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The Only Addiction You Cannot Completely Stop:
I just finished reading Shannon Ashley’s latest post and I can feel her pain. It’s mine.
I’ve been using food for comfort since I was a little girl — maybe more than sixty-five years. That’s a long time to be addicted to anything.
With alcohol, cigarettes, gambling, porn, you name it — you can just stop and not have to return to the problem. Your life does not depend on the intake of the problem. With me (and Shannon) we cannot just stop eating. We might try (anorexia or intermittent fasting) or we may change the habit to binge eating and bulimia.
On Thanksgiving, at my stepson-in-law’s parents’ home, I ate half of what was on my plate — even stuffing and my hostess’ spinach and bacon casserole that I love. I passed on the rolls and had only a sliver of cake for dessert. I wanted more but I was determined to continue on my quest for a lower weight.
My weight when I entered the hospital last December for my stroke was 211 and I moaned the number as a larger-than-me aide weighed me. “I wish that was MY weight,” she said to me. It’s all a matter of perspective. I’m now, almost a year later, 181.
I didn’t follow any diet — not Weight Watchers, not Nutrisystem, nothing. I just decided to eat half of what I would have eaten normally — pre-stroke.
