Dating through your meals

There is nothing better for someone trying to lose weight than being single again. 

Likewise, there is nothing worse for a person’s weight than starting a new relationship.  I have been in the same relationship for five or six years (depending on where you mark our beginning).  This relationship was detrimental to both my weight and to my partner’s.

Roughly six years ago, I met the person I plan to be with the rest of my life.  The first few months of our relationship were heavenly.  We traveled and ate.  We had sex and ate.  We met for Friday night dates to eat.  We went to church and then to eat.  He met my parents over dinner.  I met his parents over lunch.  I met his grandparents over brunch.  He met my grandparents at a barbeque…you get the idea.  In the first seven months of our relationship, I gained 14 pounds.  My partner gained 10 pounds.  Everyone said that we were fat and happy.

The time came when we decided to move in together.  We went from eating every meal out to eating massive, multiple-course dinners that I prepared in the evenings.  I was raised on huge dinners served at a dining room table.  Jeremy, quite smartly, took in most of calories early in the day.  Not wanting to be rude, he ate the food I prepared each evening and gained even more weight.

Jeremy and I started dating the week before Thanksgiving.  It was now Thanksgiving one year later.  We planned a huge luncheon at our house that day.  As I was preparing the meal, I slipped into the bathroom and weighed myself.  My weight had increased from 170 pounds when Jeremy and I met, to 200 pounds.  I sat on the toilet and cried.  I had never been so heavy.

Another year came and went and again on Thanksgiving I weighed myself.  I was now at 211.  By the time I returned to UNCG last summer, I weighed 230 pounds.  I know by some standards, this may seem petit.  For me, it is devastating.  I looked back at our relationship and realized that Jeremy and I had literally marked every single event with food.  Every holiday, every anniversary, every birthday, everything we did centered on consuming food.  This continues to be a major challenge in our relationship today.  Even my parents have admitted that they wished that they had taught us not to mark every occasion with a meal.

Conversely, an old fling looked me up the other day.  I have no interest in dating him.  I am truly committed to my better half.  Nonetheless, I find myself preparing for a reunion with someone I have not seen in 14 years.  I was 40 pounds lighter then.  Now, all I can think of is losing this weight and making a good impression on someone that I had a fling with ages ago.  This made me stop to think about my friends who have suddenly found themselves “available.”  They are quick to lose weight.  One of my friends divorced her husband and lost 160 pounds.  That is like divorcing two people.

My advice is to live every day as if you are single.  Keep in mind that you never know when you might bump into someone from high school, an old fling, or a college roommate.  Also, try not to mark every occasion with food.  Instead of dinner and movie, play a round of miniature golf.  Instead of birthday parties take a trip to Carowinds.  Finally, realize that it is okay to skip out on holidays with the family.  This past year, I ran a race rather than attend my family’s Thanksgiving dinner.  It was one of the best decisions I ever made.