anyone else suffer from body dysmorphia?

chazerlaa

Hey guys, so I've been on MFP a while now, and even before using it I have lost a lot of weight, I went from about 13 and a half stone, (189 pounds) down to about 8 and a half stone (119 pounds). The trouble is I still feel that I look like absolute crap, I constantly tell myself im fat and worry about every little bit of food that I eat, I can't seem to relax about food unless I log absolutely everything, and even then I worry, seeing as I am now in maintenance mode and am scared of losing more weight or gaining it back. Anyone else had this problem with fear of food and body dysmorphia? How did you deal with it? Any advice?

ElliottTN

I believe I've show a good deal of signs body dysmorphia. I've noticed that what I see on the mirror is completely different than what I see when I take a picture. Like, I could stand in front of a mirror and take a pic and look at it and see two completely different people glancing down at the pic and back up at the mirror. I think this exact reason also got me to my heaviest weight at some point bc my mind saw someone not terribly bad when I looked in the mirror and I convince myself that I was just a ****ty picture person. Not true, I was fat but my mind was masking it. Only problem now is that since I've gotten to a much better place, I still see every imperfection in the mirror. I've come to terms with how critical I am of myself now and know I will probably never be satisfied but I no longer look t it like that's a bad thing. I've learned for me that I really have to look at pictures rather than the mirror to see what I actually look like. And yeah, I don't handle change very well and I know that maintenance and eventually a bulk is coming up and it stresses me the F out just thinking about it. The mind is a funny thing.

CipherZero

I'm of the thought that it's kind of normal to a point - I know I still think of myself as "that fat guy" despite dropping over 25% of my starting weight. It's a lot about mentality and where you see yourself - as the old you you've been working to change, or the new you that you've become. It's all about which you you're looking at.

If you're really concerned about it though, it may be worth talking to a psychologist about your perceived dysmorphia.

kirkor

Also, keep in mind that people like labels, and identifying with the features of a label doesn't necessarily mean the label applies to you.
Think of a horoscope: if you rearranged all 12 descriptions on a given day's reading, most people would probably still read "their" horoscope and think "yep, that's me".

Or like when people make a mistake, and apply the label of "OMG I'm self-sabotaging! Why do I always sabotage myself?" when perhaps they just goofed, or had a lapse in judgement.

Body dysmorphia and also orthoexia are terms which people are becoming more aware of. They are "bad" conditions, and people who are concerned with their health can easily identify with traits of those conditions and wonder if they are also "being bad".

The best thing to do is to create goals for yourself, move towards your goal, and when you achieve a given goal be sure to acknowledge that in some fashion before moving on to the next goal. Pause, realize you accomplished what you originally set out to, then take stock of your current situation and create new goals that are appropriate. That way you avoid the "moving target" type of goal, where you leapfrog goal to goal without the reward of completion, and yes this I think can lead to body dysmorphia, because you never have the victories along the way.

chazerlaa

glad im not alone here, some really good advice given so far (:. Guess I just need to take time to take a step back and re-evaluate my goals so that I know what I want and what ive really achieved.