I'm at a funny place in life. It's not an unfamiliar place but it's an uncomfortable place. I've purposely created some gaps. For example, I'm not drinking Diet Coke or eating sugar right now. These things have been making me "happy" for awhile now. I've been learning about life through food and body-image challenges my whole life. Only in the last couple of years have I decided to stop berating and demeaning myself, and get quiet and pay attention and frankly acknowledge that these things are not just here to plow through till I get to the magical wonderland of skinniness. What are they here to teach me? By "they" I mean, the cravings, the gains/loses of weight, the "ideals" of where I think my body would feel happiest or healthiest.
It's almost a cliche, but I really have been hard-core emotionally eating for far longer than I wish were true. And trying to fill up emotionally on food has also filled up my clothes :(
But they say if you're going to deny yourself something you need some kind of replacement behavior. I don't have one yet. There is a big gaping hole and I have no idea what to fill it with and frankly I'm not ready to fill it, I'm allowing the hole to be a hole.
I kept thinking of it as "allowing the gap" when I was reminded of waiting in the underground Tube stations in London. A British voice would come over the speaker system just before the trains arrived, announcing, "MIND THE GAP", referring to staying clear of the space between the platform and the train. I always liked that, mostly because I like things said in a British accent.
So I'm "Minding the Gap". No need to fill in right now. In fact, on the days when I've "filled in" with french fries and potato chips, justifying because I am not filling up on sugar, I feel like crap. I think there's something to allowing for a space, just being with the emptiness, recognizing it and not panicking and trying to fill it in. Then asking myself why it's empty, if it needs to be filled, and really being picky about how, when and with what to fill it.
