TwistedBarbie Weighs In

I thought I would sleep better once finals were done, but as tired as I have been, sleeping hasnt been easy.
My (old?) nutritonist and I have been having an exchange... basically, things need to change between us... I need help in different ways and she doesnt really understand... it is kind of a long story, but one of her big things is that my relationship with feeding myself will change when my ability to love myself changes... an idea that is based on a misunderstanding of me...
My response back to her...
Thank you for your response. I will say "no" from now on if it means I would have to sacrifice something that involves me taking care of myself.
I dont have much of the kind of "fall out" that I believe you are refering to. I am curious about some of it, but it isnt an unhealthy curiousity. Im coming to this from a place of love and care and not of wanting a crash diet or a weight loss plan. I just want to find some way of living in a world with food that feels healthy and good and not like it does now. That is all I have ever wanted.... that and a true physical self perception.
There is one peice that is bothering me though. I hear you say over and over that it is about loving myself, and I have a problem with that. I feel like youre missing something about my true self when you go back to that each time as I vent my frustrations about attempting to learn to live with food in a normal context.
Kim, I do love myself very much. My relationship to food is in many ways a way that I have learned to love myself, and I am trying to untangle the impact of a million people who didnt know how best to love me.
The relationship I have to myself, is something very internal and important to me and isnt something I always give voice to, because I dont find it necessary. If this whole food thing were about not loving myself, then I would have given up long ago. It is my love and care and respect for myself that has ultimately gotten me through. If I didnt know I was someone worth caring for, I would have ever gone into treatment. I wouldnt have ever fought, tooth and nail, the last two years to get to a place where I could do what I am supposed to do in the world, follow my path. There have been times in my life where I have been very lonely, even amidst the crowds I often find myself in, and it is my love for myself that has cradeled me and kept me company until things could change.
It is my love for myself that knows I deserve a life without all of the dogma that has suction cupped itself onto my psyche about food and feeding. I know I deserve to be fed. I also I know I deserve the best fucking life I can possibly have and EVERYTHING I have done has been an attempt at that. I KNOW I was meant for big things. I knew that young. That was what got me through not being allowed to birthday parties with pizza. THAT is what got me through the moo's in the hallway as a teen. THAT is what got me through in the harsh world of theatre weighing what I did and THAT is what led me through a conscious journey to where I am.
I want everything life has to offer and I dont want it with food drama attached to it.
I love myself for my ability to hold to the ground when things are difficult and see beauty in the struggle, I love body for getting me through a long yoga class today, I love my brain and ambition for getting faculty sponsorship for my new research paper. I love my heart for being wide open and willing to cry and feel pain if it means I get to love and heal too.
And I even love myself when I dont do the "right" things with food... I love myself enough to ask for help doing what is best for myself.
So I am not sure what is lacking in my love for self as you see it. Perhaps it is my hesitancy to prove to anybody that I love myself, because I dont feel it necessary, but when it comes up time and time again, I do feel that you are mising an essential element of who I am..... and I wouldnt want that for you... I mean, after all... I AM pretty fucking amazing.