Welcome All To My Journey

Hello all,
My name is Lauren and I am a 24 year old girl who is completely ready to change my life however I know this challenge is going to be long and very hard as I believe I have an addiction to food. Sometimes I wonder if other people feel this way, I wonder if I am the only one out there who feels truly addicted to food. I wonder if this is a crutch I use to justify the fact that I am overweight or if there is food addiction in actuality. Sometimes when I confide in people that I feel I have this addiction they look at me and say "oh yeah right" and proceed to laugh and poke fun at the statement I had just made. People think you have to be morbidly obese to have an addiction to food and just because I am not morbidly obese these people think I do not need help nor do I have a problem and this my friends has enabled me to continue to get bigger. Sometimes I feel absolutely crazy when I say out loud that I have an addiction to food and I believe that stopping these bad habits is like quitting smoking or drinking its hard and you sit there and constantly think about it until it makes you sick inside and you just have to go and get in your car and get to that convenience store or local pizza place to pick up your favourite junk. Mine is chips and pizza. Now I know that addictions come from somewhere and that we use our drug of choice (mine being food) to medicate feelings and emotions that we carry deep inside us and I myself am a definite example of this.
I use food whenever I am feeling lonely, sad, depressed, bored or restless. Food has this power of me that when i am sitting there eating a whole medium or large pizza to myself it feels good like I have company. Isn't it sad that I can say out loud that pizza keeps me company? Am I the only one who does this? But the hard part is after I have scoffed down that whole pizza I feel double as lonely and fat and bad about myself as I did before I ate it. It is such a short fix, a short lived high and it does not provide any sort of positive benefit in my life. When I was in high school I always enjoyed junk food but what teenager doesn't? However I was very active and a huge athlete back then and also was much happier until I hit a certain rough period which will be revealed in future blogs. Once this pivotal event happened in my life I held it in and felt so bad about myself and just started eating because that was the only thing I felt I could control. It's the same for people who are anorexic or bulimic it's just another type of eating disorder. When you are sitting in your room door closed, blinds closed eating chicken wings 5 nights a week and are hiding the garbage so your roomates don't see it...that is a problem my friends!
I started out university at 130 pounds and I now weigh 193 the most I have ever weighed in my entire life and I have never felt less pretty, sexy, self confident or happy. I have dealt with depression throughout my adult life however now I feel it has hit an all time high. I am not enjoying my life, I am not living my life and I vow to change that.
Why has it taken me so long? Why has it taken being overweight for so many years without me doing anything about it? Why have I not taken control of my own destiny? Why do I let myself get so brought down by other girls or friends that have turned their backs on me? Why do I make excuse after pathetic excuse as to why I have not done anything about this yet? I need to start loving myself again so that I will not be so effected by what others think of me and say about me to my face and behind my back. I need to take control of my life instead of watching it pass me by while I am sitting on the couch, blinds closed, eating horrible food wallowing in my own misery.
I have always been a huge fan of The Biggest Loser and of course I cry at every episode. I used to cry out of pure joy for these people who are dealing with so many emotions and obstacles and really going for it and taking control of their lives. But now I cry because I RELATE to them and I never thought this would happen. The latest episode when Rebecca (who looks fabulous) was voted off really got to me. The final 6 gave speeches to an audience about their struggle with weight loss and I found I could relate to so much of what they were saying. I was sitting on my couch bawling my eyes out saying "I'm that girl on the couch eating bad food watching Biggest Loser thinking I cant do it" but you know what? I CAN AND I WILL
I have turned into someone who is scared of everything. Scared to apply to new jobs, scared to confront people when they are rude to me or treat me badly, scared to really commit to lose weight, scared to take a fitness class infront of other people, scared to be intimate with my boyfriend because of my total lack of self confidence (even though he tells me I am beautiful every single day but it matters what I think even though I love him to death), scared of exploring the new city I just moved to, scared to do pretty much anything and it is holding me back in every regard of my life and my twenties are just floating by before my eyes.
This is my time and I am ready to take control. I know it wont be easy but I hope to really make my dreams come true and to love who I am on the inside and the outside. I will be scared, I will want to quit, I will want to go get me some All Dressed Chips and eat the whole bag, I will try to justify why I just bought those chips, I will be a huge brat due to withdrawal of said chips lol but I can do this and I hope whoever reads this feels a tiny bit inspired to do the same and maybe we can support each other in this hard challenge that is weight loss and the journey to self confidence!
i can do this