RC #5

Yeah, it’s a weekend thing to step on the scale to verify that I haven’t binged since the last Reality Check and here it is Wednesday or actually Thursday.

Yes, I stepped on the scales last weekend and down two pounds, no big deal, didn’t have anything to say about it… oh, started a post but it was all happy butterflies and moon beams. Then I read the Sunday paper and did not feel like posting smiles and daisies fluff.

So, here it is Thursday in the wee hours of the morn, not even 4am, and I want to bake and eat a zillion cookies, call a taxi to find an open all night store that sells ice cream and chocolate sauce. I already ate a bag of chips.

WTF is going on with me?

I am tired but can’t sleep. That has become a frequent problem, not getting near enough sleep, some nights only 4 or 5 hours.

I have a shrink appointment next Tuesday, postponed from weeks ago till the end of June to give me a chance to pay off a stack of medical bills without adding to them. I am nervous about this and I don’t know why, dreading but looking forward to it at the same time. I debated about blowing it off, do I really need therapy?

I ordered clothes that don’t fit… knew I had dropped sizes so I measured myself and consulted the chart but should have dropped it one more. (Yes, returning loose jeans and capris and shirt that hangs too baggy, keeping a couple tops shaped well so loose is comfy.)

I shopped in stores, trying things on… almost bought a white cotton sundress until I noticed a rip in one of the fake macrame shoulder straps.

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LATER (Thursday afternoon)

Stopped writing in the night when it hit me… I have clothes in some of the same sizes that I was trying on in the stores stashed up in my “skinny clothes” box. So, I dragged out the box and tried things on.

I no longer have a skinny clothes box.

Oh, I still have three pairs of vintage jeans cira 1990 and one pair of leftover jeans from popping diet pills in 1998, which was the last time I wore the vintage jeans (got strange looks then, the styles are so dated). Those jeans can stack on a shelf as it is only a matter of time, ye maybe forty pounds, before I can wear them again.

I stepped on the scales this morning, against my better judgement… never weigh yourself the day after consuming 1120 calories worth of salty chips.

WHY did I buy them in the first place?

This is where it gets messed up.

First, let me share this: I have no problem keeping chips in the house – there’s an opened bag ye over half full of tortilla chips up in the cupboard right now. They’ve been there for oh, weeks? I’ve ate out of it several times, making mini tostadas for supper or crushing a few on a salad. If I want to eat chips, I eat chips, nothing is forbidden. I’m not dieting. So its not like oooo, that’s bad, not allowed or anything. So, eating an entire bag of these chips had nothing to do with an inability to have things like that in the house.

I bought the chips because a neighbor asked for a couple bucks the night before and I didn’t have the change so I sent him up to the store. I gave specific instructions of what to buy, including this particular type of chips and where to locate them in the store as they are in their own display rack over by the coffee pot and NOT in the chip aisle. He did not listen to me. Insteading of using my money to buy me what I wanted, he bought me what he wanted to buy me. I wanted “Munchies” (snack mix of doritos, cheese curls, pretzels, and sun chips) and sliced cheddar cheese from the deli. He came back with cheddar flavored potato chips and an ice cream candy bar.

I asked what happened. He forgot about the cheese. And they just didn’t have those chips I wanted. Yes, he looked where I told him they would be… none there. Okay, maybe someone came in and bought out the entire display rack, all four shelves? I let it slide, knowing that he just did not listen to me. Men. Generalization, yes, but typical problem with sending men to stores, they rarely return with what the woman asked for. Fresh spinach? Bring back a can. Ask for beans, lucky to get peas. Oh well.

I should have tossed the chips I didn’t want, but I ate them anyway, crunching down the irritation of not being heard, my instructions ignored. Then the next day, when I was walking past the store, I stopped in to see if he flat out lied to me. The display has obviously not been restocked overnight. I bought them out of spite, bit childish… but irritations simmer. It had nothing to do with chips and everything to do with feeling like I talk to the wind, my words ignored, as if what I say or what I want does not matter, ya-ya so what… so I ended up eating two bags of chips (and that ice cream bar) in attempt to crush those emotions instead of following my original intention… to eat ye about one serving of what I wanted and stashing the rest up for another day. I didn’t even enjoy eating them.

Oh well… it could have been a LOT worse… combined chip calories over two days still way less than than how it used to be, since writing and trying on clothes in the night stopped me from turning it into a full blown binge.

Damage? Temporary, mostly an OD on salt thing, as total calories consumed does not equal enough for a five pound gain. I feel puffy and miserable.

So, it’s a be kind to myself day.

Binge eating disorder has very little to do with food and everything about repressed emotions, how to do deal with things that are “inappropriate” to express. I cannot take out a lifetime of feeling ya-ya’d what I think or feel or say does not matter on a man who screwed up on a store run.

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People have told me that my blogging about it has helped them, which came as a shock as I had no idea that they even read my blog. I’ve been asked to be more specific, share what am I doing… what I eat, etc. Straight up, its not about food. Thanks for listening.

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Edge of Reason

“Nancy, don’t be like that.”

I cannot count the number of times that I have been gently scolded with those words. I am not allowed to express anger, not allowed to vent rage, not allowed to speak my mind if what I have to say might upset somebody or be construed as not nice.

This is not just an echo from childhood inside my head. I am fifty-two years and still being scolded.

Nancy, don’t be like that.

But I am like that… and there are times when I should be like that.

PRIME EXAMPLE:

When my husband left me, I could not afford to continue living in the home we shared, so I moved. And then I moved again. So to be very clear – this was MY home, not his. And everything in it was MY stuff, and yes… it was old stuff: a mix of antiques and used things that I had slowly gathered. It was my home and I liked my stuff.

By then, we were getting along okay and doing the co-parent thing, so when he volunteered to watch our daughter at my place so I could go out for a birthday drink with a friend, I said okay.

I came home to a house-full of smiling people, including my parents, all waiting to see the expression of joy on my face when I walked in the door and saw a big red bow on the couch of a brand new living room set. Yes, while I was gone, my ex-husband redecorated MY post-divorce home to HIS tastes.

I was angry, demanding “where’s my stuff?”
Mama scolded me. “Nancy, don’t be like that.”

I felt robbed. My stuff was GONE… replaced with huge fluffy contemporary furniture, all neutral beige, the fabric in the living room matching the fabric on the dining room’s padded chrome swivel chairs.

I bit back the tears and ran to my bedroom to see if he redecorate that room to his tastes, too. Sigh of relief to see it unchanged. Thank goodness I had moved the little antique horse-hair couch out of the living room or it would have been gone too, hauled off to the dump with everything else.

I took a moment to compose myself before I had to go back out and say what was expected of me, to thank the man who stole my stuff.

END EXAMPLE.

I picked an example that doesn’t matter anymore, one that clearly explains how I am “not allowed” to feel what I feel. I have to swallow it down, quench those emotions, let things slide, never seek resolution, restitution, just let it slide… hide those feelings, keep them locked inside, let it slide… again and again and again and again and never say hey, we need to set some boundaries here, this is unacceptable… or can we sit down and talk, try to reach a mutual understanding? No… supposed to let it slide. I am not allowed to be angry. No matter what, I am supposed to let it slide.

I can’t do that anymore because I don’t know how to shove down “inappropriate” emotions without bingeing. I can’t do that anymore. It is not an option.

I guess I am out in left field, learning to deal with emotions as they come. Nancy, don’t be like that?

I am coming to the conclusion that there are no “inappropriate” emotions, just inappropriate ways of expressing them.

Thanks for reading… it really helps to write.