Sweet delicious addiction
The term “chocaholic” is generally a joke, said with a smile – and I’m the first to say it’s probably the most gentle and puppydog-like of all possible substance addictions. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a real problem for many people. The bad news is that I’m about twenty kilos more than I should be (yikes) – and it’s chocolate more than pregnancy or motherhood that’s mostly to blame. The good news is that I’ve just lost five kilos (without even cutting out chocolate entirely) and the more mentally healthy I am the easier it gets. It really looks like I might have the ability to get over my addiction and just enjoy chocolate in a healthy (sometimes naughty, sometimes perfectly restrained) way. So as I work through my physical and mental addiction, I lie on the couch of the internet and talk out loud about all the reasons I eat excessive chocolate, and what I can do about it. Some of it’s pathetic, painful or personal, because that’s the nature of addiction – any addiction. You don’t gotta read it if you don’t wanna.
* Self-loathing/self-destruction: Some people drink or do drugs or self-harm for similar reasons (deliberately eating to the point of nausea is certainly a form of self-harm). Luckily, this is a mental illness thing, and as I continue to mentally improve I very rarely have even 24 hours during which I hate myself. I can tell when my mood is beyond normal, and I know I just need to wait it out.
*Anger/frustration: This has also improved as my life satisfaction and mental health improves. If I’m angry or frustrated one way to express it is to buy stuff – a takeaway meal (which also means less chores) or new clothes or something. I can also monitor how tired or stressed I am, and I can (and do) tell CJ when things aren’t going well – which results in some quiet alone time for me in the evening while he minds Louisette. (He minds her every evening anyway, but I usually stick around and stay available.)
*Retail therapy: Spending money helps a person feel powerful, which is part of my chocolate issue and very easy to solve – I just buy very expensive healthy snacks (or at least healthier than chocolate) like nudie juice drinks or Kettle sweet potato chips. This is related to the above and the below.
*Chocolate is a well-established placebo: I’ve been using chocolate ritualistically for years as a self-medication to fill in the gap between what I’m capable of doing and what I feel I need to do (eg I’d eat a bunch of chocolate if I had a lot of work to do, and that would make me feel like it was possible and that I wouldn’t have a panic attack or breakdown). I still feel that chocolate makes me better, stronger and happier. There’s a little bit of truth to this – people only have a limited amount of self-control, and if I spend it on eating healthily then something else has to give. Once again, spending a bit of silly money helps.
*Physical dependence: When I cut down on the amount of chocolate I eat I know in advance that I’ll have a headache for three days, and my blood pressure drops sharply – which I know because I start blacking out when I stand up. (When I eat chocolate after a gap of twenty-four hours or more, my hands will shake so that I have difficulty opening the packet.) I’m already past the worst, but I can also combat this by cutting down more gradually, by using dark chocolate for a while, by getting a lot of rest and by taking panadol. Cutting down on chocolate also screws up my digestive system (it seems to be fine now) and I imagine there are other physical issues I’m not aware of. The most important gets a point all to itself. . .
*Mood regulation: At times in the seven years of mental illness I just went through, I did actually lose weight. It wasn’t pretty: I was so desperately angry and depressed that I couldn’t socialise much (just endure, hidden away somewhere, until the weight loss was done) and when I was driving somewhere I had to remind myself over and over that driving off the road into a tree wouldn’t solve my problems (“You probably won’t die,” I told myself. “You’ll just end up injured and in hospital and then things will be even worse.”) Now that I’m not insane, I just get a few days every so often where I feel like all life and effort is pointless misery. But ennui is a whole lot better than what I used to go through. Of course I still get very irritable, but one thing mental illness teaches is how to (usually but not always) bite your tongue. I’m also attempting to regulate my mood by eating more turkey (like chocolate, a great source of serotonin) and plenty of grass-fed red meat (which has also been linked to better overall moods – also, I love red meat and it’s a great source of iron).
*Iron: Chocolate (especially milo) has an extremely powerful allure to pregnant and pre-menstrual women, because it’s a quick fix for low iron levels (something which I have on a normal day). And of course everyone knows it’s an energy boost. All I can do to fix that lack is to eat healthy foods, and to let myself eat slightly more chocolate at a certain time of the month (so I don’t crash and binge at the much stronger cravings).
*Habit: Chowing down on chocolate is a well-established habit. I can combat that with simple self-awareness, and with nuts (similar size to individual lollies like M&Ms, so the movement is the same).
*Sugar high: I can use yoghurt or fruit or juice or milk to get a modified sugar high, especially at vulnerable times of day (4pm, and evenings).
*Anticipation: It can be hard to get up in the morning (much less so as a non-mentally-ill person) without something concrete to look forward to in the short term. This is easily solved by always letting myself have two squares of chocolate right after breakfast (this also helps with digestion).
*Palate cleanser: People who diet get a gross-feeling mouth and bad breath. This can be easily solved with tic tacs.
