I'm at work right now and I have to write from work because HAM and I will hopefully be spending time together once I'm off. Today I went to counseling in the morning and the gym on my lunch break. I love productive days like this where I get shit done in the morning so by the time I'm done with work I don't have anything else to do. I bought a protein bar and a salad at Whole Foods and ate the protein bar, then got an Americano after the gym. Still haven't eaten the salad yet. Today in counseling (as you know, since you were there) we talked about fat/ looks and why it is so important to me. That possibly I believe the only way people will like me is if I am beautiful and thin. I know there is more to people than looks. Obviously! I have dated various guys (and even married a guy) who lack a complete set of teeth. My ex-fiance had something he called "dick-do". That's when your belly sticks out further than your dick do. My husband was bald on top - he only had hair around the sides of his head (just like my grandpa). But the issue, of course, isn't the people I have had relationships with - it's me and my ridiculously high standards for myself. But it's not just looks that matter to me. I also want to be smart and funny and accomplished. I want to do something worthwhile with my life. And be beautiful. But why is so overwhelmingly important and obsessive to be beautiful? Am I just a product of my culture? Apparently not. Apparently, it has more to do with feeling like I can't control anything in my life, that I am ineffectual (is that how you spell it?) and so I use my weight/ food/ looks because it's all I am able to control. Damn, that's some deep shit. Why would I have such a strong desire to control anything? Maybe because people have always been controlling me and making decisions for my life. Like ALL, he controlled every move I made. And my ex-husband, RC. After college I was hoping to go to grad school or at least get a good job, but he moved me out to the mountains where I couldn't get a job and was totally isolated. There were plenty other boyfriends - paranoid, delusional, controlling boyfriends who kept tabs on every fucking thing I did, every male friend, every time I went out without them. I had one boyfriend who was so delusional that when I came home wearing one of my Dad's shirts, he accused me of having an incestuous relationship with him. I had one boyfriend kidnap me and keep me against my will until I finally escaped. I actually had to run for my life, jump over fences, and hide in a fucking bush to escape this maniac. Even my Dad - he has so much power over me that all he has to do is dislike something I want to do, and before I know it, I have given up. He's the reason I had an abortion (the most recent one anyway). There's always some dude pulling my strings from behind a curtain. I'm this pretty little puppet, just moving about the way I'm told. So yeah, that gets old. When I was with ALL, I was at my most perfect weight. My body was rock solid and I weighed about 110. I looked amazing. But my exercise routine was unreal. I spent 2 1/2 hours at the gym every time I went. And I even had to fight him for that time at the gym. It became a major source of tension in our relationship because when we were doing the long-distance thing, he didn't like not being able to contact me for those 2 1/2 hours, and when I was living with him, he didn't want to spend that long at the gym. He controlled everything in my life, so I controlled my body. But now I'm with HAM and he doesn't control anything. I am free to do whatever the fuck I want and he doesn't ever tell me what to do or try to influence me to do what he wants or thinks is right. The only thing he wants for me is for me to do what I want and to be happy. And to love him. And it's easy to love him. I wonder if he reads this? If he does he probably hates how much I talk about my exes, but it's therapeutic. I need to write about them to get them out of my system. I remember when ALL started telling me not to get too muscular because he wouldn't be attracted to me. I didn't understand this, since he always said he would still love me and think I was hot if I got fat...but not extremely fit? So of course I started lifting heavier weights and doing less reps. I started working on my upper body a lot, doing pull-ups and dips, flys and bicep curls. Then after we broke up I got even more intense about it because I was pissed. I wanted to run fast, workout hard, be big and strong and look like you better not fuck with me. But the thing about it is, it's really addictive. Once you start getting big, even though it looks a little scary on a girl, it feels good. Looking in the mirror and seeing all that definition, those giant biceps, cut up traps and lats. It feels good to be strong. And maybe I wouldn't be able to take on a 220 pound ex-con with a DV problem, but at least I look like you better not fuck with me. So yeah, control. I control my body. But no one is controlling me anymore. I can do what I want now. So does that mean that my obsession with weight and looks means something other than needing to control something in my life, or is it residual shit left over from a past of violent and controlling men? I guess I've been doing the whole weight-crazy thing since around the time my parents were in the process of divorce. I was eight then, so of course I had no control over my parents relationship. Maybe it all goes back to that. But seriously, I'm really over it! That was so long ago! I love my parents, they're still friends, everyone has moved on. I don't hold grudges and I don't hold on to the past. I'm way more of a future-tripper than I past-obsesser. I guess the reality is that I don't know why I'm such a freak about my physical appearance. I know it doesn't feel good to put this much pressure on myself, but I'm afraid to/ don't know how to stop. Oh well, I guess this is a to-be-continued situation.

I don't know if it's my period, or if I'm really starting to binge again. The medication seemed to work for quite a while. I stopped bingeing almost immediately after I started taking the medication. But i guess now since I've been on it for a while, it's losing it's effectiveness. It just seems so backward to me that the one thing I want more than anything in this world is to be hot, yet I do something repeatedly to ensure that I won't be hot. For breakfast I had my toaster waffles and eggs with agave nectar and a little peanut butter, and two cups of coffee with milk. For lunch I had a sandwich on wheat bread with avocado, goat cheese, spinach, tomatoes, pickles, and carmelized onions and a Mango Kombucha. Later I got an iced latte. For dinner I had two veggie tacos, 2 1/2 pieces of bread with peanut butter and agave nectar, and a few strawberries, plus a bunch of bites of peanut butter. Then later I had blueberries (a lot of them) with low-fat cottage cheese. Jesus Fucking Christ! I am out of my mind. That was probably over 2000 calories of food and I only did a half hour of cardio today. I am getting fatter by the second. I know part of my problem is coffee. When I start drinking coffee, my water consumption gets lower and lower until I'm back to being totally dedhydrated. The dehydration is so normal to me that I don't even know I'm dehydrated, so my brain sends a message to be body to put something in it, and my body decides that the something is food, when water is what I actually need. I was doing pretty good for a few days, but the same thing always happens. I stop drinking water and start eating more and more and drinking more and more coffee. Why am I such a fuck-up? I don't think anyone has ever hated themselves as much as I hate me. I am such a fucking failure. I want to be a size 2 and I'm a size 4. I want to eat healthy and I eat way too much. At least I'm sticking to the no added sugar, no sugars other than stevia and agave nectar. That hasn't been so bad. But I'm still eating too much. I did it yesterday, too. I was just going to have a little snack before the gym and i ended up eating a ton and not even going to the gym. I ate a Larabar, which is the only bar out there that has NO added sugar, not even honey. It's sweetened with dates. I got a latte too. And some trail mix, of which I was only going to have a little, but instead I ate the whole bag. Then I went back and bought some grapes and cherries and ate those too. I think I need to just stop eating a lot more foods. Like no fruit, no peanut butter, and no bread. And no agave nectar. Just vegetables, cottage cheese, eggs, and quinoa. Maybe a little salmon, if I decide fish is okay. I hate myself, I hate that I have no self-control. I feel like such a failure. Why can't I just control what I eat? I have to quit coffee again. FUCK.