *not* a coincidence.
I want to share what I read there.
Can you think of a situation in your life when things didn’t turn out the way you thought they would, and it was such a source of painful disappointment that you were devastated? A time when you had big dreams or expectations about something, someone, or some situation, and then you were painfully disappointed when it didn’t happen?
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The only way to survive these times of great loss, disappointment, or failure and see a reversal in what is happening is to surrender them to God, lift your heart and hands to Him, and praise Him in the midst of it all. Thank Him tht He is all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing, all-seeing, all-caring, and all-encompassing. Thank Him that he is sovereign and knows the end from the beginning. What we see as going wrong is often God’s opportunity to do something great in our life. Our disappointments, losses, and failures don’t have to destroy our future. When we worship Him, we invite Him to rule instead. When we praise Him in our failure, He uses transforming power to work redemption and restoration in our life. He is a Redeemer and can redeem our greatest disappointments…*
Last night, I read my blog entry to my husband. As I read the part about what I wanted from Harley, I knew that what I wanted from Harley and from Daniel both…is …”to be normal.” What a heart ache this is to me. And it bothers me that it bothers me. I know that perhaps Harley’s role in my life is to continue to bring to the surface the truth about what I struggle with relative to Daniel. In fact, one line that I didn’t include in my quote from Stormie Omartian’s book above…the last one in the second paragraph I quoted says, “We will never be disappointed in Him.” Now I don’t know about Stormie, but I have been disappointed with God a million times. Perhaps I have no business feeling that way. Perhaps admitting that makes me among the dregs of Christian society. But God already knows how I feel. I can’t hide it from Him. He can take it, too. Frankly, I don’t think an entire book called Disappointment With God could be written or purchased by enough Christians to keep it being published if others didn’t feel this way. Admitting it is the difficult thing.
Lord, I offer you my disappointment this day. You know my heart feels so numb. So detached, so uninvolved…so…hindered. I feel dead in my heart. Please revive me. I confess that I have always been disappointed that Daniel isn’t “normal,” and I guess I thank you that Harley keeps reminding me that a lack of “normal” *offends* me…disappoints me. Lord, as warped as it sounds, I choose to forgive Daniel for not being “normal,” and Harley for being…well…Harley, too. You have created both of them. While my commitment to and love for Daniel is vastly different from my commitment and love for Harley, I know there are some parallels. Please don’t let me miss what you want me to see. Do you want me to become the person I need to for Harley? Will that somehow help me to become what I must be for Daniel, for…you, Lord? I need you so desparately. Not just to show me this answer, Lord, but then if it is to persevere with Harley to rise to the call of leadership…and to help me cease being so passive with Harley and with Daniel…and in life generally, Lord. I sure don’t like the things I have seen surface, Lord. Please forgive me for my arrogance, pride, independence. Please forgive me for hardening my heart all of yesterday when I should have prayed more to you, confessed my constantly thinking about food to you…and asked you to show me sooner what was going on. Today, Lord, I want to be different. My heart still needs reviving. These feel like words…they don’t feel connected to my heart yet. I trust you will make that connection for me. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Hmm…I have been SO focused on FOOD in my mind today. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT? I know I am tired. I know that I am more vulnerable when I am tired. But this is crazy.
So tonight, when hubby brought home fresh french bread and I hadn’t eaten dinner, but only “shaved my hunger a bit” with a few almonds, I had a bunch of it with real butter. I chased that with some ice cream with graham crackers and Hershey’s syrup. I couldn’t believe it, but I wasn’t past a 5 even ten minutes later, but I know the truth….It was rebellious eating. My heart wasn’t right. I should have fasted my hunger (or almost hunger) until my heart was in a different place.
All day I thought about food…a LOT…more than EVER in a long while. So, I asked myself what my accountability partner will probably ask me if, in spite of the way my hunger graph reads for today, I ‘fess up and tell her about my struggle with my thoughts and attitude:
“Who do you need to forgive?”
Hmm…I couldn’t think of anyone.
