Craving management: Like Maslow’s hierarchy

Well, I’m back from my break, at least briefly.  I’m not sure I’ll post again very frequently (if at all), if for no other reason than the fact that I don’t have much in the way of thought-provoking revelations or discoveries of the moment.  My ED seems to be in a state of semi-remission (I say “semi” mainly to avoid letting my guard down and becoming complacent) at the moment, so I’m just coasting along and enjoying what appears to be a new phase of my life.  Interesting, exciting, and a bit scary all at the same time!

However, I do want to post a conclusion I’m increasingly drawing on the subject of cravings, dealing with hunger, appetite, eating management, etc.  I’ll explain how and why I’ve come to this conclusion.

Due to my ED quieting down, I’ve been interacting more with people with no apparent history of eating issues, from all sorts of walks of life.  Mainly though, those people whom I admire or with whom I have shared interests.  I’m doing this both just for personal enrichment, but also to further learn — understand where an ED “ends” and “normalcy” begins.  Sometimes this is a gray area that’s hard to pinpoint.

So that’s my “how.”  Now the “why”:

I suppose one reason I’m taking a break is, I don’t want to forever have to be so active in my analysis and debate regarding my emotions, my behavior, etc.  I’m realizing that there’s no such thing as “total” recovery, meaning, you’ll never fully extinguish cravings, you’ll never achieve a state of absolute contentment.  So to keep pursuing such a goal is frought with frustration, as no matter how well you’re doing, it’s never going to be “good enough” if that’s the lofty goal you’re holding yourself up to.  I think part of why I’ve become fidgety over the last couple of years is because I want to figure out where “normal” is.  At what point am I more or less “normal”?  Obviously, the answer can only be answered by me, but figuring that out is no easy task.  I suppose the answer has to come from a combination of observing “normal” in others who appear to be more or less where you want to be….and what you personally are willing to accept as your personal “normal.”

So why be so analytical?  Why the need to decide such a thing?  Simple.  I want to get to the point that I can let GO of the recovery process already.  If I honestly feel I’ve taken my recovery about as far as I can, I can relax and settle in where I’m at and free up my mind for other things.  I don’t have to wonder if there’s more around the corner if I only put in another six months of active effort.  I do think there’s a point in which any additional improvements will be negligible at best.  More over, they may very well happen anyway, even without “formal” effort, just by living my life based on the values and principles I’ve established over the course of my recovery.  In other words, at some point I have to let go of micro-managing my recovery, and instead just let those ongoing, if smaller, changes continue to occur in their natural timing.

Okay, so here’s what I’m concluding.  In the whole scheme of eating — cravings, hunger, appetite, deprivation, etc., and life — emotions, personality inclinations, etc., there are “layers” of these elements that aren’t unlike Maslow’s hierarchy.  There’s the first layer, which I’ll call the “biological creature” layer.  Just the basic facts of being a living thing:  metabolism, eating, energy production and consumption, etc.  The next layer up will be the “genetics” layer.  Next is the “human experience” layer.  Up from that might be “issues and specific personality challenges” layer.  Above that might be the “eating disorders” layer.

What’s my point here?  That no matter how much you heal, grow, mature, resolve issues, change bad habits, develop healthy outlets, learn new coping skills, strategize your meals and nutrition, exercise wisely, attend to your health, learn to live with your emotions, etc…… you will STILL have a certain amount of cravings, appetite, hunger, emotional challenges, etc.  There is no fully getting rid of these things, because they’re driven largely by certain realities of biology, genetics, and simply the “normal” human experience.  You can do your best to attend to those things you can change, and clearly help yourself deal with those elements you can’t change, but at the end of the day, you’re still going to have to grit your teeth through times of uncomfortable hunger, cravings that just won’t die, irrational emotions and crankiness when you have no reason to be anything but ecstatic and grateful.

