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In random self-awareness news, a conversation with my local emotional eater today caused me to take a new look at my attitudes towards/ experience of food.
Hence it has occurred to me that my level of disengagement with food (besides chocolate, which honestly I don't think of as "food")* is actually probably a Thing (something that required active choices by me to be this way) instead of a Non-Thing (a natural default). So then ... thoughts:
... it displays (/the end result is) like the kind of overwhelm/ overload reaction where the person simply turns "off" a whole set of inputs in order to prevent future overloads. My real-life experienced reference for this is two relatives who turned off some large chunk(s) of their emotional responsiveness as children due to trauma and/or overload; I associate this particular kind of compartmentalize-and-shut-it-down with having an autism-spectrum mind. (Side note: both relatives are now -- cautiously -- recovering capacity in those emotional areas they previously shut down. There's a whole set of conversations to be had there, but that is not the topic of this post.)
... food is just not that exciting to me in and off itself ( = does not excite my system either positively or negatively), and I have no "OH MY GOD NO" visceral reactions to foods as if there was a pre-conscious-memories physical or abuse trauma associated with some food(s) or other. So my lack of engagement with food is probably not based directly on food physically existing in my world ...
... I do have, like, physical/ biological reactions to food, but really I mostly assess it as chemical inputs: calories, serotonin, digestive upset/ calm, hydration, potassium for nerve signaling, etc.. I buy food that I basically enjoy which meets my physical maintenance needs, which requires an initial assessment but no ongoing attention. The "basically enjoy" checkbox creates an ongoing reliable situation wherein intake requires minimum psychological engagement.
(During high stress times of my life, like now, I usually pleasure-read -- or fluff-internet-cruise -- while I'm eating, to give myself a positive-feeling reason to stay where the food is and accomplish the eating task.)
... I can enjoy food, especially if I am by myself or with someone(s) I trust. Yes, you heard right: if I don't trust the emotional situation, eating becomes very mechanical, and I have to really shift my focus to deliberately make an opportunity to notice if food is tasty. And if I don't trust the emotional situation, I resent and fear being socially required to pay attention to something besides the interpersonal situation; being socially required to pay attention to the food makes me panic. (Quietly. In a hidden way. Because in a situation that might be unsafe, displaying panic is anti-useful.)
Yep. Those "trust"/"safety" qualifiers are pretty clearly the key here : P.
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This is probably the actual thing: my grandmother was enormously (in that plausible deniability/ gaslighting way) emotionally abusive of my mother, with a great deal of that abuse centering, in a complicated tangle of allowance and condemnation, around food. Food preparation skills, eating choices, manners, chore performance, body size and shape, resource distribution authority, economic dependence -- and heavy judgement about alllllll of those things ... it's a WHOLE big mess. Very spikey and engulfing.
So I'm pretty sure I pretty early on just checked-the-fuck-out of as much food-related anything as seemed to trigger the pain. 'Bitty kr saw an utterly unsolvable emotional pain-ball -- and nope'd right out.
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Sadly, even then I didn't nope out COMPLETELY until I (very efficiently, full kudos to my subconscious, sigh) manifested an acutely-focused version of the emotional patterns of my childhood in my young-adult marriage relationship : P.
As a kid and teenager I used to enjoy french fries, and Arctic Circle brand fast-food burgers, and pizza -- nearly regardless of the context. (Maybe because Grandma never served those things?)
By my late-20s, though? Food was all a giant nope. I didn't even enjoy desserts anymore.
'Took me until I was 38 to find enjoyment in food again at all (in limited contexts, per previous), and that was due to concentrated work on re- (or newly-) opening my heart (and choosing to trust) in general. It was mostly an accident, as I recall. I was irritated all through my 30s about not liking food, because liking food would have made [having to eat food] so much easier, and obviously I did need to eat because I had children to take care of, but I don't remember wanting to enjoy food just for its own sake. Liking food was kind of a surprise bonus.
(It was also useful/ an extra bonus, timing-wise, because that was about when I decided I wanted to put on weight so men would stop (1) noticing me in the first place and then (2) doing all the stupid shit that American society tells them makes sense based on that look I used to have. I will enjoy reading the obituary notice of the Western-Civ patriarchy >:(. I am putting the weight off again now; I'd like to say it's because it got to where it felt too unhealthy -- which is a true fact -- but probably it's actually because I can see I look 'old' now instead of 'young' and I'm pretty sure that that means most of the bullshit will pass me by, even if manage to get back to the socially "correct" shape again. I prefer to be thin, for my own movement comfort. I am getting hit on again, but nothing like as often as before.)
(And being thin requires less food to maintain. So, you know, a bonus there too, as a poor person and for the environment.)
I managed to maintain for several years the reacting to food (by choice, and with effort) in a manner at least similar to how most people seem to react without choice and effort.
(Not all people, by a long shot. But it looks to me like it's most people.)
The increased emotional trauma levels of the last few years have thoroughly drained my emotional energy batteries, though.
So I don't have energy to spend to make and maintain an inner/ mental/ preceptive "space" of perceived-safety in which I can actively choose to deal with food. I almost *can't* spend energy to do it. And if for some reason I decide to prioritize it and do it anyhow, I suffer elsewise for that spend.
If someone else is making a safe space for me, who finds it valuable that I enjoy the food we are sharing, then I can enjoy that food. Them making the safe space (so I don't have to) means I can use the 'freed up' energy to pay attention to the food question. And even when I am in a feels-safe scenario, my attention to enjoying the food is always super-temporary; I prefer to pay attention to the conversation, or the clouds, or a trail of ants on the sidewalk, or the ads on the busses going by ... .
