My easy button and how it relates to everything I believe.

It has been quite a few weeks since I blogged here.  But I am back and here is the continuation from my last post about my day and how it relates to my weight loss and body image issues.  Click here to read my last post titled, learning to cry again, and continue reading below.  

The easy button, that big red button that declares life will be easier once you hit it.  That Staples commercial from a few years ago was so perfect.  We all have an easy button, wither it be a person, or an object or ideal,  it is the button you want to hit every time life gets hard, or you just need a little TLC.  But what do we do when our easy button is gone?  This past week I discovered who my easy button was and what it really meant when I lost it and how it has affected my daily life for the past six years.

My dad was my easy button.  He was the person I looked to for everything.  He became larger than life.  He stood for so much more than just my dad; he was in so many ways, my idol, and my god.

I never knew who much I relied on him to be my path to God until he was gone.  After all, he was the one who shared the gospel to me not once but twice before I finally received it.  He was the leader of every bible study in our church; he was the alpha in our house.  He was the one I looked to for spiritual guidance.  He was the one I looked to for the answers or at least the steps on where to find the answers to life's questions.  If I was having an issue with something, or having a bad attitude, I looked to him to straighten me out, to spit in my face, and then give me the Truth.  Yet, I knew he was only a man, I knew I had the Holy Spirit inside me, willing and ready to provide everything I needed, but daddy was always right there.  Did he let me down, sure, but he was my hero, and always found a way to fix it.  Did we butt heads, quite often, after all we were so much alike, but again it always worked itself out.  Dad was my easy button, my rock for 27 years.

Naturally, God knew all this, and he had a plan, a plan I did not agree with, a plan I hated Him for.  But a plan that worked itself out so beautifully, so loving, and so perfect.  I just did not see it at the time.  And yes, I did hate God, let's be real here, but it did not last long, as I realized He was in charge not me and His plans are always better than mine.

What does this have to do with my current weight loss/food journey?  Everything.  It is the final piece to the puzzle that God had finally put into place for me.  And what a glorious piece it is.  And here is where the puzzle started to fall apart.

My dad had a cancerous brain tumor, one that eventually took his life.  At one point during the final stages we (my husband, mom and sisters) we were all at a place where we did not want to face the truth because life without him would be too unbearable.  We all knew things were not looking good, yet still wanted to hope for a miracle, one that would not come, because it was not meant to.  I was still working as a teacher at the time and going to gym in the mornings before work, trying to keep things as normal as they could be.  That is where I made a deal with myself that started the lie, a lie I put in my box and sealed up tight and truthfully forgot about until just recently.

As I sat in the gym, the weight of the world on my shoulders, the feeling of pain and dread filling my mind I made a deal out of desperation.  I was desperate to control something.  I looked in the mirror and told myself that if I could not control my dad's health, I would and could control mine.  I would for the first time be the healthiest, the skinniest, the fittest girl I could be.  I would get that dream body I see in the magazines, I will exert my will on my body, because it is mine and I can control my body.  And for the past six years I made myself miserable and at times insane to accomplish this goal, this deal I made during my darkest hour.

I have always wondered where my extreme bodies imagine issues come from.  I have just always assumed they were always there and over time just grew.  But no, the moment I made that bargain with myself was the moment it became like a death sentence for me to ever see myself as I really am, so see myself as more than what my body looks like.

There were times after my father's death that I was so crazed, so out of control about my appearance that is was ridiculous.  To go out on a simple date with my husband I would go through 30 different outfits, throw a pity party because none of them looked just right, and throw myself on the bed in defeat.  Honestly, at times I am not sure how my husband did not throw my butt in the loony bin.  But again being skinny, having that perfect body was my ticket to being happy again.  And when I could not obtain that perfect body, my world would come crashing down on me and I no longer had my easy button, I was lost.  I would punish myself with food.  I would eat because I thought I was fat therefor I should be fatter, or eat/drink to punish myself for eating too much.  It was a cycle, I cycle I felt powerless to break, because deep down I did not want to break it, I needed to exert that control.  I was saved by Christ, but so lost in my lie, lost in my box, to lost to see any truth.

Back to the present.  I realized what I was doing about a year ago, and have slowly started the shed that extreme hold my image has had, but again the final piece fell into place just last week.  God works in His own time because He knows when we will be ready to listen and move forward with His Truth, not our own.

Since my dad's passing I have had to learn how to rely on Christ for the first time in my beleivership. My easy button was gone; I tried to replace it with so many other things, but was always pulled back to Him.  It's hard to release deep seeded beliefs, lies you have held on to like truths.  It's scary, pulling back the layers and finding out what you thought would make you happy was nothing but whale dung.  It is uneasy, yet powerfully freeing.  I feel vulnerable, yet amazing warm and comforted.  It is like being released from shackles, shackles of lies, shackles of studipty, just gone, done with, broken, free forever.  That box has been opened once again, and some more trash, some really heavy trash is being poured out, and Christ's love is being poured in to replace it.  His eternal, perfect love that fills everything and is in everything, even if we can't see it.  He is there and always will be.