How do you eat?

For me, eating is a constant, 24/7 issue of stress. My mother was crazy (literally, medically) and one of her fixations was body image, so I grew up in a household where losing weight was an obsession — one I inherited, unfortunately. To this day I can correctly guess the number of calories on a plate of food, like some bizarre parlour trick.

This isn’t a health and fitness blog so I won’t bang the drum about my own choices concerning food, but I will say a key component is what is starting to be referred to as “eating clean” which basically means cutting out junk and processed food.

SO. FREAKIN’. HARD!

Well, sort of.

Cutting out starchy food (grains, potatoes) was much easier than I anticipated. I did first did it back in 2010 and immediately felt better. I backslided during the health issues of 2012 but I’m back on it now, being very careful not to eat grains. Sometimes I want a pizza or a bag of potato chips but that’s usually a passing fancy, nothing I get too wrapped up in.

But sugar? Sugar? SUGAR????? Oh sweet heavens full of cinnebons, I’m totally an addict. Literally, a junky for the stuff. Yes, I do know that sugar is naturally occuring in fruits and vegetables; I assure you that when I get a craving, it’s not for an apple. 🙁

I dismissed the whole “addiction” idea because it just sounded silly. Also, I don’t have an addictive personality (I know, because I’ve tried…long story) so I figured, meh, need more willpower!

It’s not an issue of willpower, not entirely. I’m not going to say I’m a complete victim to my cravings but…close. It’s close. Surprisingly so. It’s the type of situation where suddenly at 8pm at night I want a ice cream or a peanut butter cup and I’m out the door to the little gas mart down the road before I even realized that I put my shoes on. It’s crazy. I’m not impulsive like that…in fact, I’m pretty much the poster child for “Anti-Impulsive.”

Except when it comes to sugar.

I wonder how long it would take to truly break the habit. I’ve gone two weeks without processed sugar in my diet, eating as clean as I can, and then broken on day 15. I don’t binge, not in the sense of eating 10,000 calories in one sitting or something, but I’ll massacre a small pint of ice cream over the course of an evening.

But I keep coming back ’round to trying again to eat healthfully. Work is a trauma for that, it’s hard to do it when you have job(s) that keep you out of the house so much, and that’s one reason I look forward to the day when I hold down a job part time or not at all and can stay home and write, work out, and eat clean.

Work in progress, both my life and my stories. 😛