And then there it was. THIS is who I need to forgive:
This sounds pretty pathetic, but the “person” I need to forgive is Harley–the horse in the photograph. Today I had a lesson with my trainer and Harley (and my trainer’s horse, Amadeus). It was really challenging for me. I was anxious before getting there and had to acknowledge my fears. For five years, I have tried to be something I am not for Harley or to make him be something he is not for me. I think I am only now beginning to realize this. God uses my horses to teach me a lot…and now, tonight, I wonder if the pain of yet another lesson is coming to fruition…I could be on the verge of changing a lot myself (not necessarily a bad thing if it is from the Lord)–in a way which would affect my relationships with people–I believe I can’t separate out who I am with my horses from who I am with people and with God. So…right now, I may be either on the verge of “becoming,” which, as “romanticized” a notion as it is is verrry frightening to me, or I must let Harley go to a new home. Most who have never been owned by a horse would think that should be no big deal. Well, I have to tell you…long story short…that neither option feels very good. In fact, either option throws me into an emotional bout with insecurity.
While I “should” be praising God for the blessing of having horses at all, let alone four!!! I am fussing about “becoming”…good grief. The truth is, the way I am isn’t satisfactory. I have to change to experience that for which I have longed. In a way, it touches on my…well…inadequacy…again.
And here it boils down…releasing my unmet needs, my disappointments, my failures, my unmet expectations, even my so-called “rights,” means letting go of a dream (or 10). Does God want me to cling to Harley and what we almost experienced together last summer? If I continue with him it will mean always wondering if we will be safe. It will mean never letting down my guard, but always being ready for filling in to give him what he needs assuming I am even capable of that. It will mean my confidence will be shaken time and again, as it has been these past 5 years, and each time I will try to “pull myself together” to offer again, leadership with calm confidence…yeah, right!
As with all horses, Harley is a prey animal and his instincts are all about flee now and ask questions later. Apart from him developing a tremendous amount of trust in my “leadership,” we will always be riding the wave, ready to crash land. Something I haven’t been able to offer him in all the time we have been together is trusthWORTHY leadership. The fact I have never had a bad accident with Harley is a blessing…but one I am not sure I want to presume upon.
So, why my obsessive thoughts with food today and why the rebellious eating? Well, boiling it down, it appears that I am, again, disappointed with God. After all, I have gone to him every step of the way about this. When we bought Harley…well, I better not “go there” in this blog entry, but let’s just say, from the very beginning…this has been something prayed over and decided and yet so many things have “gone wrong.” Or maybe they have gone according to God’s plan and His ways are not my ways.
Then, too, It could be that Harley just still reminds me of Daniel as he did when Daniel was going through the first stages of puberty…and that is the most difficult thing I have to accept in my life–that God makes some people autistic and God makes some autistic children with mothers who aren’t equipped…who were never nurtured properly themselves…and, well…
It is all connected for me in some really warped package. It is warped and add to that the fact that the very thing which God intended that I receive with thanksgiving, I treat as a “curse” of sorts. He wants me to welcome the trials, the testing, the learning…as opportunity for growth to be Christ-like. Does that mean I welcome Harley and what he challenges me to “become?” Can I give up the cuddly but potentially volatile relationship I have with him in exchange for a no-nonsense business partnership that says, “This is what we are going to do and that is the way it is?” He needs me to be confident and, while he loves to be scratched and is quite solicitous, interprets my doting all over him as weakness. I don’t know why, but he does. Can I offer boundaries and leadership? Solid, reliable leadership? Fair, consistent, calm, confident leadership? Boundaries? When all I really want is to bury my head in his mane, drink in his scent, throw my leg over him bareback and canter (heck, a walk would be fine) across the field? I don’t need him to be perfect. I don’t need him winning ribbons running barrels or working cattle. I don’t even need him to *do* that *much*. Just cart my sorry bum around a few days a week and be relatively ok and calm as we go.
