I continue to struggle — not terribly — but still struggle with compulsive eating. The forces in me that caused me to gain 100 pounds between 1982 and 1996 still exist in my personality. When I am stressed, I want to eat. I probably have gone about 35% tasteless in the last 2 years. I would like to get skinnier, to push my blood pressure down as much as within reason, and get rid of the fat on my belly; my waist is around 39 inches — I am 6 feet and of moderately large athletic build. I have the tendency, when I want to go mostly tasteless for a day to impulsively give in and overeat. I was misconceiving this as an issue of will.
What I’ve discovered lately is that I was confusing “willpower” with technique. Low blood sugar can manifest as depressed mood, lightheadedness, vague disquiet, and more obviously food fantasies. It can be subtle. If I attend carefully to my mood when I am trying to go tasteless, attend to my hunger levels and always have the mush and water available, I can manage my blood sugar levels and not have sudden attacks and fantasies of food. If I anticipate times when I may be experience such attacks I can preempt them. The conjunction of being around available food and having blood sugar drops leads me to eat compulsively. So now, I keep the mush next to my computer when I work, have it with me wherever I go and if I notice a sudden sign of blood sugar drop that may lead to compulsive eating, I consume a small bit of mush.
I would like to take this experiment as far as it will go but have not yet had the motivation to do the requisite work. I would like to see how thin I can become — within reason — using the method. It’s a matter of going predominantly tasteless for 3 months as I did in the summer of 2005, when I went from 210 to 177. I’m at 188 now. Time will tell whether I can pull it off…