And here’s the thing:  the above things are OKAY!!!  There was a time when I’d experience some major breakthrough, or put to practice a great strategy of “alternate actitivites” (i.e. when a craving hits, do something to occupy yourself that doesn’t involve food), or develop hobbies or form great friendships that helped keep my mind happy and busy, boosted my self-esteem and  elevated my overall life contendedness, or had an “ah-hah!” about the origins of my behavior……and I guess deep down I kept hoping that somehow these things would help “magically” cut my cravings, or reduce my desire to make inappropriate eating choices.  I was WAITING for it all to at least become a little bit EASIER.

But here’s the truth, at least per my experience.  All of those things are great, but they don’t take away the cravings.  They don’t remove the urge to eat outside of my planned meal strategy for that day.  They don’t make keeping my weight where I like it any easier.  BUT….what they do is help me solidify my resolve, keep my confidence and sense of self-trust high, keep me motivated to confront these difficult challenges and STILL make the right choice, even if every cell of my being is momentarily screaming for a bag of cookies.

In other words, sometimes you’re going to have to white-knuckle it.  If you want both the emotional healing AND a body that’s fit and trim, you still have to deal with those challenges that are simply a normal reality of biology, genetics, and the human experience.  Just as our lungs always have a reserve of air in them, so too do we have a “reserve” of challenges that won’t go away completely, not for as long as we’re alive.

Ironically, it’s actually very freeing to arrive at this conclusion.  I don’t have to wonder if the existence of these things somehow points to the ED, or suggests I need to do “more work” in order to try to extinguish them.  I simply need to accept these realities, make my peace with them, and then flex that mental muscle every time I confront one of these challenges.  It may never get easier, but like everything, with repetition and time, I can get used to it.

I can live with that!  

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Lightbulb moment! I use my dinner to “decompress”!

This month has produced so many interesting realizations.  Initially I simply made it my goal that if I were to binge, I would limit myself to only the foods already in the house.  In other words, no special trips to the store, no purchases of normally “forbidden” options.  Doing this, I speculated, would remove some of the allure, knowing that all I’d be eating are those foods that are already part of my meal plan.  And indeed, it’s amazing how this helped diffuse the urges.  They’re still there, but for sure this helped calm down my eating.

Then I issued a challenge to myself, to pursue 90 days of “abstinence,” abstinence being, a break from bingeing altogether.  I felt I’d reached the point in which I was ready to tackle this, though I also knew that putting it out there would be risky.  90 days is a long time, and more over, the definition of “abstinence” can be massaged tremendously.  Nothing drives me crazier than when a person sets out to accomplish a goal, falls short of it, and rather than own up to it and maybe speculate on what went wrong or maybe whtether the goal was too ambitious or mismatched, they simply skirt the issue, give some general, “Well, at least I didn’t GAIN additional weight” or whatever.  Hey, the idea is to set goals and make an honest effort — and be honest with yourself, not to let things peeter out and avoid confronting the fizzle.  This is something I WON’T do on this blog.  What you read is what is happening.  You won’t see me back down or side step what has actually happened.  What’s the point?  Self-deception and denial are the fuel that keeps us in our current situations.  If you want to change you have to face both the triumphs and the discomforts of tripping.

Anyway, I have a whole lot to say with regard to those two challenges I’d issued myself.  Lots of progress, some stumbles, some imperfections.  But this has been a very different month from December, or really any period of time over the last several years.  It’s scary at times, because I’m not totally sure I like where this is taking me, but it’s also encouraging at times, as it certainly can suggest the opposite:  that I’ve stepped up to a new platform in my growth from my eating disorder.

In any event, the change of eating and restrictions in terms of binge behavior has led to a number of insights and realizations.  Last night (really, this morning) was one of them. 

