Fear of Flying

For most of my life, I was on automatic pilot when it came to eating. That doesn’t mean I didn’t think about food. The truth is, I thought about food all the time, but here’s the catch: I didn’t allow any of those thoughts into the space between the impulse to eat (call it the itch) and actual eating (call it the scratch). As soon as the vague notion of, say, cheddar cheese made itself known, I simply went right to the fridge and got myself a chunk. Or two. Or six. In the thirty seconds it took for me to accomplish that culinary dash, no brain cells were required to break a sweat.

The last five years have been the opposite of autopilot. I’ve found that I’ve needed to rethink just about everything having to do with food, every day, every meal, every minute. To be honest, it’s been exhausting and I often wonder whether this is something I can continue to sustain for the long term. The one thing that keeps me going, believe it or not, is my complete disdain for clothes shopping. It’s a habit developed, I suppose, from decades of being unable to find nice clothing in my size. Yet even now that I have many choices of outfits that fit and look good on me, I still find clothes shopping to be a chore. The thought of having to go out and buy a new and larger size wardrobe is a powerful incentive to stay on the straight and narrow.

It occurred to me recently that perhaps a large part of the stress of the last five years has been due to a belief that I should be able to develop a new kind of autopilot. In this healthier version of mindless eating, I train myself to eat sparingly and replace those cheddar cheese cravings with longings for broccoli. Peaches. Perfectly poached filets of salmon. For some reason I have this idea that eating should a natural impulse, something I should not have to think about. It should as simple as itch, scratch. I often wonder if other people who struggle with weight feel that way. Doesn’t it seem preposterous that such a simple act as eating should require so much forethought and planning?

I’ve been reading a lot lately about mindful eating. This concept seems to exist somewhere in the middle of the continuum between autopilot and the obsessive-compulsive dance I’ve been doing with food. As I understand it, mindful eating is about being more aware of the messages your body is sending and then acting on those messages. Such as eating when you feel hungry and not eating when you don’t. Being in tune with how some foods make you feel good and others make you sick, or jittery, or fatigued. It sounds like a good idea, but I don’t know that I have what it would take to pull it off. It seems that mindful eating would require the ability to relax and silence that infernal voice in my head, skills that are not among my strong points.

Well, I guess we each have our own path and our own struggle. For now, I just have to muddle through the transition as best I can, hoping that maybe someday I’ll be able to sit down and enjoy a meal without so much angst and premeditation.

Then again, maybe not.