I was at a meeting recently talking to another member (love you, J!) about the intersection of Abstinence and Food Plan, which I’ve written about on this blog before. Some member of OA follow a weighed and measured or very specific food plan to the letter, and that is how they define their abstinence. They need to have black-and-white boundaries around their food. But for many OA members (including myself), they are not the same at all. Eat To Live/nutritarianism is my food plan, but it is not my abstinence. I’m less Grey Sheet, more Grey Area. And if you don’t know what I mean, check out this link: http://recovery.hiwaay.net/foodplans/.
I was also thinking about how all of my sponsors have told me that my concept of a Higher Power will change the longer I stay in recovery (they were 100% correct, as usual. Thanks sponsors!). So if my concept of HP can change, then why not my concept of abstinence? Since we get to “choose” our own definition of abstinence, that definition could change for each of us. At first, “the action of abstaining from compulsive eating and compulsive food behaviors while moving toward or maintaining a healthy body weight” looked like this:
In other words, a diet. Right now, abstinence for me means abstaining from bingeing and purging, animal products, compulsive exercise, diet pills, restricting my food/skipping meals (AKA dieting) and eating to oblivion. Eating to oblivion can happen on ANY food plan I choose. It can happen with so-called “healthy food”. I can eat to oblivion with no oil, air-popped popcorn, it just takes a loooooong time. Eating to oblivion is an extremely dangerous (and unfortunately seductive) behavior for me. As I am in recovery longer, I am seeing the subtlety of the actual behaviors more and more. Mostly now it’s not as much about what I eat. It’s how I eat it. Mind you, there are some foods that I avoid because they just have an immediate drug-like effect once they are in my mouth (hello, vegan donuts). It’s not because those foods are bad (joking pictures aside), they just are drugs for me, like alcohol or cocaine. Before I went vegan, regular cow or goat’s milk cheese was like this for me, too. I am glad that I can be more flexible with my personal concepts of both abstinence and a HP as I continue to trudge down the Yellow Brick Road of recovery. There’s room for all of us.
Writing a daily action plan and sending it to my sponsor has been immensely helpful for the last two weeks. It keeps me focused and it has shown me just how much perfectionism pops up for me on the daily as well as over committing myself. It also shows me the many, many small ways I can do service. Complimenting others, finding small ways to serve my coworkers or my roommates, a kind word or action here or there…it goes a long way.
And just some thoughts on a new obsessive behavior that started when I moved to Texas.
I suddenly have very frequent and easy access to vegan donuts. Donuts are, in and of themselves, innocuous. For most of my recovery, I have not eaten them or even contemplated them. I still to this day have not eaten a Krispy Kreme. There’s a huge variety of them here, and the Wicked Stepmother decided in one of her many moments of bait and switch—you should have some vegan donuts. Everyone loves them! And they are vegan! Go ahead, taste one. And one led, immediately, to six. And to me buying them, eating them in the bathroom at work, hiding the wrappers and immediately wanting to throw them up. I don’t think donuts are inherently poisonous or a “bad” food. For me, they are poisonous and if I eat them I will get very, very sick. Literally. Just a reminder to myself: it is the behavior that I engage in when I eat donuts that is poisonous. It triggers the phenomenon of craving and the mental obssession both to eat more of them and to throw them up AND to feel horribly guilty about all of it. Guilt is a huge part of my addictive process. I do not want to add guilt. I want to add peace, connection, nourishment, muscle mass, health, community, service and loyalty to my own inner truth. There’s not a goddamn donut at the center of all of that.
At my Monday night OA meeting last week, my sponsor announced she was part of the N.O.P.E. campaign: Not One Piece Even. Of Halloween candy, that is. I am also a N.O.P.E’r this year. I wish that I wasn’t such a sugar junkie, but I am. Treats, for me, are a definite trick. I have been avoiding the O.S.S. (overtly sugary shit) since July-ish and I feel a thousand times better. Not only is my energy level and my mood better in general (unless I am busy getting in my own way) but I just don’t obsess and get into crazy food thoughts and cravings. There’s also the secondary issue of my PCOS, which has gotten a lot better in the past year since I’ve been abstinent and eating a plant-based, whole foods diet. My hormone levels have also significantly improved since I have been abstaining from eating sugar. If you are reading this and you have PCOS, please consider breaking up with the OSS, including alcohol. They are not your friend, and your hormone levels will thank you for it.
For me, not taking that first compulsive bite of Halloween candy or vegan cookies or ice cream or whatever is critical for my sanity and well-being. The vegan desserts make me only *slightly* less insane than the regular sweets that contain butter. There’s also the entire issue of most white sugar not even being truly vegan because it is usually filtered through bone char. Unfortunately, now you can easily purchase vegan white sugar or vegan baked goods made with this type of sugar. Arrrrgh!
