A guest post and a little announcement! | The Sisterhood of the Shrinking Jeans LLC

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I am so excited about today’s post, friends.

I first heard Christie Inge speak at Fitbloggin’ 2011 in the Ditch the Diet: Eat Intuitively panel. I started following her on Twitter and soon after signed up to start receiving her weekly emails. The way she approaches her relationship with food and her body image really spoke to me.

Starting in May, and covering the next 12 months, I’m going to be tackling some of the questions that Christie presents in her getting started guide. You get to watch as I dig dip into my own relationship with food and body image!

To start this off, I asked Christie to write a little bit about her own journey. I hope you enjoy her point of view as much as I do!

If you would have told me twelve years ago that I’d be a life coach who helps women make peace with food and their bodies, I probably would have laughed. And while laughing on the outside, inside, I would have been wallowing in my painful thoughts and emotions about how worthless I was. Back then, I was on strung out drugs, didn’t have a job, was married to a drug dealer, well on my way to 220 lbs, and pretty much hating myself and my life.

I’d been escaping my life from as early as I can remember. It started with binge eating which was eventually countered with obsessive exercise, then promiscuity, then alcohol, then drugs, and back to food again. Eventually, I was wearing size 24 pants and wondering where all of that weight had come from.

And, like most women, I started dieting right away. Over a few years time, I yo-yoed and gritted my teeth to seven pounds from my goal weight. The most important thing in my life was the my weight and if I’d ever make it into the “right” sized pair of pants.

And then, I had a realization that changed my life forever.

Even though I was thin, I still hated my body. I still hated myself. My relationship with food and exercise were worse than ever before.

At that point, I knew that something had to give.

Feeling lost and frustrated, I stumbled onto the concept of intuitive eating. Though, if I’m being honest, at the time, I was still secretly hoping it would help me lose those last few pounds.

But, five years later, I can say that learning to eat intuitively set me onto a path I never imagined possible. Many people ask me about the “results” I’ve seen in my life.

And well, besides that whole no longer being on drugs, using food or exercise to cope with my emotions, and actually loving my body and who I am thing, the most significant change has been the peace that lives within my mind. I used to hate being alone with my thoughts. My mind was the scariest place in the world for me. I learned that all of those doubts I’d had about my worth were only fed (no pun intended) by the diet mentality. And by unravelling those thoughts and beliefs, I have a truly peaceful relationship with food and my body.

Oh, and, alone with my thoughts is one of my favorite places to be.

Christie Inge, HHC is an intuitive eating and body image coach and is the creator of The Body Love Alchemy Community. After years on the diet and binge roller coaster, she realized that the answers she was looking for had nothing to do with the size of her blue jeans or the food on her plate. She set out onto a quest to make peace with food, her body and her weight once and for all. She began sharing her experiences on her popular, heartfelt blog. Overtime, she found that her greatest gift was helping women, just like her, overcome their struggles, too.

She has taken what she learned in the school of hard knocks and coupled that with what she has learned in her professional trainings to create a system that has helped thousands of women to make peace with food and to stop hating their bodies. She offers support, insight, and real world tools for creating a body and life you love. You can stay in touch with by subscribing to her inspirational weekly eLetter or join the conversation facebook and twitter.

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