my relationship with food

What is your relationship with food? I had to ask myself this question not to long ago and I was rather surprised by the answer. Do you eat to live or live to eat? Why do you eat? When and how do you eat? All questions I was forced to answer. And then once I answered them, I had to ask myself why it was this way. I never realized that there are "normal" eaters and then there are people like me. People who use food for things other that fuel. Or at least I did, for many years. I am becoming much more aware of my habits and striving to change them every single day.

I learned many bad eating habits over the years. I used food as a reward, as a comfort. When things got bad I would eat. When I got upset, I would eat. When I got bored I would eat. Food was my friend. My one and only friend. Or at least that is how I felt about it for a very long time. I ate for all the wrong reasons. And I ate poorly as well as in large quantities. I tried for years to fill an internal void with food, never realizing that it simply wasn't possible to fill an emotional absence with food. But I sure tried. entire large pizzas all to myself. Two, sometimes three burgers at the drive through. An entire box of cereal for breakfast. I was always hungry, always wanting more. But it wasn't food I needed, it was something else entirely.

I learned something recently. Or rather many somethings. The first, and probably the most important, is how to listen to my body. To make myself stop and think if what I was feeling could be satisfied by something other than food. If it could be, then it wasn't hunger. It was something else entirely. Perhaps simple boredom, or stress or that old desire to simply fill the void with something. But certainly not a need for fuel. Cravings and hunger are biological signals, your bodies way of telling you it needs something. They are NOT psychological signals. Not if they are real anyway.

Hunger is not simply wanting to chew on something and then swallow it. If that is the case then perhaps a stick of gum is what you need.

I have learned that "normal" people look at eating and food very differently than I always have. A person who looks at food normally eats only when they are hungry or have a craving for something. Cravings are OK, they're your bodies way of telling you it needs something. Craving an entire large pizza though, that is not normal.

They also choose foods that are filling and satisfy those cravings. Instead of just putting whatever is around in their mouth they actually think about what it is they want to eat and if it is going to fill that craving or not. I never really did that, I just ate. Whatever was at hand. And  a lot of it.

Normal eaters stay connected to there bodies and eat with awareness and enjoyment. I would eat mindlessly. I would eat and eat, not listening to my body, just putting things in it. I would do this until I was so full I couldn't move some times. I would disconnect, almost like an out of boy experience. Like I was watching myself eat and having no real control over it. Frequently I found no enjoyment in eating, it was simply something to do. An attempt to fill the never ending void within.

In staying connected normal eaters also listen to their bodies and stop eating when full or satisfied. They will respond to and respect their hunger. People like myself on the other, will eat simply to eat. I can not count the times I have gone to a buffet in the past and stuffed myself beyond any level of fullness or comfort simply because I could. Because the food was there and I had a plate that needed filled. Not because I was hungry, not because I had a craving for something but in a thoughtless, even mindless quest to fill the void. It never worked.

Now things are changing for me. I've finally realized that the void can't be filled by food. That void is something else entirely. Food has no effect on it. I am altering my relationship with food. Or, rather, building a completely new one. I no longer look at food as just something to put in my mouth and swallow. I look at food as fuel first and something to be enjoyed and savored second. I am learning to listen to my body and think about what I'm feeling, is it hunger, or is it something else. I'm learning how to live, not simply survive.

Happiness is a habit just like every thing else. Being miserable is a habit too. It's something you learn. Something you acquire. I always thought if I went someplace different, ate something better, met different people, I would be happy. Never worked.