Friday, July 31, 2009

Climbing Back in the Saddle

A month ago, as I was bending over and shaving my legs, I felt a pop in my hip and a sudden, acute pain. Immediately it hurt to stand, bend, sit or walk.

I've spent most of the last month dealing with and avoiding the outcome of that Saturday morning.

Most of this month has been about pain and injury and healing and adaptation.

And I'm not gonna lie, friends: It's been about bingeing too.

I spent most of May and June fighting my lack of desire to cook and trying to figure out how to feed myself. Then this injury put me in a place where most movement hurt and I took the familiar, easy road for me. I started eating out again.

I'm not going to beat myself up about it. I'm not going to whine and moan and complain either. And I'm also not going to go all self-righteous and declare a moratorium on all treats and indulgences and allergy-ridden foods.

I'm just going to breathe through it and not go anal-retentive or perfectionist. The only place that has ever gotten me in the past is smack dab in the middle of another binge.

I'm just trying to own up to reality and deal with it differently than I have in the past.

So, in the spirit of good fun and because I love details, here are some of the things I have consumed the past few weeks that haven't been a part of my normal lifestyle for several months.

Chocolate: and by that I mean milk chocolate, candy bars, peanut m&ms--you know, the kind of stuff you pick up in the checkout line at the grocery store, not the good, expensive, dark chocolate that I tend to prefer when I'm eating clean.

Soda: I've never been a big pop drinker but I certainly have partaken of a few this past month. I think I really like to do this because pop has no redeeming nutritional value and when I indulge it is usually because I'm in the mood to flip the bird at myself and my sometime- sanctimonious attitude about all things health.

Candy: The stuff you buy at the convenience store. All high fructose corn syrup and air--you know what I'm talking about. The funny thing is that when I'm really miserable, this stuff provides some of the sweetness I am so craving out of life.

Chips: I go a bit crazy with the chips too. I start dreaming about Barbara's Cheese Puffs. I don't know what the deal is with those things but they are cheese on crack. And I want a bag a day of them. Fortunately, the bag says "all natural" which gives me a strange sort of comfort.

Bread: All things bread. All kinds of bread. White bread. Brown bread. Homemade bread. French bread. Any bread. Bread, bread, bread. Bread makes me happy. I just saw again that scene of Julia Roberts in America's Sweethearts where her character went off the low-carb bandwagon and ate a huge breakfast of waffles, toast, muffins--basically a pig out on all things bread. And I had to laugh because--been there. Done that.

Fast food: I'm going to clump all the neon-sign, drive-thru, caloric-killing wasteland that litters modern suburbia under this one heading. There are too many of them and sometimes I just can't fight their regime any more. At times I spend weeks there on the dark side. Hands down favorite? Wendy's or Carl's Jr. With the occasional jaunt to Taco Bell--you know, just for variety.

Somehow I have survived my wild plunge into Noshing Neverland and I've come out on the other side a bit war-torn and limping but still alive. Ready to fight the good fight again. I just have to remember--it isn't about attaining perfection but about making progress every day.

I'll do my best to keep that in mind.

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