Day 20

Today I decided to experiment with whether I can be trusted to eat bread again, and I ended up deciding (after some bread) that I don’t really want to eat bread. It was a wholemeal roll with peanut butter and rocket in it, alongside a salad with chickpeas, and an apple. Firstly, I kept forgetting to eat the bread – it was like my brain was already telling me that the rest of the food was the meal. Then, when I did eat the bread, it was just this weird, dry, mass of not very tasty thing… and, after a while, I got a painful indigestion feeling, as though the bread got stuck on the way down (I promise I chewed it).

Suggestions from the internet include: taking smaller bites, chewing it more, taking sips of water, also… just not eating bread. I sent a cup of tea down after it and will be going with that last one.

I had run out of almonds for my quiche base and went to the shop (slowly, my leg still hurts) to get some. PJ had requested Funyuns (onion rings crisps, but American) and, while picking those up, I came face-to-face with one of my favourite brands of crisps. They’re not sold everywhere, even the shop over the road (which always has Funyuns) only occasionally stocks these crisps that I like. I know a little of what you fancy is meant to do you good, right? But no. I walked past them. Don’t applaud yet though, it’s only Day 20.

I think I find certain types of food a bit addictive. Paradoxically, it’s things that, if I focus on what it feels like to be eating them, I don’t have that great a response to them. With crisps there’s the salt hit that does it for me – I think it does for a lot of people with crisps; that combined with a possible sugar hit given it’s literally potatoes, and a definite fat hit since it’s usually fried potatoes! Although I thought the experiment worth running today to see if I could eat bread, I don’t think there’s any particular value to including crisps in my diet at all, so I’ve drawn a red line through them for now. Hilariously, I don’t count the baked lentil chips because, while they’re OK, I don’t crave them. A bag of lentil chips lasts at least a week in the cupboard, with some of them occasionally being added to a meal or in a bowl as a snack. A bag of crisps that I like though, a pack of 6 used to last me less than 2 days – I was so into them that if you saw me eating them, you might have been be tempted to suggest the crisps and I go get a room.

Couple of other challenges:

How fast I eat – As a kid, I ate slower than everyone else, but as an adult I learned to speed up so that I wouldn’t be the last one at the table. Who cares what is convenient for other people though!? I need to slow back down to the correct speed for me, which is quite a bit slower. And if there isn’t time in the work day, I need to make the time.
Healing this painful calf so I can exercise / how to still get some movement in while it’s healing – I had to chase the supermarket delivery driver around the block today, as they were very lost and I did not trust them to follow directions they’d already failed on. It wasn’t fun and I could feel my calf muscle tensing up again. I figure keep walking, gentle stretches, stick it on a heat pad, do some exercise that doesn’t strain it – and avoid step aerobics at least until taking the steps up to my front door doesn’t hurt. Also ask Wilma’s temporary replacement (she’s on holiday) on Monday what to do about it. I will open with “Do not suggest swimming!” and see where we go from there.