I Love Food

While in treatment, one of my doctors audaciously said to me, "I think, you really enjoy eating.  I think you love food."  I hated him for that comment.

How dare he tell me that I like food?!  I bawled at every meal.  I tore at my hair.  I pinched my skin until it bled.  I trembled, leg bouncing, while I massacred my food into tiny bits.  I was anorexic, and anorexics do not like food.  Food was the enemy.  It's desire was to fatten me up and destroy me.  Nothing about food was even in the least bit pleasurable.

Clearly, I was lying to myself.

I remember crying to my therapist, instructing her that I.could.not.eat.chocolate.  I just couldn't.  Chocolate was part of the treatment program's required foods list, but channeling my inner lawyer, I argued my way out of consuming it.  Doing so made me feel triumphant.  Besides, I hated chocolate; I didn't eat chocolate.

Again, I was clearly lying to myself.

Why did I act in such this manner?  I loved food.  All of it, especially chocolate.  At the time, I hated myself so much that I could not conceive of allowing anything pleasurable to enter my body.  I tortured myself when I did eat out of desperation, the anorexia clawing to stay alive.  To admit that I liked food, to eat without tears, protest, or pain would be to admit that I was acquiescing to recovery, and I was terrified to be me without the eating disorder.  Food was symbolic of all my fears associated with recovery.  Fighting with food meant that I didn't have to fight these fears.  Concentrating on food took the concentration off the issues.  Hating food was my way of saying, "I'm not ready to let go just yet.  I'm not ready to trust life without ED."

Recovery means learning to love food.  It's a symbolic act, at least for me.  Allowing myself to eat chocolate freely represents that I am willing to experience pleasure freely.  Being willing to try new foods symbolizes my willingness to try new things in life.  Learning to eat what my taste buds crave represents my willingness in life to meet my needs and desires.  Loving foods equates to loving myself.

And boy, do I love food.  I love ice cream--chocolate with a ton of chocolate sprinkles.  I adore baby back ribs smothered in BBQ.  I salivate over veggie pizza, especially from Grimaldi's in Jersey. Recently, I have discovered a love of mussels, clam chowder, and hachee (a Dutch beef stew).  Risotto, mushrooms, plums, lasagna, Greek yogurt and honey, buttered popcorn, chicken french--all my loves.

I have learned that ordering food at a restaurant, the meal that nourishes and pleases me, is a symbolic act of love, that selecting such food at the grocery store shows that I respect myself.   Eating disorders are never about food, really; they're about everything food represents to us.

So, practice in the bedroom, soft at first, then louder, "I love food."  Because, really, we all do.  My doctor was right.

Cheers!