Sometimes writing something down triggers insight. Even when writing something that feels very whiny like my post yesterday about living with pain.
I do not consciously feel sorry for myself, most of the time at least. Sure, I get down and have the ‘this is so unfair!’ thing going on once in a while, but mostly I try to be at peace with things the way they are. But, when re-reading what I’d written, I realized that the times that I’m up in the middle of the night and I start eating, I am probably feeling quite a bit of “oh poor me I’m awake again.” I can rationalize eating in the middle of the night in a variety of ways, but I think it comes down to self-pity.
I’m not fond of self-pity. I think we all experience some from time to time and that’s okay, but staying there isn’t helpful for me. I thought about it last night when I was awake between 3 and 4 AM and didn’t eat. I wonder if it will make it easier to resist that impulse if I view it in this way. It might. It did last night.
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An “aha” moment for me here. I have restless leg syndrome, which is very intense right now. When it wakes me in the middle of the night I too frequently go and chow something down because I am mad and think “why is this happening to me?” A couple of nights ago my frig was bare so I started eating menthol cough drops. Luckily there were only 5 left in the bag.
Aw, MN, I’m sorry you’re awake in the middle of the night too… but it’s kind of nice to know someone else is doing the crazy eating thing. Cough drops? It is amazing what we’ll eat when searching for comfort, isn’t it?