Part II - A continuation and a quote

Just a couple days ago I posted about how I am struggling again with food and the feelings that go along with that. Earlier today I was talking with my mum and came to a realization: this has been one hell of a year. It has been absolutely, completely crazy and there's a lot of pain that hasn't totally been acknowledged. There's a ton of stuff that has happened, and I've changed a lot. And I have spent the last two months avoiding spending any time alone, truly alone, because I can't handle thinking about it. I watch tv or work or volunteer or, most of all, I eat so that I don't have to think.

This realization left me crying and a little shaken. I started to make some tea (those Brits do have one thing right - tea helps) and picked up the book I just started reading yesterday, "How to be a Woman" by Caitlyn Moran. I recently heard her on a podcast debating gender issues, and having heard of the book earlier decided to give it a read. She is a strident feminist (her words), comedian, and a brutally honest look at life in today's world. And she wrote  this in her chapter called "I Am Fat!":

"No -- I'm talking about those for whome the whole idea of food is not one of pleasure, but one of compulsion. For whom the thoughts of food, and the effects of food, are the constant, dreary background static to normal thought. Those who think about lunch while eating breakfast, and pudding as they eat chips; who walk into the kitchen in a state bordering on panic and breathlessly eat slice after slice of bread and butter -- not tasting it, not even chewing -- until the panic can be drowned in an almost meditative routine of chewing and swallowing, spooning and swallowing.

In this trancelike state, you can find a welcome, temporary relief from thinking for 10, 20 minutes at a time, until finally a new set of sensations -- physical discomfort and immense regret -- make you stop, in the same way you finally pass out on whisky or dope. Overeating, or comfort eating, is the cheap, meek option for self-satisfaction, and self-obliteration. You get all the temporary release of drinking, fucking, or taking drugs but without -- and I think this is the important bit -- ever being left in a state where you can't remain responsible and cogent.

...

Overeating is the addiction of choice of carers, and that's why it's come to be regarded as the lowest-ranking of all the addictions. It's a way of fucking yourself up while still remaining functional, because you have to. Fat people aren't indulging in the "luxury" of their addiction making the useless, chaotic, or a burden. Instead they are slowly self-destructing in a way that doesn't inconvenience anyone."

It isn't perfect in how it discusses addictions - but it is perfect in how it describes me. It's exactly right and exactly what I've been doing.

Now I need to go think about this with my tea and some time.