A Scary Book, but Why am I Surprised?

I've been reading exerpts of Gina Kolata's new book Rethinking Thin on the nytimes.com website, and it's a scary read. Because it reinforces that idea that losing and keeping off a substantial amount of weight is tough. Really tough. She maintains that studies indicate that my trying to stay at a healthy weight feels akin to starving, according to my body. And that does feel right. Another thing that feels accurate is this:

"There were a very few who did not get fat again, but they made staying thin their life’s work, becoming Weight Watchers lecturers, for example, and, always, counting calories and maintaining themselves in a permanent state of starvation."

I don't like the terms starving or starvation, because it feels like entirely too dire a term to describe how I feel about 80% of the time, but yes, there are times, like last night, when I was dying for a bag of chips and it did feel a bit like I was starving. Although I had other, less calorie- dense and more filling snacks, my body was sending me messages like, "aw come on, gimme a break, can't we have something fun to eat, just this once?!" I was having nostalgic flashbacks of the days when Fuzz and I would mow our way through a large bag of chips on the couch in front of the tv. But when I actually thought about it, I remembered that only three days previous I was at a cocktail TGIF with BF and other girl friends, and I had had lots of rich salty treats: crackers, cheese, pate, dip, crusty bread... I'd had my treats, and it was too soon for another exception.

Actually, I've just realized that my body is still playing tricks on my memory. I forgot that I've got a disease, and it's perfectly reasonable for that disease to include a body memory that wants me to be binge eating. And from hard experience I've found that anything less than the calories that keep me above 300 pounds (or maybe higher, if I hadn't stopped in time) feels like starvation --- AT TIMES. I find that those strong cravings that feel so compelling often leave when I've decided it's not getting filled and distract myself with another activity and my mouth with a cup of tea.

I don't count calories by the way, but I do have a fairly unchanging plan of eating, which includes regularly weighing and measuring foods I'm worried I'll eat too much of. And I'm having to relearn my life ---- emotionally, I feel I'm about 4 years old. I'm not a WW lecturer, but at times OA has been just as big a part of my life, I have spoken at many meetings, and I think that I actually need to increase the amount of time I spend on OA, maybe attending a 3rd meeting a week and doing more outreach work to my friends in the programme. Because I'm stuck with me, and I gotta work it if I want to keep where I am. And if that means relearning how to be in the world, well, right now I feel like I'm up for the fight. Ahrrr ahrrrrr, grrr.... ok, put up yer dukes!