Now that I’ve been off the drugs for almost nine months and I’m feeling more stable in my recovery from drug addiction, I’m starting to pay more attention to the myriad other ways that I’m dysfunctional. The main one that I am very tentatively starting to work on is my relationship with food (and eating, and body image.) Which is appropriate, I think, because my food/eating issues are very much connected to my drug-abuse issues.

Ah, food. This is the one area where abstinence just isn’t going to work. Too bad.

Now, food and I have had an effed up relationship, off and on, for a really long time. I was a chronic dieter for many years, with periods of stability and periods of fluctuation in my weight. The past year or so I’ve abandoned dieting, since it usually sets off a period of disordered eating and eventually results in loss of sanity. I’ve been reading a lot about fat acceptance and HAES and just trying to be kind to myself.

But I’ve also been indulging in a lot of denial regarding my issues around food. So my first steps toward trying to sort these issues out has been to allow myself to become more aware of the issues. I say this as if I have some kind of conscious control over how aware I am, ha ha! Really, it’s more like my body and mind have healed to the point that these things are just appearing in my awareness in a way that I just can no longer deny.

So yesterday I noticed something about triggers around food and emotional eating.

I was in line at the grocery store, and I accidentally allowed myself to look at the rack of craptastic celebrity-gossip rags perched above the grocery-conveyor belt. The front of one magazine had a picture of J-Lo and some blurb about her “bikini-ready body” “just 2 weeks after having twins!!!!!”

I immediately averted my eyes…right over to the candy rack! And even though I had no intention of purchasing any candy when I entered the store, i was suddenly consumed with the desire for a pack of Resse’s Peanut Butter Cups. I mindlessly grabbed the orange candy bar, paid for my stuff and left. In the car, I ate the candy so fast that I barely tasted it.

A few minutes later, my head cleared and I was like What The Hell Was That?

After a little reflection I realized why that picture and caption triggered me. While I’ve always had a complicated relationship with food and my body-image has fluctuation between healthy and not so much, I’ve really only been fat since I had my daughter. I gained 80 lbs while pregnant and never really lost it…and that was six years ago. So the whole stars-lose-the-baby-weight trope really strikes to the core of a lot of unexamined beliefs about myself.

I’m not sure what exactly I’ll be able to do with this information. (Stay away from magazine racks? ) But I do appreciate very much this new insight into the subtle psychological and emotional triggers that are effecting me all the time. It makes me wonder also if there are other, more subtle triggers for drug-use that I haven’t noticed yet. Mostly though I’m happy to know that this is positive sign that my healing is continuing and that I can trust that these issues will bubble up to the surface when I’m ready to deal with them. That makes me feel more confident in my recovery process.