Emotions and Food

[Guest guest]

Yesterday all I wanted was pizza and lots of it. I couldn't initially figure out

why, but then it came to me. I had an argument with my husband and domestic

tranquility had definitely not been restored. When I was growing up, for many

years, my family would get pizza on Sunday nights and watch a couple hours of

TV. We all got along during this time even if everything had been crazy right

before and got crazy right after. It was a little oasis of peace. I was sad when

we stopped doing that. And thinking back now, my major pizza cravings have often

coincided with some family problem, my past ones, my current ones, my loved ones

families, etc.

And then I was thinking some more about orange soda. My dad, when he wanted to

apologize but didn't want to use words, would buy me 2 liter bottles of orange

soda. I showed my forgiveness by drinking the soda. Sometimes there would be

bottles and bottles of soda. One day he came home (he had bought 8 bottles the

day before) and was furious that some of the soda was still there.

There was some abuse of varying kinds in my past. And like many, I would from

time to time, dissociate. And a major thing that I would do, and I don't know

how this got started and I often don't remember starting it, I'd be conscious of

doing it somewhere in the middle, of eating really loud, crunchy food as loudly

as possible. It did, and still does, bring me back into my body and ground me

and bring me back into real time again. I'll still crave this kind of food when

something triggers me from my past.

My mom would sometimes bring me pretzels (the crunchy kind, usually the rods)

and say that - see, she loved me, she bought me pretzels. Actually one day when

we were making something in the kitchen, I said that I loved her, and she

pointed to the pretzels and didn't say anything. And to this day, I still

associate eating pretzels (especially those) with actively being loved.

And I notice now that a lot of my cravings seem to revolve around food that

played a significant part in my childhood family dramas.Not just those mentioned

above, but others too. We communicated with food.

It is making it interesting now, as I try to listen to what my body wants, to

notice these connections. By the way, I didn't get pizza and I did restore

domestic tranquility. And now I am not craving pizza. I am trying to take a look

at the underlying emotion (if there is one) behind a food craving now.

Anyway, thought I'd share, lol. - Georgia