the devil

my food demons are alive and well, and it's starting to make me nervous that i still think about food and eating. for all the ways i thought i'd feel free, i still kind of feel shackled. i'm hoping that the reason i've been feeling this way has to do with my menstrual cycle, since i do think i'll be getting my period in the next couple days (my cycle is starting to change a little so it's hard to track). other potential reasons are dehydration (totally possible as water remains a challenge) and head hunger (also totally possible, in fact, probable).

i know it's different for everyone, and i do totally believe that. but at the same time, i feel like so many people who've had the surgery talk about not caring about food, not being hungry, having to set alarms to remind them to eat because they just don't even think about it. that's so not happening to me. it's not that i don't feel satisfied after eating, i even sometimes feel full. but i often seem to get hungry (or head hungry?) soon after.

when i encounter the somewhat common occurrence that i'm full before i've finished what i planned to eat, it's a hard moment for me. i feel deprived in that moment...like, i'm allowed to have that. it's mine. i feel like something is being taken from me, and i guess it's the opposite of the type of happiness i used to try and give myself (often successfully) with food. for all the happiness i felt gorging myself before, it's sadness and deprivation when i can't finish the four ounces of food i can have now. it's a work in progress, and i'm focusing lots of energy on those very moments - telling myself that the moment will pass, the same way my feelings passed when i was quitting smoking.

there was one moment that scared me a few weeks ago. i was full and had left about a quarter of my serving on the plate. i was in the bathroom and the thought crossed my mind that i could throw up and then have room to finish my meal. the thought scared me, and it felt like a dark moment. i knew in that second that if i did it, i'd be starting on a whole new path that could potentially lead me down a very dark road, and not a healthy or happy one. i'm working too hard on being healthy and happy to go down that road, and while all those thoughts were going through my mind, i tried so hard to focus in on why it felt so crucially important to me to finish my plate, even though i was very obviously full. i couldn't crack it but just the question stopped me in my tracks and it was a really intense moment for me.

i'm hoping that my efforts to drink lots of water and exercise a lot will help to relieve some of what at least definitely feels like legitimate hunger.