I used to be married to an alcoholic. I know all about denial. I'm quite good at it, I spent years swimming happily in it. Or, rather unhappily, but pretending to be happy.
And it occurred to me today as I was mowing through a bag of peanut butter M&M's (the food of the gods, this was the mana that fell on the Israelites) that I'm in denial once again. About my health.
Oh, I talk a good game. I'm overweight, I need to deal with it for my health and to set a good example for my children, I need to cut out caffeine, chocolate, asparatame, etc., to help get my fibromyalgia under control, blah blah blah. But do I live it? No. Because at the end of the day I still don't feel like anything bad is going to happen to me over this rather than having to continually cycle out my wardrobe to larger sizes as I get fatter and fatter.
So what is it with me? How come I can intellectually know something but I can't let it past the Chocolate Chex and into my heart? Is it not that I can't physically give up the food; is it more that I'm eating myself silly because then I can avoid really facing what my brain already knows? Because sometimes the reality of my situation sinks in, and I get sullen and depressed. I'm so pained and so tired, that when I face it, I just curl into a cranky little ball. If I keep eating and deny it, I'm literally "fat and happy."
And I think I must be onto something, because just typing that out, admitting it, is making my heart feel heavy. And not because of all the fat that's probably hanging all over it like Kevin Smith on Stan Lee. (No disrepect at all intended to Mr. Smith or Mr. Lee, I admire them both, it's just the first analogy that popped into my head, which just proves I'm way too pop-culture enamored.)
I don't eat to live. I don't even live to eat. I eat so I don't have to face the reality of life. I eat so I don't have to think about what I am. Because as long as there's a gluten-free, fat-and-sugar-filled lemon shortbread cookie in my hand and a cuppa on my desk, I can be somewhere else in my head. I can also cling to the fact that as long as I'm fat, I can blame all of the bad stuff in my life on my weight, and think it'd all be better if I could just lose weight (I've been thin, though, so I know that's not true). I eat instead of drink because I can feel high and alive and forget everything around me while I concentrate on the pleasure of food (without the drunkenness that pained me so much during my first marriage).
So yeah. I can talk all I want, but I'm not really there yet. And when I start to get there, it's kind of crushing. Which is stupid – I know I have so much, why am I so concerned about not having my health? Or is that part of what's defeating me, that I can't admit things aren't the best they could be despite how much is good? That I can't accept the dichotomy of daily pain with daily joy? That I can be physically and emotionally miserable while still being intellectually stable and "heart" happy? I've been so adamant the last few years that gray areas are acceptable and traversable, have I not really understood that beyond my law practice and the lives of my friends I so happily contribute advice to? Is it I can see the bigger picture with the entire world, but I can't get past tidbits in my own tiny isolated existence?
I'm suddenly not so hungry. M&M's are gone now, though, so that doesn't matter. But suddenly I'm thinking I need to just crawl into my own mind for a while, and see what's actually there.
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