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Why fight?
That is a question that can be difficult to answer. We all have our reasons for starting this battle. For some of us it is simply wanting to finally be that ten pounds less. I won't speak for others, I will only speak for me. I am fighting this battle, because I wish to live a bit longer. I joke that I refuse to say I am old until I reach 100, fully intending to reach 100 years old. There are some scary statistics working against me.
I have severe mental illness and those in that category die an average twenty to thirty-two years sooner than the average population from preventable diseases. A lot of that comes down to side effects from medications. I have meds that drive up the wrong cholesterol numbers, hinder my body's ability to respond to insulin driving up weight and blood sugar, increase my chances of developing diabetes, damage my thyroid, and several other things.
I've heard people say, "Eat right and exercise and you can get off the medication." Well, that may work for some things, but so far schizophrenia has failed to respond to positive thinking, affirmations, platitudes, or diet and exercise. Eating right and exercise does play an important part in my mental makeup as it impacts my mood and faculties if I am deficient in some area sending off a cascade of symptoms that way.
I want to be healthy. Yeah, part of me wants to be skinny for a day or two to see what that's like, but mostly I just want to be healthy. I don't want to wake up every morning and wonder if my lungs are going to make it through that day without an asthma attack. I don't want to worry if I'm going to stop breathing during the middle of the night due to sleep apnea and pass due to that.
My greatest goal is something I am frequently told is nothing more than a setting on a washing machine: normalcy. What I have now, doesn't feel like it is what it should be. It feels too much like a struggle. I want to be able to exist without fighting for every moment of peace to the point I can't recognize the peace when it's there. I just want to be.
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