R is back and life is calm – except I'm that overeating
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Version 0 of 1. It's hard to admit to R that I've been eating all day. Normally, this would suggest that I'd been at a party, or great restaurant or market. But I have been at home with the children. "I feel really embarrassed telling you this, but I just can't lay off the biscuits," I say. "Well, you know what to do. Just have to tell yourself to eat healthily. Do some exercise if you want," he says, hugging me. "You don't feel like you've put on any weight." It's clear that he doesn't really get it, the fact that I'm going through a phase of massively over-eating. I can't blame him because the way in which I told him sounded a bit like a thin woman's lament about the thunderousness of her not-very-big thighs. This is what's happening. R is doing brilliantly well at staying sober. It's been weeks, and I'm no longer counting, but his behaviour and commitment to everything is so apparent. I keep noticing the things that have changed: his reliability, his honesty and his ability to say when he's feeling off kilter. All of this is very new. But my problem – an eating disorder of sorts – is old. As a teenager I spent years in a cycle of bingeing and throwing up. Thankfully, I don't do the vomiting bit now, but the bingeing – though very infrequent – is something I struggle with and I don't know how to deal with it. I've been hanging around the treat cupboard in the kitchen for the past few days as if it were the entrance to a crack den, too scared to open it up and look inside because I know that there is so much inside to devour. Most things are for the children's packed lunches and even though I'm not hungry I know that once the door is open, I'll have a compulsion to eat everything inside, as quickly as possible. Drinking and smoking – things that have the potential to harm – are not very cool when they become die-hard habits. But watch any old Hollywood film and there's always a male or female lead puffing away on a cigarette or loosening up on liquor. You'd be hard-pushed to find a character in one of these films, however, who spends a scene stuffing their face with rounds of bread and butter sandwiches for starters, half a cake for main course and a couple of packets of biscuits for pudding. Overeating isn't even a medical condition like bulimia or anorexia. It is just plain old overeating and it is never enjoyable. Once I confessed to a nutritionist friend that I had a dodgy relationship with food. I told her that during stressful times, I overate. Sharing this was a revelation, because she helped me realise that emotional eating is incredibly common. It just isn't talked about much. So I get the shame bit. When you're doing something you wouldn't do in public, it's hard to discuss with others, because secret habits by their very nature can make you feel ashamed, abnormal. And while I love eating good food in company, and have always been a competent cook, it is when I'm alone that the thought of being around lots of food makes me uncomfortable. As part of everything – addressing the problems that existed before I met R – I have to try to understand why I am overeating at the moment. Here are some possible reasons: a) I am the only adult in the house for most of the time. I can feel bored, anxious with responsibility and overwhelmed by the amount of domestic drudgery involved, b) A few months ago I lost weight because I was stressed and somebody said, "You look great, and very thin!" which did terrible things to my head because I started to presume that I looked better "very thin" than I did "normal", c) I am worried about telling everyone that R is moving back in. When I'm scared, I resist doing it: I eat with the abruptness of fear, almost like drinking to distract. Strangely, life is relatively calm. There is a shocking lack of drama in our lives now R isn't drinking; the children seem content, enjoying the day-to-day rhythm of normality that barely existed until recently. So what is there to feel bad about? It's crazy, but the peace is so disarming at times that I grieve for the drama – at least it kept things moving, diverted my attention away from the uneventful days that will always exist and shed light on my flaws. What I need to learn is how to stay sane through the smooth times, the boring stretches, to sit with the quiet that allows me to think straight. It's easy to see how R could never just stop after a couple of drinks. To continue with something, long after it loses its pleasure, is something I understand. |