teenaged food issues while in my thirties

let's talk food, a favorite topic for mine. 

actually, let's talk binge eating. NOT a favorite topic of mine because i have some issues with food.

i've always had a "healthy" appetite. growing up i was an athlete and very active so i had a high metabolism and could pack away the food. it was amazing. it felt great to eat and eat and not put on a pound and still be "skinny". i always thought i ate a lot because i had to keep my energy up for all the activities i was involved with. but it seems that i have feelings that go along with overeating. oh boy! 

my eating habits and food issues seem to run deeper than i realize, and i'm finally figuring this shit out. good lord, i can't believe it's taken me this long to connect the dots. i should've put two and two together from my post about over eating on National Doughnut Day. but that's what i do, i over eat and don't think twice about it. i've always been okay with that philosophy, just ignore the problem. 

all my food issues are starting to catch up with me and my mid-thirties body. i should've realized this 10 years ago when we first moved to Austin. it's about time that i caught on to this. when we first moved here i was amazed by all the food options, especially the late night ones. back home, the 24 hour fast food restaurant didn't really exist. so after closing time we just went home, or if you were really hungry you could go to so some sit down restaurant (Perkins, Country Kitchen) but who wants to do that while drunk and tired because someone always passes out in the bathroom. i could just go home and make a box of Velveeta Shells and Cheese and devour the entire thing by myself.

for the past 10 years i packed on the pounds. tex-mex, bbq, fast food and beer is what's done me in, and my emotional state is the offender. at first i was emotional because of the move and living in a new city and state and having to make new friends and knowing no one -- only the boy. it's a lot harder than one would imagine making new friends (especially when i'm an introvert homebody). when that's followed by years of just having a good time and living like a teenager, it catches up with you. 

now i am in my thirties and my emotions are all over the place and this year, THIS YEAR has been a test of my convictions -- it's been a year of extreme lows and highs because some very good stuff has happened this year too. so for the past few months i've been binge eating and out of all the food options i have out there to binge on, i've chosen fast food (McDonald's is my main go-to). ugh! my stomach wants to kill me now because fast food, and my stomach and i never really got along in the first place. so now World War Three is taking place in my stomach, and i think i might die.

basically i need to get my shit together.    

        

the life of a sugar addict: National Doughnut Day 2013

last Friday celebrated the day all sugar addicts devour, National Doughnut Day -- which was on June 7th of this year because it's celebrated on the first Friday in June, who knew?

i am a sugar addict! i never thought my addiction was truly that bad until National Doughnut Day.

i've always had a sweet tooth, it's no secret. ever since i can remember i've always needed something sweet; candy or ice cream or cake or brownies. my weakness would have to be candy or ice cream, but if we're being honest, i'll take anything.

when i was in high school, a friend of mine would sell this generic candy for a fundraiser for her diving team -- she became my candy dealer while at school. i sat next to her in computer class during second period, and i would buy up all the candy bars she was selling. then i would sit back in class and eat candy bar after candy bar until all that i bought from her were gone. good lord, i had the metabolism of a god back in high school. where did that go?

when i lived at home, my mother and i made the perfect team when it came to sugar and sweets. i am a batter eater and my mother is a brownie nut. i would come home from school or work and whip up a batch of brownies and then go to town on the brownie batter. i would usually eat enough batter to where i would have to make a smaller pan of brownies because i ate half of the brownie dough.

good lord i love ice cream. i usually have a hard time just eating one helping of ice cream. with my 1/2 gallon of Blue Bell sitting in the freezer, i usually have one helping in the afternoon when i get home from work and then top off my night with another helping. i'll go through ice cream phases, too. for a while, i've been all over plain vanilla topped off with Oreos that i smashed to bits. think Amy's Ice Cream -- or Cold Stone Creamery for all you non Austinites. before the Oreo phase, i couldn't get enough of strawberry shakes. before that i needed hot fudge sundaes. god, what i wouldn't give for a hot fudge sundae from Dairy Queen right now.

at present, my day job is working in a bakery. when i got this job, i remember telling my mother and her response was, "now do you really think that's a good idea for someone like you to be working in a bakery?" and i was all like "hell yeah!" what most people don't realize is that working in a bakery isn't the same as stopping by one to browse and look at all the desserts and cakes. working in a bakery has actually made me hate a lot of sweets -- i'm talking about you cheesecakes -- and i didn't think that was possible. when i make vanilla butter cream icing in bulk, it's not as fun as when i am playing with food at home.

so, back to National Doughnut Day.

i came home from work with the worst sugar overdose, trying to figure out what to eat that could bring me down from my sugar high. i never thought that in a million years i would say "i am craving a salad" but after a sweet (pun intended) co-worker decided to bring to work some assorted doughnuts to celebrate National Doughnut Day, i might concede to the fact that i am addicted to sugar. when i was looking at all the different doughnut flavors i wanted desperately to try each one. then i thought to myself that if i only try a quarter of a doughnut, i won't eat that much. after sampling 10 different doughnuts and then going back and eating more of the doughnuts that i really liked, my poor middle-aged body just couldn't take all the sugar.

and then i wanted to go and vomit.  

it will take me a few weeks to get over my doughnut binge -- which is nice right now because when i go to the grocery store i don't buy my doughnut treat, but i'm sure i'll get over it quickly. i can't stay mad at sugar forever.