Week 3 A
Dear friend,
Would you be so kind as to check off the following things that we previously dealt with, in order for you to get an idea of how you’re doing. If you have not made any progress in this area it might be a good idea to ask for some prayer by sending me an email or posting on the forum. You might also need some counseling, or support from a friend or pastor to speed up your healing.
- Have you started dealing with denial?
- What about unbelief? Do you believe that God can and want to set you free?
- Are you busy laying down your love for food and other idols?
- Are you working on your relationship with God by spending some time with Him?
- Did you make note cards and began refuting the enemy’s lies with the truth?
- Have you experienced some grief over the loss of your idols? Did you start to deal with this grief by talking or praying about it?
- Have you experienced temptation? Have you been able to resist some of the temptations?
Food Addiction
Let’s take an honest look at what this disorder is doing to our bodies:
Please click to watch the video below
Is this an addiction?
Good question, actually!
A number of psychiatrists and doctors believe that food addiction is at the heart of eating disorders. According to them some people are more susceptible to food addiction because of hereditary factors and genetic makeup than others, in similar ways that some people are more inclined to have a drug or alcohol addiction than their peers.
Others have written books about food allergies. They claim that when some people eat certain food (specifically the food they are allergic to) it causes them to spiral into a binge episode.
However, not everyone agrees. Some people argue that food addiction is only a small part of the bigger picture of eating disorders. Others shun the whole idea of food addiction and say that overeating can not possibly be compared to something as severe as alcohol and drug addiction, where brain alterations occur.
There is still a lot of research going on surrounding this subject, so I guess time will tell what really happens biologically when people eat certain food. I will be sure to keep you updated on all of that.
However, seeing that I am not a doctor or researcher, I don’t have a professional opinion about this. I can only speak from my own experience and my observation of the women that attended my support groups:
I can not recall that I met one lady with an eating disorder who didn’t have some family history of eating disorders or obesity. In most cases their children were already carrying the burden as well. This is heart breaking for most women and one of the main reasons they are desperate for help is to also help their children. I know that eating disorders in families are also due to learned behavior, but I am convinced that it can not be the only reason.
I really do think that some families are more susceptible to become addicted to certain types of food that contain some habit forming ingredients.
Just like some people can drink wine all their lives and never become alcoholics, I believe that in some families people can eat one helping of chocolate dessert, wipe their mouths with a napkin and never give it a second thought. While others, like me, can eat the same dessert, go for seconds, eat the rest of it in the kitchen and keep craving and eating sweets for the rest of the month.
Let’s look at a simple analogy between food addiction and drug addiction:
I have a friend who is a recovered drug addict. She told me that she traded addictions. This means that when she stopped using drugs, she needed something to fill the void and turned to food. She told me about her life when she was addicted to drugs, and how she was shocked and appalled to see that using food pushed her along the same paths as drug addiction. From conversations with her and others, I made the following analogy between the patterns found in the life of a drug addict and that of someone with an eating disorder. I do realize that there are some well noted differences, but take a look at the host of similarities:
A drug addict usually uses drugs to cover over pain and escape reality
Many people with eating disorders talk about using food as a drug to numb pain and escape reality
Drug addicts usually can’t stop their behavior, regardless of the damage it does to their health and their relationships.
