Appetite: 5 Minute Freewrite

How apt that appetite is today's prompt, when today is a day when I'm batch-cooking myself into a frenzy to prevent my appetite from destroying Tokyo. That's right. I just compared my desire for food to the wrath of Godzilla. This is a thing, this has always been a thing, this has continued to be a thing even after I electively -- effectively -- had half of my stomach removed. Which I don't regret, by the way. I used to be the kind of person who would look at other people's portion sizes and wonder how they subsided on so little. "That's was a good appetizer, now what's for dinner?" was a frequent post-dinner joke in our household. Now I subside on what looks basically like a normal portion and it's a relief. But if I "eat around the tool," as they say... which I can and have done... my body begins to feel uncomfortable again.

There's a lot to write (and a lot I've already written, elsewhere) on my relationship with food. But one thing became clear to me several years into therapy, after trying every kind of approach to health: my food relationship will be with me all my life. I can treat it like my adversary and flail miserably, or I can treat it mindfully and carefully and almost feel normal. Of course, all that mindfulness-- the menu planning, the batch-cooking, the sometimes-inflexibility of my food plans -- they're not that normal. But the ability to reach into the fridge and grab exactly what I've planned to eat, and not participate in the age-old debate of "is this what I want? am I really hungry? what if I order something and it triggers a feeling and I get out of the habit and I can't stop my appetite"? Skipping that is what feels normal.

So I batch-cook. This week: breakfast's a slice of chicken-sausage/mushroom/spinach frittata and a handful of berries. Lunch is turkey-mushroom meatloaf and whipped cauliflower with goat cheese. Dinner is a steamed veg along with a shrimp-avo-cocktail. Snacks include an almond matcha latte with a protein boost, crunchy veg with a little blue cheese dip, and a nectarine with a little yogurt. And this sounds like a ridiculous amount of food, and my senses imagine that's true because there's such variety and care put into it. In total, though, it's pretty well-balanced and doesn't exceed 1400 calories. I hate that I know that. But I do. Because... appetite.

It looks like comfort food, and it mostly tastes and feels like comfort food, but it's primarily veggies and protein.

For Daily Freewrite and Selfie Celebration