Photo courtesy of Archigeek via Flickr

I recently celebrated my 10th anniversary with Weight Watchers.

Honestly, I can’t say that I really “celebrated” it. Hell, I didn’t even go to my meeting that week (not from a lack of desire to do so, but we have been down to the final few weeks of a show that I’m in and I haven’t had the time). One would also think that, after ten years, I would have hit Lifetime status and that my relationship with Weight Watchers would be restricted to maintaining my goal weight.

That, unfortunately, is not the case.

By all accounts I am still morbidly obese. My current weight is hovering around 250 pounds, and my ideal weight is somewhere around 195. My body fat percentage is up around 30%. I am really not anywhere near my goal, and I’ve been spending a lot of time recently trying to figure out why.

From where I’m sitting there are two major factors going on. The first is that, in all my years on Weight Watchers, I have never dealt with the fact that I am addicted to food. I have sat in hundreds of meetings and listened to people talk about the fact that after being on the program for a while they can no longer eat as much as they could before they started without getting sick. This is not the case with me. Put me in front of a buffet and I can fill my plate just as many times as I could when I was 420 pounds. When I am placed in a situation where my portions are not controlled I will simply keep eating well beyond the point where I am satisfied. I do not do this because I want to make myself miserable. I do this because I find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to stop eating no matter how much time I spend mentally preparing myself for the situation. Because of this I often find it best to simply avoid “buffet” style dining, which has the unfortunate side effect of making me seem stand-offish at times (especially around work, where “all you can eat” seems to be the acceptable way of rewarding employees).

I really don’t understand where this particular mental quirk of mine originates from, either. While we were never rich growing up I do not recall ever feeling as though we were deprived or that we didn’t have enough food. What I DO know is that addictive personalities run in my family. Both my Father and my Paternal Grandfather died as a result of conditions that were made worse by their life-long drinking, and my Uncle on that side almost has his life ruined by alcohol as well. I was actually on the road to a drinking problem myself, but I recognized the signs early on and applied the brakes before it got out of control. My addiction to food, however, has gone unchecked for the entirety of my adult life.

I’ve done some research recently into food addiction, but my preliminary results have been frustratingly useless. Organizations like Over-eaters Anonymous follow a 12-step program similar to the one that is used by Alcoholics Anonymous, wherein they put a heavy emphasis on spirituality and using God to replace whatever it is you’re missing in your life that makes you an addict. My problem with that, for those of you who are not aware, is that I don’t believe in God. Putting me in a situation where I’m going to be counseled by people who are trying to push me toward religion is going to cause me to run screaming in the opposite direction. I’m not trying to fill a void in my life. My life is pretty great, to be honest, and I spend a great deal of time being thankful for everything I have and appreciating it to the fullest. My problem isn’t emptiness. My problem is that I really, really like food. A lot. I like eating. Ever since I quit smoking back in November I like it even more. What I need is to figure out a why to enjoy eating without going overboard.

In the last few days I think I have also finally realized the other major thing that is preventing me from meeting my goals. I lost the bulk of my weight simply by eating less and exercise. I never really made a huge effort to eat better. Many of the foods that I eat aren’t particularly good for me. They aren’t really BAD, but they aren’t nutritionally the wisest choices. They also aren’t very filling. Because of this I find that it is very, very rare that I am fully satisfied at the end of the day. A perfect example of the kind of thing I’m talking about revolves around one of my favorite snacks – Craisins. Craisins are healthy (they are dried fruit!), but because of the sugars added to them in the process of drying them out a serving of them (1/3 0f a cup) costs me 3 Weight Watchers PointsPlus. I could have 3 whole cups of grapes for 0 points, get a “sweet” snack in, and feel significantly fuller.

For years my body has been telling me that the “easy” weight loss days were over. It’s time I started to listen. Even after ten years of actively making an effort to manage my weight I still find that I have a lot to learn.