This pattern of being powerless is very much present in eating disorders, the damage to health and family may take longer to surface, but it is just as real
Drug addicts has to get sober or clean to deal with the pain or emotional problems that caused them to start using drugs in the first place
People with eating disorders will not deal with their pain as long as they still binge, purge or starve themselves, they too have to get “sober” first
Drug addicts experience severe withdrawal symptoms when halting the abusive substance
People who daily eat huge amounts of sugar, caffeine and fat goes through withdrawal symptoms when they stop eating these, although the symptoms are not as severe
Drug addicts often want out of their addiction, but are unable to get out on their own
People with eating disorders promise themselves every day that they are getting out but are unable to do so on their own, year after year
Drug addicts feel a deep shame, guilt and self-hatred that makes them sink even deeper
People with eating disorders wear shame, guilt, and self-hatred like a cloak and this make them turn to food even more
Drug addicts always need more of the substance which many times leads to an overdose and even death
Eating disorders are also progressive, the amount of food or diet pills that worked a year ago does not calm the pain or suppress the fear anymore, which can also lead to death
Need some more convincing? Let’s look at a couple of scenarios:
Scenario #1
I love my coffee:
I can not live without my morning coffee. The more coffee I drink the more cups I need to keep me going. Eventually I might have to throw in an energy drink or two to keep me going at the same pace. Pretty soon I will be looking at more potent energy drinks or even pills to keep up my performance and help me cut calories. In just a few weeks I can not function without several cups of coffee per day. If I were to stop drinking the coffee, I would, for at least a few days have really bad headaches, feel too tired to set one foot in front of another, and eat everything in sight. So I can not possibly stop. If I want to keep up my busy schedule without gaining weight, I will just have to up my espresso shots. My skin and hair is looking pretty dull and dry, but hey, what can you do, got to be thin, go to be busy…
This is an all too familiar scenario and can be a way of life for a homemaker, business woman, or college student who suffers from an eating disorder. Some athletes and dancers with eating disorders would add diet pills to this already dangerous cocktail and do irreversible damage to their health.
Did you notice that somehow this started with one cup of caffeinated coffee?
Scenario #2
Sugar and white flour has a similar track record. Eating one doughnut is never enough for someone with an eating disorder, and a bag of cookies or a box of chocolates can never be saved for later. Actually, these delicacies would only set the stage for some more cravings and more trips to the store or fast food restaurants. This never happens with a chicken stir-fry on brown rice, but this could happen with a bucket of KFC where the chicken hides behind a crispy crust of white flour and fat. In one day a person who struggles with compulsive overeating could take in a week’s worth of calories.
Note that it all started with a doughnut for breakfast.
If you suffer from an eating disorder you probably don’t need any more convincing. You probably know that the food you LOVE, and can not bear to give up, are the ones that always get you in trouble:
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IMPORTANT:
THESE FOODS ARE THE FACE OF YOUR IDOL. |
So if I look at my own life and the women with eating disorders I met through the years, I have to recognize that certain foods are just poison to our bodies and that the more we eat of it, the more we crave it and the more we want to eat it.
I think it would be wise not to ignore the possibility of addiction and all the physical ramifications that goes with it. For this reason I also studied the treatment recommended for addiction and applied it to food addiction in my own life.
What is the solution?
In the case of Addiction the remedy is always Abstinence
I know you probably don’t want to hear this. Unfortunately you will have to throw away the crutch if you want to run free. As long as you are still playing around with the “lover”, you will never fully surrender to Jesus. You see if we still have a back door open, we don’t really need the front door, do we?
Here’s the thing: If our hearts still belong to food, we are actually constantly numbing it with food. The moment we feel pain, we cover over it with food. When we feel loneliness, we distract our hearts with food. So we never stop to look at our real feelings, and we never discover what lies deeper, and what is going on inside of us. We never deal with the pain, and we also never get past the pain to discover who we really are.
Think of a person addicted to drugs or alcohol. Nothing can be resolved before she doesn’t get sober. The original pain beneath the symptom of drug abuse can not even be located let alone healed, thus she will stay in this place year after year until she probably ends up on the street or worse. However, if she can halt the substance abuse long enough to deal with the pain, to let herself feel something and receive healing, she will eventually be able to figure out who she is again, what she loves, and why God created her in the first place. But she will have to start all of this by getting sober first.
All kinds of counseling, support groups, and healthy food programs will be useless if you don’t first stop turning to food to numb your feelings. If you can feel the pain in your heart, you won’t recognize where it comes from, you won’t ask God to heal it , and you will probably never get to live the life of freedom God intended for you to live.
Last week you had to make up your mind to take back your heart from this lover, so that healing can begin in your heart.
Now it’s time to go one step further: You have to make a decision to stop using the addictive substance (certain food), to numb your pain, so that you can actually feel the pain, bring it to God and receive healing, not only for your heart but also for you body.
