At A Snail's Pace

Recently I have been trying to figure out what my emotional triggers for binge eating are and I can say with some certainty that I still have little idea.  Admittedly, I've been thinking about it less frequently than I had been when I first started my blog and I should get back to working on that.

However, I have identified some physical triggers and one of them had been eating too quickly.  I use to scarf my food down like it was some sort of race as to how quickly I could eat everything on my plate.  When it was gone, I would go back for more, because in the five minutes it took me to eat my brain would still think it was hungry because it still hadn't registered that the stomach was full.  So I could get seconds and eat a whole additional second plateful of food and by the time it starts registering that I've had enough, my stomach actually hurts because I've eaten far more than I need to.

This is the cycle that always happening, but I never caught on to what was occurring.  It was only after starting my therapy and my visits to the dietitian that I started hearing about the importance of eating slowly and chewing thoroughly.  I felt embarrassed, and I told my dietitian this, because it sounded like something that I probably should have known but she said that it's something that people don't automatically realize when they're relearning how to eat properly.

I did feel a bit better hearing that it was more common than I thought and started putting it into practice immediately.  It actually was harder than it sounds when you've spent your entire life eating really fast, but it's been about a month now that I've been doing it successfully.  Now I don't even have to think about it.  It takes me about a half an hour to eat dinner, I'm full before I finish eating, I eat less and I never go back for seconds.  All of these things I'm happy about.

Some practices that helped me during that month were setting my fork down between bites, and I still do that actually because it's become a habit.  I chew much more slowly and thoroughly.  I did use to have to think about it before, because it had always been food was swallowed barely after being chewed as if I were some sort of wild animal.  One more thing I found helpful was to stop trying to put as much food on the fork as possible.  For some reason I would always try to stuff as much into my mouth as it could hold.  I am not a chipmunk.

Now, I don't even think about it when it comes to meals and today I realized that I don't even stress out anymore when I'm eating.  That made me really happy and I hope that it continues to stay that way.

Staying On Track

Thursday was great.  I did what I said I would do and walked Bradley to the bus stop and back home again.  Felt a little easier and I will continue to do this daily as long as it doesn't rain.  Unfortunately the bus stop doesn't have any kind of protective cover, so I wouldn't want him standing out in the rain, even with an umbrella.  Though I don't think there is any chance of rain any time soon, so no worries there.

I came home and cleaned up, keeping on top of my chores.  It's nice to be able to have the energy to do these kinds of things now which I can attribute to both a combination of new medication, strength from moving around more, an easier time moving around from weight loss and increased energy. 

Now I need to start focusing on things I want to work on next.  I need some new goals.  It's great that I've started walking Bradley down to the bus stop and have been able to start keeping up on my house and getting things in order, but now I need to start adding more things to the list of responsibilities that I'd like to be able to do again.  I'm not sure what those are.  I think my task for this weekend for myself will be to think about it.  I don't want to overwhelm myself, so maybe for now it will just be one or two small things.

Whatever it is, I just want to make sure that I don't allow myself to get comfortable and become stagnant water.  I must continue to improve by pushing my limits and I am ready to do that now.  We'll see what I come up with over the weekend.  Enjoy yours and see you next week!

My Favorite Five Letter Word

During the first several weeks of my therapy sessions, my therapist would say to me that I had to learn to love myself.  This phrase would incite such anger that if I could be the almighty Zeus, I would hurl my bolts of lightning down upon the Earth from where I stand on Mt. Olympus and lay waste to all of mankind.  Really, I loathed hearing those words from her.

She also gave me reasons why but I'll admit to being too angry to listen to what they were at the time, though I'm sure we'll talk about it again in the future.  Every week though, she would say it.  Finally, I was so furious and so sick of hearing it, I snapped at her and said, "Stop telling me to love myself!  It's not going to happen.  There is currently nothing about myself to love.  Maybe when the weight is off, I'll feel differently, but right now it's not going to happen."

She asked me, "Do you know how many times I was able to ask you that before you finally told me to stop?  I've been counting.  Have you?  Five."

I didn't get the point.  I still don't know what the point is because I have a long way to go with my therapy and I can't figure it all out at once.  However, the number of times was apparently five and she never brought it up again.  My point is anger was getting in the way of me understanding something about myself. 

Yes, I'm only figuring this out now but what made me realize it was the hospital visit on Saturday and my visit with Dr. Douchebag (name changed to protect the misguided).  When he left the room and I was putting my sock back on my foot, I suddenly chose to let go of my anger and use that moment as a motivational reminder that I can do this even if he didn't think I could.  Recognizing that I could let go of anger was an incredible feeling.  Empowering, even!

Ok, there is a slight problem now.  I can't get it back.  I have been angry since then about other things and I don't know how to stop being angry about everything and I don't know how to let go of that emotion over other situations.  Is it because I subconsciously don't want to or because I just don't know how to and what happened at the hospital was a complete fluke?  Is being angry the emotional equivalent to taking the easy way out of a hard situation or job?

So, I'm frustrated with myself and a little confused about it all.  I'm adding this to the list of things I need to think about more and perhaps even bring up in my next therapy session.  I have to stop letting anger stop me from doing things.