Forever Beloved

Faith, Love & Truth

It Was Me All Along {book review}

It Was Me All Along
by Andie Mitchell

About the book:

All her life, Andie Mitchell had eaten lustily and mindlessly. Food was her babysitter, her best friend, her confidant, and it provided a refuge from her fractured family. But when she stepped on the scale on her twentieth birthday and it registered a shocking 268 pounds, she knew she had to change the way she thought about food and herself; that her life was at stake.

It Was Me All Along takes Andie from working class Boston to the romantic streets of Rome, from morbidly obese to half her size, from seeking comfort in anything that came cream-filled and two-to-a-pack to finding balance in exquisite (but modest) bowls of handmade pasta. This story is about much more than a woman who loves food and abhors her body. It is about someone who made changes when her situation seemed too far gone and how she discovered balance in an off-kilter world. More than anything, though, it is the story of her finding beauty in acceptance and learning to love all parts of herself.

If you’ve been reading this blog for any amount of time, you’ll know my journey hasn’t been an easy one.  From losing nearly 100 lbs. to gaining quite a bit back during years of sickness.  When someone speaks of the sadness that comes from being overweight, I get it.  And not just like I kinda get it, like I totally deep down in my soul get it.   When I saw this book up for review, I was so excited to get it and read about someone else’s journey.

Andi grew up with an overworked mother who nurtured through food and a detached alcoholic father who died while she was still young. Definitely not an easy life for a young girl to lead. I thought she was completely genuine and sincere with her readers in her detailed description of her experiences – she has a big heart.

Andi does lose the weight, losing more than 130 pounds. She ends up becoming obsessed with food, developing obsessions over eating the right, healthy food, before she makes peace with herself and finding balance.

WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group provided this book to me for free in exchange for this honest review as part of their Blogging for Books program.

The Day The Numbers Started To Matter

As I’m going on my journey, I’m going to be reposting some of my past posts…not only for you to read but because this girl needs to read them as well.  So many things I need reminded of on a daily basis!  This is one of my favorites…

I was the girl in high school who wore a size 12 but had curves…curves that I hated. Those curves really caused me quite a few problems. I was made fun of for basically any small flaw they could find…lips, booty, etc. I spent my entire teen years wishing I was thinner. Oh, the years I wasted not appreciating what I had.

I remember one day in particular like it was yesterday. It was one of those spring days that make your soul happy…birds chirping, sun shining bright and the flowers were in bloom. And I was having a “thin day”. We all know what those are, right? My hair was amazing, my outfit was cute and I was feeling good. Yes! It was basically one of the only days I ever felt comfortable enough to wear shorts to school. I walked to the bus, smiling the entire time. Today was going to be a good day. I got on the bus and sat in the seat with my friend. She looked at me and immediately asked a question. How much do you weigh? Oh boy, I’ve never been directly asked that before. But she was my friend, someone I trusted, so I told her. She was horrified by my answer, immediately saying she MUST go on a diet because she nearly weighs what I do. And THAT is not possible.

And in that moment, the numbers started to matter.

From that moment on, I’ve hidden that number deep in my heart. The only people that know it is God, myself and my doctor {who I’ve sworn to ultimate secrecy}. I could tell you story after story of people piercing my heart with their careless words about my weight…relatives, boyfriends and even strangers.

I am one of those girls that likes to pretend that words don’t hurt my feelings. I like to pretend I can just brush them off, smile and go on about my day. I take the hurtful words, cram them deep down inside and save them for another day. A day that I’m by myself and can pull those words back out and stress over them all by myself. Hurt doesn’t have a time limit. Words that were spoken 20 years ago still hurt just as much as if they were spoken yesterday.

But I’ve let those words, and that number, rule me for long enough.

There has been one common thread woven throughout all my weight loss ventures…scale obsession. Those numbers mattered to me so much that I had to see them daily. I just HAD to. My daily mood would then hinge on what that number on the scale was. So many days I would see a bad number then rush to the kitchen to eat out of frustration and disappointment, horrible self-talk in tow. This was a pattern that had to be broken this time.

I eventually cut it down to once a week, but I would still sneak on it two or three times throughout the week. I would tell myself I was “just checking” on how I was doing.  Playing the same pattern I had when weighing daily. This, my friends, wore me out. My worth became what those numbers revealed.

