The Day After...Chronicles of a Food Junkie

Between the Feast of the 7 Fishes and Christmas dinner here at home I ate enough pasta to feed 3 large people. Pasta, bread, and pizza are my real weaknesses. It just slides down my throat. When the salt from the cheese hits my taste buds, it explodes in my mouth, and before it's down my throat I have another forkful ready to enter the tunnel of love again, and, again, and, again until I either feel stuffed or sick.

After that, well, the guilt sets in. Being raised in the Catholic church, Catholic school, the whole 9 yards, I'm very adept at the feelings of quilt. If you're raised Jewish or Catholic this is an inherent genetic trait. After you struggle with a habit, and then give in to that desire, you only feel worse, which of course leads you right back to the problem. It's a vicious cycle.

It's not enough for me to just eat a sensible meal.  I eat to be full. Pasta is one of those super foods that you don't have to chew too much, like baby food. It just takes a couple of bites, the saliva in your mouth along with the olive oil breaks down the flour, and it slides down your throat. It tastes so good in your mouth, and it feels wonderful going down.

Good New York Neapolitan pizza is the same way. The cheese, the salt, the fat, and the sweetness from the tomato sauce make it fucking irresistible. The crust is there to hold the other ingredients, mostly fat, together. The first piece right out of the oven is hot so you have to be a little careful you don't burn the roof of your mouth, but once you've consumed that the rest of the pie goes down hella fast.  Before you know it you've consumed 3,000 calories, and no amount of exercise is going to work that many calories off my fat hippie ass.

I have another huge baking dish full of ziti in the fridge. Today I going to test myself. Can I have a normal serving of ziti, a salad, and veggies and leave it at that? That is my challenge. Let's see if I can do it.

One can already tell by reading these blogs that I have food addictions. I, like many people, use food as a reward, as a stress releaser, and as a crutch sometimes. It's always there, it's your friend, it never talks back, and it always makes you feel good. How could something that feels so good be bad for you?

I'm going to beat food. The great thing about it is, I can still eat everything I love, all of it, pizza, pasta, meat, bacon, cheese, desserts whatever. I just can't overeat it, and that's my problem. I'm an overeater is what I am, and a food junkie. I already love vegetables and fruit so I don't have to train myself to love foods that are good for me.

The challenge for me is to recondition my brain. I can and have been successful at dieting and loosing weight before. This is not a diet, but you understand. If the brain patterns aren't changed, I will fail again, and the weight will come right back with a vengeance. New habits have to replace the old ones, because we are creatures of habit, just like other animals.

Food consumption today: 12-26-12

Breakfast: Fresh squeezed grapefruit juice, cereal, soy milk and a banana

Snacks: nuts, & raisins, carrots, 1/2 red bell pepper, 1/2 Parisian cucumber

Dinner: 1 piece of Tilapia, steamed Brussel sprouts, salad green dandelion & frisee, medium  portion of baked ziti (I actually put some back and said to myself; "You're full, you're just eating to eat."

That's it....I did it. A pretty good food day if I do say so.

Exercise...4 miles street and trail walking.

Peace,

Make Food/Not War