I followed diets for years. I have literally tried almost every diet or at least it seems like it. Here are some of my diet ventures:

Stopped eating after 5 pm

Received vitamin B12 shots

Took pills (even though they gave me the shakes)

Stopped eating meat (that was short lived)

Ate only meat 

Stopped eating sugar

Stopped eating carbs

Stopped eating fatty food 

Ate high-fat foods

I attended weight loss meetings 

I tracked apps

I limited my calorie intake

I drank ONLY Lemon and cayenne water for 7 days (that was horrid)

I did the hokey pokey and I turned myself around

You name it I’ve tried it and this isn’t even everything! 25 years later and all those diets did was leave me with a bunch of rules, a list I like to call Good Madelynn/Bad Madelynn and an overwhelming sense of discouragement.

RULES

I am the first born. I respect rules, they are there for a reason. So when I began a new diet, I researched, I created ground rules and I lived by them. I decided what plan I was on and followed it to a T. Not only did I follow it but my husband followed it and you know my favorite girlfriends would too! When we went out, restaurants were chosen based on this question “Madelynn what can you eat?” The problem with rules is if they were broken that meant I did something really bad and deserved to be punished. Naturally, I would punish myself emotionally.  I would feel defeated and discouraged, this, in turn, translated into “I failed” bringing that diet to an end. Since I was off the diet I could eat foods that I restricted myself from which led me to gain back the weight I had already lost ONLY to feel worse! Looking back there was obviously, a lot of emotional eating tied to these diets/rules which defeated my initial purpose of dieting. Does anyone else understand this? 

THE LIST

So, there I was trying all the diets known to mankind and with every diet there came a different list of foods I could and couldn’t eat. As you can imagine throughout the years this list became rather long, and you should know there were two sides to it! The “Good Madelynn” and the “Bad Madelynn” side. When I ate fresh salads with a homemade vinaigrette I was on the good list. When I ate roasted veggies with a chicken breast without the skin cooked in a smidge of olive oil I made the good list. When I gave in to a craving and would have ONE donut I made the “Bad Madelynn” list and anytime on that list wasn’t pleasant. The guilt and shame of eating one donut was exasperating. 

The straw that broke the camels back happened just a couple months ago. I was at my local grocery store in the produce section and I was craving green beans. Yes, you read that correct…GREEN BEANS. At this time I was about 3 weeks into the latest fad diet and in my research, I read green beans were considered a carb and should be limited and some sites said to stay away from them. I was torn. Obviously, my body was craving greens, something that is good for me and yet the RULES stated otherwise and that would then put me on the “Bad Madelynn” list and I would feel guilty for “cheating” on my diet and then I would never lose weight AGAIN. This is how I trained my mind for years.  I began to feel my eyes well up. I could not believe I was crying over green beans. I had to go home. I grabbed whatever I could for dinner that was “acceptable” and left. Once I got home I knew I had to reconsider what I was doing. I prayed and asked God for clarity on what was happening because there is no way green beans made me cry. With time I recognized it was the thinking behind it that triggered the tears. It was the rules. The lists. Green beans were on my list of bad foods (prior to that they were known to me as good). So here I am craving something that was good for me, and honestly, they are good for you, but my brain was shooting flares saying they were not acceptable. You know, it’s one thing to question yourself about donuts….it’s another to question yourself about green beans. I literally felt like I couldn’t trust my thinking. I couldn’t trust myself. 

NOW, WHAT?

I. Eat. Green. Beans! That’s what! I eat them like a boss! These past couple months have been unlike any before. I have given myself the freedom to eat what I want. No rules. No lists. No good or bad food. No good or bad Madelynn. Just Madelynn eating a meal. A couple of years ago I had some friends who walked me through some really serious food issues tell me to be free in my thinking and eating. They challenged me to have no rules with food. I literally did not understand what that meant, I couldn’t wrap my brain around that concept. 3 years later…I got it! Have I lost weight? No. Have I gained weight? No. Is that ok? YES! I am ok with being ok not losing weight. I have yo yo’d for so long that to maintain anything is good by me! Right now I maintain my emotional health. I have made a couple more strides with regards to food and emotional freedom since the green bean debacle and I am learning more about myself daily. What’s amazing is listening to what my body needs. I find I desire healthy food more than I thought. I enjoy salads, I enjoy veggies, I enjoy fruits (which were on my Bad Madelynn list because of the sugar). I didn’t give myself enough credit for those things. I’m learning to listen for my hunger signals. My body tells me when it’s hungry. I pay attention to my donut cravings, sometimes those cravings are attached to emotions and those emotions need to be addressed. But sometimes the cravings are real and eating a donut is ok! Its. O.K!

I don’t know all there is to know about weight loss. I do know diets are not the way there for me. I believe this weight is going to come off. I believe there is a healthy way to eat and to bless your temple as well as honor God. Personally, the diets didn’t work for me, they harmed me more emotionally then helped me physically. If you have dieted and have been successful and have maintained the weight loss I rejoice over your victory! You should be grateful and proud of yourself. But if my story resonated with and you are just tired and want to cry thinking about your own version of green beans I would ask that you take your burden to the Lord. Ask God to help you. Come clean with your thinking. Confess the horrible thoughts you have had about yourself and ask God for forgiveness. Forgiving ourselves is in many cases, harder than forgiving others. Release your mind from the burden of lists and rules that have been perpetuated by a diet culture.

Sis/Brother, you are beautiful. You have been wonderfully made. You are worthy of emotional freedom. I didn’t think I could experience freedom until I was thin. I am here to tell you I am the freest I’ve been at my heaviest weight. I’m hopeful. There is so much to come and right now I am literally taking it one day at a time and some days its one meal at a time. I pray God gives you the courage to take the steps necessary for your freedom. Some of you need to forgive yourselves, others have to reconsider dieting and some just have to eat the green beans!

If you have any questions or prayer requests leave them in the comments below. You are also welcomed to email me at whatsizewaseve@gmail.com if you find you want to share a little more information privately. I’d love to hear about your journey!

The Best is YET to come! 

Love you! 

“…Then you will know the TRUTH and the truth will set you free.”

John 8:32