Oh My God—It’s Around-the-Clock Eating

 

The American Journal of Preventative Medicine published a study in which 1,685 overweight or obese participants kept a food journal for six months. The average weight-loss was 13 pounds, but those who kept a daily food journal, in contrast to those who only kept theirs weekly, lost twice the weight. The success of a food journal is attributed to “accountability” and because seeing what you eat, how much you eat, and when you eat allows you to pinpoint bad habits.

The daily food journal, then, was the crucial component of maintaining my 3,000 calorie limit.  The journal allowed me to notice several things about my eating, some bad and some not so bad. One, I’m constantly hungry, and find myself recording the food and liquids I’ve ingested every two or three hours. Two, I’m in the bad habit of eating too many different types of foods at lunch and dinner, which creates an opportunity for unnecessary calorie consumption. Three, I seem to be drawn to the same foods, which show up in my food journal over and over again: Breakfast is typically steel cut oatmeal, whey protein powder, bananas, blueberries, citrus fruits; lunch is typically spinach with sardines and bruschetta and pita bread with hummus; a couple hours after lunch I almost always eat a cup on nonfat yogurt with two Medjool dates; dinner is usually a ton of broccoli with some protein or other and more fruit; after lunch and dinner I commonly eat a tablespoon or two of low-fat ice cream, what I call a “closer” to put a “punctuation point” at the end of my meal.

In spite of my meticulous record keeping, I fail to keep my calories at or under the 3,000 mark for the first twelve days:

August 5: 3,155 calories

August 6-10: I vacationed in Las Vegas where though I did not micromanage my journal the way I did at home, I can safely say I ate between 3,700-4,000 calories. Why I started my food journal one day before my vacation is beyond me.

August 11: 3,200

August 12: 3,250

August 13: 3,300

August 14: 3,500

August 15: 3,300

August 16: 3,230 

The good news is that keeping my food journal has reduced my calories an average of 500 a day. The bad news is that the food journal has done little to curb my hunger, which is constant and unforgiving. Speculating about my incessant appetite, I have up with three major theories: 

Theory One. My problem is existential. My constant hunger not physical hunger by any means but emotional hunger. Like most of us languishing through Modern Life, I have become the kind of creature that the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche dreaded—the Last Man, a well-fed, consumer who relying on technological advancement and science for his wellbeing finds himself to be somewhat of a spiritual eunuch. Enervated spiritually,

I crave meaning, absorbing work, higher purpose, the gift of losing myself in a project that occupies my mind rather than my preoccupation with loneliness and self-loathing. In other words, I will not cut down on my eating until I find a meaningful substitute for food and emancipate myself from the complacency and naval-gazing of modern life. For example, starting a power yoga class in the inner city, helping at-risk young people find focus through yoga, will give me a sense of purpose and belonging that will sate my physical hungers. 

Theory Two. My problem is instinctual. Because I no longer use my instincts for survival as my caveman descendents had to do, I have developed neuroses, including eating neuroses. This theory crossed my mind when I heard these two guys on the radio talking about how mentally screwed up we all are because in modern society we’re so comfortable, so fat, and so well-off that we don’t exercise this part of our brain that our caveman ancestors had to use in order to survive their brutal conditions and when that part of the brain is not utilized for survival it asserts itself by creating insane problems that have nothing to do with reality so that now, while we don’t have to burden ourselves with killing giant Mastodons and dragging their rotting carcasses back to the cave for dinner, we have to fend off this constant impulse inside us to invent monstrous crises that loom inside our imagination and we invest all our time and energy fretting over these imaginary problems, we become miserable, we feel utterly helpless under the weight of these obsessions, and we find ourselves far worse off than our caveman ancestors who couldn’t leave their cave for two seconds without worrying about some pterodactyl or other carnivore snatching their babies out of their arms or biting a giant hunk out of their ass.

In other words, if I had to utilize my brain to ward off carnivores from my cave, I wouldn’t have the time and energy to obsess over ginger bread cake smothered with vanilla gelato and caramel sauce. 

Theory Three. I simply love to eat. Let’s face it. Some people love eating more than others. Some people are content with bland hospital food and simply eat for nourishment while others with more sensitive taste buds, called “super-tasters” by the scientific community, eat with a passion and rhapsodic ardor that has to do with art, ecstasy, and transcendence. I belong to the latter group.

To tell you the truth, I don’t know which theory applies to me and I’d be full of crap if I pretended to know definitely why I love food the way I do. But if I had to guess, I’d say not one but all three theories apply to my eating condition. In other words, I’m totally screwed, and my 3,000 calorie a day dictate is kicking me in the ass. 

Comments

[Ed S.]

There's another, older theory--the Freudian one... Oral fixation. If I recall my Abnormal Psych 101, some people get hung up in the Oral Stage due to early weaning or other reasons that cause insufficient time at Momma's breast. People who like to talk a lot, eat a lot, do other things with their mouth like smoke cigarettes, cigars, pipes and oral sex, etc, were supposed to be concrete symptoms of people with oral fixations.
That resonates with your "big baby" feeling of deprivation. But personally I like to think I just enjoy food and eating a lot.

[Ed S.]

I'm not a nutritionist (and I suggest you show your logbook to one), but I'd say you're getting too heavy a hit of carbs and sugars early in the morning (the oatmeal and fruits). They make your blood sugar skyrocket and then crash with too much insulin flowing.
I've heard proteins in the morning will make you feel satsiified longer, ie egg whites (I use egg beaters), white chicken, some fish even (billions of Asians eat fish for breakfast everyday, Believe it or Not). Even a soy patty like a Gardenburger with eggs is better than cereal.
There's an old saying: eat breakfast like a king....dinner like a pauper. Hard to do I know.

[jeffrey McMahon]

I do add whey protein to the oatmeal and I don't add sugar. Bananas and a few blueberries don't seem extreme. So far I've lost 6 pounds. If the loss stops, I'll switch to a high-protein, lower-carb breakfast.

[jeffrey McMahon]

I like to eat and gab for their own sake, most likely.