Lots of scary stuff coming up this weekend. First of all, I'm seeing my dietician tomorrow. The good news is that I get to miss an hour of work for my appointment. The bad news is that I will be getting weighed, which I despise. Also bad: I will have lots of unpredictable eating situations in the next couple of days that I do NOT want to approach if I am already upset about my weight. Since I weigh myself at home, I usually know what to expect at my dietician's office, but my weight has been doing funky things this week (fluctuating way more than usual for no apparent reason) so I worry that it will be high tomorrow which will land me in a Fat Funk.
More challenges: tomorrow night I'm going to a barbecue with some old friends from high school. The biggest issue with this is the "unknown" factor. I'm not exactly sure what's on the menu, and whether it will be a free-for-fall where everyone takes their own food, or if there will be a big to-do over how many burgers to cook, who wants potato salad, etc. So I'm nervous about attention to my eating, which never fails to kill my appetite. Stressing about food makes me not fun to be around, and I really don't want to let that ruin the night.
Then on Saturday, one of my best friends from college is coming to visit. (To clarify, our school is six states away but this friend grew up about an hour north of me.) I am really excited to see her, but definitely a little nervous about food. This friend is a little overweight but not unhealthy, since she is pretty active and eats well. Read: she's normal. At the same time, though, I know she worries about her weight and little comments about calories/fat/BMI tend to sneak into our conversations. Not to make her sound obsessed, because she's not. She also loves to go out for ice cream, which definitely worries me. I can usually do meals okay - it's the "extra" stuff (dessert) that freaks me out. More so when it follows a conversation about calories and BMI.
But even more than food issues, the idea of having someone in my "space" is always nerve-wracking to me. I love love LOVE seeing my friends, but I can't last very long without having some exit strategy for when I need some alone time. Food definitely plays into this - when you spend several hours with someone, you can only avoid eating for so long. This scares me. I don't really have issues with eating enough at the moment; it's more that I like to eat certain foods at certain times, prepare my own foods, and be able to measure/count/season everything myself so I know exactly what I'm eating. When I'm with friends, there's the pressure of not having that control, plus the pressure of trying to look normal. I can't plan obsessively, and I can't obsess about my lack of planning. Anxiety? YES.
I don't eat spontaneously. I don't skip workouts. I don't choose what looks yummy. Is this disordered? Duh. Does this lend itself to a fun-filled weekend of friends, ice cream, and barbecue? NO.
In the spirit of recovery, though, I am trying really hard not to let myself get stressed over what should be a really fun weekend. I have spent too many social events be overshadowed by my own freaking-outage in the past, and it's so not worth it. Lately, it has been occurring to me that recovery is not just about eating enough calories, but putting yourself in situations that are uncomfortable and stressful (for food reasons or otherwise), and coming out on the other side.
I really hope your weekend goes well, sounds like you definitely do have some challenges, but maybe they can also be viewed as opportunities? So often we don't budge ourselves or alter routines until we're pushed, but then we find out it isn't nearly as bad as we feared.
ReplyDeleteWeigh in: I guess the question to ask is, what happens if your weight is on a high end of the fluctuation at your appointment? Worst case scenario? I'm sure you dietician knows that a given data point on something like weight is just an approximation, and if it's important to you you can even mention the flux you've seen that week, maybe she'll have some ideas as to causes.
Going into unknown menu situations can be very hard. Is there any way you can offer to bring a dish along, something that's safe for you to eat as a back up?
DEFINITELY feel you on the Me Space issue. That one has/is taking me a long time to work through, it took having a serious boyfriend to really start getting over it. Not that I'm prescribing boys, they're kind of a pain at times too. ;p When I'm in a situation like that I try to remind myself that it's just for one day, or one weekend, or whatever, and then you have all the time in the world to go back to normal routines and your comfortable space/schedule. Also remember that for most people, eating casually and such are the norm. It feels like being mega under the microscope, but people usually really don't pay as much attention as we fear at the time.
Ok hope you have a fantabulous time at the bbq and with your friends, will be thinking of you!