(I can also pay attention to interesting non-value-assignment facts about the food: this flavor exists, that is the level of spice, it arrived in a pretty presentation, the cook created an interesting texture combination. Like, art appreciation. Like, I appreciate the artistic accomplishment and skill of, but don't actually like or enjoy, jazz, or Toni Morrison's writing. This frequently is as close as I can get to enjoying the food.)
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Also fits within the pattern: Now that I'm thinking about it, I do generally enjoy, in a manner that seems to me similar to the normal "enjoyment of food" process of other people, foods that noone in my family has ever eaten around me and that I rarely ate while I was married. Particularly Thai food, Lebanese food, and Indian food.
Potentially this is also related to why I have actively avoided learning to make almost any of these foods.
And anything that is not homecooked makes the entire food situation feel WAAAAAAAY less threatening to me. (Particularly, not being homecooked by someone who cares about whether I actively enjoy the food.)
Alas, takeout is expensive, and I can't eat non-organic food more than once every couple of weeks (and that's pushing it) without it making me feel ill. The Nicholas/ Arabian Breeze restaurant (Lebanese) was organic/local last time I went there, which was fucking awesome, but that's the only one I've found.
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(NOTE TO EVERYONE WHO HAS COOKED ME THINGS: The dumb part is, I don't think I've ever been offered food at someone's house that actually tasted bad, and nearly all of it has been quite good. Not surprisingly, right? Because we are all competent adults, and usually don't fuck up basic social tasks like 'offer food that tastes good.' Again, none of this about the objective facts of the food existing. This whole tangle preexists, and is inside my psyche and my history; objective food as a fact is nearly irrelevant to my experience of it. On the other hand, if I've ever complimented food you've offered me -- which I'm fairly sure I've made an effort to consistently accomplish? -- now you have some idea how much work that 'simple' task has actually involved for me : P, and how much therefore I care about you and about our relationship, that I chose to accomplish it.)
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I was a vegetarian for 11 years, starting when I was about 15. Although I chose it for animal-rights reasons, it meant shutting out most of my family's (meat-based) inherited food patterns.
This analytical context suggests that turning vegetarian probably insulated me from quite a lot of ongoing, not-consciously-recognized intake-trauma.
It certainly externalized and made concrete a significant set of food-control fights between Grandma and I : P.
(This is still a fucking problem with Grandma. She turned 100 yesterday and there was a whole pre-planning session for how to keep from triggering her about a family member's literally deadly food allergy that she doesn't find convenient to believe is real. Oh. My. God :( >:(. ) (It is my fervent hope that I never, ever ... well no. Not true. I don't actually care if I lose my grip on objective reality when I get old. I do fervently hope I am never again emotionally abusive, as society taught me to be, and as I had to unlearn. Certainly, if I live to be old, I would like to not be shitty and mean to the people who feel an obligation to take care of me. #Goals #KeepingItReal )
... I do have some American vegetarian foods I enjoy in a limited way, even though I was a vegetarian during the first half of my food-problematic marriage. They aren't the vegetarian foods I ate at that time, though.
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* Or maybe chocolate is the only thing I react to as "food" in the way most people experience food?
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This-all is probably why it doesn't naturally occur to me to offer food when people visit (although I have learned to mimic the behavior for some people in my life for whom I've discovered such an offer makes them feel loved). In my psychological world, having to experience food in the presence of others is fundamentally an emotional threat unless/ until proven otherwise. And, because of the foundational family pattern, it's one of the most fundamental emotional threats I can experience.
So I would *never* instinctively offer someone food, as (how I feel, not how I think) to do so would be a direct attack on their feeling of safety. Offering people food just miscellaneously is absolutely an artificial overlay behavior that makes anti-sense to my feelings, but I can see it makes positive sense to a significant portion of my friends, so I superego right over my ego and my id and do the behavior anyhow.
(EDIT: I would never instinctively offer someone food -- unless they appeared hungry! In which case I'm offering them [category: fuel], not "food." Fuel is a safe emotional category and morally necessary, and enjoyment of [fuel items] only logically needs to be achieved to the point of 'willing to ingest efficiently enough for the purpose' ... any enjoyment beyond that is miscellaneous, although a functional bonus.)
I have some friends who are also skittish about food like I am. We can hang out for hours and food does not come up unless one of us hits a sugar-low. We also, knowing the hours-thing will eventually create a fuel issue, usually negotiate the how and what of [solving the need-to-eat problem] before hanging out. (Mostly we each bring our own.)
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So, yeah. Apparently I rejected the entire experiential category, as the least painful/ safest-feeling solution to consistent inflicted pain.
Yep. Super great.
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Additionally, I (like most people) don't enjoy having to explain my many obscure but real food sensitivities, which usually makes people's "simple" food offers fucking complicated and awkward, when the people offering legit just want to be casual and friendly.
Which all ties into the larger historical pattern/ cycle of social condemnation and rejection whenever I'm not "simple" to deal with.
AND which food sensitivities are -- ZERO DOUBT, now that I've typed all of this and can see the pattern -- at least partly manifestations of my underlying subconscious attempts to avoid the pain-ball that is "food."
(It's a pain in my ass, because I'm now allergic to some of the tastiest things, like stonefruits and caneberries, which used to be some of the only things I DID enjoy about food. That's some higher-order manifestation of "you need to face and deal with the actual problem" : P.) (Again, kudos to my subconscious : P.)
Sigh sigh sigh.
In good news, the food allergies my kids were manifesting during the divorce/ when they were little all seem to have resolved soon after, and they all seem to basically enjoy food. So hopefully I managed to pass down less or very little of this inherited emotional morass.
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