Beginning 2011

Maybe I should have called this Ending 2010. It all started right before my birthday which is November 20. Every year it starts before my birthday. It used to start at Halloween but now I have just about dismissed Halloween from my holidays except I do wear my pumpkin shirt and I often go to the mall to see the children. But nobody comes to our door and, since I no longer teach, I am not exposed to the hordes of treats that are in a school. So, it now all starts around my birthday.

The problem is a long drawn-out binge. I start eating just before my birthday and I don’t end until usually around January 3rd. I also decide that this is vacation time from exercising. For me, this has been a regular part of my existence – eat a lot and don’t exercise from Mid-November until the beginning of January. However, this year was worse.

Last January, 2010, I came back from a wonderful trip to New York and Milwaukee to find out that two friends had died, another had terminal cancer (she died later in the year) and I had blocked arteries requiring four stents. Not a good beginning to a New Year. Following that Bonnie decided we needed a life change and so she started cooking very healthy meals and we went regularly to the gym. We rarely went out to eat, only on special occasions, and even then I ate carefully. We traveled and I ate carefully, not as good as I did at home, but much better than I ever had before. And it paid off. My blood sugar dropped. My blood pressure and cholesterol improved dramatically and I lost 25 pounds. All was going well until mid-November.

Sometime before that, I stopped going to the gym regularly because of severe problems with my back. That pain has been alleviated to a great extent because I had two epidurals – one in late November and one in early December. So I could have started exercising then but I didn’t. And then came the coupons. Birthday gifts from various restaurants we had frequented in the past. Some were for free meals. Others were to buy one, get one free. Others were for free appetizers or free desserts. We took advantage of every one. I celebrated my birthday for at least three weeks and that was a celebration of food.

Then came Chanukah and by this time, I was a goner. This is the first year in maybe three years that we have been home for Christmas. We put up the tree and decorated the apartment. And we went out to eat every day and brought in foods that we enjoy – cheese potato chips, cheese popcorn, Joe’s peppermint cookies, cheese, crackers, candy and more. We had hardly a healthy thing in our house. I even got white bread rather than whole wheat. We also celebrated every Packer football game. Give me a reason and there was a celebration and for me, that means food.

What was the result of this binge? I gained 10 pounds and that is not an exaggeration. I also had some physical reactions which I don’t know if they were related to the food consumption or not. I awoke to go to the bathroom about 4 times a night. I had night sweats and cramping in my feet at night. I hope all these things go away as my food and exercise get back to normal. But I really wonder why I did this. Is it based on past happy experiences? I always ate more during this time but not like this. Is it because we had eaten so well for 10 months that I just “fell off the wagon?” Probably but one would think that having a health scare would be a strong enough incentive for that not to happen. I know my blood sugar is up. My blood pressure is still good. I don’t know about the cholesterol but I will find out at the end of this month. I would hope that next year I will not allow my end-of-the-year binges to take control of my life and that I will be strong enough to resist something I have done throughout my adulthood. But it was fun.