The REAL issues....

[Guest guest]

These have been very interesting discussions the past several days, and what

it's looking like to me is that when we're not " using " food, we're more able to

see/experience/feel the real issues.

I've come to realize fairly recently that I use food at parties and social

gatherings because I'm often uncomfortable. I am very much an introvert, and

often talking to people, especially lots of people or people I don't know can be

exhausting. When I started playing folk music with folks, I didn't have to eat

so much, because I could be playing music instead.

But I'm going around now thinking that all my social woes are because I'm too

fat and ugly and if I were thinner, I'd be more comfortable with other people,

and that's simply not true. When I was 21, I biked across the country with a

group of people, and I remember very distinctly feeling like the cute guys in

the group wouldn't be interested in even talking to me, much less being friends

with me because I was so....I don't even know. Ugly? Fat? Not worthy of

friendship? I was as fit and thin as I have ever been (biking 6000 miles will

do that for you, so I don't know. It's silly, really. My whole life, I have

always been somewhat proud of how strong I've been physically ( I too have never

been waif-like, but build soils, like a brick). So I don't know. It all seems

silly for me to think that my weight is the cause of anything.

Okay, I started another paragraph, but I don't know how to scroll through a

document, to get back down there, so this is going to end abruptly and

inconclusively since I really don't remember how far I got with what I wanted to

say.

My partner, who weighs the same as he did in high school, does not even seem to

notice how much weight I've gained. He keeps taking pictures of me and saying,

" that's a great picture, " when all I see is how fat I look.