h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I just came across this article about the emotional role of food in people's lives:

"Pick out any woman in a crowd and you'll find a closet dieter. Food is central to our ideas of nurture, family and love, so why do women in particular have such an unhealthy relationship with it?"

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/foodmonthly/story/0,9950,1127901,00.html


I've never really understood people who don't ever think about food beyond simply needing some every now and then to stop feeling hungry. Most people I know, male and female, have some sort of emotional attachment to food.

So, my question is - what sort of relationship with food do you have?

azahar

i don't really think about it much ...

think i need to start excersing a bit more though ... that will do more than trying to change what you eat ...

hi rule one,

Well, I'm hoping this won't turn into a talk that is just about diets, losing weight, etc (although this is also mentioned in the article). I guess I was more curious about how people feel about food, you know? You say you don't think about it much. I wonder if you are the norm or the exception?

az

depends on what kind of thinking..

if im very hungry i will eat all most anything

if im hungry, but not yet *starved* i will be able to chose something that would be nice to eat.

I have a terrible relationship with food.

I've been overweight for most of my life, since I was a teenager (but not badly so, despite what I've always told myself)

I've tried diets, but never really succeeded - probably because I've been fairly half hearted (and partly because I've never really needed to shift that much weight)

But, I grew up in a house where food wastage was one of the worst crimes (parents were children during WWII) and therefore have a hard problem leaving anything - even when I know I've put too much on my plate and am full.

Last year I lost a lot of weight (stress - basically too stressed to eat) in a very unhealthy way. And although I realise that, I am pleased to be slim. (oh, I said it! I'm slim! Well within the weight, BMI, whatever for my height)

So now, used as I am to eating little, I am having an even worse relationship with food. I want to eat (I'm a bit of a foodie, it has to be said) but I don't ever want to be fat again.

I still can't abide waste, but I can't set a bad example for my small children by skipping meals when it is obvious to them.

Almost every mealtime, no matter how healthy or low fat/calorie the food, leaves me feeling guilty

Ah... this is rambling.

Basically I have an unhealthy relationship with food. And I hate that.

sometimes the desgingated "low fat" versions o some foods are worse in other ways ...

hi Sho,

I also grew up very fat and then got very thin in my late-teens/twenties and mostly stayed normal until recently. After having an op four years ago I put on a fair bit of weight even though my eating habits didn't change. A combination of *aging* and hormonal flux, I reckon.

Anyhow, I have always had a complicated emotional relationship with food. Food has never just been something to keep my body alive.

I've heard a lot about people in England growing up with parents who lived through WWII rationing and how this often instilled a feeling of guilt for leaving any food on one's plate.

It's a shame you have such a love/hate relationship going on with food. I wonder how that could be changed without thinking about 'dieting' and 'good and bad' foods. I don't think there is such a thing as 'bad' food, as long as one eats a somewhat balanced diet.

az

for me, food is definately connected to emotions. I'm always having hard fights with my sister, and this disturbs me more than I can say. after such fights I tend to eat something (rather a lot) sweet, or fast food or something. A lot of people need some psychiologist to find out the cause of their unhealthy relationship with food. well, I do know the causes, but I'm afraid I have a hard time changing things.

My relationship with food is rather bumpy.. I love it..and hate it at the same time!
I was always a tubby kid..which i hated as i've never been high on self esteem (mostly due to one parents bullying)but lost a lot of eight almost spontaneously at the end of my teens..even after I had my son at 20
I was fairly slim. Then I started to pile it on..I'd always had the tendancy to turn to food when I was feeling low..(and having suffered on n off with clinical depression for years that could be a fair bit)
,but this couldn't be that! turned out to be an enormous ovvarian cyst n i put on 7 stone in total before it was removed. in the meantime, food again was a source of comfort when i needed it being on my own n whatnot..
I lost a fair bit of that weight..(about 5 stone) but its been a struggle and its recently started creeping back up again..food it seems, is the problem, and the solution! your self esteems low, you feel fat n ugly n unlovable n depressed, so you eat! ..its almost a vicious circle!..i also tend to cheer up, or celebrate with food..
The comfort eating, when i do it is kind of an addictive/destructive thing i feel..as well as being a fairly could substitute for a ! ..the rest is just down to me being a weak willed, food loving Taurus! I really do need/want to sort my weight out again though!

Well, I'm getting better, but I do have what one doctor called a mild eating disorder (I wouldn't actually call it that, it sounds so dramatic)

My main goal now is to make sure that my children have a healthy relationship with food.

That means: small portions, and they can always have more if they want. Not too much snacking, and 50/50 sweets to fruit/veggies

We never say the word 'fat' in connection with people, and especially them or ourselves. We never say 'diet' and we don't make a fuss if they don't eat something at a mealtime (however, there is no eating between meals, so next meal they are hungry)

All in all, so far (they are 5 and 7) they are fine, although #1 is coming home from school now and again saying 'I'm fat'

Of course, or attitude to food is further complicated by the fact that their father is a

hmm, me not actully knowing anything much


would it be possible for you to replace the eating of the food with another activity ...

like running... or a long walk or somthign completly differnet...

rule one,

That's a very good point. I read a book awhile back called On Eating by Susie Orbach and it spoke about ths very thing. Basically, about learning to tell the difference between real hunger and emotional hunger. And then, as you suggested, doing something else about the emotional hunger.

