Normal eating

I am hungry. My stomach is cramping slightly and I feel hollow and uncomfortable. I am about to go fix my "at work breakfast"

I am so tired of dieting that this non-diet or normal eating thing is really appealing right now, and I don't know if I could be any more rock-bottom emotionally without being in full blown depression.

So, here goes...

Emotional Eating

Okay, so my good pal Beth recently wrote about Secret Eating on her blog and I have been thinking about it in my own life.

Thinking:
1. How much of my eating is really ever about nourishing myself with macro and micronutrients?
2. How much of my eating would I or do I actively hide or mask or offer excuses for?
3. What would I do or what would happen if I didn't eat? (not didn't eat ever, but if I did something APPROPRIATE with my emotions rather than shutting them up with a cookie)
4. Why does something so out of control make me feel like I am somehow IN control?

So, I am now reading Geneen Roth and trying to get myself to commit to a food/emotion journal.

Attitude

A while back I made an admission to a group of friends of mine - an admission that I am so very nasty, resentful, poisonous inside myself that I am ashamed of my thoughts. I have no sense of personal peace to give me distance on a situation and I am likely to (albeit largely internally) completely LOSE IT when any given thing happens. I do sometimes act out my frustration and I am often sighing, grunting or almost silently muttering curses. I manage to be sing-song bright w/ the girls and I mask maybe 75% of stuff w/ DH, but... I know I am a bitter, bitter girl these days.

And, I am also eating for comfort.

And I am hardly moving my body. Partly b/c our schedule is SO hectic and partly b/c it is so derned cold out lately (-17F Sat morning for example).

I started a Bible study on Attitude 2 wks ago and I do think it is helping a bit. The lessons are weekly, so I have done only 2, but they were big into reminding us that God knows how flawed we are and that he wants us to put trust in him and let go of all that stuff. Not rocket science, but not bad, either. Good to remember He knows me and loves me anyway.

The trick for me is to make the changes I need to bring peace in my life w/o concentrating on it so much that it feels like punishment.

This weekend, I had beautiful plans to spend 16 hrs at a crop - with my Toni-mom. I had arranged a sitter in advance for the baby and D was to spend the day at home w/ Daddy (who has yet to change a diaper for the baby girl, he feels uncomfortable tryign to meet her needs and won't watch her alone).

Anyway, I arranged the sitter several weeks ago - then sitter made plans to do something out of town this week, but after some back-and-forth it was decided they would be back either Fri night or early Sat. I would take baby girl w/ me to crop for first 2 hrs, then drive her to sitter for rest of day. WHen the plans started for going out of town, I realized that this person really didn't want to sit for me - but wouldn't say no.

Sat morning rolls around and I am running late, it is hectic - after a short cry, I pull self up and say "why are you stressing, sister? Who cares if you get to the crop at 8 or 9:30? Your spot is reserved, no worries - relax and enjoy yourself so you can enjoy your day." No lie: w/in 15 mins, phone rings. I give to DH b/c I see from caller ID that it is sitter and I know I don't want to hear whatever they have to say. DH talks for a while, then hangs up and says "we have a little problem"

Sitter is ill. Why they didn't call Friday night, I don't know. So, crop has started, I am at home. Car is 2/3 loaded w/ all my stuff and I am w/o sitter. And my backup is in the Holy Land (not South Bend, but actual Holy Land - she floats in Dead Sea today).

There's even more to the story, but I am dropping it in favor of protecting the ridiculous.

I call my Toni-mom and cry and she encourages me to bring baby girl for a while and just see how it goes. Baby girl has been to 3-4 other long crops and is really getting too old and too busy, but a couple hours is better than nothing, right? So, I load up and leave.

We stayed til 10 pm and it went fine. There were only a couple really fussy times and I still did 30 pp. There were 2 other babies in the crop rooms where our spots were, so we weren't even the only ones.

Making the best of it paid off - now I need to remember that lesson before I have to learn it again in harder circumstances.

The power of a personal "policy"

"I appreciate the invitation to join you in X, however I have a personal policy against engaging in social activities during the week"

Okay, so I don't really say it that way, but I have started to decline invitations to do things, based on the "we've decided we just really can't do things on a weeknight" excuse. It is so nice - who knew?

Many of you may be horrified. (actually there's only 1 person I know of who reads this, so - more accurately - Beth, you may be surprised...) We just can't do anything on a weeknight and have a non-insane night/morning. We're barely keeping it together as is. and the truth is that I was accepting invitations and then not showing - either having forgotten completely that I had made plans, having realized there was no way I could make it or caving into my spouse, who was telling me I was insane for committing to whatever it was.

I have been forced to take another look at what I am committing to - and it's not pretty. I bail on a lot of stuff and not b/c I dont' want to do it - but b/c I want to do it and then realize I can't balance it against the rest of the stuff on my plate. The guilt I feel for bailing is outweighing the satisfaction I felt at accepting the initial invitation. This is a successful outcome - I have failed miserably enough to realize I must change - hooray!

What other personal policies should I write?

Reminds me of the power of "rules" with my 3 yr old. I don't have to repeatedly say "no" if I can point back to one of our 10 or so understood rules... and I get less pushback from her. Works with her and now I see it works with me.

Think it might work with spouse?

50 books

Here's the update on my 50 books for 2006

AMLP
Gilead
You: the Owner's Manual
The One-Armed Cook
8 Minutes in the Morning
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter**
Naked Conversations**
The Rational Unified Process, An Introduction**
Project Management Case Studies**

**indicates I am not finished.

1. Roland Fryer 2. Insenstive remark 3. Something about being "Out There"

1. Beth - not surprised you had to look him up, but would expect ppl here on campus to know him and make a fuss - he's *the* speaker for the celebration of Dr. King's birthday, and the Daily basically said zilch. Oh, and they now have our lecture series available via podcast and I waited and checked daily for his lecture to appear - finally emailed the director yesterday and she said he declined to grant them permission to post it. Bummer. Yeah, he's a bit on the hot side - and so very interesting. Makes me wish I were a better economist so I could appreciate his research even more than I do.

2. Coworker described a group of ppl as "yard apes" - what the heck is that? Doesn't sound good and I am a bit afraid to look it up.

3. What is that I am so fearful of that I don't link my own blog or personal info to comments I post on sites I enjoy? Is it that my blog is "frivolous"? it is. If I am embarassed that it is frivolous, then there's an obvious solution -

catching up

1. Semi-important - what to do when you are in a meeting and an insensitive remark is made.... Still wondering what to do about a junior staff member's characterization of a special needs population. The remark was an odd one and I am not sure which of us might be misunderstanding the meaning...

2. Reading moving forward. Finished a couple non-fic (diet and cooking) books. Still on track.

3. Roland Fryer spoke on campus last night and there is NO story in the Daily or online. Do people not realize who he is?

4. I look fab today. just thought I would throw that in.

No time to go further.