Food Jail

I found 'Breaking out of Food Jail' today at the used bookstore. What a fortuitous day! I also picked up two Geneen Roth books. I do like her perspective on eating. One of my favorite foods is, 'When you eat the refrigerator, pull up a chair'. It's a humorous book but has so much that is relevant to following an NT lifestyle.

I tend to war with myself and feel that I should be able to 'have it all' and that I should be able to eat anything I want and not have to worry about it. I always felt I could follow some NT principles and not all and make do but I don't think that's true anymore.

I'm tired of constantly thinking about food - whether my thoughts are positive or negative, it's just so tiresome nowadays. I want to wake up every day and not feel obsessed with food. I want so badly to feel content and light. I find it very difficult because you cannot escape the food labels.

Whether you are watching tv and someone says something about being naughty and eating ice-cream, or constantly having it drilled into that some foods are good and others are bad.

I think my biggest frustration with NT is that even Jean labels foods. She still throws diet rules into the mix by saying a diet comprised of 30% or less in fat is "good" and that one shouldn't eat too much fat. It feels so much like a diet rule. I get that research says a diet high in fat can be problematic but depending on the mood of the medical community that can be revoked on a whim, know what I mean?

I just feel so conflicted all the time.

I know that I can lose weight quickly/easily when I do low-carb but it makes me miserable and obsessed.

I can eat freely and live on a diet of fast food and junk and feel awful physically and live with guilt and anger but also with a feeling of joy and lack of restriction.

I just wonder why I feel that food is more important than I am. I go over this and over this and wonder why I choose food over health and vitality. Why choose obsession with food and dieting over freedom.

I really often feel stupid. I know NT is the right way and most likely the best way and yet I struggle to start. I struggle to make good food choices. It's easy for me to eat when I'm hungry and it's easy to stop when I'm full but the food itself is when I feel challenged.

I can eat well and feel good and yet give in to the pull of the pleasure foods and soon they overwhelm my regular eating and I'm back where I started.

How do you balance it all? How do you eat well and yet still enjoy all the foods the world has to offer? How do you do it?

There was a question in the food jail book about taking a pill for thinness but it would increase your risk for cancer ... do you know that I said I'd take it?

How scary is that... how stupid do you think it makes me feel to think I'd rather have cancer or more accurately, the possibility for cancer than deal with being obese. I know there isn't a magic pill.

I know that each path on NT is different and each person has to find their own way but damned if it isn't very very hard and painful. I know I should stop asking 'why me' and stop whining about what I don't have and practice gratitude a bit more and focus on what I do have but let me say that it's a real challenge. I guess that's what makes it worthwhile in the end though ...

I suppose this sums it up:

You can start with nothing, and out of nothing and out of no way, a way will be made.
-- Michael Bernard Beckwith

Update: 6/24/2007

I decided to start following NT today. I don't have my house prepared for it, meaning I don't have good available food, but I will go to the store after work.

This past week I've been doing the green smoothies (a.k.a. blended salads *G*) and have been very happy with them as my breakfast. Today though I made a change and added hemp protein and hemp seed to combine the need for more protein and efa's. I think that this will make the smoothies even better for me.

I tend to feel hungry 2 hours or less after I have one of these smoothies (not the ones with added hemp) and I feel guilty about it. I feel like I shouldn't be hungry so soon, especially since I just "ate" 32 ounces of smoothie which was comprised of 1 banana, a cup of frozen fruit, a huge handful of spring mix, 2 kale leaves and parsley.

I just feel like that should keep me satisfied and my body is being greedy or maybe it's just my mind, I don't know. It just feels wrong to eat so soon again.

One of the most interesting parts about reading the NT books is how I can relate to the stories in the books yet feel so sad for those in the books that have those problems. It's almost like I recognize on one level that I have a problem but on the other it's so far removed from me that I don't SEE that I am like them.

Later that day ...

I made my decision to go with NT and what happens today ... I start looking at things like SLD again.

I swear, every time I decide to "stop dieting" I get this huge renewed interest in everything I've done in the past. I suppose it's because I cling to what is familiar, even what is familiar hasn't always worked the way I expected it to work. Or because what is familiar is also easy on my mind, at least initially.

Blah.