09/03/2025
BecomingMe: When Food Became More Than Food.
I heard something today that stopped me in my tracks... perverted eating.
At first, I thought what in the world is that? But as the message went on, it made sense. Our relationship with food can be twisted, shaped by things we learned in childhood that weren’t right.
Think about it. You have heard the following often, “If you eat all your food, you can have dessert.” Or, “Clean your plate before you get up.” Those little rules became the foundation of how many of us see food today. Not as nourishment, but as reward, celebration, punishment, or obligation.
I remember this vividly. Growing up, one of my grandparents would make me eat everything on my plate. No matter how full I was. No matter if I didn’t like it. I wasn’t leaving the table until the plate was clean. And it wasn’t a requirement for everyone, just me.
One day it was black-eyed peas. I didn’t like them, but I sat at that table trying everything from cramming them in my mouth and even drowning them in ketchup hoping to finish, but I couldn’t. And because I didn’t, I got a whooping for not clearing my plate.
So for years, I lived by that rule. Full-size servings. No leaving food behind. Not realizing I was building an unhealthy relationship with food. Looking back, I see it now.
This wasn’t about nourishment, it was about control. It wasn’t, “Eat until you’re satisfied.” It was, “Do what I said.”
It taught me that my body’s signals didn’t matter. That my hunger, my fullness, even my dislike of certain foods wasn’t important. What mattered was compliance. This one thing helped to shaped my habits, my body, and my self-image in ways I carried into adulthood.
BecomingMe means confronting those early lessons and unlearning them. It means realizing food isn’t my enemy or my punishment. It means giving myself permission to listen to my body. Not to the old voices that told me I wasn’t enough unless my plate was empty.
Some of the hardest healing comes from what we learned as children. But it’s never too late to rewrite the story.
