Food

Food was very easy way back when. Oatmeal for breakfast, Lean Cuisine for lunch, and at 5 pm the daily call of "Hey babe, what's for dinner?" That would result in cold cereal, fast food, pizza, or Chinese. It was a fine situation although at times, embarrassing.

At one point we (T&T) got on a kick of no sauce on our pizza. That lasted a few months and then we decided to have sauce one night. I placed the order and got a call back from the pizza place owner within minutes confirming our order. He had it memorized and wanted to know if we had made a mistake.

Then, a few years ago I quit eating. Not completely of course but really cutting back. It started when Nicole was here and we doing 12 hour shifts at the hospital. She found a company that would deliver food to me at home. She put me on a 1,400 calorie package, a total of 3 meals a day. But I misread the labels and thought each meal was 1,400 calories. So I ate only about one of the meals each day. I got used to being hungry and when you mix that in with very little sleep, trouble at work, and a dying husband it just became part of the package. When Tom died and Nicole left I never really got back on the food bandwagon.

I really do feel sick when I don't eat enough and usually have dry heaves on my runs. But I feel way worse when I am full and when I go over the deep end (see previous post about eating a box of girl scout cookies) I become significantly unhappy physically and emotionally.

So now I am trying real hard to eat my specified 6 small meals a day. I have about one good day a week. A good day is when I actually eat all my food. A normal day is when I get about 3 meals in usually all before 1:30 pm. A bad day is when I eat breakfast, forget about all the other food, feel like crap, work out and then disappoint myself and my coach.

There are lots of reasons a therapist might say I behave like this. Perhaps I am reflecting the emptiness in my heart into my body (how freakin melodramatic is that?). Maybe I still believe that if you don't eat and work out a lot you get thin (man could I catch some crap on that one). Maybe I am lazy and distracted and cannot prioritize what is good for me (unlikely as I sure manage to fit my workouts in). Maybe this the area of challenge God has given me to overcome (Now I am cracking up. I have not succeeded in the last 678,879.03 challenges He has given me - I’m thinking success on this one would be a poor bet). Maybe I can starve myself to death (No way, that would mean giving up my critical glass of wine a night).

So I set my alarm to remind me, have a lovely snack at 10:30 am (1/2 c nonfat yogurt, 1/2 c fruit, 3 graham cracker squares, and 1 soy sausage) and promise to eat again in 2 hours.

And now as I read this I realize how completely all-about-me I am and I am sorry. How lucky I have a limited (and hopefully nonjudgmental) reader base.