How I lost 100 pounds by losing the blame-shame game

(top is 2001, middle 2011, bottom 2015)

This blog explores how I lost 100 pounds, without gastric bypass surgery or a weight loss drug. But you probably didn't tune in to find out what I didn't do, but rather, what I did to lose weight. Obesity has a lot to do with psychology and so weight loss must involve healing mental health as well as physical. I use Al-Anon teaching for weight loss. Today we're going to look at how I lost 100 pounds losing the blame-shame game. 

While obesity hasn't plagued me all my life, shame, low self-esteem, low self-confidence, (stinkin thinkin as Al-Anon calls them) have. But I never really got overweight till I lost two stillborn daughters. That plunged me not only into depression but also horrific self-blame. But it also brought a lot of self-awareness. 

Depression was an old foe, but I wasn't prepared for the mind-boggling self-esteem plummet. I always felt like a failure but now I couldn't even keep a baby alive?? That was devastating. I got morbidly overweight in part from miscarriages and taking the antidepressant Paxil. But also playing the self-blame-shame game. 

Thanks to my higher power and Al-Anon, I found that being overweight was just the tip of the iceberg.  I needed to fix this unhealthy "stinkin thinkin" to heal obesity. Soul-searching revealed how much I have struggled with feelings of failure. It was so bad that if anyone criticized me, or even hinted that I should do this or that, I automatically complied. I fully believed that I wasn't capable of making decisions on my own, that every problem was my fault, and that every belief or opinion I held was wrong if someone said they were. 

I played the self-blame-shame game so successfully that I actually dream that I fail. Since I was a kid,  my dreams involve situations where I've have screwed up, done something wrong, hurt or failed people. and that people are angry with me. I have no idea what I did but I'm definitely to blame. These dreams are horrifying, terrifying, exhausting and crippling. They get worse the older I get. 

So I said that how I lost 100 pounds was by losing the blame-shame game. But it's not a done deal or once and for all. It's an on-going process. I have to DAILY lose the game, to lose weight, yes, but more importantly to lose feelings of failure and self-defeat and gain self-confidence and self-esteem. 

If you're nodding your head at any of this, please, get help. Run don't walk, to Al-Anon or counseling or some form of self-help or support group. Lose the stinkin thinkin, not just to lose weight, but depression and low self-esteem. Don't wait, like I did.