I
have thought long and hard about writing about this, it seems almost too
personal. I like to pretend that I am
above this subject. I like to think that
I am too mature, too confident, too comfortable in my own skin for all this
nonsense. Unfortunately….
Once
upon a time I believed that I was above emotional eating. I had a breakthrough in junior high, I had a
crush on a boy. A boy that I would never
know….all right it was Christian Slater.
(This is going to get so personal.)
I bought a tub of Haagen Daz, ate it, and afterwards all I had was a
stomach ache. So I never did that
again. I thought my brilliant logic had
protected me from (as a friend once said) ‘pile driving carbs into my face’
when I was sad. I smugly believed this
fallacy for many years, until…
I
stood in the kitchen, half empty boxes were strewn around me, almost everything
was almost empty, but not quite. I
mentally inventoried the contents of the cupboard, half finished bag of
almonds, some prunes, six month old crackers. None of it normally tempting, but
right now I wanted to eat it all. We had
not closed on our house yet, but the time had come to move out of our apartment
and into temporary housing while we waited on the process to be completed. We had ‘faith’ that it would and acted in
such. Then why, as I stood in that
kitchen, was the only thing on my mind shoving food into my face? An epiphany blew the face of my own lies,
‘I
am a stress eater,’ the thought rang out in my head. I love eating. Some days I think I am just sitting around
waiting for the next time I get to eat.
I love food. I have met very few
foods that I do not like. Okay that’s a
lie… So personal…
Dill.
I don’t like dill. Do not try to
convince me of otherwise. I know that I
hate it. It’s okay, I like almost
everything. So I feel justified in
hating dill.
I
have been trying, vainly (pun intended) to ‘lose that last five pounds.’ In that quest I have started tracking my food
intake on the website myfitnesspal.com. My
husband thinks I am crazy. I eat pretty
healthy and I don’t feel like I eat all that much at meals… so what’s the
deal? One day I ate 600 extra calories
in just random stuff I popped in my face.
Handing out goldfish crackers to my kids? Some for Mommy. Someone brought in brownies? One down the mouth hole. Bought donut holes to keep kids happy? I like the classic kind, down the hatch.
As
we’ve been moving and in a time of huge transition my ability to say no to
extra dessert has left the building.
I’ve thought about this. I’m not
overweight. My husband is still
interested. Why does this matter?
But
is this healthy? That I want to shove food down
my pie hole when I’m stressed out?
Shouldn’t I have better ways of coping?
Sure the occasional glass of wine or chocolate cupcake isn’t going to
cause an early death, but should I go there every time the mercury rises? I’ve been thinking about how to invite God
into this, before when I’ve prayed about losing weight I swear I’ve heard,
‘Or
you could learn to accept yourself, Lara,’ which is not really the answer I
want.
Let
me level with you for a moment before you start typing very encouraging notes
to me about how thin I am, most of the time I’m pretty happy with what I’ve
got. I know that I am more than the sum
of my body parts. I am my intellect, my
passions, my personality, my love, and all those parts of me I like. I just think there should be a better way of
dealing with stress with more caffeine and sugar than I would like to admit. Openly, on the internet. For all to see in black letters.
I
bought a copy of the book ‘Made to Crave,’ it’s sitting unopened beside me on
the couch. Ready for its maiden voyage. All the testimonials on the inside of the
cover talk about how happy they are and they started losing weight, and they
can’t believe it. And I think, ‘that’s not
the point.’ I don’t want to make this
about losing weight all the time. I don’t
want to live my life in bondage to the way my pants feel around my waistline.
But
I do want to stop ‘going into survival mode’ and for stressful periods, mama
gets what mama wants. That is usually
chocolate, wine, and large cups of coffee (just in case you were confused.). We are in another period of transition and
stress in our lives, I felt myself pouring that glass and sinking into that
hole. I keep thinking, ‘isn’t there a
better way?’
1 comment:
I won't be much encouraging help because I feel like I have the same problem with stress eating. We went through the moving process last year and it s one of the most stressful things I ve had to deal with so hang in there.
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