Emotional eating, distracting myself from my problems and wanting to change that.

Hello to those of you that are reading this. Warning: This post contains references to attempted rape, depression, family issues and sexual assault. If these are topics that upset you or trigger you, please stop reading.

I am reaching out to all of you strangers because I do not really have anyone in my personal life I feel comfortable with talking about these things. I have friends that will listen, but nobody to offer guidance. I am hoping to find ways to stay motivated and/or perhaps meet other people with a similar background that have overcome similar situations or are making positive changes in their lives that I might be able to incorporate into my own. I am looking to kick my habit of being an emotional eater that has been with me for the last 20 years.

My story and struggle with my weight starts back around '98-'99 when I was in middle school. There was a lot of different emotions I went through while I became more aware (and old enough to start comprehending) the destruction of my parent's marriage. I felt like it was my responsibility to try and keep my family together because my mother would talk to me about her problems she was having with my father, and my nature is to try and make things "right" when a problem arises. These problems are til there to this day, but I've come to terms that it isn't my responsibility and it is out of my hands. As the stress and drama from this took its toll on me, I started to look for excuses to not go home. This is where my first boyfriend came into the picture. Little did I know at the time, he was an emotional cutter and very suicidal. He had told me that if I ever left him, he would kill himself. I was in 7th grade at this point. I did not want the guilt of being the reason someone killed themselves looming over my head for the rest of my life. At one point in our relationship, he decided that he wanted to "cure" me of my "prudeness". (I was a very non-sexual girlfriend who had no interest in having sex of any type or doing anything aside from spending time together, holding hands, and kissing from time to time). His "cure" was to try and force me into having sex with him. There was a lot of me telling him "no" and "stop" and eventually threatening to bite him if he didn't get off of me. He didn't listen, so he got bit. I will spare the details, but he was left crying and I was able to get away. Stupid me still remained in a relationship with him because of his threat to kill himself. He later apologized to me for doing what he did. (Didn't help anything.) This is where my depression started. Eventually I was able to devise a plan to get him to break up with me, and I never spoke to him again. I had nobody to talk to about this. I couldn't go to my mom because she would have just blamed me for putting myself in a position for that to happen, at least, this is what I believed at the time. Even to this day, nobody in my family knows. The next 7 years of my life I struggled with the memory of what had happened to me. I would look for distractions, generally turning to food, eating enough to put myself into a "food coma" so that I could fall asleep quick and not lay awake at night. It was at about this point in my life that I started to notice that I was gaining weight. If I recall, I think I was up to 150-160lbs at about 5'3". In high school, my weight continued to creep up to the 170-185lb range with me being 5'6". In my senior year in high school, '05-'06 , I finally tried my hand again at the whole dating thing. Met a guy who treated me nice and helped me overcome a lot of my hang ups about boys. It was about this point that my weight more or less stayed the same, with little fluctuations. It remained this way for the next 8 years. We ended up breaking up and went our separate ways, no hard feelings on my part = no emotional eating to cope with the breakup. Things were pretty mellow for me around this time in my life, aside from dealing with my parents and their failing relationship. A couple years went by and I met and fell in love with someone that I was ready to spend the rest of my life with. I happy and losing weight. I had gotten down to 174lbs, the lowest I had been for quite some time. Things were great for the two years or so until he had a very traumatic death happen. This event changed who he was and started a domino effect of negativity that eventually lead to him heavily drinking and doing "unknown" drugs to numb himself. It was during this time that he started to distance himself from everyone around him and our relationship started to get rocky. The drugs and drinking led to him sexually assaulting me. During the "downfall" of our relationship, I had started going out with friends more, spending money on going out to eat all the time to distract myself from my crumbling relationship. It was about this point that my weight was fluctuation between 185-195lbs. After the assault, things really took a turn for the worse. Within a matter of months, if not weeks, my weight skyrocketed up to 220lbs, the heaviest I have ever been.

This is where I am at today. Almost 2 years have passed and I have remained the same weight. I will get motivated, start eating better and going to the gym, then something else will happen that makes me turn to food to cope with my emotions. I was doing good with losing some weight a few months ago around October, got down to 210lbs. It was about that point that my aunt died in early November - more emotional eating. Late November our family friend died - more emotional eating. December I had to put the best cat I have ever had to sleep - lots of emotional eating. And then in January I was too sick to go to the gym, so I became very inactive. I recognize that I have weaknesses when it comes to dealing with negative emotions, and I also have a fear that if I start losing weight and being more "attractive to the public" that I will be harassed by men more. For certain reasons, I am not too fond of unwanted sexual advances. I am not happy with who I have let myself become and I want to change that. Every time I look in the mirror, I see all of that extra weight that I put on during my crumbling relationship and post-assault. Every time I see it, I am reminded. I want to get rid of this weight and keep it off, but I'm finding it difficult to get and stay motivated. I am asking for guidance. I want to feel like I am not alone on this journey. I want to meet people that share similar goals and help motivate each-other. I want to meet people that will help keep my mind on getting healthy. It would be great to learn more about the Keto community. I have dabbled with this one in the past and have found that my body really enjoyed eating keto and I felt like I had more energy and a clearer mind, but I haven't been able to maintain it for more than a few days (usually because I end up going out with friends to distract myself from other things). I would also like to note that I am tying to work on improving my mental health as well, dealing with the side effects of the assault. Hoping that a healthier life style will assist with that process.

I don't know how to start. I don't know how to maintain. Please help me brainstorm or share tips, tricks or things that have helped you.

Thank you all for taking the time to read this and I wish you all success on your journey.