Food, we can’t live without it
Nothing has caused me to feel more cognitive dissonance than food. Growing up in the time of Weight Watchers, diet soda, and the advent of big box gyms I feel I had a pretty healthy relationship with food and take it or leave it attitude about body image.
All of those things were definitely in the background in my 20’s when I could influence my weight with how much I ate and exercised. Wanting to be healthy, I would go on diets — the Candida Diet, the GAPS diet, Whole Food Plant Based, No Carb, Slow Carb. Each with it’s rule set. Each rule followed to a T would define a good day. Each rule broken would make me feel out of control. Finally I just lost interest in eating.
I went through a period of about 2 years where I was very rigid around food. It sort of came out of no where, but looking back I can see the progression. It was that time of my life that I had too many good things — job, wedding planning, grad school, buying a house. I started working with a trainer at the gym. That was a lot of fun and started my early morning routine that I would continue for years. Then Chris and I got a Vitamix in our little apartment in Fort Lauderdale. We started making hummus and soups. I started following the Candida diet (sugar free, mostly vegetables). We would go to the Hollywood farmers market and get green juice. I met people who were actually vegans. I really questioned what my previous diet.
When we moved into our new house, we found many amazing restaurants in our new area Boca / Delray. I continued to be strict with food and continued to workout and run. After a while lack of nutrition and overexercise led to my hormones being out of wack and I stopped having a period. Chris and I were newly married and thinking about having a family, so this was another point of stress.
After a few years of tight control over food, I went to the other extreme. I just wanted to be out of control. I gained the weight back. If you think of pulling the string on a bow to shoot an arrow, the father back the string, the farther the arrow will fly. I got pregnant with my first and then my second kids. I had two amazing healthy and easy pregnancies. I was able to remain active until giving labor for both. After both births, I was ready to get back to exercise at 6 weeks postpartum. Breastfeeding did me a lot of favors to quench calories. I shrunk right back down.
There were a few life events that occurred since my kids were born that made me crazy about food. Chris had a crazy skin thing show up. He’s not one to treat the symptoms, but rather to cure from within. I admire this whole heartedly. In his research, he decided to change his diet and cure from the inside instead of taking prednisone. This was the GAPS diet — a lot of bone broths. Another time the diet changed was after a bad lipid panel and calcium score. My husband did tons of research — The China Study, Blue Zone diet, Essylstien, Joel Kahn, GBOMS (greens, beans, onions, mushrooms, berries, seeds), etc. We followed this diet, he better than me for several years. We looked and felt great. Our lipid panels were stellar.
Eventually I struggled with the feelings and actions of so much control. Our kids still ate meat and some processed foods. It is really hard to have much of a social life when almost all foods at restaurants are non-compliant. We eventually caved and went back to our regular eating habits. We do try to make a few salads at dinner per week, consume less meat and dairy, and in general fill our plates with vegetables. I go through spells of cooking a lot at home and cooking nothing at home. Being pretty active and busy does not make it easy.
Every time I eat, I still have some small judgement of what I’m eating. If I overeat, I still feel remorse.
Those are just leftover feelings from decades of messaging from society. I may always have those weird thoughts. I am and we are who we are beautiful from the inside.
