For as long as I can remember

"I've had a weight problem for as long as I can remember." " I've masked my feelings with food for as long as I can remember" " I've been eating diet-y for as long as I can remember." "And I don't see how it will ever change!"

Sarah and her friend Joanna are forty years old, and are learning normal eating. So far, they've read some books and they've learned the rules of normal eating, inching them closer to ditching the diet.

Sarah is excited, but Joanna is quiet and introspective. Joanna, in fact, has begun to doubt whether non-dieting will "work" for her.

"I've been this way all my life," she explains. "I can't imagine any other way to live. My family eats diet-y, controls their day with food, they even hide food. Everything about their eating is dysfunctional."

Sarah doesn't have these doubts about herself. Sarah only recently developed a weight problem, after going on a diet to lose a little baby fat. She ended up heavier than ever, and wants to get off that roller coaster fast.

Much of learning to eat normally is in our beliefs--in how we think. Will non-dieting be harder for Joanna than Sarah? Can Joanna succeed? Is the problem in the way Joanna thinks? What's going on here?

Let's look at the factors influencing Joanna's success that may be setting her apart from Sarah:

1. She lacks a normal pattern from her childhood to model
2. She has no historical well of self-confidence about food issues from which to draw
3. She has maintained her dysfunctional patterns with food for longer than Sarah has
4. She has less family support
5. The change is scary
6. The change may involve disloyalty to family
7. The change may unearth dysfunction in other areas of her life.

Clearly Joanna has a longer road ahead of her. It's no wonder folks like Joanna will sometimes touch non-dieting, then let it go, then touch it again--perhaps even several times before they really embrace it in earnest. This is understandable and normal.

Both women will need to learn some new patterns of thinking in order to succeed, but here are a few things Joanna will especially need:

1. A strong desire to recover
2. Courage to break away and become different from her family when it comes to eating
3. Courage to face criticism and even attack from family and friends
4. Willingness to face a few of her inner demons
5. Willingness to face her faulty thinking and self-talk
6. A touch of creativity applied to forming new ways of thinking and coping
7. Courage to try something totally strange and new

Notice how many times courage has cropped up. Anyone can have courage, if they're motivated. Joanna will also need some time to ponder and decide for herself whether she wants normal eating badly enough. She may need to do more reading than Sarah, in order to gradually wrap her brain around this new idea of normal eating. She might even come and go in this new way of thinking before she allows this new lifestyle to stick. She might resort to dieting one last time.

Joanna may even need a therapist. Or she might want to learn a little bit about cognitive therapy, which is an approach she can use on her own to correct her faulty thinking.

Can Joanna succeed? Yes she can. Folks like Joanna succeed all the time. She can even meet some on the Diet Survivors message board. That's the beauty of it. Joanna is not alone. She has her friend Sarah, but she can also find folks more like herself in cyberspace for support and encouragement.

It may not be easy, but this decision cannot be made by anyone but Joanna. She decides that for now, she'll just meditate on the word "courage."