I have to admit, a large factor in my eating choices has to do with calorie density.  What I mean is, I tend to try to choose foods that I enjoy, but that also provide the biggest “bang” (volume, for example) for the calorie “buck”.  Fruit, vegetables, popcorn, nonfat yogurt, sorbet, fish, fat-free cottage cheese, sugar-free jam, rice cakes, oatmeal.  You get the idea.  Don’t get me wrong, I also include olive oil (love to cook), dried fruit, sunflower seeds, rice (neither very low nor very high in calories), peanut butter, etc.  But by and large, I gravitate towards foods that both fill me up and take a long time to eat, while providing the minimum calories for that amount.  Among the foods I don’t tend to eat:  bread, butter, dry cereal, most meats (just don’t care for), potatoes, pasta, desserts, sugar, chips, crackers, cheese….you get the idea.  I also tend to shy away from certain fruits that, while tasty, are easy to overeat and are rather high in calories.  Grapes, for example, as much as I love them.  Bananas are about a 50/50; I’ll go through phases where I’m eating them constantly, then not at all.

Anyway, I know these aren’t exactly well-kept diet secrets.  I’m sure many people do this as it makes perfect sense.  Why not choose Food A over Food B if Food A is just as enjoyable as Food B, only with Food A you can eat more for the same calories?  Common sense.

But I discovered something REALLY interesting last night!

I had a good day yesterday overall.  Work went very well.  However, given my nature, I tend to get “wound up” by the end of the evening.  I work a job that demands long hours, usually quite late.  And as much as I adore my job, what ends up happening is I get so excited and jubilant as I work, by the end of my day I’m literally ready to run a 5K.  I can’t even listen to music en route home, settling instead for talk radio that I don’t even care for, just because I need to hear someone talking; I’m too wound up to concentrate/”relax” enough to listen to music, even though I normally LOVE listening to music.  This I’ve known about myself for many years.

And I’ve also known that part of the force that drives my binges is this very trait; I get wound up and it predisposes me to make impulsive, bad choices with my eating.  I can have my normal plan in place for the whole day, only to have some weird metamorphosis occur within those final two hours of the evening, leading to my making (almost always foolish) last-minute changes that almost always leads to disaster.

Knowing this about myself, I’d made some recent (as in, within the last 4 months or so) attempts to mitigate this effect.  Since I can’t seem to change the way I go about my work, my thought was, maybe there’s some intervening activity I can perform between driving home from work and arriving home for dinner.  Because once I’m home, it’s like this ticker clock goes off, and I can’t make my dinner fast enough.  So for a little while there, I was stopping off at the gym, not to exercise so much as to do other things:  sauna, sit in the Jacuzzi, stretch, sip some tea at the cafe, get a manicure, etc.  Just *something* to help diffuse my hyperactivity.  And lo and behold, it definitely helped.  I not only did better with my eating, I also loved these indulgences, began to look forward to them.

Admittedly, as the holidays approached I began to stop doing this.  Why?  Not sure, actually.  Without a doubt, it’s a bit exhausting.  My days are long and this additional activity demands its own extra effort.  At this time of the year especially (cold, snow, ice), it becomes more of a hassle.

Okay, so last night I had a good evening at work, but a few (normal) stresses as well.   I was doing okay with my eating this week — some issues, some of them scary, but overall well.  I had no reason to believe last night would be anything but a success in terms of my sticking to the meal plan.

So I got home, cooked my dinner, which was delicious.  Healthy, warm, nourishing.  I emerged very happy and content.

But then…. I kept going.  Oddly enough, I literally almost exactly repeated my day’s food.  In other words, nothing exotic, no treats, I had almost exactly the same foods I’d eaten on my meal plan yesterday.  Definitely well in excess of what my body needs (great….back to “damage conrol” mode), but not a single “woo hoo I’m eating this!” forbidden pleasure-type foods.  Vegetables.  Soup.  An Asian apple-pear.  Sugar-free dietetic mousse from a mix.  No out-of-control portions, though by the time I stopped it was definitely enough to cause a great deal of stomach distress.  I went to bad extremely angry at myself.  What the HELL?