A few months back, I was having some God-talk-time. Read this as a girl crying her eyes out at her Fathers feet, begging for help. He revealed to me three things to specifically do some heart work on. One of them…weigh once a month. And this girl sat up and listened.

One quote from the book Made to Crave really jumped out at me.

I am a Jesus girl who can step on the scale and see the numbers as an indication of how much my body weighs and not as an indication of my worth.

Wow. Powerful, huh? Actually reading that made my eyes overflow with tears. That number had held me captive for so many years, feeling free of it was emotionally overwhelming.

Last year, I actually went an entire month without weighing myself. I know, crazy right? There were days I walked past the scale and sooooo wanted to hop on it. Instead, I prayed and gave it to Him. And He gave me the strength to walk past it. I will weigh tomorrow morning but I know one thing already, whatever number it shows won’t define me. I am so much more than a number.

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

Philippians 4:13


Sharing My Journey

As y’all know, I’m beginning my weight loss journey again.  And if you’ve followed this blog for any amount of time, you know I keep it real here.  I feel it’s important for me to share my full story as I begin my journey.  Not for pity, not so y’all will feel bad for me, but simply it’s part of who I am.  It’s a journey God chose me to walk on.

In January of 2008 I decided to quit smoking and get healthy. It was time to show my littles that you CAN do anything you set your mind to. And to give them something to be proud of. I was so worn out with being the “fat” friend, mother, daughter and girl. Goodness, you have no idea how worn out I was with that. It always felt like in every circle, I was the “fat” one. It was clearly time to change.

Over the next two years I busted my rear and lost over 80 pounds. I was going to the gym daily {at 5 am nonetheless, what the what}, teaching a zumba class and following Weight Watchers. I was dedicated like woah. I could pass up those food days at work like no ones business. In two years I went from a size 22 to a size 14. The new life I had was amazing!!!


And then my world fell apart.

I went in for a routine laproscopic hysterectomy. One of the first cuts the doctor made hit a main artery. A 9 inch incision, 2 units of blood, 1 unit of plasma and 1 unit of platelets later I woke in ICU. I had nearly died during the surgery. And during the surgery the doctor also missed a huge cyst on my left ovary. Four months later I went in to have that removed.

During that surgery, the same doctor put a clip on my ureter and put a hole in it. Three days later I had emergency surgery for a kidney that hadn’t drained in days. They installed a stent, hoping that would help the ureter heal.

Over the next 7 months, I had 8 surgeries to replace the stent. Each one would get corroded and calcified and cause a kidney infection, which would knock me on my butt. Finally the doctors at the Cleveland Clinic determined I needed a ureter reconstruction.

In October of 2012 I had a 14 hour surgery to repair my damaged ureter. While they were operating, they also found I had a partial bowel obstruction and that was fixed as well.

The surgery was a success! But sadly, my kidney had too much damage done to it. It was no longer functioning at all and was causing more harm than good. In February of 2013 I had my kidney removed. It was a routine surgery but unfortunately, I had a small stroke during it, awaking to a completely numb face on the left side.

Thankfully over time, my body healed itself and the stroke is barely noticeable. Although I do still have days, like two days ago, where the drooping on the left side of my face is really noticeable. I wish I knew why it’s so noticeable some days.

I have issues with abdominal scar tissue, but that is an issue I’ll always have.  My body just seems to love that stuff and grows it like crazy.  I just had a surgery in December for lysis of adhesions to fix another partial bowel obstruction and free up what it was wrapped around.
 

Over the years of me being sick, in pain physically and emotionally, I’ve gained weight back. It’s the most embarrassing, shameful thing I’ve ever dealt with.  Some days it’s even hard to leave the house.

I will always have health issues, and that’s something I accepted long ago.  It’s so easy for me to accept that as part of the journey God has planned for me.  But this changing body of mine, riddled with scars and weight gain, has been the hardest for me to accept.

I don’t know what His plan is for me, but I must be brave enough to follow it. I must have the strength to accept His plan and realize it isn’t a punishment. I have to know that God hasn’t abandoned me, He is growing me.

God grows those He loves through difficult times. And He loves me. And He loves you. And since He does, He walks with us through difficult trials. And I am here to tell you, this weight issue is one of the biggest trials I’ve ever faced. The beauty of the Christian life isn’t that we’ll live trial free, but that we’ll have the hand of Jesus through the trial.