Health
Reacting to a fear of gaining weight
Only someone who has walked in my shoes will understand
I was busy sharing my story with some parents at my children’s school recently. One of them asked me if I still fear picking up my lost weight. My standard answer to this question usually is: “I guess I will always fear picking up again, but I’ve learned to live with that fear in the healthiest way I know how.”
But what does it mean to fear gaining weight? Is it not something everyone fears or wants to avoid? Probably, and for that reason not wanting to pick up weight, is most likely not a “bad” thing. When I contemplate the fear, it is not the actual fear of the number on the scale increasing that is the problem. It is the things I do — or used to do — to prevent that increase that are.
The first time I became acutely aware of this fear and my reaction to it was during the last half of 2019, the last year of my weight loss journey. I had about five kilograms remaining to lose — but I was struggling. Nothing I did seemed to work or help me move forward towards my goal weight. For the first time since starting to lose weight in February 2017, I feared that I might not be able to see my journey through. I convinced myself that I did not have what it took to reach goal weight, and I associated my self-worth with reaching that milestone.
As a result, I started fearing my weekly weigh-ins. My weekly weigh-ins used to be a happy place of retrospection and reconnection, but they become something that terrified me. I knew that I had to keep attending them as failing to do so would eventually cause me to abandon ship altogether. To “prepare” myself as best I could for my weigh-ins, I started not eating or drinking, even water, for the entire day until my afternoon weigh-in. Once I started doing that, I had to keep it up weekly as I convinced myself that I would gain if I did not do it. After a few months, I discovered that I would weigh even less if I went for a run directly before my weigh-in. I continued not eating or drinking along with the run before my afternoon weigh-in till the day that I received my goal weight certificate.
The confession above is from someone who had already lost 75 kilograms at that stage and had a mere five kilograms left to lose. Scary right?
Unfortunately, my fear of regaining did not subside when I received my goal weight certificate. If anything, it became worst! I continued with my weigh-in ritual, regardless of how hard I was working or how disciplined I was and even when my weigh-in frequency changed to monthly. At home, I would weigh myself each day to make sure that I was not gaining. I also soon discarded the additions to my eating plan as I believed they would cause me to gain, not maintain. I used to spend hours looking at my body in the mirror, thinking that I had gained — when I knew very well that I didn’t. I was living with the fear, but not in a very healthy way.
It was not until I worked through therapy that I could in some way manage to live with this fear more healthily. I discussed some of my realisations in my “Fighting the fear of regaining” video. One of the things that I discussed with my group leader and that I decided to do, was to stop weighing at my group. I still weigh myself at home but have since changed that frequency from daily to once weekly — on a Friday morning. It took surprisingly long to work myself to that point.
The other day I had a previous Weigh-Less group leader criticise my decision to stop weighing at the group. She said that in her experience, the only people who were successful at maintaining their weight loss were those who still came to weigh very regularly at the group. These things are hard to hear. It is like she is saying that I am setting myself up for failure. I am used to proving people wrong and in beating the odds and doing the impossible. I guess this is just another one of those cases.
Currently, I am trying to live a “normal” life. I try to eat as healthily as I can, and I exercise almost every day — sometimes even twice a day as I try to work in a run in the morning and then some resistance training in the afternoon. When I socialise, I enjoy a glass of wine, and if I attend a birthday party, which does not happen very often, I will have a slice of cake. I am happy, and I am leading a happy and fulfilling life.
When I answer that, “I guess I will always fear picking up my lost weight, but I have taught myself how to live with that fear in the healthiest way possible,” and somebody responds, “Naw, you have nothing to fear. You will never pick up 80 kg again,” I wonder if I am silly. How can something that feels so real to me be so easily discarded by others as insignificant? Am I just blind or very dumb?
I think I am neither. I am just someone whose frame of reference is to be obese and who am used to yo-yo dieting my way through life. Only someone who has walked in my shoes will understand. I have worked hard to receive an incredibly precious gift, which so many others take for granted, while I still believe that it is just on loan to me.
About the author:
Mart-Mari Breedt is a South African software engineer with an honours degree in science and maths, and the author of “Eighty kilos of shame” and “Tagtig kilos se skuldlas”. She is also a very happily married mother of four beautiful children — two boys and two girls. From February 2017 to December 2019, she’s lost 80 kg (176 lb). Her writing is about her introspection journey maintaining this massive weight loss. Her stories are honest and vulnerable and aimed at challenging you to do your own introspection. Read more.
