Stop at Enough or Feel Deprived?

Sometimes I can stop eating and leave food on my plate, when I sense that I have eaten enough and feel satisfied. If I can put the food away for another meal, especially if I PLAN to save food for another meal, like in a restaurant when I request a takeout box when they serve my entree, or when I leave a plastic baggy by my plate to save extra fruit, or even when I leave a small container by my plate to save extra food to put into soup or casseroles or on salad at another meal. More often, the notion of stopping when there is still food on my plate, especially food which I can't save (salad, cooked cereal which is unappetizing later, etc.) sets off all kinds of DEPRIVATION alarms in my brain.

Usually I rely on externally limiting how much I ate. The TW book Day 2 says: "A surprising, yet little know fact is that your stomach when empty is about hte size of your fist, which means that approoximately a fist-sized amount of food is all that is required to take you from that 0 to a comfortable 5. That can be a great revelation to those who are accustomed to five-fisted eating; however, it is a reality, and when reckoned with can be quite freeing." I have long relied on serving myself smaller portions, so that I wouldn't have to face the dilemma of sensing 'enough', when there was still food on my plate.

Stopping eating when I feel satisfied and leaving food on my plate sets off all kinds of DEPRIVATION alarms in my brain. I really don't know where that comes from. As a child I was forced to sit at the table until I finished everything on my plate, sometimes until midnight. I often woke up and threw up in the middle of the night after being forced to eat cold, unappetizing food. Maybe I was really allergic to some of what I ate ... Whatever ... I don't know why leaving food sets off alarms now, except maybe my belief that I'll starve before the next meal if I don't eat as much as possible. There was a 'no between meal snacks' rule (for me only) in our house. I wonder if I fear punishment for wasting food or fear starvation if I don't leave the table stuffed to the gills ... okay, not that stuffed, but at least I believe I DESERVE everything I put on my plate, until I feel full, not 'just enough'. I don't want to let go of food until I feel a little uncomfortably full. Somehow I believe I will 'last until the next meal' if I leave the table uncomfortably full. However, I also know that eating comfortable amounts of 'whole body pleasers' like hot cereal with fruit, hazelnut milk and almond butter or other balanced combinations of fats, proteins and fiber, can keep me unhungry for 4-6 hours. I can eat a fist-full sized portion of whole body pleasers, feel comfortably satisfied and last 4-6 hours, but I need to feel 'stuffed' to last that long with other foods.

Suzie Orbach in her book "On Eating" says:

"It is easier to notice when you are full if you stay alert while your are eating. IF YOU SAVOR EVERY MOUTHFUL, YOU WON'T FEEL CHEATED. THE SENSE OF FULLNESS WON'T COMETOO SOON AND YOU WILL BE READY TO STOP EATING. Your body will send you a message that you are satisfied."

OK, I've eaten slowly and focussed on the taste of food. Yet I STILL don't want to let go when I have eaten enough. I STILL feel deprived. So I thought back to my childhood, when I was forced to eat my mom's terrible cooking or sit at the table sometimes until midnight until I DID finish the cold, unappetizing food on my plate. I STILL hate cold food, that was served hot. I still can't look at, smell or even think about hamburgers, because I was forced to eat cold, greasy hamburger once at midnight and later threw up hamburger in the middle of the night. So WHY don't I gladly leave food when I feel satisfied? Why do I force myself to 'clean my plate' as an adult?

When I think about 'cleaning my plate', I realize my tendency is more like 'licking the dish' of a really tasty food. If I don't really LOVE a food, I can more easily stop at satisfaction, throw it away or wrap it up for another meal. However, sometimes when I REALLY love something, I don't want to stop because I will feel 'deprived' if I let go of the food. Maybe that deprivation comes from being forced as a child to eat food I disliked (what my mother served at meals) and being deprived of desserts (cookies, cake, etc.), because she thought I was 'too fat' for those desserts. Instead of sugar laden cookies, I got sugar syrup laden canned peaches or pear, which I still detest to this day. I prefer the fresh fruit to canned fruit. So I only feel deprived if I love the food. Nevertheless, I'm trying to choose foods I LOVE and which satisfy my body (whole body pleasers), which makes letting go of even one bite rather challenging.

When I consider how I ate beyond my childhood, I remember months and years of dieting interrupted regularly by binges. Maybe my deprivation mentality came from years of self-imposed dieting, when I was not overweight, but FEARED I would gain weight or wanted to be as thin as possible to offset my chronically celiac bloated belly. Even though I 'rewarded' my diet deprivation with regular binges, I did not really enjoy the food I ate during binges, beyond the first few bites. So I spent years either depriving myself of foods I loved or eating those foods frantically to the point of extreme discomfort during binges. Maybe I don't trust myself now to regularly give myself the foods I love. I'm just beginning to regularly choose 'whole body pleasers'. I still follow a few 'healthy eating' rules (mostly about high fiber for regularity). I still have 7 food allergy restrictions. I do miss some dairy based and egg based foods which I can no longer enjoy without suffering excruciating pain.

Nevertheless I suspect I don't want to deprive myself of those last few bites of food on my plate after I'm satisifed because I believe the lie I was told for years, "Thin people can eat as much and as often as they want." Maybe that's true for undiagnosed celiacs who don't absorb nutrients, have chronic dehydration from diarrhea or don't eat much when they're alone because of gut pain. However, I know thin, normal eaters, don't eat gross amounts all the time or they won't remain thin.

Moreover, I think Geneen Roth in "Breaking Free from Emotional Eating" describes my exact dilemma when she writes:

"I could eat from morning till night for the next six months or six years and I would have still dieted and binged for seventeen years of my life ... There isn't enough food in the world to heal the isolation of those years. there isn't enough food to fill the space created by the deprivation and the ensuing feelings of craziness.

We can't go back. We can't eat for all the times we didn't eat. We CAN use that pain as an indicator of what doesn't work. We don't have to deprive ourselves any longer. Beginning today.

A balance exists, however, between not depriving yourself of the food you want when you are hungry and using food to make up for all the other ways you feel deprived. All the ways you can't have what you want ... Eating what you want gets translated to eating whenever you want regardless of your hunger ... Consequently we turn to and use food as the area in our lives in which we can have exactly what we want when we want it ... And while it is true that you cannot trust the feeling that because you want something you must have it, it is not true that YOU cannot be trusted.

Trust develops and builds when I am given a choice (and not, as in dieting, denied it). Trust deveops when I chooose to make myself comfortable, not miserable, to take care of myself, rather than hurt myself ... Trust develops when you learn from actual experience that you can decide which desires to act upon and which you will leave to fantasy."

I can NEVER make up for all those years I spent dieting, then bingeing and purging, then returning to restrictive diets. I CAN choose to leave the table comfortable, rather than miserably full. I can choose to leave just enough on my plate or bowl so that I only eat 'just enough' food to feel satisfied and comfortably full. I can learn through one eating experience after another than I can trust myself to take care of, rather than abuse my body, starting at the very next meal.