And again, you’re mixing different things.
The cornbread and ice cream were the last three weeks, planned cheats during VLC, when I’ve lost 11 pounds. So I guess it’s true that with those two things, I wasn’t stuffing my face.
The cup of beans is a cup of beans that someone was trying to assert was me eating a vat of beans and lard. I didn’t say all I ate all day was a cup of beans. It was part of my overall diet that was being mischaracterized because I’m fat. As needsoffee said in that thread:
[quote]
It’s a very common kneejerk response on the part of (presumably) normal weight people to react to anything a fat person eats that isn’t steamed fish and broccoli as though it’s something disgusting and horrible that completely explains why they’re fat. This thread has seen plenty of it. And it’s so completely unreasonable and rude, basically treating fat people like criminals for every mouthful of food they consume that’s in any way less than punitively dull… yet, interestingly, those same people will gleefully point to the man who lost weight eating nothing but twinkies to prove that calories are the only thing that matters. In which case, who cares if I get 1400 calories eating pigfat wrapped in bacon and deep fried, so long as I only eat the 1400 calories? But that would be too logically consistent, I think.
In any case, the beans say nothing about my total intake during my “whatever” eating, which was actually around 22-2500 a day.
Okay, but what it actually IS is my responding to what I just pointed out: the irrational attacks that exaggerate what the food in question is, the beans being the most shining example, since beans, even cooked with a ham hock thrown in, are a superior food, carbs and all, so trying to twist them into some fatgirl foodcrime is unreasonable and unjust. I don’t like unreasonable and unjust.
It’s really simple, Sarahfeena: I gain weight eating a varied diet that provides more than 2000 calories per day, whether it’s 2000 calories of steamed fish, brown rice and broccoli (which would so never happen…ugh on steamed fish to begin with) or 2000 calories of nutmeg cake, so focusing the nutmeg cake doesn’t tell you anything. (Although I don’t gain weight eating more than 2000 calories a day without significant carbohydrate, if the last few weeks hold true in the future. Only time will tell.)
Okay, but again, you are MIXING things, so that’s why you’re confused.
[ol]
[li]I have severely impaired impulse control across all parts of my life. (Vividly demonstrated by my inability to control my impulse to read and respond to threads on the Dope, and I’m very sincere about that. You think 250+ posts doesn’t suck massive time I should be using on other things??) This includes my impulse to eat.[/li][li]My impulses (and compulsions) to eat have mellowed tremendously over the course of my life, for many reasons. The urges just don’t come upon me the way they used to. There was a time when I could barely stop thinking about food, and anywhere I went and everything I did was first about what foods I would be able to eat. That is not remotely true anymore.[/li][li]I still love food. But I love it like many people I know love it: as an extremely pleasurable part of life.[/li][li]Reducing my calories, particularly by adopting what is assumed to be a “heatlhy” diet of grains, low-fat protein, etc. produces physical hunger and forces me to obsess over food, just to make sure I stay within the rules.[/li][li]Staying within the rules robs me of most of the pleasure I get from food, since I am very fond of fat in almost any form. This is very uncomfortable for me to tolerate, because my life is very narrow right now, and extremely light on the pleasures.[/li][li]Taken together, I find myself in the position of creating an obsession with food that is profoundly unhealthy. I spent years shedding myself of making food the center of my world, learning to appreciate and enjoy it as part of my life, not the center of it. But starvation dieting (see the lenthy post I made last night) takes me right back to being exactly who I don’t wanna be: obsessive-compulsive about food, which makes me completely vulnerable to my natural lack of impulse control, and leads to a collapse of the system. (Again, PLEASE read the post: it explains so vividly how calorie restriction in anyone, for any reason, fat or thin, is practically guaranteed to turn you into a food obsessive, and how that can possibly be an effective way to treat obesity, I cannot imagine). I find I’m thinking about it in a way I never do when I’m just living my life and eating at will. Which I try to combat by giving myself a treat to let off some of that building obsessive steam.[/li][li]Eating VLC, as I have been, is far less pressure. (It is not perfect and flawless: as I’ve repeatedly said, the only perfectly easy diet is anything-you-want-never-gain-weight, but I dont’ get to be on that diet.) As I’ve described, I loves me some meat, and cheese, and dairy, and nuts, and fat in almost any form. And so far, the amounts I’m eating are completely satisfing and I’m losing weight. So while I expected to be more in need of planned cheats, I haven’t really cared. I keep trying to think of something I really, really want…and the only things that sound really great are things that I know I can’t happily eat a small amount of: my sweet goodies. So I’m not going to go there right now, it’s too likely to be too big a trigger. Maybe I’ll have a Tom Collins Float if I really get the urge: light mint ice cream with Tom Collins mixer (which has half the calories of regular soda). I fix those when I’m not dieting at all. Very tasty and refreshing and pretty mellow.[/li][/ol]
So, you can accept that** I gain weight eating 2000 or 2200 or 2500 calories,** and that I have consumed those calories in the form of beans, tom collins floats, eggs and toast, nutmeg cake & milk, etc.(And really, it’s not that hard to believe: I’m 52 and sedentary and I’ve been fat my whole life.I’m good at gaining weight.) Or you can continue to assume that it takes more than that for me to gain weight and I’m just not recognizing that I was eating it. But I’ve done my best to make VERY clear who I am, what my history is, how I eat and how I’ve eaten, what triggers my unhealthy behavior, and what supports my healthy behavior, and where my cornbread, nutmeg cake, cup of beans and cup of ice cream fit into all of that.
And for the record, your patience and civility have been much appreciated, and account for why I have been glad to work so hard to get past our difficulties in making ourselves clear to each other. Thank you.