Denial - The First Stage in Weight Loss

Denial - The First Stage in Weight Loss

Facing one's death is the ultimate test of our indomitable courage and the final opportunity to explore our inner being and the culmination of the path our life has taken. It is our last journey and yet one where we can learn much and, perhaps, truly experience and appreciate the treasures life has to offer.

My dear friend is fighting for her life and has taken me into her confidence and the sanctity of her emotions. I am in awe of her strength, her tenacity and her graceful elegance. She is a most caring, wonderful and selfless woman and her fight for life has left me thinking about her journey and the intangible blessings of life - love, memories and the heartstrings that connect us to family and friends. These are our true treasures and the gifts that are most priceless and most cherished.

Her struggle has also left me thinking of the 5 stages of death and how similar those stages are to weight loss. This is Part 1 of a 5 part series that is dedicated to her, her compassion for others and her gentle heart. In this series, the 5 stages of death are compared to our struggle to lose weight and transition to a healthy lifestyle. Perhaps these stages are just as necessary to our weight loss success as they are to the ultimate acceptance of our mortality. READ MORE...

Denial is literally the refusal to acknowledge the truth or reality of a situation. As it pertains to weight loss, our brain negates the logic of our need to lose weight and our eyes deceive the reality of our size. All in all, it is a psychological defense mechanism we implement to help us view ourselves in a more positive light. We see ourselves smaller than we actually are and deny the existence of a problem we need to address.

When other people view our size, they are under no such delusion; they see us at our true size. From a societal perspective, they can determine readily if we are overweight or obese although the category we are placed in may differ from one observer to another. Our self-denial deceives only us and can be compared to an ostrich sticking its head in the sand.

Similarly, doctors provide us with sound medical advice and warnings of impending health issues if we do not heed their recommendation to lose weight. We receive their warnings, dread the official weigh-in and dismiss the reports of increased blood pressure, cholesterol and triglyceride levels in a casual manner. Each time we do this we tell ourselves, we'll address it tomorrow or next week.

How could I have possibly ignored these warnings for thirty years?

Could I really allow so much time to pass without truly holding myself accountable for where I was?

Who was I really hurting when I was stuffing myself with this abundance of food?

Did this behavior ever make me feel better?

How low did my self-esteem need to get before I would take action?

How much denial did I need to be in to be so unaware?

Are you at this stage in your weight loss? Do you recognize this stage?

I spent most of my adult life in denial. It began in my early twenties as I became pregnant with my daughter when I gained 60 pounds. My daughter weighed 7 lbs 2 oz; see the problem? That left me at approximately 220 lbs where I stayed for quite some time. It was a set point for me and I could eat many things and my weight held. Finally, I pushed it enough, for a long enough period of time, that my weight kept climbing.

Now, during this time, my clothing size kept increasing but, in hindsight, I ignored that. I would simply push those items that didn't fit to the back of my closet and every so often I would buy something new that fit. Consciously, I didn't acknowledge that, I just kept shifting clothes around in my closet.

This process continued throughout my adulthood and was interspersed with periods where I would diet 20-30 lbs away only. After each attempt, my old eating habits returned and I regained what I had lost plus a few additional pounds. The ostrich had nothing over on me, as no one could have been more in denial! If I had not, I would never have grown to 330 pounds and a size 30/32 or 3X-4X.

In experiencing the epiphany that brought about my lifestyle change and a 146 lb weight loss, there has been a great deal of self-assessment and the question arose, from myself and others, as to how I got so large. It was a question I had to answer for myself and it took a lot of self examination. Had there been signs? What were they? How did I ignore them? What was in for me?

Yes, there were definitely signs that I suppressed. The clothing size is one. As I contemplated these questions sincerely, I realized there were not many pictures of me in existence. When a camera came near, I would take off for another part of the room and warn those insistent on taking my picture that they better not. Wow, is that blatant denial or what? In addition, there were no full-length mirrors in my home and the only mirrors showed my face. Definitely ostrich behavior!

Finally, the question came as to why would I do this? What did I get out of it? In hindsight, I didn't want to acknowledge I had a problem. I refused to admit the truth and the reality of the situation because I didn't want to deal with it. Reality would have forced me to see something unpleasant. I deceived myself and in doing so I limited my own desires and dreams for something better.

Becoming aware of denial is our first step in officiating change. Here's an exercise for you to see if you're in denial. When was the last time you looked at your size in a full-length mirror? Now I don't mean glancing and walking away. I mean standing full square in front of a mirror, in your birthday suit (or underwear if you must), and truly looked at yourself. You must come to acknowledge your true size so consider this your homework assignment. You can blame me for making you do it, blame society for judging our size or just plain get angry for allowing yourself to get to this point. Then, tune in next Monday and we'll address the anger in Part 2.

Denial begins to ebb as you replace it with reality. Let's face reality together and move forward to our success!