I’ve tried the “Intuitive Eating” method of “eating whatever I had cravings for when I was hungry and then stopping” and I became a total raving maniac. I tried it by myself, I tried it under the supervision of a dietitian, I tried it with Buddhist meditation and mindfulness practice and each time it ended in me feeling worse than ever. I think that Intuitive Eating can work for many people, but definitely not for me when it comes to sugar and certain binge foods. I do incorporate other aspects of Intuitive Eating or mindful eating into my abstinence and my food plan on a daily basis, and that does work for me. In fact, it’s been a huge part of my recovery. If I feel like I need more or less fat on a particular day, I adjust my plan accordingly. On days where I am more active and hungry, I will have two planned snacks instead of one. Then there are days where I am less hungry or I am feeling sick and I only eat three planned meals and no snacks. I have a baseline of at least 3 well-balanced, vegan meals a day that I stick to and I adjust when I need to. I also pay attention to how I feel when I am eating. Am I content and calm? Am I irritated? Am I angry? Am I anxious? I take note of these feelings and let myself experience them and I try to notice what is really underneath those feelings.
Today I choose not to eat for a fix or to eat over my emotions. I get to live life and (mostly) be sane and happy. And when the emotional upheavals come, which they do, I am better equipped to handle them because I am not a slave to food or crazy food behaviors. I can act with a clear head.
With all of that being said, I made a big batch of fake blood last night for my Zombie Catholic Schoolgirl costume. My tried-and-true recipe for fake blood is a bottle of corn syrup, a packet of cherry Kool Aid and three heaping spoonfuls of baking cocoa. I add a little hot water to thin it out and voila, fake blood! I used powdered instant coffee for dirt smudges to replicate that freshly-crawled-out-of-the-grave look. I spent the entire night covered in sugar and chocolate and didn’t even think about it until today. In the past, I would have definitely been tasting that concoction as I was making it, licking it off of my fingers and generally having a good old-time with all of that sugar. Now I don’t even think about it. In fact, it seemed kind of gross to me and I had no urges to try it. All I could think of was cough syrup and it made me kind of queasy just looking at it! However, I think next year I will just buy store-bought fake blood and leave all of that sugar and the Halloween candy to someone else.
The most recent issue of VegNews is their annual food issue. For those of you not familiar with the world of veganism, VegNews is a large publication that is devoted to veganism, vegan food and vegan hot topics. Normally, I totally dread the food issue because it’s pretty much 100% vegan food porn. Tons of pictures of vegan desserts, snacks and entrees of all persuasions with one ad after another for food, food, food. The vegan blogosphere is pretty heavy on the vegan food porn blogs, with some noteable exceptions like Natala Constantine at Vegan Hope. Although I completely understand this, I can’t participate in the entire vegan food worship scene without triggering my addiction and inviting the Wicked Stepmother over for some vegan candied apples. Although she would just love to slip some poisoned ones in there just to teach me a lesson…
In the midst of various pictures of cupcakes, there was a great and unexpected article by Victoria Moran about food addiction. Victoria Moran is the author of many different books, and one of my favorites is called The Love Powered Diet (and it’s not a diet book). I like it so much that I am going to devote a whole separate entry to it! She is a recovering food addict and compulsive eater, and she also happens to be a dedicated vegan. Before I stumbled across Victoria Moran’s work, I really didn’t know of any other people trying to incorporate 12 step recovery into a vegan lifestyle. I don’t like to say diet because I don’t do diets and because veganism is my lifestyle: it impacts not only what I eat, but what I wear, what cosmetics and body care products I use, what companies I support, what entertainment I choose to view and so much more. Today I choose a compassionate life, and I try not to abuse other people or animals—and that also includes myself.
I was so happy to see an article about food addiction in a major vegan publication. So many times, vegan and vegetarian diets are associated with eating disorders, as many who restrict or binge & purge use vegan diets as a way to easily shrink their acceptable food choices and further control our food. However, I will also say that I reached my highest adult weight as a vegan. There’s so much ridiculously good vegan junk food and dessert out there these days. Vegan food ain’t what it used to be.
