One of the truly bad symptoms of dieting is that I no longer can trust myself. I know I’m not alone in this. Here’s the usual scenario: I start a diet. I do what it takes to lose the weight. On day eight, nine or ten, I have some candy, or cake or breakfast strudel. Then, I snap. Since I’ve had forbidden food, I think, what else have I missed? What have I been longing for? Then I eat whatever I can grab.
To help me, my kids will start shouting, “Your diet! What about your diet?” I will shout back, “None of your business! Look, is that Pikachu behind the couch?” While they’re searching, I’ll tiptoe over to their Halloween/Easter/Birthday stash and snag a few more candy bars. I’ll feel evil laughter building in my throat. Mwahahaha!
My husband has tried to have a few heart-to-heart conversations with me about this. “Give yourself permission to eat food,” he’ll say kindly. But I’m too far gone. I think, what does he know? Who is he to give me advice? He doesn’t diet. He doesn’t know what it’s like.
After a day or so, the storm will calm and I’ll either be back on the diet, or I’ll give up completely. You can bet good money on this pattern. Oh, sometimes I’ll make it an entire three weeks before the snap, but it’s going to happen. I can’t remember the last time I went an entire month. Oh, wait, Weight Watchers around a year ago—I manipulated the point spread well enough to contain my cheating. I was “good” for three months. It didn’t help me lose any weight, but, on paper, I didn’t “cheat”.
So when I find myself radically altering my life to change eating habits, I can’t help but wonder how long will it last? I don’t have a good track record. Well, actually I do have a consistent track record. It’s a track record of eating whatever the heck I want when I want it. I can always trust myself to revert to that.
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