Kraft American Cheese, Sleeping, Anxiety And Yoo- Hoo

Slumber (Photo credit: weesen)

Some people drink when they are under stress, others turn to cigarettes, some to drugs. It soothes their souls and it may take the edge off of their anxiety. The people who drink red wine can boast that it is medicinally beneficial, heart healthy in fact. Others like scotch or beer or ooey- gooey sweet stuff with vodka in it, like a spiked punch. I do none of the above, when I am anxious all I do is get into my bed, surrounded by layers upon layers of blankets and sleep. Really, I do. The only food my stomach allows me to eat is a Kraft (orange) American Cheese Sandwich on soft bread with soft butter or margarine spread and a box of Yoo Hoo to drink. That’s it. I lose weight during this period of anxiety but really, it isn’t any fun and definitely not worth it, well maybe worth it a tiny bit.

There is nothing more relaxing to me than”hibernating” under mountains of blankets, snuggling with my pillows and escaping life’s problems. Do I know what I am doing? Absolutely. Do I choose to do this? Yes. It is my way of dealing with overwhelming stress without any addiction except the warmth of my bed, no alcohol or drugs needed. Sometimes I say I am just going “to rest” and we all know what that means…..

I acknowledge what my problems are, I’m not crazy, this is my coping mechanism. I can’t change the situations at hand for the better so I have to live with them and instead of being the hyper-oh-my-God-what-are-we-going-to-do person that I already have been for 24 hours, I try to balance that with pure avoidance therapy. It’s cheaper than a lot of other coping mechanisms and I can do it anytime I want.

There are only specific foods that I CAN eat when I am that, shall we say, out of sorts? American cheese (Kraft Individualized Orange slices) and bread, soft butter and Yoo- Hoo to drink (boxes). This is my comfort food and I will absolutely have it every single day, it is the only thing I WANT to eat and CAN eat when I am this upset. It soothes me. I can eat it five times in a row, even ten. It depends heavily on the situation. Tonight, I actually ate something different since we were at a restaurant but the only thing that appealed to me was ravioli stuffed with butternut squash. I couldn’t look at my husband’s rare burger though admittedly I did try a bite of my son’s steak. It tasted delicious. My own food was soft, mushy and comforting and it certainly was in the same genre as my American cheese sandwich. Club soda with lemon was definitely no substitute for my beloved Yoo- Hoo. They should really stock that in restaurants, don’t you think?

Things are a little better now, not completely but we are coping. I’m off the complete American cheese sandwich but am still into small portions of soft food like the baked ziti I made today. It wasn’t my exact comfort food but I’m trying to branch out a little. Even I try to be flexible after my 24-48 hours guaranteed American Cheese/Yoo-Hoo Festival. Sometimes. it even works. Sigh. Okay. Rarely.

*my admiration and thanks go out to Kraft and Yoo-Hoo companies.

Carry On Tuesday – Only In Our Dreams

Eating Shiva (Photo credit: Mirror | imaging reality)

I felt virtuous when I sat, eating an open-faced veggie burger, with stone ground mustard and drinking ice water. I don’t feel the same way now. It’s three hours later and my son is having a barbecue for his friends. He came running up the stairs with a freshly charred hamburger on a bun dripping with ketchup and a slice of cheese slithering on top, shining with grease. I did not hesitate, I ate it  in one minute and I’m paying the price, in fullness and actual physical pain. I can’t lie; I have enjoyed it immensely along with the toasted marshmallow he brought up too. I know this game very well.

It started at birth with me, a six-week premature baby having to stay in the hospital until I gained enough weight to be able to come home. After that, my mother overcompensated and then I went full speed to fat or what they used to call “chubby.” I can pretend to eat healthy food now (most of the time) but I know that I will always be the fat, round, girl, that I have always been.

My mother could never figure out why I never wanted to go shopping when I was a child and a teenager, how could she not know? I was a very slim child only from age five to six until she decided to fatten me up, relentlessly, wherever we went. The Nestle’s Quik was at my side, spooned generously into my milk at every meal, like a religion.

Last year, I gained forty pounds when our house was demolished by termites and carpenter ants and we had to stay in a hotel, in one room, three of us and our dog, our disappointment and our dreams, dashed. My husband was also on medical leave for a snapped Achilles tendon, our sixteen year-old daughter cooped in one room with us while our house was built again from bare walls. That’s when you know who your real friends are, because it is at their house you are sharing a meal, they are asking you in and treating you like family, it saved our souls and sanity.

The only comfort in our lives was that our son was away in college was missing the trauma we were living through, and FOOD. We ate out at restaurants, two or three times a day. It was clear we were not eating healthfully, we were eating to comfort ourselves, dessert for lunch and for dinner every single day and night. French fries with your sandwich? Yes please. The only decision to make was what flavor milk shake we wanted, vanilla, strawberry or chocolate. Candy bars, cookies and crackers were stored in our hotel room like paper cups.

Piles of cakes and pies, white tendrils of coconut smiled down at us from its vanilla perch. Chocolate mousse cake winked at us from its place on the revolving cake display, cheesecake with strawberries, we denied ourselves nothing. Deep, deep down I knew what was happening though I chose to deny it; only in our dreams did I believe that we were not feeding our depression. When times were easier, better, we would deal with it. Then, we couldn’t cope with one more detail, one more restriction.

In three and a half months we moved back into our completely disorderly yellow house. For months we didn’t know where anything was. There are still boxes missing, items that some day we hope to find. I started taking responsibility for my unhealthy body. I worried about my heart, I started slowly and decided to eat more vegetables and less red meat. In the end, I lost forty pounds with another five to ten to go. I drink ice water with lemon instead of soda. I try not to have dessert but lately I have been craving something sweet. It’s a slippery slope; I have to be very careful.

I know I am the same chubby girl I was when I was little. I will always be that child in my mind and body; I will always be the last girl picked for any team sport, the fat kid, the ugly, stupid child. I don’t measure up, why should I be able to do something when my parents always said I wouldn’t be able to do it?

As we get older we make our own choices, we slip away from the past and make up our own rules, our own belief system, we cherish different qualities than those that we were taught. I taught my own children that they can do anything they want and they can do it well. Whatever they want to do they should do it with pride. There is nothing that they can’t do, nothing they can’t succeed at; in my heart, I love and like these two people. When they were young, if I was fearful for them, I hid it, because they had the right to experience life through their own feelings and not become unnerved because of mine. That, is what parenthood should be about. This was my gift to them; the gift of freedom, freedom to choose, but most of all, freedom to believe in themselves, knowing, always knowing, that I believed in them too.