In the 90’s when I first tried to become vegan, it was a struggle to find a veggie burger. At the time, there was pretty much Gardenburger and that was it. I ate a lot of salad, hummus, lentils, Gardenburgers, Vitasoy Vanilla Delite soy milk, Tofutti, french fries, falafel and avocado. I wasn’t eating very much fresh fruit, unless you count the apple I would use as a bong to smoke weed out of at work! I also wasn’t eating a lot of whole grains and I definitely wasn’t eating kale, collard greens and broccoli. I constantly felt starved and deprived. I was drinking a LOT at the time, so dinner was pretty much beer (at least a 12 pack) and lots of bong hits. After a few months of this, I lost quite a bit of weight (which shocks me in retrospect). I struggled intensely with food cravings, especially for cheese. Eventually I would relapse, usually while drunk, and it was always on cheese or cheese containing junk food. I felt ashamed and I felt like a failure. Other vegan friends would berate me for having no willpower. I had people tell me that I didn’t care about the animals and I was just as much of a murderer as other omnivores. Finally, I just gave up and went back to being a cheese eating, occasional omelet eating vegetarian, which went on for years. Eventually, I became so desperate to try to control my eating and my weight that I went back to eating meat for a few years. In the back of my head, it never felt right.
I didn’t fully give up the ideal of veganism, though. Periodically I would try, and eventually I would relapse on some sort of dairy product. As more and more vegan products became available on the market, I was able to replace certain beloved dairy foods with a vegan equivalent. A trip to California in 2009 rekindled the fire. A friend dragged me to Cafe Gratitude, and although I wanted to hate the food, I loved it. I had this delicious, amazing rice bowl and I remember thinking, “why did I ever stop eating this way?”. When I came back to Vegas, I decided to try to be vegan again.
And I started to gain weight like crazy. Every little sick eating disordered part of me screamed at me to go back to eating meat because being vegan was the reason I was fat. I was determined to find another way and be able to eat vegan and attain a healthy weight while working on my recovery. It took a few years of stumbling and confusion, but I found my way. I had to make several painful realizations. I could be vegan and be healthy, but I couldn’t do it while living on vegan junk food. I couldn’t leave my meals to chance and just wander through life without a plan, either. And I couldn’t stay away from old, dairy-filled binge foods or new vegan junk food without help. I was still engaging in crazy diet behavior and eating disorder/compulsive exercise behavior. So I came back to OA, asked for help and started working with a sponsor again. A lot of that was thanks to Victoria Moran’s books. So if you are struggling, please check her out. Even if a vegan lifestyle is not for you, her wise words can help anyone who wants to get into recovery from an eating disorder. I kind of think of her as my E.D. Fairy Godmother—the anti-Wicked Stepmother!
So I have to tell on myself—I went to my endocrinologist on Wednesday and I had a major freakout. I have to see him every 8 weeks right now because they are still trying to adjust my thyroid medication as well as address my PCOS. The news was mostly good this visit, especially when I think about where I was a year ago. My triglycerides, cholesterol and B12 status are all perfect. My blood pressure was 105/67. My A1C test was good as well, so my blood sugar has been normal over the last 3 months. And my testosterone for the first time ever went down, which is a great sign with the PCOS.
But then came the scale…they always weigh me the second I get in the door. This, of course, stresses me out to the nth degree. I have to remind the nurse to NOT tell me my weight, as I do not weigh myself more than once a week, period. I had weighed myself on Monday and my weight had stayed exactly the same, which of course bothered the holy hell out of me. She told me that I should make sure that I tell the doctor not to tell me, because he will if I don’t say something. So what do I do? I don’t say anything, and he tells me. He said, “So, you weigh XXX pounds. You’ve lost 8 pounds since the last time I saw you. Tell me how you did it”. Instead of feeling good about the fact that I had lost weight and that all of my blood work came back great except for thyroid and Vitamin D status, all I could think was, “How the FUCK did I gain 3 pounds since Monday??? Three pounds in three days??? And fuck him for telling me!!”. I was so angry all I could do was sputter something about not eating sugar and doing yoga. And immediately, the Voices started in. “You’re eating too much. You really need to drop bread from your food plan. And oil. And start restricting your fruit. Because otherwise, you are going to get even fucking fatter than you already are. You’re going to be like Violet Beauregarde in that scene in Willie Wonka where they have to roll her to the juicing room before she explodes.” I grabbed my new Synthroid samples and got out of there as fast as I could. I went to a meeting later that night, which helped a little.
Unfortunately, for the last 4 days, I’ve been internally struggling to not restrict my food plan and to not kill myself with exercise. I’ve found myself trolling the “diet” section at the store, casually looking at the various diet pills…and then the magazines, looking at the various diet and exercise plans. Since Wednesday, I’ve downloaded one new workout book, bought some carb blockers and added up my calories on MyFitnessPal.com twice. Trust me, that website is NOT my fucking Pal. I’m still using my food plan, doing my daily prayer/affirmations and meditation, going to meetings and calling my sponsor, but I need to fess up. Next time I am going to speak up and tell him to please not disclose any numbers to me. I’m going to be honest and tell him why. The mistake I made was to not speak up for myself and to not put my own welfare first. I know that I am at the point in my recovery where I am still shaky and oversensitive about the scale, and I’m not going to put myself in that position any more.
