No? Hmmm…

Is it because you never actually realised that dream? Or because you only had it for a second before it was stolen from you by caramel lattes and chocolate ding dongs?

I’ve been there. Many, many, maaaany times.

I used to diet like a hard core lunatic, reach my “goal weight”, then proceeded to stuff my face with strawberry ice cream sundaes in a delusional sugar stupor believing that “I had arrived” and now that I was “skinny” I could “eat what I want”.

But were ice cream sundaes what I wanted?

Or did I just want the way ice cream sundaes made me feel?

Special.

Sweet.

Happy.

Yes. I wanted happiness. And months of Rambo-esque dieting had certainly deprived me of that.

I wanted to feel special. The way I felt when I was five years old and my Mum rewarded me with jelly beans for not subjecting her to my weekly supermarket tantrums as she tried, with her dignity intact, to shop for the family groceries.

And I wanted sweetness. Not necessarily as a flavour, but as a component of my life. Why? Because my life was nuttier than a Christmas fruit cake!

After my husband of twenty-five years decided he “didn’t love me anymore” and we were “through”, I felt lost.

So I ate.

I ate A LOT.

I ate so much I gained two dress sizes in a few short weeks and suddenly the pain of my impending divorce seemed minor compared to the fact that my once loose Lorna Jane leggings could now only be used as fingerless gloves (that is, if one fancied stretching lycra leopard skin over their arms).

So what did I do?…

ONE THING.

I decided to get comfortable with the pain.

Yup. Call me crazy but Prince Charming riding off into the sunset on his Harley Davidson? Best thing that ever happened to me.

Because he left me with a gift.

The gift of decision.

I had to DECIDE, right then and there, was I going to drown in a sea of fluffy white lamingtons or would I rise to the top of my game and be the woman I was born to be.

Strong.

Independent.

Powerful.

But above all…

Not afraid.

Not afraid to be me.

Not afraid to feel my feelings.

And not afraid to show myself to the world. ALL of me (including my crazy pants “thing” with food).

So I chose the latter. Why? Because if I can only share one message in this life, I want you to know that you are NORMAL.

There’s nothing “wrong” with you and you don’t have an eating “disorder”.

What you have is a world full of people and problems, all pushing their opinions on you like an abandoned fun sized Snickers bar that made its break for freedom but ended up squished between the cushions of the couch.

Melted.

Misshapen.

And alone.

I want you to know that you CAN overcome emotional eating.

How do I know?

Because if I can do it, after thirty years of knock your sock off dieting, meal replacement shakes, obsessive exercise and one heck of a sugar addiction… you can DEFINITELY do it.

Just trust.

Take the first step.

And know that whatever you are faced with today….

You’ll be okay.

Here’s to Ditching the Diet!

Pssst… want to know how I started to find my way out of the emotional eating black forest (cake)? CLICK HERE to get my hottest secrets.