Dr. Jack: Holy cow! Sit back and re read the email you just sent me. Seriously, I want you to read this to yourself again. THIS IS YOU! Picture yourself six months ago. Could you ever Envision yourself writing such an email?
Have a great day. Enjoy life and enjoy all you have now. But, don’t forget, it is going to continue to get better. There is more to come!!
Sunday, I got this email from Dr. Jack. I sat there for a few minutes reading it and looking kind of puzzled. What?? What had I said and what was he talking about? So, I went back and read what I had sent and his words echoed in my brain. THIS IS YOU!
I sat there reading through different eyes, and thinking…… YEAH!!! This IS me!!!! For years, my friend Mark, and now Dr. Jack have been trying to save me. There was soooooo much that needed fixing. I am surprised they both had not ditched me a long time ago. I have been a lot of work. Maybe one day, I will be so brave that I write about all of it, but not today.
I read it again…….. YES!!! THIS IS ME!!!!!!
The email I had written to him was all GOOD, in the sense that everything in it was positive, but also very factual. I wrote about how I needed to stay off the scale because I was slowing my own loss down by getting so obsessed with the number, knowing full well that I was not doing anything wrong. I talked about a reaction I had to a food and realized now how preservatives and I just do not get along and it is best I stay away from them permanently.
I wrote about how I had usually slithered away in a difficult personal situation but that, this time, I was able to stand up for myself, and not be embarrassed or humiliated by the words or actions of others. I had a few difficult conversations this weekend and I was able to stand up for myself. I usually just take what people say to me, and just keep quiet no matter how much it hurts me.
But this time was very different. I did not let their words have any effect on me. As a matter of fact, I had made a bold move and I stuck with it throughout the whole story, so much so that I felt as though for the first time in a long time, I had “won.” I wrote about a whole bunch of things that were going on, but the one thing they had in common? None of them were tied up in words that look like putting myself down, or hatred for my own body, or the constant looking at myself as being the fault for everything short of the sun coming up today.
Dr. Jack was right…… Six months has changed me. HE has changed me. Little by little, email by email, call by call, I have changed. I read his email again, “Could you ever envision yourself writing such an email?” I started talking to him out loud….No…… absolutely, positively…. NO……I could never have seen this coming… This is me!