…one year as of today. One year of abstaining from animal foods and major trigger foods (cheese! yogurt! ice cream! nachos! cheetos!), 42 pounds gone. One year of getting back into OA, back into yoga, back into myself. One year of moving away from victimhood, self-pity and self-hatred. I can’t believe I got through an entire year of being vegan and abstaining from all of that crap. I’ve tried and failed so many times that I lost count. Nachos and frozen yogurt seriously had me by the balls for most of my adult life. I would stand in the ice cream aisle and practically cry because all I wanted to do was eat two boxes of caramel drumsticks, except that I didn’t want to eat the fucking drumsticks but I felt compelled to. The thought of Fage greek yogurt with honey would make me salivate…or popcorn with half a stick of butter. Food was the puppet master and it definitely jerked my strings. I initially felt so pathetic admitting that, fully and truly admitting it, but it’s a relief to admit it 100% today. And the thought of those binge foods today does make me recoil (as they say in the Big Book). I am still abstaining from sugar and a few other newly discovered trigger foods (Earth Balance, sigh), although that desire for sugar is still percolating a little in the back of my head. Mostly I feel good. It’s weird, and sometimes it’s scary, but it’s good.
I spoke on the 8th step last week for the first time in OA. I’ve spoken quite a few times in AA, but it was strangely powerful to do it in OA. It made it all seem much more real somehow, like I truly belonged there. Just trying to plug away on a daily basis and take the actions that send me in a good, orderly direction. Or at least keep me present and accounted for…
Went to a crazy hard Baron Baptiste Power Yoga class last weekend and it kicked my ASS. It’s the first yoga class I’ve been to in a few years. The last time I went to a yoga class I was sober from drugs and alcohol, but in a hideous binge/starve/exercise cycle that had been going on for over a year. During my annual physical, my doctor told me that both my cholesterol and my blood sugar were high and she put me on metformin, which really freaked me out. It also made me feel like crap, and I became inwardly determined to get off of that shit as soon as possible.
I was so frustrated and pulled out of my physical body during that class that I wanted to scream. I felt like stabbing everyone in the room including (and especially) myself. Most of the class was spent inwardly cursing and looking around the room at everyone who had it “easier” than I did. I was eaten up with resentment. I can vividly remember how painful, both physically and emotionally, the class was. I had been killing myself in the gym doing cardio and lifting weights. I was so stiff that I could barely bend over, and I struggled just to finish the class. I drove out to Boulder City afterwards because I wanted to suddenly see my father. Once I got to the VA, I couldn’t make myself go inside to see him. I sat there and cried, and ended up driving aimlessly out to Lake Mead, shaking and confused and having horrible low blood sugar because I had been starving myself that day. I ended up in the McDonald’s drive through, pissed off and plowing through a bag of quarter pounders and fries and ice cream.
This time, the yoga class was very different. I was terrified to go because I am still struggling with injuries and physical limitations. I was dreading being the fattest person in the room (which I was). The teacher was instantly amazing. He came over and called me by my name (???? quick draw McGraw on reading the sign in sheet) and unrolled my mat for me. I decided that was a sign to stay and try the class even though I thought it would be way above my abilities at the moment. I almost threw up/passed out midway, but instead of getting up and leaving and being in a snit, I sat on the sidelines until I felt better and then I got back down on my mat. In the middle of some sweat-drenched downward dog from hell, I noticed that I had not looked around the room once. I even took off my glasses so I could concentrate on the poses more. And like a miracle, I was bending over without pain. I was grabbing my feet in bow pose, which I haven’t been able to do in more than 5 years. I realized after class that it has always been my pride that made me give up on yoga and consequently give up on myself. I get frustrated with the limitations of my still fat, still stiff 41-year-old body and my injuries, and I get a case of the fuck-its and usually storm off like an angry child. I had this moment where I realized that I was going to have to make a conscious decision to be humble, admit there are certain things I can’t do yet and do what I can. I have to accept myself for where I’m at today physically, but still push myself at the same time. No wonder I fucking hated yoga for all of these years! It brings all of my defects of character and fucked up behavior patterns right out into the blindingly bright sunlight. I can’t force my way into fixing them–only time and the process can heal them (and some of them may never be totally “fixed”), and that process is definitely a power greater than myself.
Anyway, Happy Fucking Vegan Birthday to me! And it is happy…
Queen of the Darned 