Rehabbing

I just watched the season finally of Dr. Drew’s Sober House, so I feel it’s a good time to address some of my feelings about addiction in a blog.

I’ve always wondered why I LOVED Celebrity Rehab and Sober House and the like so much. Why I feel like I’m in their shoes when I watch, and their therapy is like my therapy. I don’t have a drug or alcohol problem. (though nothing like 9 months of pregnancy to make me feel like an alcoholic). I don’t have this problem, so why do I somehow feel connected to these people instead of sorry for them because they have issues they can’t control?!

Then it occurred to me, I do have an addiction problem, a HUGE one. Except unlike these celebrities I can’t quit mine cold turkey (nom nom turkey). My addiction is food. It is amazing to me how similar my food addiction is to these folks’ drug addiction. Maybe the reasons aren’t the same for the initial behavior (I had plenty of love and support from my family, they rock, so no daddy issues), but the reasons for ‘abusing the substance’ sure is. When I’m having a bad day or something didn’t go just right or I am feeling like I just can’t cope, what do I do? I reach for some food. I am the same as them. Except they get to go to the Pasadena Recovery Center, and I go to Weight Watchers. They get to chance the give up their addiction 100%! I’m not saying they have it easy, but they can live without the cocaine, crack, beer, and opiates that has kept them going for years. But I can’t just stop eating. They have the luxury of giving up their vices to save their life, but if I gave up mine it would kill me. Who needs a rehab center now?

I do try to keep my addiction at bay. I try to eat healthy and right and follow my Weight Watcher plan, but I am only human. Like Seth (“Shifty”) on Sober House went on a drug bing before rehab, I went on a food binge the day before I rejoined Weight Watchers. Us fatties are no different then those druggies, so why isn’t there more help for us? Medical plans cover rehab for drugs and alcohol, but don’t do anything for weight loss. They might give me treatment if I had an eating disorder like Anorexia or Bulimia. (again can someone explain why not eating enough is a disorder, but not being able to stop eating isn’t?)And sure they might pay for your gym membership, but does that pry the gallon of ice cream out of your hand at 1 am when you have a complete meltdown because your baby is crying and you don’t know why?

If these shows have taught me anything it’s that you can’t treat a drug/alcohol problem without going to the root of why the person is using. Where are the programs that help me get to the root of why I use/eat. I will say Weight Watchers has done wonders for me. It’s made me start to think about all of these issues, but unlike rehab I don’t get any one on one focus time to work through my personal issues, and I don’t get the accomplishment of knowing I’ve been sober for 30 days. I only have the scale, and even if it goes down I still know that one day at any moment it could go up again. I have to live everyday knowing that I have this addiction, but at the same time will never be truly capable of kicking it.
I only hope that I will learn to maintain a healthy weight and that what I have learned will help my daughter, so she doesn’t struggle with the same problems with food as I have.

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