It wasn’t until this morning that I realize what I do.

I use my dinner to decompress.

And last night….. I had more stress to “vent” than normal.  And guess what.  My dinner didn’t “last” long enough for the full decompression to take place.  Because it was weird, the impulse to eat more came out of nowhere.  It was as though I felt a certain let-down upon finishing my dinner, like, “But I’m not READY to be done with this yet!”  I didn’t feel hungry per se, just wanted to keep eating.  But I didn’t want to undo the progress I’d made this month or gain weight (well…at least not gain so much weight that I couldn’t get back on track quickly), so I fastidiously avoided any foods that would constitute my “treat” foods.  By keeping my foods within my “normal” options I avoided initiating that “what the hell, I’ve already eaten this, may as well go for the things I’ve been craving!” switch.  But still, I ate.  And well in excess of what I needed.  But I had no problem stopping long before I might normally have stopped with my “regular” binges.  So something was definitely different here.

And that’s when I realized this this morning.  I had more on my mind last night.  More “stuff” to release.  The safety valve was my dinner, only the safety valve was not opened for long enough to fully release the pressure that had built.  I had to re-open the valve and keep it open until all pressure had released.  I could then stop and relax, albeit now with a whole new stress in its place.

So here I sit, with a bloated stomach and this realization.  Which means I have to do something about this.

Clearly, I have to figure out how to release that steam, that built-up energy (which by the way is often positive, which makes it even worse as I feel like I’m truly abusing food for NO good reason!) in some other way.  Yes, I’ve become good at sitting with my emotions and not letting them sway me the way they used to.  And yes, I’m valuing my body and my sense of worth more than ever, which is one reason I made these challenges for myself this month.  But I don’t think any amount of recovery from the ED will negate the fact that I’m inclined to work myself up when I’m at work (or anything — I get excited and happy and sad and intensely passionate in so much of what I do).  I need some additional strategy to take that edge off of the pressure, so that dinner becomes the tail end of that unwinding process.

What to do?  Not sure yet.  I could resume my hit-the-gym-after-work routine, but I also need something I can do at home.  Last night, for example, would have been out of the question for that strategy as the temperatures dropped below zero, with windchills even worse.  I need to keep it practical and accessible enough that I’ll readily be able to follow through with it.

Got some brainstorming to do!

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Learnings from this last week

This is when my posts turn boring, as there’s not a whole lot to report other than my week has gone well.  I hit a couple of rough patches in the form of some foods that probably don’t belong in my food plan anymore, so I’m eliminating them for now (certain cheeses being among them).  But nothing even remotely reminiscent of disordered behavior.  It’s actually a relief to have the junk out of my radar; I genuinely enjoy eating fruit and steamed vegetables and whole grains and was able to get back to preparing recipes with these ingredients.  More over, releasing certain foods as even an option seems to have had the effect of freeing up my mind even further, allowing me to focus more on work and other areas of interest.  It’s a subtle shift as I already had most of my eating disorder behind me — the few remnant leftover behaviors being more physical distractions than emotional ones, but it’s definitely noticeable.  And it feels so WONDERFUL to be taking better care of my health.  If there’s any one thing that I’ve learned (more reinforced as I already knew) over the last couple of months, it’s that I do love my body, and that it pains me deeply when I harm it.  Probably my greatest motivator to finish flushing out these last few (but significant) behaviors is the desire to take good care of myself and my body.  It’s a desire that’s come over me especially over the last six months and it’s (thankfully) something I can’t turn off.  But of course, nothing is instantaneous; where there’s bad habit, mere desire alone doesn’t typically translate to instant change.  It’s a process and I’m convinced I’m in the next phase of that process.  I don’t think I’ve ever been here before — “here” being in a state where I’m consistently in a state of contentment with my body AND I’m following a specific healthy food plan AND I’m processing and sitting with my emotions so as not to turn to eating as an outlet for them.  I feel as though I’m experiencing the best of all worlds here, and it’s a great feeling, indeed!

