January 2021 graduates

[SugarcubeOD 4084]

5 hours ago, Rebecca001 said:

also one thing I don’t have that you ladies seem to have,  is any pressure to eat from anyone. I don’t care if I’m ‘that person’, I will happily not eat at a party, or take my own food or say no to things.

Same... I feel zero feelings of guilt or shame or a need to be pleasing to others around food... If I'm the only one that has to deal with the reprecussions of eating the item, then I'm the only one that gets to weigh in on the decision.  I get that is MUCH harder to do for some people - I'm not a people pleaser by any stretch of the imagination which I imagine makes it much easier for me.  

I think the one good thing I can say to help others that have this struggle that comes out of my experience with being 'that person' as you say @Rebecca001 is that my friends still invite me around, my family still likes me and there seems to be absolutely no poor side effects from declining food or bringing my own.  Hopefully that helps those who struggle with this?

[christine19 128]

14 minutes ago, SugarcubeOD said:

I'm not a people pleaser by any stretch of the imagination which I imagine makes it much easier for me.  

This made me smile! The issue for me isn’t so much the people pleasing, it’s the family gatherings and holidays steeped in tradition and all about the food - my family is Italian and German, my husbands is Italian. Food that I used to eat! I find that many people are not knowledgeable about hidden food ingredients, and don’t know (because they didn’t need to) that there is gluten in soy sauce or sugar in pepperoni! And overall, I think most people do not make simple food where you don’t have to “try”  to be gluten-or-whatever-free. Lots of casseroles out there!  The easiest for me, is in fact, a party or lunch with catering, or as I like to say “component food.” Everything on the side, make your own Mexican plate, build a salad with toppings of your choice or even a sandwich and toss the cheese and bread.
 

For me  “that girl” also means the person that everyone is worried about even though I’m not as worried as I know I won’t starve and always bring my own food. But, as we discussed before, people are weird about food, and if they are the one doing the cooking (and the pleasing) they get stressed. 

It is great to have a group here that “gets it” I appreciate the support as we can discuss our challenges in a thoughtful way! 

This picture sums it up for me today! 

[SugarcubeOD 4084]

1 hour ago, christine19 said:

The issue for me isn’t so much the people pleasing, it’s the family gatherings and holidays steeped in tradition and all about the food - my family is Italian and German, my husbands is Italian.

Our family has very little food tradition (save for Christmas baking) so I definitely don't envy you.. especially coming from and having relatives where food is love and there's just a complete delta between generations... not sure if that's how it is for you and obviously there's some stereotyping because I'm sure not every Italian family grandma is a 'feeder' but it's become a stereotype from a level of reality.

I definitely enjoy this group.  I like hearing what people are working on, struggling with or winning at - we cannot as human beings have every experience ourselves so it's nice to be able to share with like minded people.  It's also nice to see where we might be having it easier than some folks in some spots or harder in other spots - it creates such a nice feeling of balance to hear our differences in how we interact with food.

[Rebecca001 93]

And let’s not forget that when someone says ‘no thank you, I am trying to eat less X’ everyone looks down at their big plate of X and thinks ‘maybe I should eat less X too’ (and deep down they probably know it, especially if x is pudding) - but they haven’t done this process so it seems like a massive jump for them. They feel they need to defend their, and your, right to eat X. When people ask ‘but what do you eat??’ I do remind them that I came to this from a place of no dairy, very few carbs/rice/pasta etc, I’d done several stints of sugar free, I train daily, I do yoga daily.... this was a small step for me. Starting from scratch is a huge step. But I’m a bit like @SugarcubeOD in that if it’s me carrying the burden (wearing the swimsuit on the beach) then it’s me who gets to decide! My husbands family already think I’m bohemian and slightly deranged (“you don’t eat cheese? Or cake? But you’re so thin” <I’m not>)  so it’s very normal for me now; my own family are lifelong dieters and mum is W30, my niece is allergic to dairy and soy and my brothers family are all vegan so (if and when we ever can meet up again) I think we’ll all just bring our own food!! 
 

anyway it’s Friday today! I got paid today! The sun is set to be shining (unseasonably warm here after our freezing few weeks). Our lockdown is starting to be lifted from 8th March. Last night James and I booked our summer holiday. Things feel, slightly, like they are improving. 
 

I weighed  myself today also. I was 10st 2lb (142lb). End of December i was 10.7 so I have lost a couple of pounds but I have really tried this time for it not to be about the numbers. I have a long list of NSVs and the scales are going back in the loft again until Easter! 

[Rebecca001 93]

Also, I don’t know if I’m allowed to share a link to a podcast but if mods say I can, I will. It’s a lifestyle podcast I love by a very smooth voiced, handsome English doctor (if that’s your thing?) but this week he is interviewing some foodie guru about Real food and I thought it might be of interest to us here. I plan to listen to it today and then I can post the link if if I’m allowed? The whole series is very good, all ‘life enriching’ topics about health etc 

[Lorna from Canada 272]

21 hours ago, Rebecca001 said:

I guess my point is that rather than me condemning perfectly innocent foods to the FWNB list forever, there comes a point where I’m forced to actually look at the braking mechanism itself and resolve the issue.

Such good insight! I know this to be very difficult work but it is worth it if you can figure it out. I have good understanding as to why I have a lot of automatic behaviours (I've had some excellent therapists!) - not all of those behaviours are food related but many are and many are interconnected with food. What I've learned to tolerate is that I can't always change those automatic reactions that drive behaviour - some of them were developed in my precognitive state and I can't go back far enough to access the information I need to change the speed of many reactions - they're just going to happen. What I have learned to do is to be able to slow it down, recognize it as it's happening and make better choices in the moment - it's a lot of work but totally worth it. The Rules help me a lot and, I'm actually okay with a huge pile of "never" foods. The pile of ALWAYS foods is delicious and equally massive so, I'm not going to starve. LOL

Cadbury Creme Eggs are very popular here but they're too sweet for me. Now a Curly Wurly - that's another thing all together

 

[SugarcubeOD 4084]

10 hours ago, Rebecca001 said:

Also, I don’t know if I’m allowed to share a link to a podcast but if mods say I can, I will. It’s a lifestyle podcast I love by a very smooth voiced, handsome English doctor (if that’s your thing?) but this week he is interviewing some foodie guru about Real food and I thought it might be of interest to us here. I plan to listen to it today and then I can post the link if if I’m allowed? The whole series is very good, all ‘life enriching’ topics about health etc 

Definitely!  Feel free to share anything like that! (we usually only restrict links when it's blatant ongoing self promotion or spam). 

Things you can link: recipes, podcasts, articles, photos of cute dogs/cats... go forth and link

[christine19 128]

I’ve had a good week focusing on lighter meals - more salads for dinner and less snacks. And I worked out 6 days in a row - testing out those knees and all that jumping and no pain! Yay! Thinking about running (really it’s jogging) again once the weather warms up (I have a very long driveway so I don’t have to leave my property). 
 

I’ve determined that stevia gives me a headache. Not when it’s part of my protein drinks, but when I add it to my tea at night. It’s happened 3 times so that’s what it is. Done with that it doesn’t even taste sweet anymore. 
 

I missed the booze the most during Whole30, so tonight’s test is a spritzer, Italian Pinot Grigio with lime seltzer. Cheers!