Thursday 3 June 2010

Unwilling

This morning, for the first time in nearly three weeks, I managed to make porridge for breakfast.

First I was away. Then I was too busy eating bagels with Barney Butter imported from the US. Then I moved on to Kashi honey flax and Nature's Path Flax Plus Pumpkin Raisin, both also imported from the US (and the latter given to me by my sister). Another day I ate two breakfast bars: Kashi cinnamon roll and a honey graham Cliff Z bar (you guessed it, US imports). I carried on eating all these alternative breakfasts even though – after multiple tests and despite being roughly same number of calories – they didn't fill me up as much as porridge does. (For the record, as a kid I hated cold cereal. Then again, I also liked white chocolate, so there's no accounting for my taste then.)

Yesterday I thought about making porridge but again reached for the cold cereal. I don't wanna, I whined inwardly, as though making porridge were as time-consuming and labor-intensive as, say, homemade lasagna. This morning I started the whine again: I'm hungry. I don't want to. I'll make it tomorrow.

I thought again about my response to the Harpers Bazaar editor's question about how difficult weight maintenance is: That it requires constantly daily effort. And I seem to be having a spate of feeling particularly unwilling.

It took me until yesterday – so five days, on top of all the days I was travelling – to return to doing my five Sun Salutations in the morning. This morning I got back to the porridge. They're only little things, but they are part of what center me and set me up for a day of good choices. (One of the reasons I usually avoid breakfast out is because when I eat breakfast badly, I usually eat badly all day.)

Every little thing seems to be a struggle at the moment – I can already feel myself resisting getting the pot and measuring cup and bowl and spoon ready for porridge tomorrow. Often I can block out a lot of foods, but not this week -- suddenly every corner is teeming with things I'd like to eat, and every second, it seems, there is a choice to return to a habit I thought I'd long since broken. Tonight I opened the cabinet for some tea and thought seriously about eating my way through the Twix bars and shortbread I got on the airplane.

This too shall pass. I just hope it does soon.

***

Monday, I told my grandmother I have a blind date coming up. And it is 100 percent blind, because I have no idea what he looks like and actually don't particularly even like the person who's setting us up.

"I wish I knew how tall he was so I could decide whether to wear heels," I said.

"Well, on the second date you won't make the same mistake," my grandmother said promptly. Who knew she was such an optimist? (Maybe she's given up – she didn't even ask if he were Jewish. Which, for the record, with a surname that is O'Something-or-Other, he most certainly is not.)

***

Thanks, by the way, for all of your lovely photo comments. I'm blushing! The photos, for the record, show a loss of about 85 pounds -- my total loss is 95 pounds.

4 comments:

  1. Oh dear, at 5'10", the heels dilemma is one which I must suffer before every first date.

    I've decided that if I'm happy to wear flats for the duration of our relationship then I will wear flats on the first, otherwise I start as I mean to go on, whether I tower over him or no. My concession here is that the first date heels never exceed 3inches. If he can't handle that then there's no future I'm afraid. Never again will I choose a man over shoes!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm having similar "I don't wanna" feelings lately, particularly this morning. I drank lots of wine and smoked cigarettes last night and today I feel horrible, and am once again questioning why bad decisions feel like such a good idea at the moment. Sigh. My usual breakfast (greek yogurt, fruit, Fiber One) sounds absolutely horirble right now but I don't have any alternatives...

    ReplyDelete
  3. I just finished my cold cereal breakfast, and was thinking "The only reason I didn't make a fruit smoothie is because I am LAZY." Then I come here and discovery I'm not the only one! :)

    We'll both get back to that more filling breakfast soon. A reprieve from the ordinary sometimes makes us appreciate all the more.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Why is it soooo much easier to gain bad habits than good?? I can buy one bar of chocolate in a petrol station once and then suddenly, whenever I'm in ANY petrol station, I have the thought that chocolate must be bought. But does the same happen with good habits?? Does it buggery....Noooo, when they're lost, they take bloody ages to reinstate.

    Grumble grumble...even after months of good behaviour.....

    Lesley x

    ReplyDelete