But I’m aware that I’m not out of the woods yet.  No room for complacency, I have to stay focused and greet this next week with the goal to keep the growth and improvement going.

If I have one challenge that’s still working its way out, it’s trying to figure out how to strike the balance between “allowing myself to eat what I have a taste for” vs. “eating what I know is healthy for me.”  These aren’t always one of the same, and making the decision can be daunting.  If I want to include a bowl of low-fat ice cream with dinner, no problem, this isn’t an uncommon treat I allow on my food plan.  On the other hand, if I know I’ve been fighting a cold lately and would definitely do better allocating those calories for a healthier option — an orange and some almonds, for example, what to do?  I have been at this long enough to know that choosing the orange and almonds, while arguably the better choice in terms of nourishment, can backfire as I don’t feel as satisfied as I’d like with my dinner, which can lead to a return to the kitchen an hour later.  But obviously, choosing the ice cream is choosing basically something with no nutritional value.  As a mature adult, surely there comes a point in which you have to learn to override that “inner child craving” and do what is best for your long-term health.  At least…..that’s my goal, to reach the point that I’m more at peace with that decision process.  I’m doing much better, but it’s definitely still a situation-by-situation decision process.  I wonder if it ever becomes automatic rather than so cognitive?

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Going out on a limb here: My 90-day challenge

Every now and then, I’ve had to shake up my routine and/or my approach to continuing to move forward with better eating and related behaviors.  Over the years, a number of measures have helped tremendously, but the only thing they really share in common is that they came from something deep within, a momentary light bulb idea that, had I tried to impose it on myself at any other time, probably wouldn’t have worked.  That’s one of the tough things about managing/overcoming a bad habit:  There’s no formula or step-by-step set of procedures, no linear “plan” of first you do this, then you do this.  As often as I have been helped by my diligent logs and journals over the years, I know how often I have fallen into that trap of trying to look up what I was doing during a particular era in which I was experiencing good success, hoping to glean some insight as to what I could be doing now to get back to “that point.”

And while there definitely are measures that consistently work well for me no matter what year it is or what I’m currently experiencing….there are plenty of actions that become outdated; they run their course and may never be of use to me again.  Or they fade, I stray away, but they resurface later, at another time.  The lack of clear-cut answers and definitive “methods” can be daunting to an analytical mind like mine!

With that in mind, I’m feeling the light of inspiration for one of those probably-short-term-but-effective strategies for myself.  I hesitate to blog it because it’s quite the tall order.  Nothing annoys me more than when someone vows to do something….then a day later that “something” falls off the radar, or they abandon it.  What was the point of making such a declaration if you’re going to be so wishy-washy?  So for me to reach the point where I’m recording this, means I’ve given it a lot of thought and have a sense of readiness about myself.

I have basically always exercised.  At one time in my life, I exercised probably 4-5 days/week on average.  I’d exercise a few days, take a day off, another few days, take a day off.  Sometimes two days off.  At some point, I realized I felt better, functioned better, improved my health and happiness, if I aimed to exercise every day.  It took a while for that to fully happen — about a year of 6 days a week — but these days, with very little exception, I exercise every day.  Some days are lighter, some heavier, but the goal is every day, even when I’m slightly under the weather, even when I’m tired or cranky or just don’t want to.  My current streak is over six months long.

I’m looking at this as a model for my next eating phase.  I’m making it my goal to be abstinent for the next 90 days.  I’m borrowing that term from OA (I’m not personally a fan of that program but I certainly acknowledge it has helped many — and like everything, it has those points I agree with and disagree with), because it describes my goal most accurately.  In this case, my aim is to to 90 days without bingeing.

I feel ready for this because I honestly feel I’m down to the “bad habit” stage of my eating disorder.  As my dear husband often observes, I’m 97.9% there, save for this pesky remnant behavior I just haven’t yet kicked.  But I think it’s been weakened to the point that I have a real shot at this.  I do it with my exercise, why not with my eating as well?