*Tastes good and has a nice texture: Food is meant to be enjoyed, so I can get a similar sense of satisfaction by having really nice meals like Peking Duck or fresh cheese and bacon rolls. That also helps with anticipation and with helping me not feel angry or frustrated with life – because I know I have a delicious dinner waiting for me at the end of the day.
I have a long way to go to be in the healthy weight range (it could easily be a lot longer) but I hope that with practise and self-awareness I can break my unhealthy relationship with chocolate and simply enjoy it. The way I eat chocolate isn’t a good thing to pass on to Louisette, and it’s looking like by the time she’s aware of my eating habits I’ll be able to be a good example.
How to serve vegetables
Fry them.
*ahem*
I’m not big on vegetables, as a rule – although I like potatoes and avocado. I also like butter, garlic, and cheese. Combine all those things and you get an awesomely unhealthy two-vegetable side dish:
Rocking the roll
This week Louisette discovered how to roll from her back onto her front (which is harder than front to back, which she’s done once or twice a week since Mothers’ Day). We walked into her room in the morning and found her on her tummy, terribly pleased with herself. Then she did it several more times that day. I predicted it wouldn’t be a good night. . . and it wasn’t. I had to go in and turn her over twice*. Since then she’s got a little better at turning front to back, but we still often hear a particularly strident cry well before she’d normally wake up – and sure enough, she’s on her belly with the same helpless fury as a Christmas beetle waving its legs in the air.
She also had her first projectile vomit this week. She only managed about a foot in distance, but (giving credit where credit is due) that IS almost half her height. It was a reaction to her first taste of protein: tofu.
Now I know what you’re thinking, dear reader: “That’s uncanny! I projectile vomit at the thought of tofu too!” As yet it’s unclear whether it’s truly tofu her body rejected or the whole concept of protein as a food group. We’ll try a different protein once a week has passed, and see what happens.
Because she’s still at the tail end of her cold, she’s wanting more frequent feeds. This means six bottles a day instead of five – in addition to the three solid feeds a day. It’s a little like having a job where one aspect involves getting an electric shock nine times a day, and knowing that the force of the shock is random. It might be little more than an inconvenience, or it might be thoroughly painful. But either way, there’s another on the way first thing in the morning, last thing at night, and averaging every two hours in between.
I don’t know if she’ll cry, scream, spit up, stain her clothes, stain my clothes, pull my hair (yes I tie it up and out of the way, but there’s not much more I can do short of lacquering it to my skull) or all of the above – but I’m pretty much guaranteed to get at least one. Shockingly, I’m not loving the experience.
It could be worse: I could still be breastfeeding (although it’s clear my body is yet to realise I’ve stopped).
It’s worth noting that Louisette remains awfully cute and rather better company than most adults I know.**
Next week you’ll be seeing another month’s worth of photos, but here’s one or two to tide you over til then. Cross-species interaction has begun (for better or worse):
*For some parents, this would have been their best night since their kid was born. I am so glad not to be one of them.
**Not you. Others.
Potato Salad
I had one of those moments today – you know the kind – where a lightning bolt struck my brain and I thought, “Egad! That food that I love so much – I can make it!”
After a brief sortie into Google Land, I had a potato salad recipe. Between being thrown up on, doing washing, getting covered in pulped zuccini, taking baby photos and videos, and making potato pulp and bean pulp for Louisette’s near future, I made potato salad for the first time. The ingredient list sparked wildly out of control, and I ended up with something only tangentially related to the recipe I’d found. The meal began around 3 in the afternoon, and wasn’t done until 8pm. It was exquisite.
Yes, I know that photo makes it look like it’s already been eaten. It hadn’t at the time, I swear.
I like the way the vegetables are cunningly disguised so there’s barely a hint of green.
So here’s MY recipe (minus interruptions):
Potato Salad (for a meal for four people)
4-5 medium potatoes
8 or more bacon rashers (more bacon is more betterer)
4 eggs
One-third of a cup mayo
One-third of a cup sour cream
One avocado
Fresh green beans
Mushrooms
Spring onions
Sage
Chives
- Boil water – with eggs in it from the beginning of the heating process.
- When the eggs have boiled for four or five minutes, take them out (peel one and cut it in half to check all is well) using tongs (to keep the water).
- Meanwhile wash, peel , and cube potatoes.
- Put potatoes in the hot water. Rinse eggs under cold water a few times (so there’s no dark ring around the yolk).
- When the water boils again, boil potatoes for 15 minutes and then drain them and put them into the serving bowl and in the fridge for one hour (or freezer for ten minutes) or longer. Or shorter. Or don’t use the fridge, because it’s probably bad for it.
- Meanwhile, cut the bacon into squares and fry it.
- While it’s frying, cut up all your veggies and peel and cut up the boiled eggs.