See? Even as I write that, I realize how like my unverbalized thoughts about my son this is…Daniel needs to be accepted for who God has made him to be, just as Harley does. Daniel needs me to provide him with calm, consistent, confident and fair leadership. He needs me to not love the cuddles and giggles more than the gift of providing clear concise boundaries so he knows the standards all the time. Sure, in Harley’s case I can send him packing to a new home…but then am I allowing myself to grow and mature the way God wants me to? And what if becoming what I need to for Harley would make me a better Mom for Daniel (and Michaela too for that matter)?
No wonder this has been a day consumed with thoughts of food and then this evening’s massive inhalation of french bread and dessert…it touches on the deepest places in my heart, where I feel failure the most keenly (in my parenting).
Well, after all the anticipation of last night, today it was pretty uneventful. I think I ate it merely because I planned on eating it. To be truthful, something else sounded better, but that seemed just too weird. So, I prepared the brownie and some ice cream. In the picture, all you really have for scale is the tines of the fork.
I tell ya…if you take four times as long to eat half as much, you feel like you have twice as much as you used to! Or so the theory goes! LOL!
So what is up? Sunday I ate one meal to 6 and another one yesterday. Not only that, but I have had constant thoughts of food. In fact, last night, I obsessed about brownies! I haven’t experienced brownies being such a powerful draw in a long while.
I dug in my heels and refused to succumb to eating the brownie and ice cream (just a tiny bit…) unless I was at a zero. ALL EVENING I looooonged to be at a zero. I was LUSTING big time for that zero so I could have “My preciousssssss….” The zero never came and I actually considered several times having the stupid brownie anyhow just to “End the torment!” I realized that this was what I did over and over again in the past. I minimized the significance of indulging in “Just a tiny brownie and just a dollop of ice cream…” It isn’t even the food that is the issue here. It is my HEART. I didn’t want to harden my heart to the sweet voice of God in exchange for the insistent voice of the stupid brownie! Good grief! How is it that something like that could have so much POWER over me? :-/
I finally went to bed at 10pm (No, I didn’t eat the brownie), but no sooner did my head hit the pillow then hunger hit BIG time! AH! BROWNIE TIME!!!!!
That thought was followed by God stopping me dead in my tracks. My gentle, loving Shepherd laid it on my heart that while I could get up to go eat, that I needed to bypass the brownie. Why? Because brownies are evil? NO! Because brownies are not nutritious? NO! I had to bypass the brownie because I had to be master over IT instead of letting it own me! So, God convicted me that even if I ate (which I was free to do, even if it was 10:15pm by this time), it would be something other than the brownie. Ok, so I did not have a godly little attitude about that. More like “Wow, Lord…that is a total bummer…are you sure?”
I chose to fast that hunger to the Lord and go to sleep instead.
This morning, when I woke up, the first order of business in my quiet time with God was to look at just what has been going on with me! Why the eating to a 6 at Sunday’s lunch and again yesterday at lunch? And why the obsessive thoughts about the brownie? That isn’t freedom! So what is up?
God showed me in the quietness…in the stillness…the brownie has no power over me, but what did is feelings of rejection that I had at church on Sunday. I was deeply wounded and I hadn’t yet recognized that pain or given it a voice. I spent time this morning, sharing with the Lord the pain I felt about what happened on Sunday and then intentionally choosing to forgive the one(s) who I felt wounded by.
You know what? That act rendered a death blow to Brownie Obsession! LOL!
Funny how my emotions, even when they are not at the surface…can play a powerful role in causing food to seem like an answer when I am not hungry!
I was always athletic and as a chubby, if not obese, adult, exercise and working out was a GIVEN! There was my aerobics and strength training period where I obsessively began to chart and log every exercise, repetition, intensity, set, etc. Every step climbed on the stair climber, every class attended and each minute of “Quad Step!” I was working on being certified by ACE as an aerobics instructor. (I was “certifiable” all right! LOL!)
Then, something weird happened and I ended up in the hospital…I came out of there needing to do something different. Long story, but I began training for a marathon! Yes! Something different! I logged and charted and graphed my miles, terrain, hill workouts and ran the San Francisco marathon and trained for the Rock and Roll Marathon in San Diego.
