Birthdays do count
Dear Food Diary,
Friday wasn’t such a good day for me. I had worked till the wee hours of the morning on Thursday, and started off Friday with a cup of tea and an early conference call, which is too early for business hours here, and too late for business hours in Germany; just the logistics of business. As soon as I finished that, I had two guys come to give me quotes on landscaping and building a fence for the back yard. I think that triggered a money-anxiety response, because I spent the rest of the day trying very hard to focus on work, but finding my mind wandering and thinking about, what else, food. It’s not like I wondered about cooking techniques or similar. I was fighting a primal urge to relieve the general feeling of anxiety, the knot in the pit of my stomach, by eating something. I know how the feeling goes. As I start to eat, I feel a calming, a let-down, start to happen. Instead, I made tea, I drank water, I updated Facebook and clicked on every Twitter link that came through. I would work and pace, and pace and work. I should have gone to the gym, and in fact was dressed for it, in the hopes that being prepared would make me more likely to “just pop out” and go for a work out. Instead, I was distracted and unfocused. I wrote letters to the strata office, asking for authorization to build a fence, upgrade windows, add a screen door, redirect the downspouts from our yard to points beyond. I prepared my granddaughter’s birthday gift, and wrote cheques to colleagues who needed to be paid for contract work. I made soup with organic chicken with veggies and quinoa instead of barley. I grit my teeth so hard that my jaw hurt. Yes, the anxiety had taken root. Coming from a poor background, there was never enough money. I really hate the feeling of being financially squeezed. Did I mention how much I hate the pressures of financial stress? I don’t know what I’d do if my business dropped off and I couldn’t earn money. Thank God it’s doing alright. I ate chicken soup with quinoa and veggies, and worked until the moment we had to walk out the door to my granddaughter’s dinner.
Ah yes, dinner. A group dinner. A group dinner with that whole social dynamic I just spent the previous day fighting with, and which I lost. My granddaughter chose Italian, and I asked for the calamari not to be breaded, to leave the croutons out of the salad, and drank club soda. But the bread, the never-ending hot bread with butter that was being cut into generous slices and passed around the table. I succumbed, several times, in fact, and though recovered by ordering chicken parmesan instead of a pasta dish, it was too late. The bread slices, the breading on the chicken, and the mozzarella in the main dish set me back. I didn’t even have cake - thanks to her dad having bought an ice cream cake, I was spared that hurdle - but the damage had been done. I may have tried to rationalize away the fall from the wagon as not counting, as it was a special occasion, but my body wasn`t buying it.
Net effect: up yet another 2 lbs and feeling horrible, not just because of the cumulative effects of eating wheat and dairy 3 days running, but not liking myself for my lack of restraint.