I loved my first job out of college! I worked in the Financial Aid Office at a local university with an amazing team. I was the secretary – the first person you saw when you came in the door, and the first person you talked to when you called. I was at my best, smiling and cheerful and happy to help our customers and my team. 

The four years previous to this job were fantastic! You see, I loved going to college! I felt like I could be myself – Debbie Wick (my maiden name). I made my own decisions about how late to stay up and when to do homework. I had many friends and visited with them and talked on the phone all the time. I lived in the dorms on the meal plan, and didn’t have to clean bathrooms or make my own food. All I had to do was get to the dining room between certain hours so I could eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. I didn’t have to worry about snacks or tempting food lying around because it was a rare student who had a refrigerator, and there were no microwaves!  Exercise was built in: I had no car, so I walked everywhere; I jogged with friends every night after the library closed. I felt good about myself for one of the few times in my life.

So, now to be working at a college was wonderful! To make my life even better, I married my love, Vince, during my tenure at the Financial Aid Office. I was still eating well, and I walked a two-mile round trip to work every day. I was finally making progress on losing weight. I had a job and a husband I loved AND I had this weight thing licked – right?

One day, one of my friends from a neighboring office brought in a pan of brownies, and told me and my coworkers to help ourselves. The smell stopped me in my tracks.  My mouth watered, and my stomach cramped. Even though I hadn’t craved sweets for a long time, I wanted those brownies. 

But I tried to stay strong. I said, “Thank you very much,” I went back to work, and I tried to put those brownies out of my mind.  I was not successful; I couldn’t stop thinking about them. 

I saw people coming out of my friend’s office, enjoying the brownies, but still I resisted.  Later, as I continued to salivate over those darn brownies, I thought maybe I could have just a taste, but I knew that would ruin me, so persisted in my resolve. I hoped that if I hung on until those gooey chocolate wonders were gone, I would be fine.  Lucky for me, they were eaten quickly. But I was not fine. 

I began to feel very empty, even though I had eaten the carefully planned, healthy lunch I brought to work. Then I got light-headed and faint; my head hurt, and I began to be short of breath. My body literally vibrated as I began to fantasize about eating an entire pan of brownies, shoving them down my throat as fast as I could.  I felt ill.  What was happening to me? Was my reaction because my calorie-controlled meal was not enough food for my body? Or was it because of some weird brain-chemistry reaction caused by my years of starving/binging? Most likely, it was a combination of both. 

I dragged myself the mile home after work, hoping Vince wasn’t there yet.  He wasn’t. I proceeded to eat everything I could get my hands on in our apartment.  But still, I had no brownies. Over the next week, I stuffed food into my body. I just couldn’t seem to satisfy that craving for the brownies and the emptiness I felt within me. I finally was so disgusted with myself that I stopped. I vowed to be “good” again – to make it work (“This time!  Please God!).

Some might say, “You should have just had the darn brownie when you wanted one, and then this wouldn’t have happened.” Back then this wasn’t true for me.  Having a brownie wouldn’t have prevented the binge because I wouldn’t have eaten it with pleasure and joy; I would have eaten it filled with guilt and shame. And the result would have been the same: a binge. How do I know this? Because a version of this story has happened again and again and again in my life. It has taken me all this time to figure out that learning to enjoy food without shame is the only way to end it.  Although I still struggle with the shame from time to time, eating with pleasure and joy has improved my life immeasurably.