An overuse injury resulted in me not being able to run and horror of horrors! The weight POURED back on my body! PROOF that I hadn’t dealt with my obsession with food. No wonder my husband calls that my bulimic period.
I have had video workout “phases” where I obsessed about that, gosh, I could go on and on.
Suffice to say, I have GOOD reason not to trust myself as I evaluate whether I really want to have a “program” of some sort for exercise. Since I released all my weight, I have never had a “program.” I used Dance Praise to work out for FUN! I didn’t log minutes, reps, or intensity. I just bee bopped along and praised the LORD! Perfect for me! Some problems with the computer program have caused that not to be a part of my activity these days.
It recently occurred to me that maybe I wanted to incorporate exercise into my life again…I mean something to improve my cardio vascular fitness. I live an active life, but I think God might actually want me to offer Him my fitness…I know that it could improve. I am quite strong. I don’t need to strength train. But I do feel like my heart health could be bolstered by doing something aerobic. Thing is…what could it be that won’t snatch me back into compulsion?
Simply, exercise used to be an idol–a stronghold. I have to be really careful now not to go back there again. I have released all my weight by living a relatively active life, but no intentional workout plan. This has been incredibly freeing for me.
Now, however, I can’t help but feeling like I should make sure my body is operating at maximum efficiency…you know, optimal health. I struggle with “pushing” myself still…I hope to find things that I can do that are FUN that I do just because I LOVE it not because I feel a sense of “I better or else I will get flabby again” or some such fiddle faddle.
One thing I am considering is Dodger. He needs to be worked with. We aren’t ready to ride on the trail together, but I think I could take him out walking, hiking and jogging on the trail. In fact, he and I used to do that together…so given he may go to my trainer’s in a few weeks, I would like to maybe get him out for a walk, jog, hike (we live in a very hilly location) several times a week! I think this would help me accomplish a couple of things. I just LOVE being with my horses and this horse is very special. (He is in a video with Danieland he was featured in Chicken Soup for the Horse Lover’s Soul Volume 2.) I am so eager to have special one on one time with him. I could do that while helping him through some of his fears at being away from his herd buddies…and be active at the same time! It sounds wonderful! So…maybe I need to brainstorm things I enjoy doing that don’t feel like my old compulsive workout days…
1. Taking Dodger for walks 2. Dance Praise
3. I MISS ROLLER BLADING! I need to find a place where I can roller blade! Where we live we can’t do that. Bummer! Maybe I could out at the Omstead (where I often go to ride…they have a fire road that might work for blading on…) 4. Taking the dogs running…I used to train for marathons with my dog Samson…I haven’t wanted to start running where we live now, though. This is home of the 100 miler runs that some of my friends do…I am not kidding! And *I* thought training for a *marathon* was obsessive! LOL!
5. Mountain biking is something else that TONS of people do in this area. I would LOVE to do that, but I know I need to be fitter to manage getting UP the hills!
6. Kayaking. I live in river country…gives me something to consider! These things sound like fun!
Well, I am already out of ideas! Maybe God will show me as I just get started doing something fun…maybe one thing will lead to another.
Lord, you know that I want to have a temple (my body) that is in the best condition it possibly can be in (reasonably, Lord) for service to you. I want to be able to be fit enough not to worry about climbing any of the hills around here. I want to be able to have more energy and to know that I am doing my best to be in the best condition reasonably possible that I might serve you more effectively. You know that I fear returning to obsession. Please help me to remember that perfect love casts out fear. You are perfect love, Lord. If I rest in your love, I need not fear. I want YOU to be my guide and not to allow fear to be my guide…yet another idol in my life. Please be King in this and show me the way. Keep me from slothfulness, lethargy, laziness. Thank you for Dodger. I pray that he and I might bond as we go out on special walks together…Make it possible, Lord! In the precious name of Jesus, Amen.
