Therapy is different for all of us and over the years I’ve had my fair share of therapeutic diversions. Since my forays into the field of Positive Psychology, I’ve gotten pretty good at preventing the onset of the sads, but the extrovert in me can’t live on positive feelings all the time and the roller coaster is bound to crash at some point.
The first self diversional therapy technique has become the default over the years. Its been an emotional response to anger, sadness, euphoria, well anything actually. It was a reason to celebrate, to console and to suppress whatever feeling was spilling out of my brain at any particular moment. I am, of course, referring to food. I ate to spite people, to spite myself, to make myself feel better, I ate for all of the emotional reasons under the sun but I’ve hit new territory this week. What the hell do you do when you can’t eat your feelings?
My PT would be proud of me. I’ve only eaten two breadrolls over the last two days and consumed only half a bottle of wine. The old me would have eaten the loaf, drank the bottle and consumed my original body weight in chocolate Freddos, but the times, they are definitely changing. I want to eat. I want the chocolate Freddos. I really want the wine and I think I’d push my grandmother over to get to a carbonara dinner. (More mortifying because she’s not with us anymore but that doesn’t make it nonetheless true.) However the Freddos and my Nan are safe this time because my self control with food gets better everyday. But the question remains, if I no longer eat my feelings then what do I do with them?
Previously when trying to avoid eating I would shop. Buy shoes, jewellery, anything that didn’t involve me putting on clothes or accoutrements that might not fit. The purchase of such goods would keep me busy, make me feel better and prolong the avoidance of dealing with whatever was ailing me. This weekend there wasn’t time to shop. I had overbooked myself to the point of dates running into dates and shopping wasn’t an option. So what do skinny people do to deal with their issues? How does everyone else deal with it? No matter how happy some people are, everybody gets sad sometimes and what are you supposed to do to pick yourself up from the spiral of self deprecating talk that fills all of our heads at some point?
Being surrounded and overextended by the people who love me all weekend, I asked them. While the looks were puzzling and the questions extensive the answers were a little less forthcoming. And with me in the midst of the spiral, I was easily distracted to discuss the woes of my privileged, first world, white girl problems. So instead of strategies to fix my funk, I got what women do and what I do, I got advice.
We all know that my behaviour won’t change till I do something about it. We all know that I won’t change until I make the decision and I’ve cried for the final time. When it came to my weight it was the numbers on the scales and a helicopter flight that pushed me to a final, teary, unsightly performance in my gym and a change of behaviour. No other problem in my life is going to be any different. And no amount of ‘health’ advice or ‘you really need to…’ is going to change me. I have to be hit hard and repeatedly before a lesson will sink in. I can even agree with you, know what you are telling me is right, but I need to hear it repeatedly, with force, from every source, and be emotionally scarred before I take that advice. So again, here we are, back at square one. What do skinny people do when they are sad if they don’t eat?
Buying a pair of shoes wasn’t that emotionally exhausting but retelling my state of sadness and post drinking depression to my friends who no longer experience such post traumatic stress incidents was exhausting. So talking wasn’t necessarily the best option either. (Well maybe it is, but probably to far less people to avoid retell fatigue, repetitive sentences and exaggeration) So what’s left? Well, red wine was the first option. I love it. I love it when I’m happy. I love it when I’m unhappy. I love it all winter long. While it helped with the sleep and encouraged the fuzziness of pre-sleep bliss, the feeling still existed as the wine wore off. It also carried calorie guilt so that didn’t help either. So red wine isn’t really it.
Option number two was exercise. Not something I’ve ever used as therapy before but I must admit it was the most effective available. It didn’t make me feel pretty or give me something new and shiny to look at, hold or touch but God damn it, I felt like Lance Armstrong with two testicles. I rode that spin bike like never before. I set the timer, watched the seconds count down, felt the sweat roll between my boobs and peddled like a mad woman possessed. In hindsight I probably was, but I pushed that bike, pulled that rower bar and swung that cross trainer like a stolen Communist Russian child athlete.
Outside, I stood in the sun. I bought myself a coffee and I just stood there. Sweat still rolling from my body, I stood in the carpark and raised my face to the sun. I reminded myself that I was grateful to be alive. I made myself list five things that I was grateful for. I focused on the positives and made a plan for my day. I kept myself busy, I booked appointments, I filled my social calendar for the next few weeks and I got a massage. I spent a fortune and while I couldn’t actually see anything for my spending, I had spent it purely on me. A massage, theatre tickets, concert tickets, holiday plans – I made provisions for a happy life for when the sadness had passed.
I spent so long making plans for a happy life that somewhere along the line I forgot I was sad and smiled. My friends who had heard tales of woe over the weekend rallied and sent messages of love and support. They provided plans of distraction with beer, bowls, proposed dinners, brazilian dancing and skype dates. Somewhere in there the feelings of being loved were slowly returning and food had not saved me. While I still hadn’t quite saved myself, I’d broken the cycle. Well I cracked it. I still gave in and ate a breadroll but the chocolate and the shoes stayed at the shops. I didn’t need a ‘thing’ to make me feel better.
Actions, movement, quality time, alone time and gratefulness. Turns out these are the things that make skinny people happy. I don’t think I’m ever going to stop wanting the breadroll or the shoes, but it is reassuring to know that I can tell myself to put them down. I am lucky to be loved by the most amazing people in the whole entire world and sometimes I need you to remind me of that. Just take the breadroll from me first you lot.
life in big frilly knickers 