I felt nervous and weirdly excited as I waited with my toothbrush as the gagging continued.
Me and my sisters were ‘trying out’ bulimia.
One by one we stuck our toothbrushes down our throats as the rest of us waited behind the door cringing.
Looking back I see how messed up this was, but at the time looking like a walking skeleton was in and the mantra ‘beauty is pain’ was seethed into me from a young age.
My turn came.
I stuck my toothbrush in the back of my throat.
Nothing came out. I tried again. Over and over until my throat was raw. Nothing happened.
Well, I guess bulimia isn’t for me I shrugged.
Throughout my childhood I watched the people I looked up to struggle with food. I saw both extremes:
Overeating & underrating.
Male and female.
This is how I was raised to view food.
As the enemy that haunted the image in the mirror no matter what size you were.
It wasn’t until I met my husband that this mindset changed for me.
He changed EVERYTHING by one sentence.
In the beginning of our dating days he asked me to workout with him. I told him no, I don’t need to loose any weight.
“It’s not about loosing weight or looking good.” He explained. “It’s about FEELING good.”
I was silenced by his viewpoint.
It was something I had never been exposed to. It was the catalyst that began my health journey.
It’s been many years in the making.
And I’ve been honored as a life coach as my team and I have walked men and women through their journeys of loving their bodies and seeing food as fuel instead of the enemy.