But How Do You Stop?
“How do I do it?”
This question must be on you mind by now.
I know that more than anything I wanted to know “HOW?”
Maybe, like me, you have tried going cold turkey before, but failed miserable.
Maybe , like me, you have even gone without certain foods for a period of time, but always had the fear in the back of your mind that this too will fail, and sure enough…it did.
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I eventually discovered that what I was doing would never work, because it just didn’t make any sense: Here I was abusing my body with junk food, fad diets, starvation, binging and purging for years and then one day I up and decide that now I’m only going to eat healthy and everything is going to be wonderful. The problem with this is:
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Have a look at what eating disorders do to the body:
- Skin rashes and dryness (dehydration due to vomiting and starvation)
- Tender and painful salivary glands (due to frequent vomiting)
- Constipation (due to poor and irregular eating habits)
- Water retention (due to malnutrition, vomiting or excess laxatives/diuretics)
- Bloating (due to over or under eating, vomiting or excess laxatives)
- Abdominal pain (due to over or under eating)
- Heart burn (due to eating large amounts of food)
- Rotten teeth (due to vomiting)
- No menstrual period (due to lack of body fat)
- High blood pressure (due to excess weight )
- Serious lung and stomach problems (due to vomiting)
- Raw, bleeding sore throat (due to vomiting)
- Coronary artery disease (due to obesity)
- Orthopedic problems (due to excess weight)
- Hyperglycemia and diabetes (due to compulsive overeating)
- Depression and mood swings (due to over or under eating)
- Weak bones (lack of calcium due to malnutrition)
- Low potassium levels that can cause sudden cardiac arrest (caused by vomiting)
The above list was given to me by a doctor friend and he assured me that it is by no means a complete list.
The ladies in my support groups also mentioned other physical ramifications of eating disorders such as tiredness, irritability, insomnia, and anxiety. These were very familiar to me as well.
So to just expect your body to be on board after years of abuse, is not only impossible, it is to further abuse an already DEPLETED BODY. This is not God’s will for us, he has made us stewards of our bodies and he expects us to take good care of this great gift of life that He has given us.
YOUR POOR BODY NEEDS SOME NURTURING, NOT MORE DEPRIVATION
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WAYS TO NURTURE YOUR BODY:
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MAKE YOUR BODY STRONG ENOUGH BEFORE YOU GIVE UP THE ADDICTIVE FOODS – THIS IS ONE WAY TO MAKE THE CHANGES PERMANENT
Click here to go to the next section: How this helped me
PS: Please help me improve the quality of our members area by using the comment box below to let me know if you pick up on any technical errors, spelling errors, or typos. Testimonies are always welcome as well:) Thank you
i forgot the lessons last week but would like to continue with this week and go back to week three in between the lessons for this week ty
Judy
Hi Judith
You can go back and forth as you need to. The program is designed for ladies to do it absolutely at their own pace and go back to some of the work as often as they need to:)
Heleen
I’ve made it to Week 3! Thank you Heleen! Your program is awakening my spirit and strengthening my mind. I’m starting to see clearer a little more every day. Your program is a precious jewel! Your videos allow me to feel like you are right in front of me in a personal setting. I have fallen in love with Christ at a much deeper level since I begin this program, as I’ve allowed His healing powers to enter my life and my heart.
This is surely the truth coming to life awakening what has been in my soul bit I have just ignored it for all those years.Thank-You Heleen
You’re so welcome Ellie:) All the praise be to God!
Heleen
Thank you Heleen! Your willingness to be completely transparent with your struggles is making me not feel alone. Your wisdom from the Lord is unlocking the doors to areas in my life I felt I couldn’t grasp. Thank you for allow God to use you to help set women free. It’s only week 3 and I’m already starting to, for the first time, feel hope of ending this eating disorder for good! I cannot say thank you enough for your encouragement, knowledge and prayers.
-Jamie
You’re very welcome Jamie:) I’m so grateful to hear that God is using this program to bring healing to your life. You are so loved by God Jamie. I will keep praying for you.
Heleen