I think a lot of people who have unhealthy food relationships have lost the ability to tell when they are either truly hungry or truly full. The emotions mix up the natural physical signals.

az

I can understand what you said, and I think the advice to do something else in place of eating is sensible.

Is it having an affect on your health? If so you need to address it, if not... why worry?

Was that to me Sho?

If it was I'd say it's affecting my health, yes..I'm still a good 4 stone over weight,which isn't that healthhy for anyone.It's more mentallly unhealthy thuugh if you know what I mean..

you're right,I know sports are an answer, but here we all are, sitting at a computer, at least I am not doing weight-lifting in between making comments, and anyway it's so cold you can't possibly go swimming (my favorite sport)...

what you could do though is some form of land traing to help with your swimming.

To me, food means family. I went to boarding school when I was eleven, and the food was, not surprisingly, very very dull and at least twice a week it was revolting. Part of the joy of going home was having very nice things to eat - I don't mean sweets, both my parents are very good cooks, it was so nice to eat vegetables that were still green and crisp, meat that wasn't grey and overcooked, food that wasn't too salty, too gristly, too soggy, too oily, too tasteless. I was bought up in Italy, and the school was in Britain, so I also used to have real cravings for pasta (NOT fifteen soggy white worms in a pile of mince) (icky mince at that), clementines fresh from the tree, fresh herbs, olive oil... all the things I was used to. Well, there was no getting them in the depths of Somerset so I ate sweets as the only nice thing going. Now I very rarely eat sweets because I cook for myself - infact am a raving foodie - and can have the things I like. But when I'm stressed out at work or very tired I eat chocolate, even though I am a) allergic to dairy and b) insulin resistant, so sweets make me feel all tired and limp and dizzy. Sometimes the need to be comforted overwhelms the sensible bit that says you can go home and get a cuddle and a nice dinner this evening. The sweet eating thing is also due to the fact that my parents, thinking they were doing the healthy thing, used to take any sweets we were given (and in Italy people nearly always bring goodies for the kids when they visit) and 'ration' them, one chocolate after lunch etc. I used to bitterly resent having something given to me, into my hands, taken off me. So even now that I am a big clever grown-up, I find myself hiding away to eat any sweets I have bought, in case 'someone' wants to take them away. And to eat them all at once, so as not to leave any for someone else to find and take away.

That said, I eat about one bar of chocolate a month, which sounds disgustingly healthy and reasonable. It's not necessarily the eating that is unhealthy or difficult, it's the strange thoughts and feelings that insist on going with it.

Parents, if you forbid your children things, or take them away, you WILL make it into a big issue and WILL encourage them to rebel and eat all the unhealthy junk they can. Sure, don't have sweets and junk in the house, but if they are given some, why, let them have them. Occasionally won't do any harm and making a fuss or 'depriving' them will. No child will eat an entire bag/big bar unless they fear that if they don't it'll be taken away.

Did anyone see Victoria Wood's recent programmes about food and weight? She covered a lot of interesting ground.

My own attitudes towards food have changed recently as I find I can no longer just eat what I want. I spent most of my life looking like an emaciated stick-insect no matter what or how much I ate. Now I have to work quite hard to make sure that the energy I expend is not exceeded by what I eat - it's taken me 3 years and a 35 lb weight gain to work that one out!

Food is one of the greatest pleasures in life. It appeals to all of our senses, it makes us feel happy and satisifed or sad and unfulfilled. It reminds us of being mothered and cared for - or of being neglected and unloved.

And while we in the west have all the problems associated with being over-nourished, in calorific terms, other inhabitants of this planet struggle to find enough to eat.

I'm thinking back to when I was a kid and when I got nervous or afraid the first thing I would do would be to look for some sort of food to shove into my mouth. It was a momentary comfort. It kept me from screaming out loud. And it became a habit.

From my experience I later became a 'fattist' Okay, a bit of a silly term for my belief that all overweight people do not have healthy relationships with food. And that most of them are suffering from some sort of emotional stuff that they are using food to deal with, rather than dealing with the emotions in another way.

I know that if I am really really really full of food then I cannot feel anything else.

I also know that when I feel really hungry it sometimes makes me feel vulnerable and somehow afraid.

Furthermore, I know that - on a healthier level - I do love food very much and I'm quite a wonderful cook, if I say so myself. I almost never need a recipe book - if I eat something once I can go home and just make it from the memory of the flavours and ingredients.

Thing is, food has always been used by humans for much more than just keeping us alive.

I do find it curious that in this present 'time of plenty' in the western world it is more socially desirable to look like you haven't eaten in weeks. In other cultures having some extra fat on one's body represents wealth and comfort.

I am not overweight right now to the point of posing any physical threat to myself. I'm just a bit chubbier than I would like to be. Yet I still have a somewhat wonky relationship with food.

Which is really why I started this thread. To maybe get people talking about their food relationships and - perhaps? - by doing so, become more able to understand them better and to know they are not alone with how they feel.



az

i am a bit chubbier than i would like ... but to solve that if i can be bothered i will not change may eatin habits... i will jsut do a bit more excersise.

and perhaps try and snack less.