- Put eggs, bacon, and veggies in with the potatoes.
- Mix mayo, sour cream, sage, and chives together, then add to potato bowl and mix it all up. Add more ingredients if necessary, and check taste.
- Wipe the rim of the bowl if you’re that kind of person.
This takes about an hour altogether, and is fairly labour intensive. It looks better if you save the bacon and avocado (especially the avocado, which tends to vanish) and put them in a separate layer on top.
The Favourite Toy
This week CJ and I decided on a toy we intend to be Louisette’s favourite, and (once the danger of SIDS has passed) sleep-time toy. She really liked a particular monkey toy because it was a comfortable size, easy to hold on to, and nice to chew on. I didn’t like the monkey’s face, so I used it as a model to find something that had it all: no TV brand name, washable, portable, and suitable for a five or a fifteen-year old as well as a baby. It took a long time, but we found Eeyore, and although it’s been less than a week Louisette is already fond of him (we bought three so the creation of dependence doesn’t horribly backfire when Favourite Toy is lost out a car window or has just been thrown up on and needs a wash). As parents, some of your plans come to naught – but some do actually work.
In other news, Louisette has been crying with frustration at every breastfeed (I breastfeed, then give her a full bottle feed, morning and night) so if she continues crying at every single feed for a week, I will let her (and myself) stop.
This amazing photo was taken at my baby-only playgroup this week:
Food Glorious Food
After about a month of intense anticipation, CJ and I sat down last Saturday (the first Saturday after Louisette passed the current recommended minimum age of four months) to give our little girl her first taste of food. Mmm. . . rice cereal mixed with watered-down formula. . .
I’d taken too long to get ready and she was grumpily sleepy before we began:
But she went for it! Hence my crazy eyes, and her “What just happened?” face:
We could have kept going but I didn’t want to overfeed her and cause problems for her tummy or kidneys. I’m so delighted she didn’t reflexively spit it out! Instead you can see her turning her head towards the spoon for another go. A world of messy delight stretches out ahead of us. . .
Since Saturday we’ve discovered that her preferred method of feeding is to be sucking on her hand at the same time. I knew feeding would get messy fast, but Louisette has truly done her bit in making it messier faster.
She’s been crying after feeds (both bottle and food), which is obviously quite disturbing, but it’s possible that all she really wants is more solids faster (I talked to a nurse about it, and most of the crying-during-feeding scenarios are already somewhat familiar – burping, wind, reflux, hunger, stress. . .). A desire for more solids certainly seemed evident during last night’s rice cereal feed. Now that I think I know the answer, I shall attempt to start breaking her hand-sucking-during-meals habit. And to let her eat more in a sitting.
This morning she’ll try her second food ever: zuccini mush. I’ll have CJ take a video, but I’m not posting it today. I have a Very Cunning Plan That You Will Love in the works, and filming her spewing bright green goo is just one of many parts of said plan.
PS: Long before Louisette was born, I planned to lay something on our dining table so I could lie her down and be at her level without crawling around on the floor. It worked very nicely when CJ and I had friends over last Monday – but the macabre overtones weren’t lost on any of us.
Mmm. . . delicious baby, buffet style.
PS:
Make your own pizza
Making your own pizza – especially with a group of friends who all bring ingredients – is so much fun. Every so often I come across an awesomeness that is so easy, so cheap, and so good. Don’t forget to play along at home. One had mars bars on top:
Cold Rock Baby
CJ and I said we’d have Cold Rock Ice Cream when I wasn’t pregnant. . . and I’m not. That’s excuse enough 🙂
You select an ice cream flavour, then select fillings (basically, a wide variety of lollies – mostly mini chocolate bars – and some fruit). The staff member puts them on a cooled slab of rock and bashes them together to combine, like so:
The above is CJ’s choice: Butterscotch ice cream with Turkish Delight, raspberries, and cookie dough.
I have learnt from experience that three fillings is the right amount, and anything bigger than a medium cup is too much. I feel that people have a choice to go either the fruit route or the candy combination, but as it turned out CJ and I both crossed genres today, and both combinations were exquisite.
I had forest berry sorbet with mini M&Ms, a caramello koala, and cookie dough. Here it is as modelled by our associate:
It is delightfully insane to think that in six weeks I could have chosen to share some of it with her.
It is also delightful that this was good for her: seeing us eating colourful food with spoons at a table. One of those rare times when eating ice cream garners positive parental points instead of negative ones. Yay us.
Make Baby Food
After going to an early parenthood class on solid food and finding out that you can puree vegies and keep them in the freezer for three months (two months longer than they need pureed food), I seized the moment and made psychedelic carrot mush (ingredients: carrots, water):
A month or two from now, my little girl will be eating this. After a host of feeding problems, that’s super exciting.
Here’s a photo Bonnie took of Louisette, by the way (keeping to the orange colouring of this entry):
Felicity Banks 