On the Thin Within forums, I have been asked some things about my eating. When I mentioned that I have refined and adjusted my hunger numbers over time, one member asked me if I was eating more like to what would be a “4” on the hunger scale.
Here is my (edited) response to her question:
Well, no. I would have to say that I am not eating anywhere close to what I would have called a “4” in the beginning. Here is why: I weighed 250 pounds when I began. I didn’t know it, but I had 100 extra pounds of fat to release. It takes X amount of food to sustain 100 extra pounds of fat. It takes less than that to begin to release the extra fat weight. As I released weight, I found that it took less food to sustain my NEW weight…but I wasn’t done releasing weight yet and I knew it.
God didn’t even let me evaluate it that way at the time…he made the process of change always be about him…and my heart. It is as I look back now that it seems to be so obvious what happened physically!
At that time, I could tell that, even with the releasing of the weight that had happened so far (say 50 pounds), I still had a stronghold with food going on. I saw a subtle attitude that I had that “I am owed” food to a “5”….and God began to gently nudge me…”Release it to me, child”…
Anyhow, so it took less food to sustain my new size and less food to release more of my extra fat as I went along. God nudged me that I was still clinging to the food…And so on.
I found that my body is efficient and that even as active as I am, I don’t need much food at a sitting to stop being hungry….which is my goal. How much food do I need to stop being hungry? That is the place that God has led me *now* call 5. I didn’t call that a 5 before. I would have called that a 1 or a 2. (I know this sounds scary…if someone had said it to me, I would have quit right then and there…it has to be GOD’s doing in us…it isn’t anything I would have planned! Honestly!)
The cool thing is, I went from eating more food each time, but only 2 times a day (or maybe 3) to eating 4 to 7 times a day, but not very much food each time.
My body and my life have adjusted to eating that way just by heeding what the Lord has said to do (in his strength…honestly…)…but if I was to compare how MUCH I eat at a sitting now to how much I ate at a sitting when I weighed 250 pounds…no…I ate a lot more then than I do now.
My thinking has changed. I don’t have anxiety about not getting food, for instance. I am not fearful. Hunger doesn’t bother me like it did then. I also don’t have fear of regaining weight (that is a new thing that God has done in the past 3 months!).
Another thought that God has changed in me is I figure that if I don’t eat enough at this sitting–if I serve myself too little–…if I am hungry again soon, I can eat again! For instance, yesterday I had a funky new food for a meal. I ate to what I call a 5…and within an hour I was hungry again! No problem. I ate.
If you want to see photographs of my portions for a few days, you can check …but don’t freak! It may not be what God leads YOU to do now! What is right for me now, came after a year of God slowly evolving things…and it wasn’t intentional to do anything but to ask the Lord what His will is…and to ask for His strength to do it…to release my grip on things like “I MUST have ‘a sweet’ after every meal” and other lies I believed and built my life on.
Hope this helps…again, though, don’t use it to judge your own eating. It is totally personal and I would have FREAKED out if anyone had shared this with me a year ago! God does amazing things in each of us in HIS timing! I am thrilled to delight in what I eat…and I don’t feel deprived at all.
True confessions. I am currently praying about if I can have the freedom to develop some sort of routine workout program. I really don’t feel the freedom to just now. Sort of just doing whatever I am in the mood for is about all I feel the freedom to do…without turning my body (bleah) or self (yuck) or exercise into an idol and becoming ensnared again…I have come out of that in my past and don’t want to return to it. I am sure, in time, I might be able to do that in freedom…someday, but not today.
So below is my Busy Horsewoman’s Workout 1! LOL! I decided to have a little fun…Hope you enjoy!
Daniel has what doctors call a “developmental disorder.” Even the label flies in the face of the character of God. 1 Corinthians 14:33 says: “For God is not a God of disorder but of peace.” So where does that leave us when God formed and created Daniel in the womb and he has what man, anyhow, calls a “disorder?” This makes no sense to me. (Obviously, one answer is that GOD does NOT call it a “disorder!” I cling to that hope right now as I edit my words here!)
