Feed Me, Seymour

Know what’s a wonderful thing?

Being hungry.

Hear me out.

I was at a lecture the other day, eating my rice porridge with prunes and protein, content to listen to whatever the lecturer was speaking on, and happy to be eating … in public, no less. After lecture ended, I was chatting with a few friends and remarked that I was hungry. One of my writer friends said, “But you just ate that weird hippy food.” I stopped, shook my head and looked at him skeptically. No shit. I had  just eaten, and holy hell, I was hungry again!

Listening to body cues and relearning the idea that it’s okay to eat when my brain signals that I need fuel is now becoming so commonplace that it’s almost difficult for me to remember when it was any other way. I say that confidently, in this moment, mainly because I’ve had a really great run with eating this month. But, I’m a realist and I know that once I return home after this residency, the likliehood to freak out about all of my impending deadlines will be present. History has shown that in freak-out mode, my first inclination is to restrict. It’s been a safe place for me for so long.

However.

I am so fucking optimistic that when this bound-to-happen moment rolls around, I’m going to be able to handle it in a much healthier way. This is as much because I’ve been retraining my body to accept and want food and nourishment, as because I’ve been retraining my mind.

So much of all of this is mental. Trusting myself to honor the process and believe what my brain is signaling was so difficult when I started this process six months ago. Now on the eve of the end of residency, I’m realizing that because it’s mental, and because I believe in myself, I am well equipped to handle that bitch of voice that tells me I shouldn’t eat. Fuck off, voice. I’m so far beyond not wanting to eat … I need to eat and dare I say it – I’m loving eating right now!