Personally, I’m looking forward to seeing what happens.  How will I feel?  Happy?  Relieved?  The Same?  Cranky?  Irritable?  Excited?  I promise I will blog what happens.  The whole truth.

If by chance YOU feel ready to take on a similar challenge, well certainly, you’re welcome to join me!  I know I’m not the only one at this stage of my eating behavior.  Or if you’re not interested or ready, sit back and see what happens.  Either way, it’s bound to be an interesting three months!

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“Advanced Eating Disorder Recovery Phase”….not many resources for this!

It dawned on me yesterday, upon lurking at a blessed message board for eating disorder recovery (yes, I know my tagline suggests otherwise, but there IS sometimes an accurate use for that word), one reason I feel the need for this blog:  There’s very little out there, be it in the form of books or therapies or support groups or message boards, for those who are well beyond the early stages of eating disorder recovery, yet still struggle with a few remnant behaviors (and/or thoughts) and are still facing the challenges of common, dare I say “human” issues, such as weight management and emotions and life’s ups and downs.  One of the moderators of the board pointed this out and reiterated that one of the reasons the board was created was in the hope of addressing just that group of people.  What a wonderful thing!

I can relate because, for the couple of times I have contacted a therapist, doctor, counselor, etc. and explained where I’m at in my recovery, the response (usually following much silence) is usually one along the lines of, “I’m not sure why you’re contacting me?  You seem to be doing quite well with whatever it is you have been doing on your own.”  In other words, I no longer fit the definition of someone in need of outside assistance:  I’m not in immediate danger and I’m not dysfunctional and I don’t have immediate red-flag emotional issues; my problem is not significantly disrupting my life and I don’t appear to have depression.  And this is all true.  I’m functioning very well, am happy a good deal of the time, don’t have symptoms that match any clinical definition — either in behavior or in frequency — of a true eating disorder.  But I’m not convinced (obviously as I wouldn’t have finally broke down and contacted those services) that I’ve taken my recovery to its fullest potential.  In fact I know I haven’t.  While my behaviors may not be as harmful as they used to be or could be (thank the Gods I’ve never purged via vomiting, and the last laxative I took was 1990), my periodic binges are absolutely harmful to my poor body; I hear my stomach churning and gurgling and I want to cry, like I’ve just abused a loved one and now I’m hearing it suffer its wounds.  It’s a huge motivator for me to keep moving forward with this, as I can’t bear the thought of wrecking my long-term health with this.

Even so, I still appear to be in that group where you’re done with the initial “putting the fire out,” and now you’re re-released back into the world, armed with strategies to manage the problem and to avoid/deal with lapses, but also now having to make heads or tails of life’s normal challenges and the normal psychology that comes with the package, which often has nothing to do with an eating disorder and is just part of the human experience.  Where does your eating disorder end and all of the rest of that begin?  What defines “acceptable” behavior?  What defines “normal”?  If your eating is healthy but extremely odd per what’s considered “normal” and yet it does nothing to harm your health, is that acceptable?  On the other hand if you change your eating such that you no longer retain your “quirks” but you’re now eating more typical of the American diet — meals that may include some healthy stuff but also include junky ingredients, is that “healthier” or “better” than the first example, simply because you’re “fitting in” better, socially?  These are questions no one seems to be addressing, and I suspect it’s both because this is such a gray area — no easy answer, and also because there are so relatively few (percentage wise) people who are at this stage.

But just because the percentage of people who are at this stage is low, doesn’t mean there aren’t a lot of us out there!  I’m relieved to at least be letting go of all the “early recovery” stuff — not because they’re not useful but because they’ve run their course for me and are no longer relevent — and focusing on this stage of my recovery.  I only hope to see more voices discussing this, as I suspect this is where a lot of us get bogged down.

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