Aug 22, 2009 23:31
I want to put this out the open so it can be "on paper" and I can stop thinking about it in such a nebulous fashion. It came to my attention recently that someone very significant in my daily life has Type 2 Diabetes. Knowing this, I've recently made a great turn around in my eating habits, both to support this person and learn from the example she has set in living a responsible and health-conscious life.
The trouble is that things aren't all that different from the way they are every time I miraculously turn my life around. Yes, I'm being disciplined, I'm keeping my goal in mind, and I'm determined to say "no" to all the things that will detract from that goal. However, I'm finding myself waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I've managed to maintain my new set of behaviors so far based largely on a unique kind of Marxist anger I've felt lately toward the commercial food industry. I've looked at the friendly cartoon characters and bright colors adorning all the foods I enjoy eating and I've come to realize how these positive commercial entities have preyed upon my rather simple animal instinct to seek out as many calories as I can get a hold of in one sitting for the sake of survive. After all, this is why human beings love things like fat, salt, and sugar; they denote the foods that will save our lives in the scavenger context of the paleolithic era. Modern industry, in its quest to exploit the buyer, has appealed to these instincts and added an emotional component--to which children are particularly vulnerable--to make these sources of caloric stockpiling into "friends" that will "comfort" rather than sustain us. This is an especially useful tool of marketing, as modern consumers are much more likely to be uncomfortable as opposed to starving.
I've moved a little beyond my point however. What I fear is that somewhere down the line I'm going to loose my sense of righteous anger and my efforts are going to go to shit. Of course, this would be what my therapist calls "all or nothing thinking", a kind of irrational mental equation to which I am prone. So for now I have no real conclusion. Only a knot of discontent in the pit of my stomach and a will to do better. I'm determined to keep a written account of the foods I put into my body and the exercise I do in the course of every day. After a week of doing this I can already see that I'm holding myself accountable.
I do know for certain this time that everything I'm doing is about health, not some phantom sense of attractiveness I've needlessly chased since I was a teenager. I am desirable so long as my physical state does not damage my intellect and personality.