Empty House, Full Stomach

My name is Greg Penney, I'm 17 years old, 5'6" and weigh more than most teenagers my age. I was recently featured in the documentary Generation XXL, directed by Teresa MacInnes, which aired on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on March 8, 2007. I was one of four teens the film followed to a "Fat Camp," where we confronted issues surrounding our weight, self-esteem and body image. Because I've always been the class clown, hiding behind my jokes, it's not always easy to see the pain I carry inside. I come from a broken home, so growing up, food was sometimes my best friend. I didn't talk to it or anything, but it got me through some hard times. But now I'm facing the issues I have with food and learning to be mindful about eating. There is so much talk in the mass media about childhood obesity and body image among teenagers. Now I'd like to offer my voice, so society can hear about it in our own words.

Growing up, every day I would come home to an empty house - a lifeless building. I would walk straight from the door to the computer room, where I would plant myself in front of the screen, unless I got hungry, which seemed like always. What did I eat? A slough of snack food, chips, popcorn, and if there were any homemade cookies or cake, it would be gone in one sitting. I have eaten half of a cake just because it was there. I never understood, though, why no matter how much I ate, I was never full. That's not to say that I didn't regret it after, but everyone says they regret it. Regret doesn't help.

I don't like offering excuses but, I felt broken, incomplete and unhappy when I wasn't eating. When my sister Beth got home, she would see what I had eaten, and would get very upset and call me names like "brat," "spoiled," "lazy." These names only widened the emotional gap in my stomach, which I tried to fill with food. After a while, I developed a relationship with food. I didn't talk to it or anything, but I used it as emotional support. No matter what, food was always there. Because it was only a temporary solution, I always needed more.

When I was younger, my entire family was in turmoil, and it became a serious problem. After we moved, the fights only increased, but unfortunately it wasn't yelling fights, but just a quiet sniping attitude. This destroyed my stomach. I would eat supper, then dessert, then get up at around midnight and eat some more. These tendencies would continue into my school day, which was extremely disruptive. I'd sneak a snack here and there, and get caught for it every time.

In school came more stress. We got a 15-minute break in the beginning of the day at around 10 a.m. I would go to the local store and get a hotdog, chips (Marine Coast), a Snickers bar, a slushy and sometimes sunflower seeds. I would eat all this like it was nothing. I was known as "the Mooch," always asking for food, always wanting to trade my healthy stuff for bad. I don't like using excuses, but my school made it worse. There was no health official telling me not to, so why not?

It got to the point where I would take food without really asking. ("It's easier to ask for forgiveness, then ask for permission")-it is safe to say this did not make me any friends, therefore my eating habits, were not only playing havoc with my body, but also my social life.

As weird as it sounds, there was a fair amount of peer pressure that came with being a "food vacuum." Not only was I the class clown, I was expected to eat. People would dare me to eat things, old, expired stuff and whatnot. This attention was bad because it taught me that, to get attention, all I had to do to was eat.

To this day, if I am angry, I will not eat supper to show my dad I am upset. This relationship went on for years, until I confronted it at the camp that I went to. I learned that I "mindless eat." That means I will eat a bag of chips while watching TV, and without even realizing, I would eat the entire bag. An interesting trick I learned to keep myself from eating donuts, popcorn and other fatty snacks is "mindful eating." Try it, take a piece of popcorn, and chew on it for about one or two minutes. It feels really fatty of the roof of your mouth. Just being conscious while eating makes a huge difference.

To say that emotions play a large part in appetite is an understatement. Not only that, but when you become stressed, your body recognizes that, and starts storing fat and produces cellulite. At camp, I realized that I was not the only one who ate for comfort. This was definitely a turning point in my eating habits. Not to say that I have gotten rid of my food complex entirely, but I have cut eating for comfort down to 1/100 of its original size. It's a start.