the time i had a toxic relationship with food.

Note: I was not diagnosed with anything, but this is just something that still sticks to me because I mean…it didn’t happen for very long but it did happen.

ALSO! Trigger warning to anyone who may need it because I do talk about unhealthy eating habits

Growing up I was always the chubby kid. Always the ‘not so pretty one,’ always the one who remained quiet. Always the one who would be looked over.

But eh, part of me didn’t mind it. I had my friends with me, and that’s all that mattered.

It started when I was in school. I don’t remember the year, or how old I was; all I remember was that I was young.

My weight wouldn’t go down and the continuous munching wasn’t helping at all. One night, my dad came to me, and said ‘let’s go work out.’

Now mind you, I was never a workout girl. I still hate it to be honest. But I went. I don’t remember much about it. All I remember was feeling the need to cry because everything felt too hard.

When we came back, everyone was having dinner and my family asked me to join. I shook my head, refusing to even look at food because it just made me feel sick to the stomach.

How could something so delicious be an absolute nightmare to get rid of?

I remember that night I had grilled chicken and some sautéed vegetables. I remember crying because I felt hungry. I remember crying even more when my mother fed me some chapati.

I cried knowing that all of this was my fault.

I went downstairs and worked out the second day.

Same routine. I hated it.

My dad recommended this app called ‘Noom.’ He said it can help me track how much I’m eating so that I don’t go back into the binge snacking mode. It was safe. Nothing too crazy. It was a normal app that everyone used when they were trying to lose weight and actually understand how calories worked.

I was grateful. I was happy.

But then I got obsessed.

I stopped working out. Ran away from it because of how hard it was. But the calories? I got horribly obsessed.

What I understood was that the lesser calories you have, the better.

And I just stuck by that theory.

Day after day, I tracked my calories and saw the way I shed the weight. I loved it in the worst possible way.

I remember I was deliberately have little because anything close to a 1000 calories (which were wayyy less than a day’s worth of calories) used to make me panic. And since my body wasn’t used to any of it, all it could do was oblige and keep shedding fat.

I lost a total of 10 kgs in that time, and boy how I LOVED it.

I got compliments left, right and centre. People told me I looked good. I got told, I look better. I smiled a lot more. Clothes fit me and I felt UNSTOPPABLE.

I remember checking the weighing scale multiple times a day. I used to check it before food, after food, whenever I passed by, whenever I felt like it. I remember I used to be sitting calmly and all of a sudden I’d get up and check my weight.

It was weird. And not healthy by any means.

I don’t remember the exact time frame but I do remember that all this happened in around a year (maybe a bit more than that).

But I do remember not having a lot of food, staying away from anything that looked bad. And mind you, my diet wasn’t amazing either because my goal was to eat less. So, I’m pretty sure my carbs dominated everything while my protein was practically nonexistent.

It wasn’t the best.

Then came the infamous road trip that ‘ruined’ everything for me.

I was sitting and around my feet were bags. A bunch of bags…filled with chocolate, chips, biscuits, cookies. Technically every single thing I had been avoiding.

And I ate it.

To be fair, I was on vacation, and that gave me the sense of freedom to do it.

And. I. Did.

Oh God, I ate so much. I binged every second. I wasn’t hungry during any time of the day, I just ate because I could.

I came from the month long vacation after gaining 5kgs.

I panicked and instantly slipped back into the not eating habit I previously developed. But my body wasn’t stupid. It knew exactly the kind of nonsense I was doing.

So, it stopped listening. And what was once a bullet proof plan was just some shield I made out of paper.

It didn’t work.

Once my body didn’t listen, everything went downhill..fast. Workout was out of the question and the binging refused to stop.

I ended up gaining a total of 15kgs back then.

It was never the same.

I still try to lose weight. Although it’s an on and off thing because I’m still learning on doing it the right way without damaging my body. I started liking chia seeds, started slowly eating a bit more protein, understanding how carbs, fats, protein and sugar works.

All the works.

It’s tough.

Some days it works while other days I feel like skipping meals because it’s not working (and these days I hate to say it but it’s been happening a lot).

I definitely have a much better relationship with food, but that was a time I will never forget. I don’t hate myself for it and neither do I blame anyone for it. Honestly? I’m grateful that someone believed in me that I could even do it back then and I don’t know…that felt good in its own way.

Nevertheless, it was my fault for the way things happened and it’s something that I will remember. I would never understand how I managed to eat 700-800 calories in total for the whole day, but whatever I did worked back then.

Now? I don’t want to do that. I want to do it in a healthy, sustainable way that would make me feel a lot better than starving myself.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA that was unnecessarily deep but anywayssss!! Did you notice the lovely popcorn photo i put up right before things went downhill? Quite diabolical if you ask me.

Also not me spamming food pics on a post like this (lol)

But yea…this happened years ago and to this day I still struggle. Sure, sometimes I absolutely love my body and other times I hate looking in the mirror but it is what it is.

You live and you learn people!

Only thing I would say to people in a similar situation…do it your way but also not the unhealthy way. Do it in a way that would make you happy long term because what I did only lasted short term and my body is recovering since (random hairfall, struggle with figuring out which foods I can eat stuff like that, fatigue, random urges to binge, feeling the need to skip meals).

Stuff happens, it’s fine, like I said: You live and you learn.