Thoughts can become our Truth

BREAKING MY SILENCE -  My Fear of Doctors, part 1

It has taken some time to digest things in my life that has happened.  For so many years experiencing bullying, anger, abuse, low self esteem, grief, resentments and fear,  I didn’t know how to handle them all. To cope, I stuffed them with food and hid ….but it didn’t take care of the pain I experienced.

In looking back, I have to say my weight started to increase once I started school.  I was a bigger girl, never in jeans or cool clothes, for those cool clothes never came in my size. I soon learned I was different than others, especially when I was called those special names by those who must have thought I didn’t know I was fat. Yes those slurs stung many a time. Somehow I sucked it up, not saying a word to anyone. I ignored them but…. I let every word sink deep into my soul and rest there.  Those choice words cut to the bone.  With a low self esteem, those words did me harm. Somehow in my warped thinking I felt deserving of such treatment. I knew I was fat, I felt it, I lived it.  I ate the food that got me to that point so, it had to be my fault, right?

Trying to fit into a society where “thin was in” was difficult. I can remember when my Mum was going to take me to the doctors to get my ears pierced. I was ecstatic!!  Finally something I could get like other little girls; earrings!!  The appointment is ingrained in my memory.

As I stood in front of the doctor, with his fingertips on both my earlobes, he squeezed and rolled his fingers back and forth. Looking down through his glasses on the end of his nose, he said, “hmmm, kind of thick, hmmm…. ” and with that he went and sat at his desk to write as he spoke.

I can still feel his fingers on my ears if I close my eyes. I vividly see and hear it all in my mind.  You see, I didn’t get my ears pierced that day. The doctor wouldn’t pierce them until I lost weight. I went home that day devastated. I felt very unworthy and undeserving.  I was heartbroken. Life was teaching me that being me had consequences.

Immediately Mom got a copy of the weight watchers diet from a friend and so my dieting world began.  I felt awful. The restriction I felt sent tremors through me. I couldn’t eat what everyone else ate. Again I felt different, undeserving. In shame & guilt I wallowed.  I deserved every bit of it because… I was fat.

In two weeks the diet ended. Mom brought home a pair of self-piercing earrings that she had borrowed.  I was so mixed with emotions. Happy to get my ears pierced, but a part of me felt I didn’t deserve it.  I was to lose weight wasn’t I? Did Mom think I couldn’t?  Amazing in looking back how I thought. Never once did I think that Mum too was disappointed that her little girl wasn’t able to get her ears pierced. That she loved me enough to find a way. In my own garbled negative thinking, I was solely focused on the opposite.

This was only the beginning dealing with negative times with Doctors.  With each occurrence, it cemented in my mind the false truths I had about myself.  So I stayed away from them as much as possible… but that too did me harm.   I have learned over time avoiding my health only hurts me….

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